Rating: T - makeouts, language
Note: The title is inspired by a line in Live's song "Run to the Water". There are spoilers throughout the series, up to about chapter 283. Constructive criticism is welcome.
Fall from grace (and miss the ground)
Hayato Gokudera would be history.
The little boy built a new name that he could stand to call himself, rejecting his father's and taking what he could of his mother's, and swore to the wind that they'd all know it someday. He ran off the estate that had been home and went far from anything that was familiar to him, took money from the accounts his father didn't know he'd learnt to access, bought a train ticket and went looking for something to make his own, to put between himself and every unbearable bit of what lay behind him.
"It's starting today, Tenth. History!"
Tsuna backed up with a hand clutched over his heart, and Gokudera realised he'd pretty much jumped at him. From behind the wall. Technically, this was an ambush. He'd been too excited to think!
Before he could apologise, Reborn hopped onto a nearby gatepost. "Good morning, Gokudera."
"Reborn-san!" he said in greeting, excitement returning full force. "When will we go make our inspection?"
"Later!" Tsuna said.
"What's happening later?" They turned to see Yamamoto, jogging up the sidewalk and waving.
"The tour of Tsuna's mansion," said Reborn, jumping onto Yamamoto's shoulder, and with the little everyday ritual complete, they set off walking to Namimori High.
"Wait, that's today?" Yamamoto said, looking dismayed. "I've got a make-up test after school."
"So cancel it! This is important!" Gokudera said. He was lucky Reborn was using him as a ride, or Gokudera would have shaken him by the shoulders like he was an errant brat. "This is absolutely vital, and we need to make a good showing for future purposes!"
"I need these marks for future purposes too, ha... I'm not concentrating enough on schoolwork lately. There always seems to be something better to do."
"Exactly! So is this. Far better. The best thing all year!"
"You're pumped up!" Yamamoto gave him a thump on the bicep, and Gokudera was in such a good mood he didn't give a damn. "I guess it is exciting, seeing Tsuna's inheritance."
"It's weird," Tsuna said, frowning. "I mean, it's not like anything's happened to the Ninth... I don't need to inherit right now. It feels like bad luck." He ducked his head. "It is."
"You call this an inheritance?" Reborn resolutely did not look at him. "It's hardly worthy of the term. There's a lot more coming."
Gokudera stiffened. He let his glance slide to Yamamoto, and saw that he was looking at Tsuna, his expression all concern. Damn it. Sometimes Gokudera wished Reborn wouldn't be so blunt - the position of boss was a huge responsibility, an outright burden at times, and the Tenth was realising that more and more.
It was great to have him talking again. He'd been really quiet for weeks on end. When the Ninth had requested (Gokudera hated how orders were called 'requests') that they deal with certain yakuza groups around Japan, which had access to ring-level weapons and few morals about using them, it had taken a lot out of Tsuna. They hadn't fought that seriously since the ring scramble matches.
No wonder Tsuna had been tired, was what Gokudera thought, but Yamamoto's theory was that he had been avoiding everybody. Ridiculous, because that idea came up while they were walking out of the Tenth's home, after spending the day with him and the girls. Nonetheless, after that it struck Gokudera that Tsuna always seemed small lately. Physically turned in on himself. The silences didn't seem that bad, because ... sometimes they had a very particular way of becoming comfortable, when it was just him and Gokudera, and he knew the Tenth appreciated that. But the way Tsuna was constantly hunched up and turned away from all of them - that was nothing good. Even if he didn't literally avoid them, he could seem like he was barely present.
Gokudera sidled over to jostle Yamamoto so he'd stop staring - the Tenth shouldn't have to feel awkward on top of everything else. Yamamoto took the cue and slung an arm around Tsuna. "Do you believe in bad luck?" he said. "I didn't think you were superstitious. Anyway, you could look at this as a really big present, instead!"
"And it's definitely not bad luck!" Gokudera said. "I've never heard of a case like that. It could even be good luck to have the blessing of whoever you're inheriting from while they're alive. There's less chance of vengeful ghosts!"
Tsuna started replying, then stopped as it looked like an unpleasant memory occurred to him. "That's probably true, I guess," he muttered. "Ugh, that time when that Romeo came back..."
Yamamoto laughed. "Hey, kid, is Tsuna's granddad giving him a haunted house?" he asked Reborn, and then ducked Gokudera's sideswipe.
"Find out when they tell you it's time to go see the place," Reborn said.
A few steps more and Tsuna stopped in his tracks. "They're not calling you, Reborn?"
"What, do you need a babysitter? Go on your own. You need to take care of yourself at some point, useless Tsuna."
"Haha! The kid being the babysitter. Who ever heard of something like that?" Yamamoto tapped down the brim of Reborn's hat, lowering it to cover his eyes. Reborn had to reach up to right it and give him a glare.
The infamous hitman was pouting. He probably couldn't help it, what with the baby face, but even Gokudera would admit it didn't look all that intimidating.
It got rid of some tension, and Tsuna took a deep breath and they resumed their walk. The baseball idiot really had a talent. Gokudera didn't mind the thought the way he might have a few months ago. He had developed a reliable method too, and so he smiled.
He lit a cigarette so he'd be able to fight easily if there was trouble along the way. This was pretty much the first time the Arcobaleno wouldn't guide Tsuna. The whole tenth generation had more responsibility now. Gokudera would live up to it.
Once they were sitting in class, he made do with keeping his lighter in hand. He flicked the lid and daydreamed, lulled by the teacher's droning. Whenever he turned to smile at the Tenth, he was slumped over his desk. That proved it, he really was in a state of exhaustion too ... or maybe Yamamoto's obvious brain disease had infected him, because that dumbass was also sleeping. He already had a make-up test!
Gokudera threw paper pellets at him until he woke, and then a few more for good measure. He stopped after Yamamoto, looking intrigued, threw some back. (He was sure it was going to bruise. How could paper make you bruise?)
A groan from the Tenth's direction! Gokudera nearly whipped out dynamite, but restrained himself to seeing what was going in. Tsuna was looking at his cellphone under the desk and grimacing.
"Sawada-kun?" the teacher began, and Gokudera said, "The Tenth's stomach hurts! I'll take him to Shamal!" He had Tsuna across the room before he'd finished speaking. He motioned for Yamamoto to join them, and Yamamoto sleepily waved back.
Gokudera didn't care anymore. He righted Tsuna, clasping his arms. "Well, let's get going! Where is it?"
Tsuna stepped back, out of his grip. "Not yet! The message said they'd be ready at twelve-thirty."
Gokudera stared at his watch. "It's only half-past ten!" The moment was an impossible two hours away. Ridiculous! Unbearable! The second-counter on his watch went up one figure, such a measly measure that it might as well have gone backwards. "We can go now. We don't want to be late!"
He looked up for confirmation and found that Tsuna was down the hall. "Need some air," Tsuna called in a muted voice, striding towards the staircase to the roof.
Gokudera looked at him and then in the direction of the exit, and then back to the stairs Tsuna had started climbing. It wouldn't hurt to be early - but if it was the roof, then...
He ran up the stairs, almost fast enough to catch Tsuna up. As he barrelled through the door Gokudera noticed for the first time what the day was like. It was warm for autumn, and the day was clear with a refreshing, blustery breeze. Even nature was playing along!
It was the kind of day when the Tenth would give thoughtful looks up at the good weather and go along with any suggestion on things to do, or start giving some of his own. Right now he had his head pressed against the chain link fence and his eyes on the ground, though. Tsuna was well aware of what came closer as they neared graduation. When things got like this - and they did more often than before, since the start of the year - it was Gokudera's job to remind Tsuna of the good in their circumstances.
Technically, he just had to stand there.
It worked most times. Tsuna didn't really talk about serious troubles, so Gokudera would go stand by him and wrestle over careful, caring, tactful words to coax out the problem until his stomach was a knot of bile, and before he'd managed to say one of them Tsuna would push off the fence, looking less tired and asking if he wanted to go.
Once when Tsuna started to move off, he'd said, "Thank you", smiling and a healthy blush colouring his face. So Gokudera went each time he thought Tsuna had gone to the roof, even though he was never sure he was doing enough. Sometimes ... well, pretty often, lately, he'd add a reassuring touch to whatever it was that his presence offered, just so that the Tenth could get a fraction of an idea how badly he wanted to help. It was always all right to do so; Tsuna moved into it each time.
Gokudera leaned against the fence and stood quietly for as long as he could - not long at all. "What will we do about the baseball idiot? We can't let him keep going between the family and this other crap like it makes no difference." He waved his hand at nothing in particular - rooftop, school grounds, town, earth and air.
"He has to decide for himself."
"But he still acts like he doesn't know what this is about!"
Tsuna's fingers fidgeted in the fence links. His voice was clipped in an unusual way, every word with a snap to it. Today, Gokudera thought, was a day to lend support with the firm touch of a hand. An arm around him, maybe. "I guess there's a decision in that."
"He's the Vongola Rain Guardian. He can't be allowed to treat it lightly, however much natural skill he has."
"He can't be forced to be Rain Guardian, either."
Gokudera blinked in surprise that force would even be necessary, and got a crazy image of Reborn holding a gun to Yamamoto's head, on Tsuna's orders. No. Of course it couldn't be anything like that. Then it was a matter of training twice as hard to make up for the exposed flank! Until they found a decent replacement, maybe, and Yamamoto realised what he'd lose by goofing around.
"The Vongola will be safe," he announced, and then hastily swallowed plans of extra training. The Tenth could get so worried about that kind of thing. "There are more than enough people who could act as back-up guardians. Basil's reliable. Maybe there are more possibilities at the mansion!" He rattled the fence out of sheer need to do something. "Reborn-san didn't say anything about what to expect?"
"We won't have to live in it or anything. I'm almost surprised."
"The place is for business use, right? It's about time we take care of official meetings. We need to get used to that kind of thing." Meetings would probably be made up of them and a bunch of the old, established bosses. And then the Vongola could tell those fossils where to get off... "We should get going, Tenth! The place is outside of town, after all."
"What does it matter if we're late? It's not like the people there are dangerous, like other Mafia people we'll have to meet. Just servants."
Gokudera turned and frowned slowly, not recognising that mutinous tone. It didn't look like the Tenth believed what he was saying either. He looked ... scared. Angry too, but Gokudera saw first what unnerved him most.
"It'll be fine..." he said, not sure what was wrong. He shuffled closer. "We just need to make a good impression! I've heard that a reputation should be built from the ground up." It had sounded stupid when he was a kid, but after being one of the lowest members of the Vongola, Gokudera knew it could get dangerous to treat low-ranking people badly. At least, he'd really wished he could make it dangerous, but he hadn't been so stupid that he'd attack the family that had taken him in. But if his feelings had tipped a little more towards vengeful than loyal...
"Huh, am I supposed to make a good impression? I should probably shoot the head butler or something."
"Tenth!"
"Well, what kind of reputation should a Mafia boss have?" Tsuna snapped.
Gokudera stood closer. "What's...?" What's wrong? He interrupted himself as the answer to Tsuna's question occurred to him. "Yours! The reputation that you already have ... you only need to show them who you are."
"I don't even know those people."
"You can't know everyone, Tenth. Look at Cavallone; he's got over six thousand people working for him." He thought over the times he'd sneaked into his father's meetings, Shamal's side commentary, and observations he'd made in the families he'd had contact with.
"The thing to do is make sure that the people in the family, all the different groups, learn to take care of each other, even while you're taking care of them. That's how you make things run smoothly, so it's good for everybody." At all levels - in the casinos and the sham companies, the research labs, the libraries...
"That's how we'll make our legacy," Gokudera said, gritting his dreams out through his teeth because it was okay to tell the Tenth. He'd get it. "We'll be so goddamn good to the Vongola they won't know what hit them. We're going to make history!"
"We'll definitely be history," Tsuna muttered.
The tone made Gokudera blink hard enough that his dreams cleared for a second, but then he processed the words and grinned so that his face hurt. "That's the spirit!"
It wasn't, because Tsuna stared miserably over the town. Gokudera reached out, willing himself not to be tentative. Or overeager. Couldn't go around grabbing the Tenth, after all. An arm around the shoulders would be all right, though, to know that he felt as solid and warm to the Tenth as Tsuna did to him, and to watch him smile from up close.
"It doesn't matter," Tsuna said loudly, jerking away from his hand. Gokudera froze and then stared in confusion. Tsuna met his gaze for a millisecond and looked down, chest expanding visibly with a deep breath. "We have to go."
Gokudera swallowed to bring moisture back to his dry mouth. "Are you worried? You don't have to be. You can handle it."
"I don't want to!"
Tsuna hadn't said anything like that in a while - since last year, Gokudera thought, and even then around the time they started their first term. He'd gained confidence over time. "Tenth, I know you'll do fine!"
"It's not that."
Gokudera put all his sincerity in his voice. "I'm not just saying it. If you think about everything you've accomplished so far, then it's obv—"
"I said it's not about that!"
Furious. Gokudera remembered that voice best from the time when it rang out above flames and Belphegor's hissing-cat chuckles. He stared at Tsuna.
"I've never wanted to be the boss and you don't even know that! I'm stuck in this Mafia business for the rest of my life, and you'll always be ... like this, and..." He bit back words with a pained sound, but more spilled out with fresh anger. "All you ever say is, 'it's so great', and ... you... I don't want to! That's it!"
But...
There had to be arguments and examples to remind Tsuna that it wasn't true, but the memories of years went blank. Tsuna was part of the Mafia. Had been since Gokudera met him. That's it.
"Gokudera! I don't want anything to do with this and I never did! Do you even get that?"
Tsuna turned and strode away, hands made into fists. He wrenched open the door that led downstairs and ran, the noise reverberating up to the roof.
Gokudera stared at the open door in bewilderment for too long, because the clatter of quick footsteps was broken by a startled squeak of rubber on concrete, and then a yell over the sound of something banging down the stairs, too big and too fast - falling. Then silence.
Gokudera nearly fell downstairs too with how fast he ran. Tsuna was three-quarters of the way down, clutching the railing and blinking away shock. "Ow-ow-ow," he said, grimacing at his right leg.
Its awkward angle made Gokudera yell so loud that his voice echoed off the walls. "Tenth!"
But it was only sprained at the ankle. Tsuna pulled himself up by the railing and turned his leg this way and that to find a comfortable way to put his foot down, wincing.
"I'll take you to Shamal's office! I can bandage it!"
"It's not that bad... I can walk."
He walked more easily with help, though, and after trying a few steps allowed it. So Gokudera focused on helping and Tsuna seemed to focus on walking, and it was surreal how normal the motions were while the silence between them hissed in Gokudera's ears. They greeted Shamal when they entered his office but basically ignored each other for long minutes.
"That feels better," Tsuna finally said, once the white wrap was pinned around his ankle.
"Don't wiggle it!" Shamal said from the desk, having peeked over the magazine he was reading so he could watch Gokudera do the bandaging. "You'll feel it tomorrow. Not too bad, Hayato." The magazine went up again.
Tsuna looked out the door, keeping Gokudera in his peripheral vision at best. "I guess ... it's time we got back to class."
"Then we really might be late for our appointment," Gokudera said. Tsuna finally looked at him, but as if he was a traitor. "We will! It's outside town and there might be traffic. We have to go."
"I don't—!" Tsuna glanced at Shamal and hopped off the bed onto his good leg. He stumbled and Gokudera caught him by the arm, and he jerked it away.
"Are you off, then?" Shamal asked, nosiness blaring in his voice as he pretended to read.
"None of your business!" Gokudera snarled.
They made slow progress to the front of the school, and Tsuna sat on the pavement as Gokudera called a taxi cab. Gokudera thought of calling the others, and imagined having to deal with any one of Ryohei and Lambo's noise, Yamamoto's laughter, Hibari's surliness, and incongruous second-hand smirks on Chrome's face. He looked at Tsuna, whose expression was tight and pale and futilely furious.
Reborn hadn't said they all needed to go. He'd even accepted Yamamoto's pathetic excuse about the test. Gokudera pocketed his phone.
He and Tsuna sat at opposite ends of the cab's back seat, Gokudera staring at his knuckles and waiting for the least cue.
"We're going to be really freaking early," Tsuna muttered, and that was the conversation for the trip.
o - o - o
Gokudera had emailed Reborn for directions to the mansion and had received them with no extra comments, such as why he'd need to ask when Tsuna had already been informed. Maybe he'd guessed his student's mood. He knew Tsuna like no one else, and Gokudera wished he were here.
"You're sure this is the way?" the driver asked for the third time, peering at the garden that lined the long driveway. Gokudera had a general impression of short grass and tall hedges, and a really clear impression that the driver needed to shut up.
"We're going to see our rich uncle, all right? Keep going!"
Finally the cab stopped, the driver gawking. "This place is huge!"
"It'll do," said Gokudera.
It was like the castle, was his first thought, but that was a trick played by old memories. This building looked newer and was more compact, and there were even more turrets than the castle he'd grown up in. The next comparison he remembered was the Vongola mansion proper in Italy, and how he'd looked at it and wondered what he'd have to accomplish to deserve a place there - but this mansion hardly looked like that stately, old, weathered house either. Four storeys high and built to look impressive, creamy walls offset with dark tiles and gleaming woods. It would definitely do.
Tsuna didn't see that yet. Instead of looking at the mansion, he was watching an old man striding towards them. The guy looked like the uptight, buttoned-up type to yell about getting off the property, and Gokudera set a sneer on his face and rubbed his Vongola ring. The sneer fell as the man reached them and creaked elegantly into a bow.
"Vongola Tenth. My humble greetings to you and your Storm Guardian."
"Uh - I, I-" Tsuna stared at him but didn't outright deny his title, and Gokudera felt a lurch of hope in his chest.
"I am the head of the household staff. I'm afraid that all is not ready yet; to my regret, we're running behind schedule."
"No, we're early!" Tsuna mustered an apologetic grin.
The head butler didn't acknowledge the admission of wrongdoing on his employer's part, which was in line with what Gokudera remembered as good behaviour for servants. "Allow me to take care of the fee," the guy said, gesturing at the cab. Gokudera caught a glimpse of a gun holster as the man's uniform jacket moved. Now that's a Mafioso's head butler!
Gokudera moved to help Tsuna to the house, because once Tsuna stopped leaning on the car it looked like his ankle was tender. He was wincing.
"Don't," he snapped when Gokudera came up to him, and added, "If you don't want to," like he was a little embarrassed.
"Of course I want to help," he said. Tsuna started walking even more stiffly.
They stopped at the entrance, two huge double doors. Only one was open - how had that old man slipped through that narrow crack? Maybe there was special training.
The butler trotted up as the cab drove off slowly (the driver leaning out the window to continue gawping at the ordinary-looking high schoolers with a mansion) and bowed on the top step. He had a cellphone in hand. "Sir. That gentleman was able to give me the number of a cousin who works in a local hospital, who would help me to get a wheelchair here in no more than half an hour. Would you prefer a standard model or a motorised one?"
"Wha—no, don't bother!" Tsuna looked cornered. "I don't need something like that!"
"The grounds are extensive, sir, and regrettably, the order to install elevators in the building was only recently received. They've not yet been completed. A comprehensive tour will cover a lot of ground, and your injury might worsen."
"It's only my ankle. Really, don't..."
"If the Tenth is willing to wait a moment, some of the burlier gardeners will come and carry you through the house."
"No! No thank you!" Tsuna waved his hands frantically and Gokudera glowered at the old ass-kisser. What the hell kind of idea was that? And he hadn't even straightened out of the bow, like talking to your kneecaps was so polite.
"The Tenth and I would like to see this place alone."
Tsuna froze and then turned away, hunching up, like he'd been doing so often around everybody else. Gokudera ignored that and the way it made his stomach turn over (thanks for the inadvertent training, Bianchi, I guess).
The butler nodded. "Allow me to give you my contact details, so that you may get in touch with me as necessary." He took the phone Gokudera held out to him and typed speedily. "There are walking sticks in the umbrella stand in the foyer, Tenth, if that would be of assistance."
He held the door open for them. The foyer was relatively small and there were few furnishings, none of it particularly impressive. But everything was polished and gleamed softly, radiating an impression of richness.
Gokudera glanced back when Tsuna had taken a walking stick, leaving the butler watching them set off down the plush red carpet. Clearly the man had serious problems - huh, 'the burlier gardeners' - but he was efficient, and chances were that he could put up a fight. Tsuna was feeling weird, and he had said...
"Tenth? You're not actually, uh, going to shoot that guy?"
"No!" Tsuna exclaimed, and then leaned towards him to hiss, "Of course not!" He looked around, making sure no one was nearby.
Someone was. The man had backed into the corner made by a cabinet and a wall. He seemed to be shaking.
Tsuna shuffled away from Gokudera. "Um, hello?"
The guy threw himself full-length to the floor. "Vongola Tenth! My humble greetings! A-a-and to the Storm Guardian!"
"Um. Hello," Tsuna tried, but even with more authority in his voice the guy still kept lying there. If Gokudera got a look at this idiot's face, he was so fired.
"He said he wasn't going to shoot anyone, so get up and quit snivelling," Gokudera said. "The Tenth always keeps his word!"
"Bless your kindness, Vongola Tenth," the man yelled into the carpet, and hopped up and ran in a flurry of multicoloured fabrics. Gokudera picked one up; it was a big silk handkerchief. Damn it, he thought he'd got away from fancy hankies when he ran away from home. Were they supposed to act like useless rich brats from now on? At least it wasn't monogrammed.
"The servants wear top hats?" Tsuna mumbled, looking after the guy.
There was no one else in sight down either length of the hallway. "Tenth," Gokudera said, balling up and tossing the hankie, and his voice made Tsuna look as unnerved as the servant had. "About - about being boss, and those ... worries you mentioned. We don't have to be anything we don't want to be. I swear! All you have to do is protect your own interests, nothing worse."
"I'm here to see the stupid house," Tsuna said, and started stumping down the hall. If not for the carpet the walking stick would have made a hell of a noise. "And then leave," trailed back to Gokudera.
You can't! You can't. They wouldn't let him, anyway, Reborn and the Ninth. Wasn't that exactly Tsuna's problem?
You can't. He wouldn't, Gokudera told himself. Leaving them - or sending him, and maybe even Lambo, I-Pin, Futa and Bianchi back to their homelands - wasn't something Tsuna would do. But Gokudera remembered hundreds of times Tsuna would argue furiously with Reborn against getting involved in the dangers of the Mafia, and all those moments of panic and despair that fueled his resolutions to do better. If the despair was the truer part of it, if an escape plan would have been better than to stand and fight and protect - if Tsuna really didn't want to be the boss...?
Silently, Gokudera followed.
o - o - o
"Oh! Vongola Tenth! Storm Guardian!"
Humble greetings, every other corner. At least the staff had been well-informed, even if they weren't all as professional as the household head and let too much of their emotions show.
"They're already scared," Gokudera said in an undertone, walking as close to Tsuna as he dared. "See? There's no need to do anything more to get them in line."
Tsuna stumped faster. "Is that supposed to be comforting, people being terrified just seeing me?"
A man with a big industrial vacuum cleaner walked out of a room in front of them and bowed as soon as he recognised them, staying that way until they were past.
"You can tell him to stop bowing. Ask. You can ask all of them to stop doing stuff like that."
"They shouldn't have to in the first place." By this time Tsuna had stopped trying to go faster, since it was obvious that Gokudera was pretending to lag behind to make him feel better. "Telling them something like that doesn't make a difference," he hissed once a woman with a floor-waxer had jogged ahead of them as fast as she dared. "I'm still stuck as their boss."
"It's not so bad!" That was probably the wrong thing to say, but he had to say something. "Having this position limits your choices, but it also gives you a lot of choices you would never have had otherwise! You can do so much with the power you'll gain!"
Tsuna's mouth opened - and shut again. He stopped walking, and Gokudera forced himself not to grab Tsuna by the shoulders. Had that got through to him? He stared straight ahead, and Gokudera waited to see if it was a revelation, if things were okay now.
"You two haven't changed into your costumes?" said the person Tsuna was staring at, coming closer from behind, and Gokudera jumped. He turned around with the intention of reaming the guy out until the only appropriate response was ritual suicide.
He found that all he could do was yell, "Why the fuck are you wearing a clown suit?"
The man stood in all his baggy-trousered, face-painted glory and said, "Take a guess, kid. I'm a clown. You guys are with the school drama group, right? Better hustle. We're already behind schedule, and you do not want to disappoint the head butler." He mimed a gun with one hand.
They watched him go. His left shoe sprouted flowers from the heel with each step.
"The Vongola mansion has a clown?" Tsuna said.
"Maybe ... for Lambo and I-Pin?"
They kept walking, bemused - but as people rushed past with more exclamations of 'Vongola Tenth!', Tsuna began to pretend that he could walk faster again. They really were too early, after all - everyone just kept on saying the title in surprise. Gokudera watched Tsuna as he strode away from all the shock and awe, suppressing the limp determinedly. He'd got so much stronger over the years. He could handle this. Didn't he know? Why didn't he care?
There might not be an answer.
Maybe this really was it. There was no way to make the situation change. Make it better. Tsuna wouldn't understand or even want to - and he'd know that Gokudera couldn't get his side of it either.
"Damn it," Tsuna said softly, staring at the staircase that was the only place to go. Gokudera trailed to a halt behind him, then followed when he finally mounted the steps. Halfway up Tsuna stopped and leaned against the railings, breathing hard.
They might as well go back to school, or home. But Tsuna hadn't said he wanted to leave yet. Was there at least a chance that he was curious about the place?
"I'll carry you."
Tsuna looked tired and the kind of annoyed that meant he was experiencing a persistent pain. "Huh?"
"Or we can call those gardeners." Gokudera took his cellphone out of the pocket of his school blazer.
"No! That would be weird!"
"Then I'll carry you." He bent, kneeling to make it easy for Tsuna to get on his back.
"This," Tsuna said, "would be kinda weird too..."
"It will make the tour easier. We'd..." He growled the words. "We'd get done faster."
It looked like Tsuna was scared. Not simply annoyed or uncomfortable or angry, but scared of him, and that hurt enough that Gokudera flinched.
"You don't have to," Tsuna said
And you're not getting out of this.
Tsuna ducked the glare and looked up the rest of the staircase, and then awkwardly got on his back, still holding the walking stick. Gokudera straightened, gripping the railing, and then barrelled up the stairs so there wouldn't be time for protests. Tsuna held on tighter. He caught another quiet 'weird' and blushed furiously and kept going.
"It, it's going to be my whole life," Tsuna said suddenly. "I think the Ninth wanted me to go up against those yakuza gangs over the last few months so they'd know about us, not just because they were causing too much trouble. A lot of those groups hold a grudge against us after all that fighting. There are people who live right here in Japan who'd be ready to attack all of us."
"You agreed that we had to stop those guys! They were harming civilians in their districts, some of them without compunction!"
"Of course we had to! But it's not like every member of every group is gone away and locked up, and you know there are plenty of them who would be willing to take revenge!"
"They could've attacked us before, too! They kidnapped you once already, remember? We were still kids then, and we dealt with it!"
"But now they know about all of us, even Haru and Kyoko-chan, and there are groups all over the country... There's no way to get out the Mafia lifestyle anymore, and I've always wanted to."
"You haven't." At another time Gokudera would have hated the obstinacy in his voice, so childish. "You fight for us and say you want to stay together."
The hands on his shoulders tightened with a jerk, making him stumble on the edge of the narrow hallway carpet, and he stopped focusing solely on Tsuna and the conversation so that he could take in the surroundings. They'd come to the top of the stairs, and this part of the house wasn't as fancy as the rest - servant's wing, probably. Still not shabby, which was good; piss off the help and you got a lot of spit in the coffee.
"Just let me down!" Tsuna said with a panicked whine. "There are people around, and—well, you know, those times when I say I want to, all of us to s-stay together, Gokudera, I mean it in a normal way." A heavy pause. At least he knew he should feel guilty about that statement. "It ... shouldn't be forced by something like the Mafia..."
"You think I'm forcing myself to stay with you?" Gokudera demanded.
The Tenth went bolt upright on his back. "Let me down! I—" and then his voice became a tiny, outraged whisper, "I am trying to have a serious conversation!"
The girl in the samurai costume with a sword halfway down her throat wasn't exactly stopping them, but Gokudera had to admit her presence was distracting.
"Just what the hell is going on?" he snarled, and the girl carefully began pulling the sword out of her mouth. "Forget it, that takes too long!" Gokudera started walking again, although if it weren't for the fact that he was carrying the Tenth, he'd have preferred to start blowing things up. "Where's the rest of the staff? Someone better clear this up!"
"I'm calling Reborn!" Tsuna said, and then swore. "My phone is at school!"
Gokudera fished his phone out of a pocket and handed it to Tsuna. "Reborn-san's on the contacts list. Did he really not mention this?"
"I bet he knew all about it," Tsuna said darkly, the phone buttons beeping, and then he yelled, "Reborn! There are sword-swallowers and clowns and I think the top hat guy was a magician! What's going on?"
Gokudera heard the squeak of a reply, and held on harder as Tsuna flailed. Sometimes he thought Tsuna's Italian blood was showing across the generations, the way he talked with his hands. "House-warming party? This isn't another weird Vongola tradition, is it?
"Wha—You can't drag everybody over here! Haru has exams; you know what they're like at her school! And Yamamoto's test! Haahh, that's not even the worst thing. Reborn, I don't want them here. This inheritance thing..." His voice dropped to inaudibility - he sounded scared again.
It would have been bad enough if it was because he didn't want to be boss.
It was worse that it was because of the lion sauntering down the hallway.