1100+ alerts?! After only a prologue and nine chapters?! I am not worthy! *bow* Thank you so much for the support. This story, although it doesn't have the most reviews, has broken the 1000-alert milestone that I've never had happen to me ever in my 7-8 years as a fanfiction author. And it is very, very close to getting 1000 favorites, another milestone. Hooray!

On another note, I recently got back from an 8-day vacation to Italy. If I ever need to write anything in regards to Rome, Florence, or Venice, well… it'll be more realistic, now that I've actually been to all three places. Venice was especially nice, despite its maze-like structure (my family and I had gotten lost more than once because the writing on the map was tiny and we had to squint to make out the names of all the streets).

Blazing Sky

Gen. fic, no pairings.

Features sarcastic!resentful!Tsuna.

Summary: Tsuna isn't stupid. He knows that construction workers usually aren't absent as long as his father is, and construction workers usually don't visit the South Pole to take pictures with penguins. He also knows that normal people can't conjure flames at will, yet he can. What's left is to wait and see, watch and learn. When Reborn goes to Namimori, he expected an idiot student, but found Sawada Tsunayoshi.

Chapter Ten – Crazy Days

Irie Shouichi wondered, for what was probably the hundredth time in the past five minutes, what made him decide to accept Tsuna's invitation to eat lunch at his house. He knew it would be a nightmare of epic proportions to dine with these abnormal people, but he went along with it anyway and now… all he wanted to do was bolt out of the house, sprint home, lock himself in his room, and pretend the Sawada house didn't exist. But simultaneous shock and horror kept him glued to his seat as he watched the chaos unfold in front of him.

"Hey! That was my piece, Reborn!" Tsuna gave his tutor an annoyed glance, his chopsticks still poised to take food from his plate.

"You were too slow, Baka-Tsuna," Reborn chirped, chewing the stolen meat with relish and gulping it down loudly.

Tsuna looked ticked off. "I told you not to eat my lunch—" he began.

"Die, Reborn!" Lambo yelled, throwing his chopsticks at the diminutive hitman's head.

Thwack!

"Gupyaaaa!"

"You shitty cow brat, you're interrupting Tsuna-sama's meal!" Gokudera bellowed, raising one fist to pummel the Bovino kid while the other hand grabbed a handful of dynamite from who-knows-where on his person.

"Now, now, Gokudera, you should calm down and put those away—"

"Shut up, baseball freak! Why don't you go take a hike—"

"Waaah, Tsuna-nii, Aho-dera hit me! Lambo-san needs grape candy!" Lambo wailed, his tiny hands gingerly cradling the large red goose egg that sprouted from the top of his head.

"Why, you—"

Tsuna sighed, "I'll get it for you after lunch, okay?"

"Maman, this is quite delicious. I want more," said Reborn, holding out his rice bowl to the Sawada matriarch.

"Sure!"

"Would you guys stop fighting already, I can't eat with you guys flinging rice at each other!" Hana barked irritably.

"Hana-chan, can I—"

"Sure, go ahead, Sawada-kun – HEY! Watch where you're throwing those things, you worthless monkey!"

"Who're you calling a worthless monkey, you dumb woman?!" Gokudera spat, enraged.

"You, asshole!" Hana screamed back at him. They exchanged ferocious glares over the table, mentally stabbing daggers at each other. Sparks were sizzling between them so ominously that they were almost tangible.

Shouichi could not, for the life of him, understand how the Sawada matron could just stand at the stove and hum a cheery little tune while cooking more food for her guests, all the while ignoring the commotion going on at the table as if it was an everyday occurrence. He paused. Well, given her lack of reaction, it probably was. He shivered.

The orange-haired girl, who was introduced as Sasagawa Kyoko, was also smiling as she daintily ate her food, miraculously managing to avoid having any food thrown at her. The pink-haired woman who had been sitting at the table before had already left; apparently the boy engaged in a glaring contest with the brunette girl was the woman's half-brother and couldn't go near her without getting violently ill. He wasn't told why, but he could imagine well enough. That definitely told him a lot about these freaky people.

A kitchen knife flew dangerously close to his head, flung by the flailing kid in a cow suit. Shouichi nearly screamed.

He wanted to sink into the ground just to escape all this madness. Why me? he cried.

Suddenly there were three loud, successive knocks on the front door. The room went quiet as they all turned in that direction. "Who could that be?" Nana wondered. "Tsu-kun, if you would be so kind to get that—"

Whoever was at the door banged on it again, but this time a voice accompanied the knocking, "Oi, Sawada! Let's have an extreme match!"

Tsuna dropped his head on the table with a solid thunk, groaning out loud, "Oh, not him…"

Shouichi panicked even more. If the person at the door was someone even one of these crazy people couldn't stand, what did that say about the person? Nothing good. Not at all. He wondered if now would be a good time to crawl under the table to escape this madness. When he went home, he was going to drown himself in music to forget that this ever happened. Yes, his nice, ordinary apartment with its very ordinary, normal, and definitely not freaky atmosphere.

Gokudera immediately whipped his head towards Tsuna with a scary look on his face, threateningly holding up a handful of dynamite. "Shall I get rid of the nuisance, Tsuna-sama?"

"No, don't do that," Tsuna replied hastily. "He's Kyoko-chan's—"

"Sawada! I know you're in there. Kyoko! Hey!" Bang, bang, bang!

"—brother," Tsuna finished. He cast his friend a long-suffering glance. "Kyoko-chan, could you go deal with him?"

"Sure," Kyoko agreed amicably, knowing full well how insufferable her brother got on some occasions. She wiped her mouth with a napkin and stood up.

"Sawada! EXTREEEME—"

Tsuna's eyes widened and he all but flew out of his seat and ran for the door, yelling, "Not the door, Ryohei-senpai! NOT THE DOOR!"

"—PUUUNCH—there you are, Sawada! You should've answered earlier!"

"Most people don't go around breaking other people's doors down when they don't answer!" Tsuna shouted from the hallway. "Really, couldn't you have waited a few more seconds? Kyoko-chan was going to answer the door. I'm just lucky I got here before you could smash our door to pieces, again."

Either this person didn't care or he was just dumb, because a loud voice replied, "Don't sweat it, Sawada! Let's have an extreme boxing match! I've heard from Kyoko about the extreme training program you guys are going through—"

"Not now, Ryohei-senpai! Besides, I don't even know how to box!"

"I'll show you to the extreme!"

"I said no—"

"Extreeeeme!"

"…Just come in, Ryohei-senpai. We're in the middle of lunch."

Oh hell no. Did he really just hear Tsuna invite the crazy at the door in? What was he thinking?! That's it, Shouichi thought, hanging his head. I'm doomed. These people have gone and lost their minds to the dark side.

Footsteps sounded briefly, and then both Tsuna and a tall, muscular teen with short white hair stepped into the kitchen.

"Onii-chan!" Kyoko greeted, smiling brightly. She'd sat back down after Tsuna had practically teleported out of his chair to intercept her brother before he could wreck the front door.

"Oh, Kyoko! You look extreme today!" he declared, punching a fist into the air. His gaze landed on the mismatched gathering of people sitting at the table. "Hmm? What's this? It looks like an extremely fun party–"

"No, Ryohei-senpai, we're just eating lunch," Tsuna quickly interjected. He didn't need Kyoko's brother making a bigger mess in the kitchen when Lambo and Gokudera were already doing quite a fine job of that by themselves. "Why don't you sit next to Kyoko-chan? Mom won't mind having an extra mouth to feed."

"An extreme meal! I will gladly accept," Ryohei bellowed, once again punching upwards. "Extreme!"

Shouichi buried his face in his hands. This, he decided, was a madhouse.

Reborn just smiled secretly to himself.

"You were away for quite a while, Shouichi," his older sister remarked when he finally returned home, ignoring his pallid face and zombie-like demeanor. She sent a sly smile in his direction. "Did something happen with that woman sunbathing in the yard?"

The implications of her question were not lost to him, and, like a switch was flipped, his face immediately went up in flames. "W-w-what, no!" he fervently denied. "I just tried to drop the box off and they invited me to have lunch with them!"

"Aw, don't be shy, Sho-chan," his sister teased, deliberately emphasizing his much-hated nickname. "You can tell me."

"Nothing happened, really! Nothing at all! D-don't start getting such weird ideas in your head!" he sputtered, waving his arms about frantically.

"You're denying it," his sister sing-songed, slinging an arm around him. "Little Sho-chan is all grown up now, how cute!"

"It was just a lunch," he cried. "Nothing happened with that weird lady, because there were even weirder people inside! Their baby drinks beer, they hurl insults like cannonballs, and they throw food and kitchen knives at each other. And then this crazy boxer almost broke the door down and started yelling 'extreme' in every sentence he spoke!"

"My, what a fascinating family," said his mother, who came up to them. "Did you remember to thank them for the meal?"

Shouichi shuddered. In the end, he couldn't even eat thanks to all the pandemonium the people in that demonic household caused. "J-just leave me alone, okay?" he said, pushing past his sister to zoom down the hall to his room. The door slammed shut behind him.

With a groan, he staggered over to his bed and flopped down, staring up at his blank ceiling with a listless look. The people in that house were not normal, by any means. Especially the strange baby in a black suit and a fedora, who talked like an adult despite his childish voice and deflected weapons without batting a lash.

More importantly, Shouichi just couldn't get the baby's words out of his head, the last ones spoken to him before he finally gathered the guts to flee the house:

"Your intelligence and intuition would be a valuable asset to the Vongola Famiglia, Irie Shouichi. Join Tsuna's family and become his chief advisor."

If he wasn't mistaken, Vongola Famiglia sounded Italian. But what could the baby possibly mean when he mentioned becoming a chief advisor? Was the Tsuna guy some kind of rich company heir who just happened to be living in a normal neighborhood in a deceptively normal house? The only other possibility considering the baby's word choice was that the Tsuna guy was part of some kind of organization and he was chosen to be the next leader. Considering their rather extensive use of weapons, maybe they were secretly part of some underground criminal group, or maybe they were spies. Now that was an absurd thought. But outlandish as it was, it couldn't be right, even though they were the craziest people he'd ever had the misfortune to encounter…right?

Troubled by his thoughts, he drifted off into a restless slumber.

Tsuna raised an eyebrow at his tutor later that afternoon, after the Irie kid pretty much hightailed out of his house, unable to stand what was, sadly, becoming a normal occurrence in his life. "You were trying to recruit him? What for?" he asked. "Don't tell me he's got some unknown connection to the mafia and now it's my responsibility to go and drag him into your demented little world—"

He was unsurprised when Reborn flew up and kicked him in the face, sending him crashing into the wall. Groaning, he sat up and rubbed his cheek. "Damn it, stop kicking me every time I say something you don't like," Tsuna sighed. "One day my head will swell up like a big, ugly balloon because of all these bruises you keep giving me. Who would want a purple balloon-head for a leader?" He stifled a chuckle as he tried to imagine what that would look like, a bunch of subordinates in black business suits bowing down to a purple balloon shaped like his head.

Reborn smacked him this time. "Ow! Reborn!"

The baby hitman smirked at him. "Stop daydreaming, Baka-Tsuna, or do you actually want to look just as you imagined just now?" An ominous glint entered his beetle-black eyes.

Tsuna visibly shuddered. "Oh hell no!" he exclaimed. "My face is too handsome to be ruined like that."

"Keep it up and you won't be handsome for much longer," Reborn told him cheerily. "Not that you are right now, anyways – you're still just a baby compared to me."

Tsuna choked as a cross between a laugh and a snort tried to simultaneously leave his mouth. "Right, right. But who's the real baby here, huh? Sure isn't me," he said, grinning.

"Of course you are. You can't even take a hit without complaining about it," Reborn said, pulling on his most innocent look-at-how-cute-I-am face. "Though I am only two, my charm is a thousand times greater than yours will ever be."

"Whatever you say, you overgrown infant." Reborn smacked him again for his audacity. "Ouch!"

"Keep it up and you'll find out what a literal swollen head feels like," Reborn said. Tsuna just huffed indignantly.

"By the way, you never answered my question," he said, deciding to change the topic. "Why were you trying to recruit Irie-san? Isn't he just some guy who thought we were Lambo's family?"

"Baka-Tsuna, that's why you're an idiot," said Reborn. "I did research, of course—"

"What? When? You were busy stealing my food during lunch!"

Reborn ignored him and continued, "—and Irie Shouichi, despite his timid countenance, is a genius whose intelligence puts yours to shame. He attends Yumei Private Middle School and enjoys both music and engineering. Given a push in the right direction, he could even take over for our current inventor."

Tsuna whistled. "All that in a short span of time? You amaze me sometimes, Reborn," he said.

"I'm insulted. You should be amazed by my presence every day."

"When you put it that way, the only thing I'm amazed about every day is your sheer arrogance."

Leon transformed into a huge boxing glove that Reborn used to punch Tsuna across the room. Again. Standing on Tsuna's back from where he was lying on the floor, groaning, Reborn crossed his arms and said, "It's not arrogance, Baka-Tsuna. It's confidence. Know the difference."

"They're the same when it comes to you," came Tsuna's muffled reply.

"Unlike boasters, I can actually carry out my threats," Reborn corrected. "So if you carry on, I will give you the purple head that you seem to want so much." Tsuna twitched. Reborn smirked, even though Tsuna couldn't see him from his position.

"You're the epitome of satanic spawn, you know that? Would you mind getting off my back, 'cause I'd like to get up now," said Tsuna.

"I like you better when you're flat on the floor. It's a reminder that you're beneath me, literally," chirped Reborn.

"You're evil."

"You're just an idiot for believing otherwise."

Tsuna sighed, but knew there was no point in arguing with Reborn. He'd just threaten his way to victory. Tsuna would like to keep on living with all his body parts attached, thank you very much.

The brunet grunted as a foot slammed into his stomach, launching him backwards towards the wall. He twisted and threw his hands out behind him so that he could expel his flames to help him push off the wall. Tsuna coiled his legs as his feet made contact with the stone surface, then he shot forward with a high burst of speed, throwing a flaming right hook to his opponent's face.

The other boy weaved to the side and countered with polished, gleaming steel. Tsuna pushed the tonfa off-course to unbalance him, then slid low to knock him off his feet. Hibari leaped over the leg sweep and did a quick somersault to regain his balance. The dark-haired prefect crouched slightly, his eyes sweeping over Tsuna's form to check for openings. A couple seconds later he dashed forward, twin chains bursting from the compartments on each tonfa.

Tsuna shot straight up into the air to avoid being captured. Hibari paused and idly began to twirl the chains, keeping his tonfa in constant motion. His steely eyes never left Tsuna's. The flying brunet contemplated on how he should maneuver in the air to avoid Hibari's chains, being careful to stay out of range lest he be caught unaware.

Ever since Hibari had obtained the compartmental tonfas from Reborn, he had become much more formidable than before. Instead of just having two solid steel rods to attack with, he now also had chains and spikes at his disposal (although Tsuna, having absolutely no desire to get shredded by sharp spikes during a simple spar, thankfully managed to wrangle a promise out of Hibari for him to stick to using only the chains during their daily sessions).

Hibari shifted his right foot slightly. Sensing an opportunity, Tsuna dove. Hibari pivoted on his heel, using the centripetal acceleration to fling one of the chains out to meet Tsuna. The brunet caught the chain in one hand, wincing as it slapped harshly against his bare palm, and halted in mid-air. He then fired from his other hand to boost himself backwards, yanking both the chain and the tonfa from Hibari's hand.

The prefect stumbled forward at the sudden loss, but quickly regained his footing. Tsuna swooped down low as Hibari charged at him, using the chain he just obtained to attack Hibari's feet. He missed though, unused to wielding the flexible silver links. Taking the chance, Hibari lunged into his space and smacked him with bruising haymaker right in the face, sending Tsuna hurtling back into the stone wall several yards behind him. The intense punch completely disoriented him, so the brunet had no time to prepare himself as he crashed into the wall and blacked out.

When he came to, he was lying on the floor with a panicky Gokudera hovering over him. "Tsuna-sama!" the silver-haired teen cried. "You're awake!"

Tsuna blinked slowly, his brain feeling like goo. "Huh? What happened?" he asked.

Gokudera scowled. "That bastard Hibari knocked you out and gave you a concussion! I'll blow him to smithereens the next time I see him!" he vowed darkly.

"A concussion?" Tsuna mumbled. He shakily lifted a hand and tentatively pressed his fingers to his head. He winced when he grazed over a particularly sore spot marked with a swollen bump. "I see. Hibari-san got me good this time."

"I'll avenge you, Tsuna-sama! How dare he do this to the future leader of the Vongola Famiglia!" Gokudera fumed, leaping to his feet.

"Stop it, Hayato-kun," Tsuna said tiredly. "It was just a spar."

"But look at what he did to you! He could have given you brain damage!"

"Hibari-san is just like that. He expects me to give him everything I've got during our spars, and I expect the same from him," Tsuna replied. He closed his eyes, grimacing as his head began to throb dully. "Don't go picking a fight with him. Right now, Hibari-san is stronger than you."

The explosive teen seemed torn. "But Tsuna-sama…"

"Please, Hayato-kun. I – ugh!" Tsuna clapped a hand over his eyes to block out the light. Even through his eyelids, the light had suddenly seemed to intensify and he started to feel a little nauseous. "Never mind that now. Can you get Takeshi-kun and Reborn for me? And turn the damn lights off on your way out."

Gokudera quickly nodded, despite the fact that Tsuna couldn't see him. "Right away, Tsuna-sama!" Through the syrupy fog that seemed to hang over his brain, Tsuna vaguely heard Gokudera's footsteps walking away, and a sound like a door opened and closed. The lights went off and he was left in the blessed darkness. His stomach still churned unpleasantly, but it wasn't as bad as before.

Moments later, the door opened again. "Why's it so dark in here?" Hana wondered aloud.

"Don't turn the lights on, Hana-chan," Tsuna said, removing the hand from his eyes. "I had Hayato-kun turn them off because they were making me nauseous."

"Must be that concussion," Hana said. "I told Yamamoto to get me the medical supplies, even though that silver-haired monkey said you only asked for him and Reborn."

"It's fine. I asked for Takeshi-kun because he'll have the easiest time carrying me to the toilet in case I need to throw up," Tsuna told her. "What about Reborn?"

"Baka-Tsuna, I'm right here." Reborn's familiar voice sounded from his right. Or was it his left? All this concussion business was confusing. "If that concussion is messing with you so much that you can't even sense me when I'm right next to you, you definitely need more training." Tsuna felt an involuntary chill go down his spine at the implication of 'more torture sessions'. Oh fuck.

"You're serious, aren't you? At least tell me you're not going to start till my concussion heals, otherwise you'll have to look for another successor, 'cause my brain-dead self won't cut it," Tsuna pleaded.

"That would take too long, Baka-Tsuna. But since I'm your tutor and you're my responsibility, I'll allow you to take a break from physical training for now," Reborn acquiesced. "That doesn't mean you'll be slacking off doing nothing, though. In fact, I think it's time to start you on the basics of mafia politics and the application of the Poker Face." Tsuna could almost hear the sadistic cackles that were going on in Reborn's head behind the innocent child's voice and baby façade. God help him.

"I'm here! How are you doing, Tsuna?" Yamamoto announced, opening the door. "Hey, why are the lights off? Can I turn them on?"

Tsuna was about to say 'no', but Gokudera, who came behind Yamamoto, beat him to the punch. "Tsuna-sama requested for the lights to be off, baseball idiot. The bright lights were making his concussive headache worse," the dynamite user explained.

"Oh, I see. Hey, can I get a flashlight or something then? I doubt Kurokawa can do check-ups in the dark," Yamamoto laughed.

"No need, I have one right here," Reborn said. Leon transformed into a flashlight, which the baby hitman clicked on, taking care not to shine the light directly at Tsuna. Tsuna blinked rapidly at the sudden flare of light in the room, but the flashlight was noticeably less bright than the room lights had been.

"Alright, Sawada, let me see your head," Hana said, moving closer to her friend. "Once we're finished here, I can go get Kyoko-chan. She's been worried too, you know."

"Heh, sorry," Tsuna apologized with a wry grin. "Not like I purposely tried to give myself a concussion. Hibari just packs a mean punch."

"I can see that well enough," Hana grumbled. "He could hold back a little, though. I'm the one who's stuck bandaging you all the time. You're going to turn into a mummy sooner or later."

"Better than a purple balloon head," Tsuna quipped. He heard a quiet snort of amusement from Reborn's direction, and cracked a weak grin despite the throbbing in his skull and the fog in his head.

Having not been a part of Tsuna's and Reborn's conversation involving said balloon head, Hana just gave him a confused look and decided to blame Tsuna's odd joke on the concussion. What else could it have been?

Sorry for the super long wait. I had a hellish schedule during the Spring Quarter of my second year in college. I am never going to make myself available for 7AM work shifts ever again. It's not worth it. I would like to happily sleep till 8AM, at the very least.

I wanted to make an extra-long chapter for you guys since Blazing Sky's first birthday is coming up in a week, but my brain didn't want to cooperate with me. Of course, it could also be jetlag because Italy is 9 hours ahead of the U.S., so I'm crashing at 9PM and waking up at 4AM. Bleh.

Anyways, aside from introducing Ryohei, I'd say this was a fairly uneventful chapter. Sorry if it was boring, but I hope the humor made up for it.

Please review, and see you next time.

MangaFreak15