Title: friendly fire

Author: sllebswap

Characters/Pairing: Miura Haru and Belphegor

Type: Continuous (InComplete)

Genre: General/Romance/Humor

Word Count: 1919

Rating: T (Contains content not suitable for children)

Disclaimer: Kateikyoushi Hitman Reborn belongs to Akira-san.

Summary: TYL AU. If at first you do not succeed, then try, and try again. Much to Belphegor's annoyance, the woman just. Won't. Die. Haru just wishes that this crazy man would stop randomly popping into her life to attempt spontaneous murder.

Chapter Last Revised on: 23/04/2019

Chapter 1

"And that's why we need the both of you to work together to recover the artifact," Tsuna explained somberly, both Ryohei and Hayato flanking him as he sat behind his study desk and regarded the two most unlikely partners whom he intended to send out on the crucial mission.

Looking from the arrogant and cocky demeanor of the golden-haired male on the right to the fidgeting, nervous female on the left, the Decimo briefly wondered if he was about to make a huge mistake by putting the completely mismatched pair together on this assignment. Not only had the two never worked together before, they also happened to move in entirely different circles and therefore weren't even vaguely acquainted. Unfortunately, time was of the essence right now and there were no other viable alternatives to choose from at this last minute. If they had a problem with each other, then they would just have to sort it out amongst themselves, but Tsuna really hoped that wouldn't be an issue.

As usual, the Tenth was being too optimistic—overly so, in fact.

Belphegor, the only Varia Commander available to answer to the main Family's request in such a short window of time, lazily tilted his head in the direction of the doe-eyed woman who happened to be staring at him warilt—as she had been doing for the past fifteen minutes or so since they had been put in the same room. "While I understand why you require my expertise," the Storm Flame wielder drawled idly. "Who on earth is Gawky there and what is she here for?"

In response, 'Gawky' flushed with chagrin and hurriedly looked away from him with mortification.

"I- My- I'm Haru," the brunette stammered with embarrassment. "Miura Haru, desu. Nice to meet you, Belphegor-san."

It was the standard greeting that most Japanese used when meeting new acquaintances, but the Storm Prince of Varia was never quite interested in exchanging niceties, let alone do so with someone who seemed so dull and boring even from the first impression. He stared at the flustered, visibly embarrassed female and instantly felt irritated. Being of a rather attractive and significantly sought out male, the blonde could spot a potential fan girl from as far as a mile away and to make matters worse, she also acted like a ditz and an airhead.

Great. What was she here for again?

Belphegor completely ignored the woman in favor of scowling at the Decimo and his Guardians. "Is she supposed to be a convenient doorstop? Decoy? Distraction? Or just plain decoration?" the Prince demanded with appalling rudeness, never mind that the woman in question was gawking at him once more, this time with overt disbelief, not that he cared, of course. "If so, then I have to say that you lot have really lousy tastes in décor. Also, although I know that you main Family types usually bring along a full cheerleading squad and a marching band when embarking on one of your epic crusades, we Varia don't really require the same consideration, so I don't need the adoring presence of fan girl over there just to do my job."

Belphegor wasn't even looking at the gaping brunette as he motioned sharply to her with his thumb, and even though Gokudera seemed visibly amused from behind his boss, Sasagawa had his arms crossed against his chest and was shaking his head with a vague sense of rueful dismay and disappointment. The mission hadn't even officially begun and it was already off to a rather bumpy start. Standing beside him, his Storm Guardian counterpart snorted under his breath. This partnership was going to be an interesting one, to say the least, and also extremely hilarious for everyone else not actively involved in it.

And really, the stupid woman was partly at fault for this case of mistaken identity; Belphegor would have been less likely to go off on her like this if she had just quit her ridiculous and misleading charade in the first place—but that was probably something that the golden-haired European would realize eventually.

Meanwhile, the Tenth calmly observed the visibly irked Varia from behind his desk, momentarily keeping an inscrutable silence even as poor Haru sputtered with a mix of mortification and rising anger, her face growing bright crimson as she struggled to reach an acceptable middle ground between her conflicting feelings of humiliation and fury. Truly, she was still shocked to meet somebody so offensive and ill-mannered, especially since she hadn't even done a thing to provoke him in the first place.

"I'm not a fan girl!" the brunette finally gathered her enough of her wits together to snap out. "Hahi, you are an incredibly impolite person!"

Belphegor just rolled his eyes and sneered back with a subtle curl of his upper lip, hardly impressed by the woman's comeback. "And you are obviously unimaginative and boring. Stating the obvious now, are we? I can do that too." Turning his head back to look at the Decimo and his Guardians, he scowled accusingly at them. "Not the brightest crayon in the box, is she?"

The man was so unbelievably rude that Haru could only stare at him with her mouth open. It was not often that she was made speechless, but this man was obviously in a class of his own and he was successfully punching on every available button there was to push when it came to her. That was actually something quite amazing seeing that this was the first time they both had prolonged interaction with each other and already they were at loggerheads after all of fifteen minutes together.

Hayato could not hold it in anymore; he snorted and promptly earned the attention of everyone in the room.

"…you two are either going to really love each other or really hate each other after this, aren't you?"

It was just a rhetorical question made in jest, but the identical, appalled expression that both sported was so comical that the silver-haired Storm Guardian could not help but smirk with rising amusement.

"I'd never like someone like him!" Haru declared emphatically, wrinkling up her nose for good measure.

Belphegor did not buy her vehement denial. "So says the one who was looking at me earlier like she could not wait to get into my pants," he remarked sarcastically, much to her infuriated glare.

"Excuse me?!" By now, Haru's voice had already climbed a few octaves higher than her usual pitch. The men in the main Famiglia all winced inwardly at the increasingly shrill tone. Haru, for all her constant attempts to curb her brash, impetuous manner and behave more demurely and ladylike instead, didn't always succeed in her efforts. Unfortunately for her, this time was one of those.

"Wonderful. You are hard of hearing too," Belphegor shot back with a tone overflowing with sarcasm. Haru scowled at him, whatever sense of goodwill and amiable friendliness long gone.

"You-You are such an a-ass!" the brunette stuttered, tripping over her tongue in flustered pique, as if she could not believe that somebody like him really existed. Belphegor chuckled in an extremely taunting and annoying manner. Meanwhile, their audience watched with varying degrees of interest.

"Perhaps we should make some amendments to our current course of action," Ryohei commented under his breath. "Those two are likely to murder each other if we leave them unsupervised. It is unfortunate that Lussuria-san already had a previous engagement to see to and is unable to lend us a hand this time around." Based on the location of the target, a combat-based fighter like the Sun Varia would have been more preferable than one with the Storm Varia's expertise, but it wasn't as if they had a choice anymore and there was hardly any time left to make any drastic changes in the plan.

"Or I can partner Haru instead," Ryohei offered, but Tsuna shook his head.

"Not possible," the Decimo rejected the idea with practical pragmatism. "De Villieres is an extremely paranoid individual; we're invited to attend this function with the explicit understanding that the entire Famiglia will be kept under extensive surveillance from the moment we enter the grounds until we leave it. As such, our actions cannot be left unaccounted for especially when the artifact goes missing."

Belphegor, who clearly heard Tsuna's explanation (and was also tiring of the woman's squawking), snorted and butted back into that conversation. "The man should just lighten up a little. What's a bit of friendly theft between allied Famiglias?"

Haru scowled at the rude and offensive blonde, still visibly miffed over his unwarranted attack on her just now. "There's no such thing as 'friendly theft,'" she muttered, clearly in a disagreeable mood.

Belphegor arched his brow, not that anyone could see it. "Oh?" he asked casually, making it quite clear that he could hardly care less. "In that case, there's always friendly fire for when problems like these refuses to resolve themselves. That's what I'm here for, right?"

The Storm Varia did not sound like he was making a joke at all, and Haru turned to stare at Tsuna.

"Is he always like that?" the brunette asked the Decimo in a confused, disbelieving manner, almost as if she did not understand what she had done to merit her Boss torturing her this way, expecting her to work alongside this obvious lunatic.

"Yes, he is," Gokudera answered cheerfully on behalf of the Tenth, looking quite amused in the process. Haru was understandably not as entertained.

Leaning forward slightly, Tsuna rested his elbows on the table and interlinked his fingers loosely together. He regarded Haru thoughtfully. "Do you have a problem working with Belphegor-san, Haru?" he asked gently. As usual, his compassionate demeanor and deceptively calming nature, coupled with those rich amber, Hyper Intuitive eyes that seemed to penetrate right into the very soul of anyone he looked at quickly worked to settle Haru's agitation and annoyance. The young woman knew that her friend and leader would not have requested this of her if he had any other choice, not to mention, this was an important assignment and she really wanted to do her bit for their clan.

"…No," she sighed at last, just as her new partner bluntly answered in the opposite manner.

"Hell, yes. I've a huge problem with this ridiculous arrangement," Belphegor shot back. "I can complete this mission all by myself. I don't need this deadweight hanging around me; no doubt she's just going to slow me down and be about as useful as tits on a bull. I don't need nor want an amateur greenhorn getting in the way of my work, so she can just sit here and paint her toenails for all I care."

He was being extremely insulting and sexist, not to mention his simple comment promptly reversed all the positive effects of Tsuna's soothing. Haru looked quite furious by then, but since the Decimo really needed the two to at least get along well enough to complete the mission successfully, he cut in before murder could be attempted.

"Actually, Haru is extremely good at her duties," Tsuna explained simply. "Therefore, due to the compatibility of her abilities with respect to this assignment, she has been designated the mission leader for this job. I regret that the parameters have not been explained to you clearly, Belphegor-san, but you will be only taking a supporting role this time, serving as secondary precaution and guard detail once the artifact has been successfully retrieved."

::tsuzuku::

Questions That I Would Like To Answer Before You Ask:

I've always enjoyed the idea of Belphegor and Haru being randomly plunked together for a mission (and both being very unhappy about it), haha. Something like an 'enemies to lovers' trope combined with 'being forced together to work towards a common goal/get out of a hair-raising situation' is definitely the idea for this pair here!

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This was written a while back just for fun. It's not completed yet (as usual) but recently I went back to review what I've written out so far and have decided to start working on it more, hence I'm posting this first chapter. Do let me know what you guys think- hope you enjoy! :)

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Your reviews make me update faster; so please leave a comment if you like this fic!

-sllebswap