Summary: Vongola 15th is on the run. Since the Decimo generation's time Vongola had been causing chaos in the Mafia, upturning all the norms and traditions, not to mention defying the Vindicare and Cerevello, causing the two superpowers to love their hold on the mafia. Vongola Quindicesimo has known for a while someone is after him, but when he is attacked while hiding in Japan he needs to make a move to save his famigilia. First move, find his guardians. Contains OC. Collab fic.
"Speech in a different language, Italian (when in Japan), unless stated otherwise."
"Speech in country language (Italian- Italy, Japanese-Japan), unless stated otherwise."
Thoughts, non-verbal messages etc.
"Speech in V-writing language."
Vongola 15th
Chapter 2: Training
Koneko charged forward, her staff clenched tightly at her left side, sitting behind her left shoulder and ready for use. Her eyes narrowed in concentration as her target remained with his back to her. Her steps were fairly light, though she cursed slightly when a floorboard creaked under the ball of her right foot.
Distracted for a mere second, Koneko didn't notice her target spin around. When she did, it was too late.
Strong arms lashed out and pinned her staff to her side; trapping her shoulder under it. A leg stuck out at an angle to block her swinging left foot, and with a quick movement from her opponent's free hand she was on her back with his knee at her throat. She wheezed at the slight pressure on her ribs from where the rest of her opponent's weight was digging in before she started thrashing around.
Yoshi had gotten a handle on her again!
She glared up at the boy who pinned her, watching as his blank face morphed into a frown when she continued to struggle. When she kicked out, aiming for whatever piece of his flesh she could reach, he jumped back, landing gently on the floor three paces away.
Then he reached for his blindfold.
Koneko fumed as she watched her friend pull the black blinder off of his face. His eyes found hers instantly, and Koneko bristled when she caught sight of the disapproval, worry, and deep down in there, disappointment, swimming in his deep hazel eyes.
"You told me you had trained this week." He accused, though there was barely a tilt to his tone. "You said that you had trained with the girls."
Koneko glared at Yoshi, as if what he was saying wasn't true. "I did train, Yoshi." She gritted out, "You're just some kind of monster with this stuff."
Yoshi watched her for a moment, and Koneko could tell that he was saddened by her words. She wasn't the type to regret them though, because he still had that frustrating look of worry in his eyes. "I worked my ass off, so get off my back. You only beat me once."
"It'll only take once for a sniper, or a brawler, or any one of our enemies to get you, Koneko." Yoshi explained solidly, not letting Koneko's eyes drift as he knew they would. "It only takes a lucky hit or something like you charging in without thinking again for them to kill you." He elaborated.
"Yoshi shut-"
"You promised me you had trained." He interrupted her with a tone that had lost its usually hidden humour and instead had that tone that reminded Koneko of why people often flocked to Yoshi for leadership. "I hate to make you train, Koneko because you weren't born to be in this lifestyle, but when you promised me you'd be training enough with the girls to make up for our missed sparring, I felt okay about letting you miss a week for this tournament. But a tournament will never be worth your life."
"Whose fault is it that my life is in danger anyway?" Koneko snapped, letting her frustration at not only being beaten, but chastised too, get the better of her temper. "Whose fault is it that I have to train four times a week physically and the other three days train mentally? That's your fault Yoshimune, so don't you dare treat me like a child for wanting a fucking break once in a while."
When Yoshi's face didn't change and that infuriatingly worried look remained in his almost gold eyes, Koneko grabbed her staff and her clothes before storming out of the dojo that was hidden on the grounds of the shrine they trained on. She ignored her friend when he calmly called out to her, and ignored the painful silence when she didn't tell him when she'd be 'home' for dinner.
After all, she wouldn't be going to back to Yoshi's house that evening.
When Koneko walked into her house it was bright and clean, as it always was. There was the smell of a home cooked meal permeated the air as soon as she entered the door. It was a normal evening in her house; the only abnormality was her own presence there.
"So the little bitch finally drags herself home." Were the cruel words that greeted her, and Koneko let her face become blank as her father appeared from the living room.
"This little bitch does more than you'll ever do." She sneered, though it didn't reach her face.
Her father's eyes burned for a minute before it smoothed into a smirk as he saw a bruise on her shoulder, a training spar from a week ago. "O-ho, is that shitty boyfriend of yours getting a little rough?" He asked as he tugged on the collar of Koneko's shirt to bring emphasis to the yellowing bruise.
"Yoshi's not like that and you know it. These are from training."
"Pfft, training." He laughed, arms crossed over his chest. "More like stripping. How much did you and your whores make this time?"
"Says the bastard that can't keep it in his pants; should I tell mom that she has to come home to keep her little house-husband in line?"
Suddenly there was a palm across her cheek and her head swung around to the left, making her eyes stare at the wall.
"Know your place you little slut. I could swap out the locks while your away doing god-knows what with that little bastard who can't keep his mouth shut, but I don't. You always have a roof to have over your head for when that bastard finally gets tired of you, and you better be thankful. Get to your room; I don't want to see that stupid face of yours again."
Koneko just hiked her bag higher up her arm and stormed up to her room where and the scent of her favourite incense greeted her. She was furious. She was still furious at Yoshi, but she really didn't want to be at her house right now. She wanted to go home.
Yoshi's expression didn't change much as he walked home from the dojo, however his eyes and his overall aura seemed lost and he cursed himself internally for letting it happen. He didn't realise just how lost he was until his key slid into the lock and he opened the door to his apartment. He actually frowned when he noticed how dark it was in his house, seeing as no one had been in there since that morning when he and Koneko had left for school.
Throwing his bag on the couch, Yoshi walked into the kitchen where he threw on his favourite apron and started cooking. However, soon enough he had to turn the radio on, because the silence was both suffocating and thundering. He had to drown it out.
Yoshi put his face in his hand as he sat down to eat, frustrated at himself and at Koneko. He had made enough food for two people. Again. Because there were usually two people eating at the table.
Yoshi stood outside the house four streets over from his own, it was early morning and there were few people around. Those that were on the streets were mostly students and the majority of them were walking in groups, chatting comfortably about what was ahead for them in the day.
It looked so normal, and when a young girl walked out of the doors, her father smiling behind her it was even more normal.
"Have a nice day." His voice was pleasant, kind even.
"Yeah right, jerk."
Yoshi pushed himself off the lamppost he was leaning against, and as he came up beside the girl, intentionally getting between her and the man at the door, he let a cold expression surface on his face; a glare he usually kept under wraps for the men his famigilia interrogated.
"Good morning, Neko-chan." Yoshi mumbled when they were finally out of range of Koneko's father.
"What are you doing here, Baka?" Koneko asked suspiciously. Yoshi usually avoided her father at all costs; it was no secret that the two didn't like each other. "We usually meet at your house if I've gone home."
Yoshi shrugged and mumbled something about walking this way anyway. Koneko didn't buy it, but she didn't want to admit that she was happy to see her friend. She was still mad, but that was because she held one hell of a grudge and didn't want to admit that Yoshi may have been right all along.
Suddenly Koneko's stomach rumbled, breaking the silence between the pair. Yoshi would have sniggered at the blush running over her face if he didn't know the reason for the rumble.
"Ba-ka," Yoshi intoned, "you let him chase you out before you ate again didn't you?"
His eyes grew serious when his friend looked away, and had Yoshi been a weaker person, he would have scowled and snapped at the girl. Instead, he rummaged through his bag and pulled out two boxes, one smaller than the other. The larger one was Koneko's bento, a red box that Yoshi always filled for her each morning. The second was orange and smaller.
"I didn't let him chase me out. I just couldn't be bothered with the screaming." She sighed in resignation, but she accepted what would be her breakfast and lunch.
Koneko was still mad at him, because he had a habit of treating her either as a child, or as a useless girl. She admitted and knew she was weaker than him, but she was still stronger than a lot, if not most of the girls in their entire school. He had no right to treat her like she didn't know what she was getting herself into.
She had known for years now after all.
"Thanks." She mumbled behind the food in her mouth.
She didn't notice the relieved look on Yoshi's face.
Classes, as usual, were rather dull. Especially for Yoshi.
Ever since he was four, Yoshi had been conditioned and raised to take over Vongola. He had no siblings and no cousins so he was the sole heir. With his mother dead and his father still grieving, there was no one left to take over Vongola; Yoshi understood this and grew proud of it too.
He was heir to the largest, openly and accepted vigilante organisation in the world. Sure, he had to accept the Mafia ties his once and perhaps still dark famigilia was left with; but there were fewer now than earlier on in the famigilia's history.
Of course with conditioning came training and lessons that had fused into Yoshi's mind from a young age, and Yoshi could remember each and every lesson, from his father and tutors alike.
It's already been a month, how do you not understand Russian yet?
It's a partial fraction, Yoshimune. You've been at this level for far too long.
Now young master, that is not the proper way to drink coffee in the presence of another.
Sit up straight.
Better pronunciation, stop slurring your words.
No the answer is not Norway. Must we go over it again?
Your great grandfather must be rolling over in his grave if you think it was the twelfth generation to develop V-writings.
This ring will be your grave, son. You need to be able to hold it close to your heart without flinching from its power.
The dream blurred and rushed around Yoshi's mind, one word fell into the next until he felt a migraine coming on.
One downfall of having hyper intuition was overly vivid dreams.
Suddenly his intuition spiked enough to move his body without conscious thought, and Yoshi was next aware of a board eraser sitting in his hand; having been thrown at him from the front of the class.
Yoshi glared up at the teacher who had thrown the eraser at his head, and the man flinched back as a sleeping Yoshi, unbalanced by the memories in his dream, didn't have the capacity to ease the dangerous look out of his eyes or mask his face.
Yoshi then put his head back into his arms and went to sleep as if nothing had happened.
He woke up again at lunch when he felt Koneko approach his desk. She wasn't fuming as much as she had been earlier that morning, but he could tell that she was still angry at him and herself for the mistake yesterday.
He sighed under his breath as he got up, because it was a stupid reason to be so angry.
Fratello always said 'people can only grow from mistakes they accept; to be frustrated is normal, but wallowing in anger will only deteriorate your skills.' Yoshi just wished that Koneko would understand that.
The two travelled quietly to their usual eating spot in the furthermost corner of the picnic area, and half way through Yoshi spoke up. Feeling his insides churn in that happy way when he was doing something right.
"I think you need to start learning V-language, Neko." Yoshi's voice was suddenly sullen, and though she noticed it, the girl beside him ignored it
"Why would I need to do that, Baka-Yoshi?" She asked uneasily, sure she didn't have hyper intuition like Yoshi did, but being with him and training for so many years had taught Koneko to trust her gut; her gut was clenched into a tense spring. "We already speak Italian and Japanese, and I'm learning Russian like you asked. No one should know what we're talking about if that's what's worrying you."
Yoshi levelled his friend with a look stuck between being concerned that Koneko didn't feel what he was feeling, and contemplation of whether he was really feeling anything substantial at all.
"Ah, maybe you're right. I must be overreacting."
Koneko was going to argue, because Yoshi didn't look like he thought was overreacting at all. But her pride said that her friend was being overly cautious yet again; she had missed out on a lot of things growing up because of that tendency of his.
"Fratello did just phone you, warning you that not only the Yakuza, but the Triad were both moving in a strange way; it's natural to be worried. I would say you might actuallymake a good boss if you weren't such a Ba-ka."
Yoshi almost broke into a small smile at his friends' strange way of comforting him. "I'd call you a good right-hand if you weren't always PMS-ing." And Koneko could hear the smirk in her friend's tone of voice.
Their one sided argument turned into laughter as Koneko let out her pent-up stress and Yoshi allowed himself to chuckle softly. No one could notice his laughter besides Koneko, but that was fine.
"You really need to learn V-writings, Koneko." Yoshi sighed, happy though that the fight between them was over.
"Ah, I know. I will. But not today okay, we can start tomorrow." She was not mad anymore, she was just stubborn.
"Alright." Yoshi ruffled her hair and stood up just as the bell rang out for their last lesson. "Let's go."
It was walking home later in the evening that Yoshi felt that tell-tale shiver in the back of his skull. It always felt differently, and this one was telling him to get into Hyper Mode extremely quickly.
"Yoshi?" Koneko's voice was quiet but her demeanour had become closed off and suspicious as she noticed her friend deviate their course. Yoshi never diverted through the forest to get to his home; it was too suspicious and he had to keep up appearances to hide from the enemies and make himself out to be weaker than he actually was.
"We have company."
Suddenly bullets hit the floor, but Yoshi and Koneko were nowhere to be seen. Suddenly there were storm flames flying through the air in arcs and slashes towards the assailant, and he was hard pressed to dodge before they destroyed him.
"Shit, how did he find us?" Koneko swore as she glided above the tree line on one of the newer box weapons on the market; a storm-flame hover board designed from 1st-generation technology; a Vongola signature.
It was one of the only times that Koneko thanked some god that she wasn't born four generations earlier, when box weapon were rare and for the rich; Koneko had heard stories about even Vongola being at a disadvantage when their enemies had box weapon before them.
She couldn't see Yoshi, but Koneko knew that her friend was somewhere in the air already; ready to strike down with dire. Koneko just had to distract their enemy long enough for Yoshi to get a lock on them.
"You new generation are so painfully naïve." The enemy crooned as he sailed through the trees on lightning-flame boots. "You think your enemy can't learn a new language? It's not even a secret language." He laughed, "Especially Japanese, I am so disappointed in you children."
Koneko cursed herself in her mind, recalling her reluctance in learning V-language. True in the past maybe English, Italian, and Russian were the only languages popular and associated with the Mafia, or at least a Mafioso was likely to know at least one of those. In recent years, Japan was rising in the ranks of the mafia world as the country's yakuza started taking bigger and bigger steps into the dark world. Russian if anything was on a fall somewhat, as the climate changed for the worst and drove not just the mafia, but ordinary citizens as well into neighbouring countries such as Ukraine and Belarus whose own languages were used instead.
Koneko knew this, knew about Yoshi's intuition, and yet she ignored his foreshadowing comment about his stupid V-language because she wanted to be right for once.
Stupid, fucking me.
"Call us naïve once you've tasted our fists." The voice was detached and it seemed to echo from everywhere; making its origin seem nonexistent.
Koneko took it as a signal and charged towards the attacker who had shown himself by speaking. She didn't have any of her good box-weapons on her, but she did have a reinforced staff, and so she charged, forcing the attacker into an opening in the trees, directly into Yoshi's attack.
Yoshi knew many of Vongola's iconic attacks; X-Stream being his favourite and Zero-Point Breakthrough coming in a close second. He was the fifth in Vongola History to be able to use the attacks; his father and many of the earlier bosses hadn't used a fighting style compatible with the amazing techniques.
As the man sprinted away from the stream of Sky-flames burning from Yoshi's hands, he felt the tingle of his intuition mocking him for his actions; it was too easy. Just as his flames connected with skin Yoshi noticed Koneko spin around with a gun in her hands. He startled when he noticed this, because Koneko didn't like using her gun, she found it bulky and the recoil hurt her more than it was worth.
Oh fucking brilliant. It was never easy in Yoshi's strange famigilia.
It was a kind of avalanche of activity then, Koneko was dodging and swooping around on her flaming hover-board, and Yoshi had a hard time dodging with his gloves. They were an heirloom that matched both the Primo's and Decimo's gloves. The only difference being in the colour –which was a steely blue –and the numeral on the back which was missing.
They were separated in the hail of bullets and invading enemy bodies, which wasn't an issue given how they had trained, but it did mean that Yoshi's insufferable habit of worrying flared its head and left Yoshi rushing through the enemies.
Suddenly a hand lashed out from a tree and snagged Yoshi's collar, Yoshi felt his centre of gravity wrenched from its original position and he started falling to the ground before he could right himself.
His face felt the dirt as a weight pressed on his back, he first noticed the feeling of wide thighs then realised that the weight was not as heavy as he would have expected.
"Well, well, I didn't expect the Quindicesimo to be such a little cutie." The woman spoke a heavy language and her tone was angry. She accented her words by gripping Yoshi's nape, like a misbehaving mutt.
Yoshi felt frustration boil in his core at the realisation.
Before he could retaliate, Yoshi got his leg hooked underneath the woman's foot that was pinning his thigh, and with a heave that left him with a pulled tendon, they were flipping away from each other.
The woman was tall with wide shoulders and sloping curves, she was slim but Yoshi could see that she was conditioned to fight, and to fight well. Her dirty-blonde hair was pulled tightly to her scalp and her eyes were a grey that burned with ferocity and frosted cruelty.
"I didn't know such a well-endowed woman could be so ugly." Yoshi spat in German, his eyes hardening and his face smoothed out some more. The affect was lost though, as his face was still splashed in dust and scuffs.
They stared for a long time, Yoshi tried to keep his head in the game but it was difficult; he could hear the battle in the forest ahead of him, and he could practically feel the breathing of the enemies waiting up in the trees. His intuition was screaming at him; but fucking dammit, he knew he was screwed and that he was in danger.
Sometimes, sometimes Yoshi really, really hated his intuition with every fibre. It had no settings or filters; danger was danger and sometimes it got in the fucking way.
Then they struck, or that's what Yoshi would have liked to say, but he was forced into hand-to-hand combat with the stranger as she charged forward and lashed out with punches and kicks he could follow but only half block.
Yoshi felt each punch with a brutal clarity. He felt each hit and could feel the injuries inflicted; internally and externally. He smelt the sun flames and cursed as he tried to pull out and gain some distance.
He noticed mutely that Koneko was running in his direction, all her enemies falling away as her storm flames rushed through them. He grinned a little because he knew his Storm was strong. He had picked her after all.
Another chop rippled through Yoshi's side and he felt the explosion of his body's cells as Sun flames touched them. He cussed, but he could do nothing. He hadn't been this outmatched since he was nine; when his sorella fought him for the first time. Since then he was always either easily matched, or was never fought at full-strength. It was always training. Never battle.
Yoshi was weak. He was losing and that meant Koneko would be losing too.
Bullets hit the ground, cutting close enough to rip his clothes and draw blood in some places; but the tactic worked and the woman was thrown off of Yoshi as he gasped greedily for air.
"Yoshimune." A voice cut through the glade in perfect, deadly Italian, from the position where all the bullets had rained down, "I was told by your Fratello that you were better than this. I'm disappointed."
Just as Yoshi tried to stand using Koneko, who had just ran to his side, as leverage, another rain of bullets swarmed in by grazing just too close. He snapped his narrowed eyes up to the shooter, and he recognised the long, flowing black hair and feral smirk visible through the gloom of the trees.
"Now, now, you've shown me you're not strong enough to handle them so you and your damned girlfriend can stay there; it's my turn. So," the voice seemed to turn to the nervous enemies. "Let's get dangerous."
Dun, dun, duhhhhhh!
So, who is this new character? What are they here for? Can you reader's guess? If you do I'd be surprised, but I am curious as to who you think this person is.
So we hope you enjoyed this chapter, we've been getting good response on the first chapter and we appreciate everything you've said and the concerns you had; it's helped us to plot some more.
So please review and thank you for reading,
~~Bleach-ed-Na-tsu, Darkened Shadowed Dragon, and Hitomi Torng :3
