TsubakiTwilight: This story came to me when I was delivering newspaper with my dad. Also, this story is told from Iemitsu's point of view and is slightly AU with my take on Iemitsu's childhood.
This is my take on Iemitsu's relationship with Tsuna and the reasoning behind his decisions. Enjoy!
DISCLAIMER: I do not own KHR in any way, shape or form.
REBORN!
I know many things.
I know how to disassemble and reassemble a gun with my eyes closed.
I know how to give a person a quick death or a slow, painful one.
I know which pressure points on the body cause the most pain.
I know how to use my body as a weapon.
And I know what a horrible father and husband I am.
x.x.x.x.x
I did not have a good childhood.
My father was an assassin for hire while my mother was an informant for the Vongola; they had met on a mission and decided to live together. They never married and I was born a few years into the arrangement. My father did not want a child and my mother did not know how to raise one, so I was left in the care of a nanny most of the time. She was a horrible woman – greedy and selfish, she treated me like dirt and sucked up to my parents whenever they decided to come home.
I was eight when I discovered I had Sky Flames.
My father was ecstatic, I was no longer a burden to him anymore – I was now someone who could carry on his legacy. He began training me the very next day.
It was hell.
If I did not meet his standards I was beaten. If I took too long to finish a practice mission I had no dinner. If I showed any hesitation in killing I was locked away for weeks.
I hated that man; but his lessons were paying off. I became an excellent assassin by my fourteenth birthday and began taking on missions the same year. I killed and seduced and killed and drank and killed and killed and killed and killed and killed.
One death a day. More blood on my hands.
I caught the attention of the Vongola and joined their ranks on my seventeenth birthday. I quickly rose through the ranks and even befriended the Ninth Boss Timoteo. He treated me like a son, gave me the love I never had as a child and brought me out of my shell. He showed me that life was not meant to be lived with a dark outlook on life – that hope and love could occur even in the underground world.
x.x.x.x.x
I met Nana Yamato during a mission in Japan. I was sent to kill a spy who had stolen blueprints to various weapons the Vongola had created and tracked him down to Namimori. I had finished my mission and decided to eat lunch at a small diner that had caught my eye.
When I stepped through that door, our eyes met and time stopped. She was beautiful – more beautiful than any other woman I'd seen before with long, chocolate colored hair and gorgeous brown eyes that seemed to sparkle and shine. She had cream colored skin and an amazing figure. I was in love.
And it scared me.
I didn't eat at the diner that day or the day after or the day after that. I was angry, confused, scared and in love. Never in my wildest dreams had I thought of falling in love. What should I do? What if she had a boyfriend or worse, a husband? What if she found out about my profession? About all the people I killed? What if it was just me and she turned me down? Questions were whirling in my head and I turned to the one person I could trust, Timoteo.
He calmed me down, told me to talk to her and gave me advice on what to do and what to say. My very first mission had nothing on the nervousness I felt the next day as I walked up to the diner and took a seat. At first I didn't see her but then there she was, still looking beautiful.
She approached me, introduced herself and things fell in place after that. We dated for a year before I proposed to her – in the same diner where we had first met and we began living with each other not long after.
It was heaven.
I had the woman of my dreams and for once, I felt at peace.
When we found out that Nana was pregnant I was scared. I did not have a good father as a child and was worried that I might turn out to be like him; but Nana – beautiful. kind Nana – just took my hands and kissed away my tears.
x.x.x.x.x
Our son was born and he was the spitting image of Nana with the same chocolate, brown hair and expressive brown eyes. As a Mafioso, I don't cry much but I cried on the day my son was born. As I held him for the first time, I vowed that I would be there for him, that I would be a good father.
But I lied.
I broke that promise when I first stopped – killed – an assassin right outside our bedroom door. At that moment I knew that I would have to become a bad father and husband in order to protect my family, the only light in my life.
I began coming home less and less – often not coming home for a few years at a time. Nana was sad and angry every time I missed a birthday, a holiday an anniversary, but understood that my "job" was very important to our family. It never ceased to amaze me the love Nana had for me, everyday I thanked God that she hadn't left me even though I was never there for her.
Every time an important date came and passed I wanted to kill myself. My beautiful Nana and our beautiful son were hurting because of me. Because I wanted – no, needed them to be safe. I needed them to hate me but to be alive, so that the few times I did go home they were there to greet me with a buffet and a kiss. So that my son could grow up living a normal life. A Mafia-free life. A life I never had.
x.x.x.x.x
Then Timoteo's sons were killed and Tsuna – my son, my beautiful, innocent son – was chosen to be the Vongola Decimo. On that day I destroyed half of the mansion. I yelled and cursed at Timoteo for even considering my son; I wanted Tsuna to grow up normal! To remain untainted for the rest of his life! He was supposed to graduate, marry a nice woman, get a job and raise a nice Mafia-free family! He was not supposed to be dragged into this dark and cruel world; but Timoteo was set on his decision. Tsunayoshi was the only candidate capable of inheriting the Vongola.
I begged and pleaded and cursed and yelled, but the decision was made.
I stood there and watched as Reborn – the World's Greatest Hitman – left for Japan. He was the best. He would train my son to be a great Boss.
I cried that day.
x.x.x.x.x
When I returned home for the first time in eight years, I was surprised and saddened to see how much my son – my beautiful son – had grown. He had spent almost all of his life without a father and it was clear that he hated me. Hated me for lying. Hated me for leaving. Hated me for pushing the burden of being the Vongola Decimo onto him.
I wanted to tell him. To tell him why I wasn't home. Why I never called or wrote. WhyI chose Reborn as his tutor. I wanted to tell him everything about me; that everything I did was to give him life I never had; but I didn't – I just plastered a goofy, idiotic grin on my face and told him how cute he was.
I died a little that day.
What a coward I was. I couldn't even tell my own son the truth, that I never wanted him to be the Vongola Decimo. That I wanted to live a normal life and work a nine to six job and come home and to help him with his homework and give him advice on girls. That I wanted to be there when he walked his first steps and said his first words.
But I didn't; I told him that I believed in him and that he would do just fine.
x.x.x.x.x
The next time I went home was a year after the Ring Conflict and once again, I was shocked and sad at how much my son had grown during my absence but at the same time, I was happy that he was not turning out to be like me at that age – cold, cruel, a killer.
Fighting against my own flesh and blood was the hardest thing I had to do. Every punch I threw tore me apart and every wound my son received from me killed me; but I had to do it in order for Tsuna to get stronger; and he did.
His resolve to protect his loved ones was so pure and beautiful and in that instant I knew that he no longer needed me.
x.x.x.x.x
I know many things.
I know that my son will never forgive me for my actions.
I know that Nana will still love me no matter what happens.
I know that I will love my family to the end of time.
And I know that my son has grown to a better man than me. I know that he will protect his loved ones with all his strength and will not leave them; I know that he will become a great Mafia Boss and I know that my son will not make the same mistakes I did.
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