Chapter 2: Shinigami follows (Wishing it was Ichigo)

Year 5

Mi…mi…

mi…n…

Mimi-nee!

"Mi-nee! Wake up!"

Yoshi…

"Mi-nee! Please! I'm scared!"

Yoshi!

"Yo-osh…" mi lids were refusing to open but my brain overrode their will and I opened my eyes to a blurry Yoshi.

"Mi-nee!" he looked worried and dirty.

And it was snowing grey flakes?

Ashes

"Yosh-ii … wha-t happen…?" there was fire and then nothing more…

"Ah! T-the bad man had a … a BANG!BANG! and you were all RUN and then and then! It was soo pretty! And mean! It pushed me!"

Whaat?

"Sl-ow… Wh-aat ws pre-ety?" my throat burned but I strangely had never felt better if not a bit drained.

"Ligh's! dheres dhis big green one! Dhat one push me! Far far away! And dhen dhere was dhe big vio-vio-viole'! and dhe red one! Dhe red one star'ed small and eaded! dhe viole' and grew and grew and I couldn' see notshing! And dhen dhey go away. And you dhere and everytshings grey. And dhe bad man wasn' dhere. -you dhink dhe green ligh' push him like me?- And you fall and go sleepy-sleepy and I dry wake you!"

O-key. Gods, this is going to do hell on my head.

Translation: There were three "Lights", green, violet and red. The green one pushed Yoshi. The big violet got eaten by the red one and covered me and the assassin. Only I remained.

The earth beneath me was black, scorched and so was everything around me in a five meter diameter. There was something white and grey ahead of me. Actually it was at the same distance the Bad Man was. It looked like… bones.

Oh, gods.

I think I'm going to throw up.

"Mi-nee!"

XXX

Year 6

Around this time last year was when my world turned around. My first non-family human interaction, my first kill, my first day without the fire in my head. It was a rather important day in my opinion. A day that changed everything for me.

Not to those around me. Auntie never had a clue of what happened that day. She thought we got dirty from rough playing instead of being in a blaze of my own doing. Dad never found out either, he thought that me being more pleasant was from doing friends at the kindergarten instead of not having no more pain. Yoshi… well he did change a little. He now thought I was a Magical Girl or something, and it fed his whish of being a Mecha when he grew up. Yeah… I have no idea how that made sense either.

My favorite outcome of the event was my pain free existence. I always thought that the pain was a consequence of my previous memories, now I hesitate. The fire in my head exploded that day and manifested itself outwards, or as Yoshi called them "pretty lights", protecting Yoshi and myself while burning away that man. A week later the fire began to build up again but instead of repressing it I sneaked away at night and released it. It came as a burst of violet flame, no sign of red or green that Yoshi saw.

The pain that had begun to appear disappeared once the violet fire was released. After that I began to play around with it.

It was a weird thing. Didn't really burn anything unless I wanted it to, instead it clones things. Not only that, it also makes me stronger, faster, grumpier. A lot grumpier. I don't know, ever since I started using it I have been far more easily annoyed. Especially if it had to do Yoshi. I was almost … possessive? of him.

Since the violet one doesn't really burn and the green one pushed Yoshi away, it only leaves the red one to be able to …kill. Yoshi said that the red one started small and fed of the violet one. Considering that the violet one makes more than there was I suppose it multiplied the red flame enough to make damage.

I wonder… if the violet clones/multiplies whatever I want…what about cells? I multiply my strength and speed so I know I can internalize it, but if I can do that I would be capable of healing myself as I get hurt. I better study medicine before trying though… I don't want to give myself cancer or exploding my arm or something…

This is what I ponder about as I go to the next circle of hell.

The first circle was kindergarten.

The second is primary school.

Kami protect me when middle school starts… hormones will be the death of me.

High school is to traumatizing to ponder about.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Year 10

There were two more assassinations and one kidnapping attempts since the first one. Only luck kept Yoshi alive.

The second one was when I was seven and Yoshi five. It was summer and we were going for an ice cream. As we were passing an alley someone grabbed Yoshi and tried to slit his throat. Only that Yoshi fainted and the guy only cut some hairs. I pumped my flames thru my body faster than ever and before the guy could blink I crushed his skull with my fist.

My second kill was far more difficult than the first. That time I had blood and brain matter all over myself, on my hands. Nightmares were common for a long time.

Then came the kidnapping attempt. It wasn't even a month after the alley. Yoshi had insisted on sleeping over when he found out that I had trouble sleeping. It was three in the morning and I had awoken from a nightmare and couldn't go back to sleep when I heard someone on the stairs. There was one step that always made noise and I knew it couldn't be Dad because he slept like the dead and Yoshi was with me. I never debuted that whoever it was they were after Yoshi. Uncle must have pissed off someone really persistent or several persons.

I took Yoshi out of his futon and hided him on my closet. I arranged some pillows in my bed to simulate myself and took Yoshi's place. I got in place just in time as someone opened my door. The shot "my" head with a gun with silencer and took Yoshi's futon with me inside. Once they were out of the house they got me in a car's trunk and drove away.

When they got wherever it was, they took me of the trunk and where surprised I was still "sleeping". Not once they checked if I was Tsunayoshi, incompetence must have been their middle name. I found out it was a guy, an Italian guy. Surprise, surprise.

He had taken me to some warehouse and left me in the ground. He started talking on the phone and there were a few words I got. Mainly Vongola, Estraneo and Fiamma dal Cielo. I killed him from behind with a metal pipe.

It took me three hours to get back.

The second assassination I wasn't there. Yoshi was six and the idiot decided not to wait for me and go home by himself. Once I got home he told me about a guy who talked strange and waved a gun around. They where on the bridge when some randome guy on a bike passed by and accidently pushed the would-be-assassin off the bridge. Apparently the assassin didn't know how to swim because Yoshi saw him drown. He was crying and asking me if it was his fault. I told him that the guy was a mermaid and that he went home to sleep with the fish.

Given everything that happened one could see how I would hate my Uncle Iemitsu. Given the stupid excuses that he gave my Aunt about his job and why he couldn't be with her that where enough to dislike him, the various attempts at Yoshi's life didn't endear him to me at all.

So when after six years of absence he showed up at Aunties house with his boss it would not be out of place for me to close the door on his face.

"Mi-chan who was it at the door?" Aunt Nana was humming and dancing around the kitchen preparing a feast.

"A hobo." My reply was firm and gave no place for uncertainty.

Ding~ Dong~!

"It must be a persistent hobo, Auntie. Don't worry, I will get rid of him." And went to the door again and once opened Iemitsu's horrible smiling face was still there.

"Nao-cha~an! How big you are! Give Uncle a hug!"

My face couldn't be more blank. "Wrong house." Just as I was going to close the door Auntie came from behind me.

"Mi-chan is the hobo still… Anata!"

And so my plan of getting rid of the pest was derailed.

Iemtsu's boss was called Timoteo and was… wait for it…. Italian. Yep, shocker.

He insisted on being called Nono and had an unhealthy interest on my cousin. Given our previous history with Italian men I never left him within five feets of Yoshi and was always in the middle.

My little cousin may not be the smartest or the most athletic eight years old but the boy had fine instincts and knew that man was trouble. So he left me to be as overbearing as I could while those two where at his home. The problem came from Iemitsu, again.

He insisted that Auntie took me with her shopping so Yoshi and him could have a "Men's Day" with his boss.

When we came back Yoshi was tripping over his own feet and had a stupid/confussed face. Not even an hour later Iemitsu and his Boss had left because of an emergency in the Amazon site. Amazon. As far as possible, construction should take place in areas where it will have least impact on biodiversity, so how can someone working traffic at construction sites as he says he does, work on the Amazon. Next he will be saying that he works at the North Pole!

He left and all there was of my cousin was a dumber and far clumsier version of himself. Even his eyes had changed. No longer where they a bright orange with hidden intelligence but dull brown that looked like those of a cow.

But the worst was that my cousin was left cold, with half a soul. No longer had my cousin felt like a warm bonfire… he didn't have left even an ember to bring him heat.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Year 13

It was the start of middle school and I felt like a failure.

All my tries to bring my cousin's fire back where a failure. All my tries to bring some of his memories back where a failure. All my tries to tutor him back to his previous levels where… a failure.

Not only that but everyone had started calling him Dame-Tsuna. Even Nana-san. I forgave my Aunt for many things. If she forgot to feed Yoshi I would reminded her or just do it myself, if she forgot to make him a bento I would buy one for him as we went to school, if she joked about his clumsiness or less than stellar academic record I could distract him with games and compliments. But to call your own son by the name he is ridiculed and bullied every day, to complain about how disappointing and unlike his father he is in his face… Unforgivable…

And how it burned. How it burned that I could do nothing about it. No matter how much I tried I couldn't bring the old Tsunayoshi back.

It was all his fault. And he got himself killed. The day Yoshi came to me confused because his mother told him Iemitsu had "gone away to become a star" I had to explain to him what death meant. He went and died and Yoshi was left with half a soul and me with no way to fix him.

I did everything I could to protect my cousin. I took Krav Maga classes, I took hapkido classes, I learned how to use a staff. I learned how to throw knives and how to shot. I knew how to fight hand to hand and with weapons. I could fight from short range, mid range and long range. I always carried some kind of weapon on me.

When they came for Yoshi again when I was twelve I destroyed them. Whoever hired got smarter or was a different guy because he sent a group to kill Yoshi. Too bad for those four guys they weren't prepared for me.

As I walked to school I spun one of my throwing knives on my finger and tried to think of a new way to free Yoshi's fire.

Something silver flashed towards me and I barely dodge.

A tall thirteen year old boy was prowling towards me. He had black hair, his fringe in an "M" shape, grey eyes, dressed in black pants, a long sleeved shirt and a black gakuran top over his shoulders with something red pinned in one of the sleeves. He had a pair of tonfas on his hands. I looked behind me and there was a third tonfa pinned to the wall.

Looking behind me was a mistake as I had to suddenly doge again, this time a strike with the tonfas, the boy looming over me glaring.

"Herbivore, carrying weapons with no- authorization of the Discipline Committee is against the rules. For breaking the rules… kamikorosu."

Is it wrong that I feel mildly aroused by him?

The dreaded hormones awaken!

A.N: Some things I forgot last time.

Sawada Tsunayoshi 沢田 綱吉

YOSHI from Japanese 吉"good luck", 義"righteous", or 良"good".

In Tsuna's name Yoshi is written as in good luck. So everytime Naomi calls him Yoshi she's wishing him good luck. He's going to need it.

Naomi - From Japanese 直(nao) "honest, straight" and 美(mi) "beautiful" (usually feminine) or 己(mi) "self" (usually masculine) My Naomi's name is written 直美

Nanami (Naomi's mother) -七(nana) "seven" and 海(mi) "sea". It can also come from 菜(na) "vegetables, greens" duplicated and 美(mi) "beautiful". Nanami's name is written七海.

Nana (Tsuna's mother) - From a duplication of Japanese 菜(na) "vegetables, greens" or 奈(na), a phonetic character. Sawada Nana 沢田 奈々, so cannon Nana's name is the second.

Why did I select all the names with 'Na'? for one Cannon Nana's insistence to be called Mama always seemed a bit odd to me. It could be that she at least subconsciously realizes that she's not a very good mother and tries to bury that by trying to be as motherly as possible with strangers. Or her own name brings bad memories, like sharing part of the name of her dead older sister. And that's how Nanami was born. And since it could be a family tradition to name the girls with 'Na' that's how Naomi's name was chosen. Other possibilities were Nao-ki and Nao-ko which share the same character for Nao, Na is always vegetables, greens or a phonetic character so I didn't like Na-tsuki even though I do like the tsuki part that means moon. Natsu-ko and Natsu-mi were also possibilities Natsu means summer and I really like Natsumi but one of my favorites fanfictions already has the main character called Natsumi so I didn't want to repeat it. By the way that fanfiction is called Déjà vu no Jutsu by Vixen Tail, if you like Naruto it's one of the best fanfics I have read.

Very little dialogues. I'm disappointed on myself but I was tired of rewriting this over and over.