Ripples in the Sea of Time: Shark Tales by InsaneScriptist
Beta'd by the majestic Umei no Mai
Summary: Choices have consequences. Going to the past to destroy the future? Ambitious. Starting at twelve or so? Not impossible but unlikely. Good thing that Squalo's audacious enough for it.
Squalo ditched the motorcycle about half a mile away from the private academy he and a lot of other mafia-affiliated kids attended, taking care to wipe it with his sleeve to smear any fingerprints beyond recognition as any sensible person should after stealing and hotwiring a motorcycle; he even wiped the wires he had had to fiddle with to get it to start which tool a while out of thoroughness. This is why Squalo liked wearing gloves; didn't have to worry about shit like this.
His broken sense of time said it was somewhere after two, but not quite three in the morning when he did so. Anything more specific than that was out of the question; his inner time clock was busted and had been for ages. The Varia knew not to trust Squalo's estimates on how long things would take; 'a while' could be anywhere from a few minutes to half a day but he'd get around to everything eventually. Which was the point of being non-specific about how long things might take, because Squalo knew he'd never get it right. His asshole Boss had never let him forget the one time he had been over a week late getting back after a mission, but that's what happened when a blizzard made ground travel impossible for a few days and then another one grounded air traffic.
It was still full-dark out by the time he approached his childhood and technically still his current home. Maybe it was three in the morning? The walk there went about as expected and was utterly dead quiet due to absolutely nobody else being out and about, as he didn't get lost since he knew the streets pretty well even if he passed most of them on the way to and from school; few places had very capable exterior cameras at this point, being that even in the mafia visual surveillance was pretty shitty in the 90s. It was just a long-ish walk and all the street-lights were out since this was technically a rural area, so they went out at midnight and didn't come back on again until four in the morning. His day had been trying enough, the sort of enough that made him think breaking in would be a good idea, except there were all kinds of sensors on the windows and doors, so going in through the front was honestly the best idea. Yes, he could bypass the security, but that was a bit more trouble than it was worth when it would mean getting asked 'how did you get past the motion detectors?' and other important and potentially embarrassing questions.
So Squalo gave the door guards his most intimidating stare and was let in with a minimum of fuss; Squalo probably shouldn't have threatened them by saying he'd cut them off at their knees if they didn't hurry up, but he blamed sleep deprivation. Sleep deprivation was known to make people irritable and Squalo had a lot of things to be annoyed at. More so than the usual twelve year old. Fuck, he was twelve and thought of himself as a thirty-something year old assassin. Thirty-three, he realized upon doing the math while walking through the house.
Squalo shucked off his shoes once he was in his room, pulled off the school uniform he had covering his 'spare' clothing then removed that too. His alarm clock said it was a glorious twenty-two minutes before four a.m. Not exactly an ideal time to go to bed if he wanted to go to Mass… he locked his door, put a chair under the handle at an angle to keep it closed and then fell into bed. Secure as he was going to get on short notice.
He'd wake up later and deal with the consequences of his actions today then. Yesterday. Because the most unfortunate part of being twelve was that adults did actually have nominal power over him, no matter how dumb or lacking in sense they might be.
He woke up at seven thirty eight according to his alarm clock, when he glanced blearily at it.
Then he decided it was too early and went back to sleep.
Squalo woke up buried under blankets and with the vague pressure that said he needed to use the bathroom.
He poked his head out from the blankets, looked at the alarm clock again and figured that nearly two in the afternoon meant it was time to get up. A quick visit to the bathroom saw his bladder relieved and a shower had him clean of yesterday's muck. The shower was refreshing and reminded him that he actually did have a flesh and blood left hand now. He had gotten so used to ignoring odd sensory input from a variety of prosthetic left hands and had been so focused on his 'mission' to see Donna Aria that he had ignored the fact he had both his flesh and blood hands. Admittedly seeing Donna Aria was a bit higher up on his priority list than marveling over having a hand again, if only because one of the potential dangers of having his mind sent back so far was that it would stress his brain, possibly to the point of seizures and death if Donna Aria didn't do her Arcobaleno magic.
He went back to his room, dressed and then stripped the sheets he had previously been sleeping in for the maids to launder, along with the clothing he had worn yesterday. He grimaced as he realized that yes, people had permission to be in his room uninvited and might have stripped the bed anyway after he left the room for any length of time like when he was at school. It felt like a violation of boundaries, because snoopy people existed and so privacy didn't. He did even have basic traps in his room!
Squalo then took a deep breath because this room wasn't his room at the Varia where he had lived for nearly twenty years with all the personalization inherent in that. Fuck, his things were gone, to possibly be collected again some time in the future but what was in this room was also 'his.'
His room here and now didn't have too much he was really attached to in it. There was his clothing, his school books and so on; the typical things every person had, since it looked like Rossella had picked up his school books from where Squalo had ditched them at school and brought them home for him. There were a few things that were common in the mafia but would have been out of place in a normal child's bedroom; a few handguns, some ammo and so that were hidden but still accessible because 'civilian' as his parents were, that didn't mean they were unaware or defenseless, just not informed of specifics and so not worth bothering with except as hostages or as part of a statement of total war between his famiglia and another. Then there were the various real and practice blades and the cello, which were replaceable no matter the sentimental value. So not really a privacy concern as he didn't have anything to hide at the moment but the lack of security was still appalling.
Yes, he could sleep, had demonstrably managed to do so, but he did like having his own personal space where he wasn't to be bothered, not even by well-meaning maids. The Varia and adulthood had spoiled him that way. Maybe he could broker a deal so his room was exclusively his concern, cleaning included?
It would probably have to wait a bit. His parents and Rossella had no reason to give what looked to them like a brat acting out any additional privacy; that would make it look like a reward for bad behavior. Maybe ask in a week or so after his mother was back? She wasn't gone that long this time according to memory.
Even if he might have to do extra cello practice for it -actually, the cello was probably the most valuable and portable object in the room. Yes, the various blades he had did have value, but they were more of a specialty item with a much more limited -mostly for collectors and those interested in the sport or violence of the blade- market than a cello in fine condition. He hadn't touched one since he cut his hand off in preparation for fighting Tyr a few months after he had turned fourteen, but that didn't make him appreciate any less the amount of skill needed to play some pieces of classical music. The Soave were pretty big on music, but it wasn't Squalo's passion. He had liked the cello the most out of all the musical instruments his mother had pushed towards him, so he had kept at it. That while practicing he hadn't been bothered by Otario was also a bonus. One which no longer mattered though, since his brother was dead and been so for years now. Still had been a reason he chose the instrument.
Would he still be able to play the scales? Or the more challenging pieces? That idea was ruined by the growling of his stomach. He would play better without hunger distracting him.
One meal of leftovers from a lunch that Rossella and one of her assistants hadn't finished washing up after yet, a scolding he ignored in favor of food and a chair blocking his door from opening later, Squalo had his answer to the question of 'could he still play the cello?'
The answer was in theory, yes. He had surprised himself by being able to remember the fingering, the chords and so on for all the scales with little prompting. He wasn't fluent at them, but muscle memory seemed to be an odd thing as he gained that back in short order. Maybe because it was stored in the body as much as in the brain? A few dry runs of which fingers went where before he had even attempted to take the bow to the strings helped him refine vague memory into something more solid. Then he took the bow to it and played a simple scale; accurate enough so yes, he could play but the lack of practice would show to experienced ears, just as clearly as it did to his. Clearer even. Another run through of the scale showed obvious improvement, so it wouldn't be so bad. Music practice was not his favorite thing, more of something he had done to make his mother happy and to get some privacy.
Maybe he could ditch music classes once he had skipped his last year of middle school? He didn't manage that in high school last time and he still had some time before he 'graduated' middle school. A couple of months before it was summer and he could really focus on other things. Being recently twelve sucked and school wouldn't be out until the beginning of June. It was only April after all...
So the question became, sword practice which he enjoyed and needed to do to make sure he had adjusted to his twelve year old body or practice an instrument that he had no intention of truly continuing with.
Who was he trying to fool? He'd choose the sword every time.
Sunday evening had him getting a reminder about his homework and to get ready for dinner, so Squalo stopped his series of lunges for some cool-down exercises and stretching. Stretching was probably the most important part after some exercise, along with staying hydrated and a quick but hot shower to wash off all the sweat although a bath would be best for soreness. Yes, he'd eat soon enough, but for now preventing cramps and taking steps to reduce soreness were key. He was still growing after all.
The food was fine, his father showed up for the meal and said absolutely nothing useful; just little things that were annoying him at work and generally, which currently included his wife running off to visit a friend. Strange, as Squalo thought his mom usually went off to visit cousins on the Soave side of her family who lived vaguely locally, since her immediate family was over in Canada. Somewhere in his father's tone was a hint of personal offense and injured pride; if Squalo heard him right, his father was implying that his mother was sleeping with someone else. That was...
Squalo wasn't so blind to think his mother was perfect, but that sounded like projecting. It was a subtle sort of implication that Squalo was certain he would normally have missed until post-puberty and the first time around he had carved himself a place in the Varia and been settled for years by then, not visiting his father at all and not really talking to him either. His father was a Rain, if one of a Sunny bent, so that explained the libido; that his father was a pathetic example of a loving husband was his own problem. After all, what sort of 'loving husband' slept around on their wife with multiple people? Their marriage wasn't even arranged, so having a mistress wasn't anywhere close to socially acceptable even among the mafia since he remembered being told his parents getting together had been due to a summer romance; a mistress on the side was far less acceptable for those that were civilian on a technicality. It had happened or would happen before they had divorced, but it was very difficult to not think of his father as anything other than human trash right now.
So dinner was endured, homework he hadn't already finished off was completed and he ditched music practice in favor of humoring his baby sister and then humming to Delfina until she was asleep. He should probably stop using France's national anthem as a lullaby, but one of the Varia mooks had been humming it and he got it stuck in his head prior to having his memories sent to the past.
He could try and get in more sword practice, but he would have to get cleaned up again afterwards and honestly his muscles were tired and parts of him were well-stretched, more so than they'd been when he was first twelve. Different sword styles required more or less work, depending on the blade and the style, but some of them required flexibility and there was no reason not to train in that too. Since he had the time and his body was young enough to take it with relative ease.
So the choice narrowed down to bed or play the cello in the name of practice.
Bed won. Best to try and get his sleeping schedule looking like he was attempting normal sleep patterns.
Monday saw Squalo sitting through another day of classes, and honestly he had forgotten how boring some of his classes were. Yes, there was some 'new info' in the classes, but mostly to Squalo that meant said information was so utterly pointless that he failed to remember anything about this or that the first time around. Still solid facts and what not, just not important to an assassin or someone that was ruling the Varia. He was completely confident he did not need that information in later life.
Some classes were even worse than that, like the class of draftsmanship, which was pointless if historical; soon people would be doing this on the computer with ease. It was just that the current civilian computer and system was probably 'dumber' than most basic phones that would be developed within the next decade or so. Those classes sometimes had stuff that was nice to know generally and possibly fun for making conversation, but useless for his eventual profession. Fuck, Windows '95 hadn't even come out yet, so Squalo knew he'd fail to be enthused about such classes when they appeared on his schedule.
Draftmanship, computers and so on were not the only classes that were useless to him as he was now, as another language class proved. German wasn't his favorite language, but it had its selling points. The compound words were fun. The class itself was less relevant to his eventual goal as it seemed like the teacher had assigned an entire chapter's worth of homework, plus pages in the workbook. That was the problem when you had the language only twice a week and the teacher wanted to make sure you knew it; hours and hours of work to plod through afterwards.
He blitzed through it in the small break period they had, if only because he didn't want to hear or deal with a teacher complaining that he wasn't paying attention to the lesson. Then there was a short period of 'Civic Studies' which was all historic mafia politics, trade policies like the Vongola's Rules of Business and so on. Basic and not so basic overviews of history and how to look like a boring yet mostly-law-abiding citizen to any government agency that might throw a cursory glance in your direction. Nobody was fully law-abiding so leaving something minor like tax avoidance or traffic fines for them to notice was less suspicious than having a completely clean record.
His last class of the day was history. Local history, but not local mafia history as that was called 'Modern History' since 'Mafia History' would draw far too much suspicion; although most 'mafia history' taught in school was censored propaganda to some degree or another with just enough reality to be plausible, barring a few specific topics. Most of the 'true' history didn't leave the famiglia it pertained to. History had been boring and the homework wasn't as heavy a load as it could have been. So really his homework was reduced to 'not going to bother with' for the draftmanship -utterly useless shit- and history, which he could probably do part of on the ride home, since it was mostly reading in preparation for questions being asked in class next lesson. Civic Studies had some homework, but mostly review stuff for a test on Thursday.
Even with living in a house close by, being picked up and dropped off was part of an image thing; it meant either your parent didn't have to work or could afford the help and expense to have someone else do so. Rossella generally rode passenger, as whoever was driving tended to change up on occasion as a point of reference for the security people -because a private trade school had security obviously. As a precaution. To reassure all those wealthy paranoid parents paying for their babies' education.
He recognized the driver though, so not a big deal even if he'd rather drive himself. Because this whole 'security business' here was terrible; how had someone not taken advantage of the holes here? Even just to snipe a few people? He suppressed a shiver at the thought but hated that he'd have to go through this business for the few months, at least. Then there would be high school, but he had a summer to 'learn how to drive' a moped despite not technically being allowed to until he was fourteen and convince someone that he could take himself to and from school. His father was more likely to agree there than not, which would probably set off another fight or six.
He obviously hadn't thought the whole 'twelve' thing through properly, because all these restrictions based on age and so on were bullshit. So he tossed his books in the backseat, climbed in and started reading. A few pages now were a few less later, before he would have to write the stupid paper.
The trip took minutes, as expected, as most of the time was spent leaving the academy grounds as people ahead of them turned onto the road as the other kids walked across the drive with absolutely zero regard for traffic. Then once 'home' they were let in through the gate and went up a bit in the drive towards the front door.
The blue '69 corvette with white racing stripes in the drive was far less expected. He knew that corvette.
What had prompted his grandpa to visit?
And why was his father's vehicle still here? Shouldn't he be at work?