~.~.~
Title: Vigilante Tendency
Summary: Tsuna's vigilante organization goes international.
Notes: Edited 5/24/2014 It's a lot less funny than the first part. Also, I hope you all read the manga because... yeah.
~.~.~
After a certain point - unknown to Tsuna, the point when he managed to recruit every individual with a certain degree of vigilante inclination in Namimori - life for Tsuna and the rest of the Committee fell into an almost peaceful rhythm of vigilante nonsense - the occasional fight with everything from school gangs a town over to actual criminal organizations - and going to school.
Tsuna was all too happy to embrace it. He, for one, was rather glad that Namimori was quickly moving in the direction of what could only be described as "crime-free" and the Committee was more and more forced to turn their attention to non-fighting-related activities like helping old ladies with their groceries and rescuing cats out of trees.
However, his hopes for these halcyon days to continue were cruelly dashed before too long.
Running out of people to recruit in Namimori just meant new recruits would have to come from abroad.
~.~.~
It started simply enough.
"My friend is coming to visit!" Shoichi announced one day, all but glowing in an unusual display of good cheer.
This was the same friend who had sent Shoichi the robot he had been so valiantly protecting back when he and Tsuna first met. Shoichi and his friend, Spanner, knew each other through an online forum about robotics. They had originally gotten into a bitter war over... some technical detail Tsuna didn't understand, but by end they had exchanged contact information and become geek buddies.
"Actually," Shoichi admitted sheepishly, "I wanted to show him some of the stuff I've been working on. Do you mind if he comes by?"
Tsuna smiled and nodded. After all, they weren't a secret organization or anything, and they had nothing to hide. What did it matter if Shoichi's friend saw the nifty gadgets their resident inventor had so much fun cooking up?
In retrospect, Tsuna should have said no.
~.~.~
Spanner was the placid sort, but he quickly got caught up in Shoichi's excitement about his inventions and about the Committee's... work in general, and the two of them disappeared inside Shoichi's workshop for a week. When they emerged, Spanner declared that he was joining the Committee whether they liked it or not.
"Do you even have a visa?" Tsuna asked.
The fact that Spanner simply waved aside Tsuna's very reasonable questions should have been an indication that everything was not entirely normal with him.
Spanner was only a couple of years older than Shoichi - thus, a middle school student - but he was apparently just fine traveling alone halfway across the world and then staying over for an indefinite period of time. Didn't he have school? Tsuna wondered in despair.
Fortunately, or not, depending on your perspective, there was plenty of room in the part of Momokyokai headquarters set aside for Shoichi's workshop and rolling out an extra futon was no real trouble. Before long, everyone got used to bringing an extra set of meals too, for one more inventor who always forgot to eat, and even started giving him all the lollipops they received from the elderly they helped with various things.
The problem was that Spanner already belonged to a group, and they weren't happy about his sudden change of affiliation.
~.~.~
Tsuna was very grateful for many of Shoichi's inventions. There was the hand taser, of course, very useful. There were the tracking tags that Kyoko had helpfully sewn into all of Ryohei's and Hibari's shirts. Also very useful, given their tendency to run off without a word to anyone.
And then there was the whistle. Shoichi had presented it after the third time Tsuna yelled himself hoarse trying to stop his friends from pointlessly fighting. It was very loud, of course - the ear-piercing sound was enough to stop most people in their tracks. However, the whistle did that literally too. Stop people in their tracks, that is. It worked on a frequency too low for humans to hear and caused a short-term paralyzing effect.
Very, very useful for stopping a fight.
Tsuna put it to good use when he walked in to find the base having become a battlefield - strange foreigners in formerly neat, expensive suits brawling violently with the rowdier members of the Momokyokai.
One deep breath and a long whistle-blow later, the entire building became blessedly still and silent.
"Now, let's all calm down, okay?" Tsuna said, putting the whistle in his pocket. In a trick he had picked up after a while, he encompassed all the foreigners with a quick sweep of the room, making it seem as if he was speaking to each of them personally. Then, Tsuna smiled and bowed. "I'm Sawada Tsunayoshi, Tsuna for short. It's nice to meet you."
He had timed it just as the paralysis wore off. Cowed by his good manners, the foreigners ducked their heads and chorused, "Nice to meet you."
A kid about Tsuna's age, dressed like a punk, stumbled forward. "Yo! I'm Naito Longchamp," he declared, puffing up like a bad-tempered kitten. "I'm the next boss of the Tomaso Family! We're here to-"
"Great," Tsuna cut him off shamelessly. "Would you like some tea? Or do you prefer water? Why don't we take a seat?"
Herding Naito - Night? Knight? - to one of the couches, which was quickly righted and dusted off by a couple of Momokyokai members, Tsuna accepted a cup of tea from Kyoko, who set another in front of Naito and a plate of snacks between them.
Naito couldn't quite resist grabbing one - Kyoko's cookies were delicious.
"Young master," an older man in a tall hat hissed, "be careful!" His concerns about poison were fortunately unfounded, though he looked like he was having a heart attack as Naito glanced at him with puffed up cheeks like a hamster, stuffed full of Kyoko's cookies.
"Thank you for coming to see us," Tsuna continued as Naito washed down the cookies with the slightly bitter green tea. Good manners, he had found, if applied aggressively enough, could cow even Hibari on occasion. "Are you here for the Momokyokai or the Peaceful Namimori Committee?"
"I'm here for the ones that poached our head mechanic!" Naito declared, slamming his cup into the coffee table. Some of the remaining tea sloshed out. Tsuna pressed a napkin into his hands, all but forcing Naito to use it.
"Do you mean Spanner?" Tsuna asked mildly. "He didn't mention having a job. What kind of work does he do?"
"Well, he's our head mechanic," Naito repeated, getting sidetracked. "He does development and tuning, and he works on our vehicles too. You know, the Tomaso Family is famous for our cars, boats and heavy machinery, so..."
"Oh, you're in the automotive industry?"
"No, man, we're in the mafia!" Naito laughed. "We're the biggest mafia family in England!"
Tsuna laughed too. Mostly because otherwise he would cry.
~.~.~
Naito turned out to be a cheerful, easy-going type - mafia connection aside. He was happy to explain to Tsuna that he spoke Japanese because he was a big anime fan. He was also suitably impressed by Takeshi's katana.
He even volunteered his Family members to help clean up the mess they had made, with only the subtlest of guilt-tripping from Tsuna.
"Come ooooon, Spanner," Naito whined, scratching at the workshop door like a cat. "You've gotta come back! Or Pops will be so mad!"
"I refuse," Spanner called back. He had locked himself and Shoichi in the workshop the moment he realized the Tomaso had arrived, and it seemed the two of them had managed to weld shut the thick blast doors (installed for the safety of those outside).
"Spanneeeeer," Naito moaned. "I'll get you that, uh, thing you wanted! We'll renovate your lab!"
"So what? What do it matter what kind of equipment I have, if all I'm doing is the same boring stuff?" Spanner shot back. "I'm sick it! I want to do something new and exciting, not your stupid mindless routine maintenance! This improvisation stuff Sho-chan's doing is much more fun. I like it. And the atmosphere here is great too."
Wailing pitifully, Naito curled up into a ball and began to cry, utterly desolate. "Pops is gonna be so mad," he moaned.
Gingerly, Tsuna patted him on the back. "It'll be okay," he said. "We'll figure something out." With a sigh, he knocked gingerly on the workshop door. "Spanner, Shoichi, we're going to have lunch. Come out, okay? ...Kyoko made cake today."
There was some frantic clanging, and then the door slid open.
~.~.~
"Okay," Tsuna said, having listened to both Naito and Spanner whine for nearly two hours. What happened to the British stiff upper lip? "So what you're saying is... Spanner, you want to do more than just the same thing over and over again. Naito, you want Spanner to get back to work and stop running off to do whatever he feels like."
The aforementioned two nodded, both clutching their teacups.
"Well, you both have good points," Tsuna said. "Naito, Spanner's right. He's not just a mechanic. He's a top-notch inventor. You're wasting his time having him doing little tune ups."
Or at least, that's how Tsuna would have felt about Shoichi working at a factory or something. Spanner nodded, looking smug.
"Think about how much more he could do for Tomaso," Tsuna continued. "You want to advance too, right? Stay ahead of the competition and all that? Then it's only natural to invest more in research and development."
He was just going to ignore the mafia part. Just think of them as a car company, Tsuna told himself.
Now Naito was nodding along as well, and Tsuna turned to Spanner next.
"And, Spanner, Naito has a point too. You can't just blow off your projects or run away whenever you get bored. Otherwise, the Tomaso won't be able to trust you as their head mechanic," Tsuna said. "Even if it's boring sometimes, you have to stick with it."
Spanner sulkily shifted the lollipop in his mouth, looking properly chastised.
"You can come visit whenever you want - and you let everyone at Tomaso know," Tsuna conceded. "We'll be happy to have you, if you need a change of pace."
"That's a great idea!" Naito agreed. "I'm sure Pops'll agree too. It's a great chance to build ties in Asia. I'll come too! You guys are great!"
He burst into obnoxious laughter. Spanner was smiling and nodding. Tsuna suddenly had a premonition of dread.
"Wait-"
"In fact," Naito continued loudly, "let's make it official! Let's form an alliance between your Family and mine!"
Tsuna stared down at his outstretched hand in disbelief. Then, he sighed. "We're a Committee," he corrected, clasping Naito's hand. "And the Momokyokai are yakuza, who help us out sometimes."
"Oh? So what do you guys do?" Naito asked.
"They're a vigilante group," Spanner replied. "Sho-chan told me all about it."
"We're not..." Tsuna tried to say. But thinking about it, yeah, they kind of were. They definitely beat up a lot of criminals, illegally. Kyoko had even learned to time the arrival of authority figures so that their group had time to get away. Narrowing his eyes, Tsuna compromised. "We're protectors," he said, with great dignity. "We protect the people and the peace of Namimori."
"That's... so cool!" Naito exclaimed. "So you're allies of justice!"
"I heard from Sho-chan that they toppled all the local gangs," Spanner added. "Those peach people were a gang, but they reformed and became allies of justice too."
Naito looked at Tsuna with stars in his eyes. "And you're the leader, even though you're just my age..." he mused. "I wish I was that strong."
"I'm not strong," Tsuna protested. "I just had lots of help and... A man has to fight to protect! That's why I've been able to do all this..."
If anything, Naito looked even more awestruck. "Tsuna!" he declared. "I promise on our (new) friendship that I'll follow your ideals! I'll become a man who protects!"
~.~.~
This was not, admittedly, all Tsuna's fault. Naito really was just like that. He liked to copy Kamen Rider poses and catchphrases, after all.
~.~.~
Tsuna would have thought that Naito's father, the mafia boss, wouldn't be too please with his son's sudden - literally, within a couple hours - turn to vigilantism.
He would have been wrong. Longchamp Sr. thought his son's sudden dedication to protecting the people and reforming their Family was charming. And also very manly.
Naito's father sent the Committee a fruit basket in gratitude.
He also sent them an all expenses paid group vacation to Mafia Land.
~.~.~
"A vacation would be nice," Kyoko said.
"You've got to be joking," Tsuna shook his head. "It's to Mafia Land! Mafia. Land."
"Just because it has such an un-extreme name doesn't mean we shouldn't go," Ryohei said.
"It sounds exciting!" Takeshi said brightly. "Besides, it might not even have anything to do with the mafia."
"This ticket is for an entire 'famiglia,'" Tsuna presented a counter point. "Famiglia. Mafia!"
"So we can bring the Momokyokai," Kyoko said reasonably, or not so much, really.
"Don't worry," Shoichi said. "Spanner told me about that place. It's neutral ground, and it's got a powerful protector who doesn't allow any violence or fighting."
"I'm staying in Namimori," Hibari said. Glancing at Tsuna, he smirked. "I'll make sure to keep the herbivores in line while you're gone."
Traitor. He just liked Spanner's special modified tonfas and wanted to test them out without anyone to stop him.
~.~.~
The Momokyokai's exuberant joy at being invited to Mafia Land didn't make Tsuna feel any better. The yakuza group's boss had actually groveled and hugged Tsuna's knees in gratitude for bringing them "into the big leagues."
However, there was no way to back out. Kyoko, also a traitor, had gone behind Tsuna's back and told Nana all about their vacation plans. In the face of his mother's excitement, Tsuna had been unable to do anything but sigh and nod.
And, well, he might get to see Kyoko in a cute sundress. Traitor or not, she was still the girl he liked.
For a while, it even felt like things were going well. The cruise there was mostly peaceful and pleasant. Naito met them at the dock and managed to completely bypass the usual entry requirements, talking the front desk lady into stamping their passes.
"Usually you have to do a test to show that you're a real mafioso," Naito whispered to Tsuna conspiratorially, "but there's not way I'd let an ally of justice like you be forced to do something like that!"
"...Thanks," Tsuna whispered back, his uneasiness quickly returning.
Of course, things couldn't go that smoothly, not in Tsuna's life.
As they were heading out of the visitor center, a thin man with slicked back hair and a mole under his eye sidled up to them and asked, "So which Family are you boys with? I'm from Beccio."
"Yo! 'Sup?" Naito greeted him. "I'm from Tomaso." In an almost uncharacteristic show of discretion, Naito didn't mention being the next boss. It seemed he was a mafia kid after all, and he knew how to play the game.
"I hear Tomaso has really been taking a new direction recently," Beccio's eyes narrowed, his smile taking on a shrewd edge. "Of course, we all know better to believe every rumor. I mean, there's talk of a robot army, of all things!"
Tsuna struggled not to make a face as he realized what was going on. It seemed that even on "vacation," some mafia members still tried to learn more about the competition and sniff out new info about other Families. No wonder the Beccio man was still wearing a suit, even on a tropical island.
"Yeah, we got one of those. It's great stuff," Naito agreed, making Beccio's laughter cut off sharply. "Our head mechanic got a lot of inspiration when we were in Japan."
"H-how unexpected," Beccio bleated. "I always heard the Tomaso were very... peaceful."
They were supposed to be cowards whose only ability lay in their business acumen and who couldn't fight except across a conference table.
The Tomaso had been the butt of many jokes among the mafia, ever since their third boss had fled the bloody mafia wars a century back and relocated his entire Family to England.
Those taunts had sadly persisted even as the Tomaso bought out almost the entire British Isles and became the largest crime syndicate across the channel through the power of cold, hard cash. Even rival gangs couldn't run if they had no food and no place to sleep, it seemed.
However, Naito's sudden interest in beating up anyone doing the wrong kind of business in their territory - and Spanner's terrifying willingness to supply his personal collection of robotic design attempts to assist him - had put a sudden, shocked halt to the jeering.
Longchamp Sr. had beamed with pride and wiped a tear from his eye when a gang who had just the week before been mocking the Tomaso came to beg for an alliance with their tails between their legs.
"Yeah, our third boss swore not to lose any more men to pointless power struggles," Naito continued, "but now we don't need to lose men, so it's all cool. We needed to give those things a test run anyway."
Beccio nodded dumbly.
"And it's all thanks to my friend here!" Naito added, dragging Tsuna closer. "He really opened my eyes. I couldn't have convinced Pops to give our R&D the money for all this if it wasn't for him! Our alliance is really going to bring about a new age for Tomaso!"
Grinning widely, Naito gave an exaggerated wink to Tsuna.
"A new age of justice and protecting the people!" he whispered. "We'll use our power for good!"
Fortunately, the Beccio representative was too stunned to notice this aside.
~.~.~
"Are you serious? Did Spanner really build a robot army?" Tsuna demanded as they wandered out into the amusement park.
Naito shrugged. "Eh. He already had them. Apparently, all those times he blew off work to go mess around in his private workshop, he was building new robot models. He just had to put some of those tasers on them, and voila! Mind you, some of them are pretty buggy, but we're getting a lot of good data. Actually, Pops is thinking of going into robotics seriously..."
Tsuna fought hard not to bury his face in his hands and cry.
The public announcement system crackled across the park.
"Your attention please," a pleasant female voice said. "Heads of the Difo Family and the Momokyokai yakuza delegations please report to the Mafia Fort immediately. Thank you."
"Difo Family? Oh, they're the biggest in Asia, I think," Naito mused. "Haha, they must have gotten into a fight! We better hurry or we'll all get kicked out."
Tsuna gave up, buried his face in his hands and sobbed.
~.~.~
"This is the Momokyokai boss? Heh, how fitting, an upstart kid for an upstart little group," the Difo boss sneered, his topnot bouncing as he jerked his chin up.
"I'm not the boss of Momokyokai," Tsuna said. "They're allies, and I was the one who invited them here."
"I knew these small fry weren't good enough to get into Mafia Land on their own," Difo smoothly took another angle of attack. "If you're responsible for them, then keep these rats in line, you got it? They've got no business messing with real mafia!"
"I'm sorry if we disturbed the peace in Mafia Land," Tsuna said, bowing a little. "I understand that everyone has come here to relax. I'll make sure no one causes any trouble."
"Leader! It wasn't our fault!" the Momokyokai boss protested. "These blowhards demanded we pay them protection fees!"
"You're overdue! Asia is our territory!" Difo puffed up. "Anyone who operates in Asia owes us a cut! You might have been too pathetic to be worth noticing before, but you've crawled out of your hole now and it's time to pay up!"
Naito whistled quietly. "Really? Trying that sort of thing in Mafia Land?" he muttered.
Tsuna kept smiling apologetically. "A cut?" he repeated. "How much? Ten percent? Fifteen?"
"Fifty," Difo bid ridiculously high. "We want fifty percent of your last operation's profits. And we'll be watching you from now on, so don't think you can skip out on future payments!"
"I see. Then, where should we deliver the payments?" Tsuna asked. He nodded along as the Difo leader provided a bank account. "Okay. As for our last operation... Here it is."
Rooting around in his backpack, Tsuna pulled out a mandarin and held it out.
"Huh? What kind of joke is this?" Difo demanded.
"Well, it's more like twenty percent. We got five of them, but we already ate the rest," Tsuna admitted. "That's the profit from our last operation. We helped Chiyo-san find her cats."
All seventeen of them.
"We'll be in touch," Tsuna added.
Oh yes, they would be. Shoicihi would certainly be in touch with their bank account - to empty it out toward charitable donations and follow the trail of money transfers to the rest of their accounts as well.
Drawing attention to yourself was dangerous, after all.
~.~.~
Notably, Tsuna never once explained what group he actually belonged to.
Rumors ran wild. Momokyokai were their allies, and so were Tomaso. They had a terrible sense of humor. They had an interest in robotics, or was it fresh produce?
They were based in Japan. They brought down the Difo Family within a week.
All anyone could agree on was that a new power was emerging in Asia.
~.~.~
By the time a little boy arrived in Namimori, impossibly massive book in hand, and asked for protection because they were "the group number one most likely to change the mafia," Tsuna had just sort of given up.
"So your name is Fuuta?" he confirmed.
"That's right," Fuuta said, peering up at Tsuna with his big, cute animal eyes. "And you're Sawada Tsunayoshi, the number one least able to refuse a request. Can I call you Tsuna-nii?"
"Okay," Tsuna said, grabbing Fuuta by the hand and pulling him into an alley.
"You're trapped now, you little..." one of the three mafiosi chasing them began to say, only to trail off as he took in the scene inside the alley.
Tsuna and Fuuta were there. So were a dozen members of the Momokyokai. They cracked their knuckles, advancing. "Picking on kids? You scum," the Momokyokai growled. "Don't you know this is our town? We won't let anyone disturb the peace in Namimori!"
Amidst the brutal beat down that followed, one of the Momokyokai members waved to Tsuna with a smile. "We've got this, Leader!" he called out.
"Thank you!" Tsuna called back, waving as well. He patted Fuuta on the head. "Come on, it's almost dinner time. You can stay at my house. Mom'll be happy to have you."
Fuuta hugged his ranking book happily. Coming to Namimori was the best decision ever.
~.~.~
Notes: You can see my utter and complete dedication to canon. *sarcasm*
~.~.~
