i already posted this on ao3 and thought, what the hell, i might as well post this here too.
Nothing is known about Reborn's family. There are no scraps of information to paw at. Nothing that would suggest Reborn had a life before entering the Mafia.
Logic dictates that that's impossible; surely Reborn must have had some sort of life before he became who he was. But even the most skilled informants and spies come up with nothing when asked to look into Reborn's past.
It's as if the man didn't exist prior to his entrance into the Mafia. There are no records of his birth, of where he went to school or even where he lived as a child. Some whisper that he is a bastard, born on the streets and left to rot by his parents. That even his parents couldn't deal with the child that had death in his eyes.
It's this story that becomes so popular it might as well be true. Soon enough Reborn is approached by those wondering how a street rat came as far as he had.
Reborn shoots the first person to suggest he was a street rat in the leg and let's them bleed out in the middle of a cafe in the slums of Florence.
Once the body is taken care of and Reborn has called in a favour from Viper he walks out of the cafe and easily blends into the crowd outside.
Three days later, the man who started the rumor Reborn was a street urchin is found dead.
No one mentions the story to Reborn's face again.
The truth is a little different from the story that circulated the underworld.
Reborn had been born Renato Sinclair to a middle class family. His mother had shining gold eyes that seemed to reflect light, she was tall and slim, towering over her father even as her birdlike frame seemed perpetually hunched over. As if she was trying to make herself look smaller.
His father had been a large man with a laugh that almost seemed to shake mountains. He would wrap Reborn in his arms and swing him around; Reborn would laugh and pretend he could fly.
(Once, Reborn had asked his mother if she could fly.
His mother had looked pained for a moment before she answered.
"No," She said, "Not anymore.")
Reborn had been a happy child.
Even if it had only been for a while.
Reborn's family moved a lot. Always after his mother had a wild eyed look on her face and held him close to her.
"They're coming," She would say, clutching Reborn and her husband to her chest, "They are coming."
It wasn't until Reborn was fifteen that he understood who 'they' were.
Reborn is thirteen when his wings come in.
His mother wakes to the sound of his screams and comes rushing into his room, a sword he had never seen before in her hands.
The sword clatters to the ground when Araiel sees what shape her son is in. There are wings sprouting from his back, staining his white night shirt red and he's screaming 'mother mother please help please,' and Araiel-
Araiel sees red.
She picks up her sword, cuts open her son's shirt, drops the sword at her son's side and slowly eases the wings out of the two long gashes on Reborn's back.
When the wings are fully out, one spread out across the room and the other folded in the space between the bed and the wall she picks up the sword again.
Just as Reborn's sobs begin to die down they start back up again.
(Later, her husband will come home to find her burning Reborn's wings in the backyard. Reborn himself is passed out in his room, stitches holding his back together.
"Araiel," Her husband will say, sadness lining his features, "What have you done?")
Reborn remembers that night as if it was only yesterday. Remembers the way his mother's sword seemed to cut through bone and sinew like butter. He remembers the pain of extra limbs growing out of his back and he remembers his mother taking them away.
Even now he isn't sure he forgives her for that.
Reborn spends the next two years of his life running, hiding from the light that seeks to slaughter his parents. He quits school because suddenly nowhere is safe.
Nephilim, animals call him, Nephilim.
Danger, they mean, damned, they don't want to say.
Reborn learns to hate that word.
Reborn is fifteen with too long fingers, too dark eyes and two scars running down his back when all he wants to do is run run run-
His family is in some rundown motel room when his mother's family catches up to him. The building shakes on it's foundations and his mother is screaming at him and his father to run but-
The light's above their heads shatter and suddenly the room is filled with power. His mother uncurled herself from her hunched over position and snarls at the figure suddenly in the room with them.
Reborns mind is racing a mile a minute because how did they get there? What do they want? Are they here to-
The last question is obvious, of course they are here to kill his parents. It's what they've been running from for the past two years since the night his mother had cut off his wings.
They want his parents dead and Reborn, Reborn doesn't want his parents to die.
So he charges at the figure in the room, yellow flames engulfing his body as he rushes toward them.
The figure lifts an arm and Reborn goes flying into a wall.
His father rushes toward him and his mother snarls something at the figure in a language that sounds like broken glass.
The figure flicks their wrist, and Reborn's parents are suddenly ash.
The figure disappears.
Reborn screams.
The motel goes up in flames.
(Reborn loses his faith that night, loses any trust he put in God.
He wouldn't find it again till years later; when a boy with eyes that shone like gold and two scars on his back made him believe again.)