Hibari Kyouya and Dino Cavallone, the skylark and the bucking bronco, the student and the teacher—a strange duo, off the battlefield, with their completely contrasting personalities, but a fearsome sight when fighting on the same side. Hibari alone was enough to send most people into hiding, if they could get there in time, but somehow the fierce boy being backed up by the usually-cheerful Cavallone boss was that much more frightening. The lone skylark, the carnivore who hated to mingle with others, could be seen working in perfect harmony with the whip-bearing blond, and at times it even seemed the flow of the battle was being directed by the latter. The way they worked together instinctively, whip controlling and tonfa mercilessly beating, showed that this pair knew each other, inside and out—in more ways than one.

"Hey, Kyouya, you're bleeding."

"…Yes. Yes I am."

It was a lull in the battle, a rare moment of something not completely unlike peace in the midst of all the killing, and Dino was taking advantage of this time to look Hibari over for any serious wounds that the skylark himself would leave untended. They had been fighting opponents of far above average strength for hours now, so of course they were both covered in blood, some of it the enemy's, and some of it their own. This made Dino's comment rather redundant. But Dino had been unable to help himself. Upon looking over at Hibari, he had been struck by the feeling that the small stream of blood trailing from the boy's lip was exceedingly important. He couldn't just let that stream continue without being cleaned up.

In lieu of a handkerchief or something equally accepted as a usual source of cleaning things, he took it upon himself to clear Hibari's chin and lips of blood in a way he deemed more fitting of the situation. Without another word, he closed the distance between himself and the wild-haired boy, a smile decorating his face. Not allowing Hibari the chance to react, in one smooth movement he lapped up the trail of blood and took the opportunity to let his tongue do a bit more exploring, since he was already so close to Hibari's mouth.

Hibari accepted the kiss, but made no move to further it. Instead he offered only a small sigh, one of exasperation as opposed to that of a lover. The fact that they were not immediately moving on to the next fight annoyed him. Any pause in a fight always caused this general unhappiness, but usually it was more of a pissed off kind of unhappiness; when Dino was the cause of the delay, the feeling seemed to soften to mild irritation. It was a good feeling, to be able to delay one of Hibari Kyouya's fights and live to tell the tale. This was a privilege reserved solely for Dino. (But then, so was the privilege of sticking his tongue down Hibari Kyouya's throat.)

It became clear when the battle-hungry boy thought enough was enough, because he let out a low growl and spoke around the barrier Dino was creating to say a muffled, "Are you done yet?" Somehow, he managed to make the question sound dangerous.

More because he wanted to see Hibari happy than out of fear for what the boy would do, Dino relinquished his hold and offered something half-way between a chuckle and a sigh. "Yeah, I guess it's about time we got on with the death and destruction."

Picking up on the almost regretful undertones in Dino's voice, Hibari scowled. "There are enough herbivores in the world without you becoming one of them full-time, Cavallone. I'm not one of your useless family members, but that doesn't mean you're allowed to lose your bite around me."

At the mention of his family, and the fact that none of them were around, Dino flinched unconsciously. Romario had been following the pair, and doing his part in the battle where he could, but he had been seriously injured and had to leave the front lines. Dino wasn't really worried about Romario's health—he had taken the man to be healed himself, at the penalty of temporarily being left behind by Hibari, and knew he was in good hands—but more about his own performance in the fight. He could fight when he needed to, of course, but he had always known he did much better with his family around. It was the thing Hibari hated most about him—that he relied on others, a strictly herbivorous trait, in order to be a carnivore. And here he was, most likely letting Hibari down, because of that bit of 'herbivore' in him. Seeing Hibari unhappy wasn't an uncommon thing, but Dino still hated it passionately. He wanted to see his Skylark happy. And if he couldn't fight at his best…

"Am I holding you back, Kyouya?"

The stare the boy offered said more than enough, but he clarified anyway. "Currently, yes, by showing your affection at the worst possible time and by asking stupid questions." Effectively dropping the subject then and there, he readied his tonfas and started towards the next patch of violence ahead. "Hurry up, and you won't be holding me back anymore."

At first, Dino wasn't sure Hibari had understood the question, but after letting the blunt answer sink in, he couldn't help but smile. With anyone else, he might be worried about something being said to not hurt his feelings, but with Hibari, feelings weren't anything worth going out of his way to avoid hurting. His blunt truths were always refreshing. The smile remaining, Dino got his whip back out and jogged to catch up with Hibari's confident pace.

Hibari Kyouya was a carnivore. No one could doubt that. He was strong, his very presence could scare most people into submission, and of course, he relied on no one. It used to be that this also meant letting no one near him. It was by his choice that he refused the company of anyone, because they were all herbivores, and any herbivore that spent its time around a carnivore was doomed to be hurt eventually. It used to be that all humans were classified into being either a herbivore or a carnivore. It used to be that Hibari was always alone, because he hated herbivores, and didn't need the company of what few fellow carnivores he had stumbled upon. It used to be that Hibari never thought that any space of time would be better if someone was there.

Then Dino Cavallone came along.

He had started out just as a 'tutor,' but more so a worthy opponent for Hibari, who was constantly craving violence and had a very difficult time satisfying his craving. At the beginning, Dino was stronger than Hibari and made a show out of it, and that pissed off the skylark quite a bit.

The bastard mocked him with that whip, and though Hibari had never said anything about it, Dino had picked up on the fact that he suspected the whip was the cause of Dino's success, seeing as Hibari had easily defeated countless opponents using different weapons. Dino had picked up on it, and accentuated it by telling a pointless story about a master swordsman who had never lost a sword fight being defeated by a peasant with a quarterstaff. Though these sorts of anecdotes, clearly told so that Dino could feel more like a tutor and less like a sparring opponent, were usually ignored by Hibari, in this case he had understood the point Dino had been trying to make, and had been unable to help but take it into serious consideration. The whip was to his tonfa what the quarterstaff was to the sword—an obstacle on the way to success, as Hibari saw it. In order to win, he had to learn new ways of fighting, to avoid the whip, or use the whip's weaknesses against its wielder. Admittedly, he had improved because of that, but so had Dino. Still, he could only avoid the whip half the time; he suspected this was because Dino had gotten to know his fighting style so well. This only served to make Hibari into a more chaotic—and thus, better—fighter overall.

Though Dino's original purpose had been to teach Hibari, and though he eventually had, in some ways, done just that, Hibari had never thought of the man as a teacher, and still refused to. A true carnivore had no need to be taught, it learned for itself. Dino had merely provided the situations to learn from.

And though he refused to admit it—there were many things regarding Dino Cavallone that Hibari refused to admit—Dino was more than just a sparring partner, or worthy opponent, or supposed teacher. He was an omnivore. A true, full-blooded omnivore, a creature Hibari had always insisted didn't exist. But here was the proof to the contrary, right before his eyes, fighting alongside him only because there were people who needed him to, providing bloody ends to many lives and regretting it afterwards, making out with a sixteen-year-old and wishing it didn't make him a pedophile. He was a carnivore who needed people, and cared about people, things only a herbivore could do—he was an omnivore.

It seemed his omnivorous state was what allowed the man to get so close to Hibari, the unapproachable carnivore, in the first place. It was because he could kill that Hibari allowed him to fight at his side, and it was because he regretted it that he was bearable afterwards. While others boasted about their kills, Hibari saw them only as removing herbivores from their herds, nothing more, and Dino saw each as an individual person, a human being whose life he had taken, whose family he had put through Hell…When had this trait become something Hibari didn't hate? Had he just been sick of herbivores pretending to be carnivorous around him? Whatever it was, Dino always ended up being a breath of fresh air. His perpetual smile, though perpetually annoying, was something Hibari had grown used to seeing, and when Dino was around without his smile, something felt…off.

Was that how it had started, this strange relationship between the two of them? Or had it started when Dino leaned over to whisper breathily in Hibari's ear during a meeting, and hadn't been pushed away? Maybe it had started in the Namimori Disciplinary Committee room, when Dino had used that infernal whip in an entirely new way, and Hibari had resisted only enough to further encourage the Bronco's bucking.

Whatever the case, here they were. They. It was a word like 'us' or 'we,' an impossibly binding word. Once the two of them became 'Dino and Hibari' as opposed to 'Dino' and 'Hibari,' all was lost. Forevermore they were going to be a 'they,' and that…didn't bother Hibari nearly as much as he thought it should. The idea of Dino being around constantly, always clinging and doing things that would have been considered suffocating before, wasn't nearly so terrible as it was supposed to be.

Was that what 'love' was meant to be like? Dino insisted yes, but Hibari was still certain of no. It was possible he was just being stubborn, as Dino would sometimes whisper in the middle of the night, a hint of something not unlike hope tingeing his voice—or maybe it was regret. Though Hibari was quite aware of how eternally optimistic Dino could be, he also had known the man long enough to learn that he wasn't always optimistic. He was an intelligent man—more intelligent than Hibari had originally given him credit for—and he always saw the worst of a situation as well as the best, he always considered every possible outcome, and he wasn't as blind to the reality of things as he pretended to be. He often spoke of his family's problems in a hushed tone, when it was clear he wasn't sure if Hibari was listening or not, as if his secrets had to get out, even if they fell on deaf ears. Dino was truly a wolf in sheep's clothing, in so many ways…But his optimism couldn't always protect him. The herbivore in him couldn't be saved from Hibari's cruel honesty.

As the pair came close to the next small skirmish, Dino did what only he could get away with, and pulled Hibari back quickly before they reached the fighting, bringing the boy behind a building so they would be out of the line of sight—and fire—of the enemies on the battlefield.

"What is it?" Hibari nearly spat, clearly fed up with Dino's stalling.

Just stalling more, Dino paused, looking uncertain, and then wrapped the skylark in a quick embrace. "I just want you to know that I'll watch your back out there, Kyouya. I won't let anything happen to you."

As expected, he got a scoff in return. "That isn't necessary."

"No, no, it's alright," he began, seeing that this was pointless but persevering as usual, "it's just what people do when they love each other; they protect each other, even when it might not be necessary." The smile plastered across his face was a small one, and faltering; it was hard to smile in this environment.

Hibari offered him a level stare, blank and unreadable. This stare, Dino had learned, meant Hibari was thinking it over, considering the new information and trying to get it to compute in his unique thought process. There was a silent moment, and then he spoke. "You have to watch your own back, or no one will be watching it." This was the philosophy of a carnivore, and Dino should have expected no less, but somehow it made him flinch unconsciously anyway. Over the course of their relationship, he had grown almost immune to the skylark's harsh words…

Almost.