Merry Christmas! Here is a slightly early present.

Please leave a review.

Summary: She has always envied the clouds. (Or: In which dreams are fulfilled in the most peculiar ways and a young girl gets reincarnated as the future Cloud Arcobaleno.) [SI, Self-Insert/OC-Insert as femSkull]

Enjoy


''Hello.'' The main language will be from now on French.

''Hello.'' Foreign language. (In this chapter Croatian.)


Nobody Sees Me Wishing

Chapter 4

I Saw My Dreams All Die

.

.

.

Where Pandora's Box Was Opened


perennial (adj.) lasting or existing for a long or apparently infinite time; enduring or continually recurring.


X.


''Where are we going, Tata?'' Asked Anja as she took a tight hold of Filip's thin jacket.

It was late spring and they had just arrived at their newest rented grounds in Italy. Instead of helping the other members of the 'Lanterne Française', her father had immediately picked her up from the ground once he was sure that their baggage was taken care of and was now carrying her away from the place she considered to be her home.

Adjusting his hold on her, Filip rubbed his daughter's back reassuringly. ''To the market. It's open only until 5 o'clock, so if we don't go now, we will miss it.''

''The market?'' She scratched her head in apparent confusion. ''What's so special about it? Can't we just go tomorrow?''

''Ne, ne.'' He widened his eyes dramatically, smiling all the while in amusement. ''Giuseppe's there only once a week. If we don't go today, we might not get any of his mandarins.''

More than slightly confused over why they had to buy exactly these mandarins and not just those that would be available tomorrow, Anja pushed a strand of her loose hair behind her ear and closed her eyes in contemplation. ''We could just get some mandarins from another vendor. I'm sure this Giuseppe isn't the only one selling them.''

''And betray Giuseppe's trust in us? Never, my dearest Anja.'' He paused, pushing her against his chest a little harder. ''We could never do something so horrid. Besides, no one sells mandarins as good as those of our Italian friend.''

It all sounded like one of those ridiculous adds in the future. Anja had once seen one on the TV that claimed she should be a queen and clean her own home of all things. As if a queen would ever clean anything by herself. Her point in this, however, wasn't that cleaning products had illogical and stupid advertisements, but that they just did not offer any real and good arguments for why people should buy them.

Filip had just done the same. He had told her that Guiseppe's mandarins were the best and that was why they would be buying them. What exactly they were the best in was never mentioned.

Her father must have seen his daughter's irritation over this on her face because he smiled placatingly. ''The taste, moje sunce, none mandarins I've ever eaten tasted as good as those of Giuseppe. The price might be a little high, but they are worth it.''

''Are they very sweet? Because if they are, then I probably won't like them.'' Anja scrunched up her nose.

Narrowing his eyes, he almost slipped on the damp ground. His gaze immediately strayed from her and focused on the ground, but his mind stayed on the matter at hand. ''How do you know? I don't think you've ever eaten mandarins before.''

''Well,'' She almost cringed before she finally continued speaking, ''I tried them once when we were in the Soviet Union.''

This wasn't the first time the Croatian girl had used knowledge from her previous life and applied it to this one. Neither was it the first time she had claimed to like or dislike food Lubanja had never tasted.

And she knew that Filip was catching all those small slips of her tongue and if she did not start controlling herself better soon, Anja might blurt out something detrimental in the future. The girl did not want him to find out the truth about her. Did not want to be shunned by her own father.

(...and she did consider him as such after more than seven years in this world...)

Fortunately, Filip did not question her any further. Perhaps it was because he believed her or it might have been that he did not think that it was necessary for him to know the truth—After all, what secrets could his soon to be eight years old daughter have?—but Anja truly appreciated the change of topic when it came.

''We could go to the beach tomorrow. It's wonderful there, you know.'' His voice was tinged with nostalgia. ''When we were younger, your mother and I would often go there. Here in Italy, it's where I proposed to her.''

Anja remembered the sea and its salty smell. Even now she could still recall the endless tracks her wheelchair left behind in the sand. She could remember sitting on the shore with her sister. Small waves had lapped at their feet.

Anja could not remember how the water had felt against her skin. She had been unable to feel it.

''Isn't that a tad cliche?'' Asked the small girl to distract herself from unwelcome thoughts.

''Cliche?'' Filip looked down at her with slightly furrowed eyebrows. ''There was nothing cliche about my proposal, I will let you know. Victoria used to say that it was one of my most romantic gestures for her.''

''Well, then you're probably not much of a romantic.'' The giggles that erupted out of her mouth after she uttered that sentence could not have been stopped no matter how hard she would have tried. Her father's completely scandalized expression made the whole thing only more amusing and turned her soft giggles into a loud and cheerful laughter.

The Croatian man sighed in mock exasperation. ''You're lucky that you're my daughter, otherwise I might have felt just 'a tad' insulted.''

The female Croatian tried to force a serious expression onto her face, though she failed miserably.

''Don't even try to apologize.'' He reached out for her hand and put it above his evenly beating heart. ''It won't save my bleeding heart. Besides, there is not enough time for that now anyway. We've finally reached the market.''

Due to their soft banter, Anja had not noticed the thickening crowd around them. That had probably been her father's objective. The man knew how uncomfortable she felt with so many people surrounding her.

And there truly were a lot of people there. It was almost as if the whole city had gathered there for some last minute shopping. Men and women walked through the streets and stopped at the different stalls to purchase their groceries. Most of the vendors did not sell a wide variety of goods, choosing to focus on things like vegetables or fruits instead. Not too far away from them was a man selling meat and next to him another one trying to promote his fishes.

Only a handful of stalls did not have any food in their repertoire. A woman on her right was arranging the few remaining textiles on a table and shouting commands at what looked to be her daughter.

''Giuseppe!'' Filip shouted while waving the hand that wasn't holding her against his chest. Surprisingly, a middle-aged man managed to hear her father's exclamation over the loud chatter of the crowd. The Italian turned his head towards them and grinned brightly.

Her father's friend was a slight man with graying hair and darkly tanned skin. He was missing one of his front teeth which made him speak with a lisp. Giuseppe's most striking feature were his pinkish eyes. Their color was very fair and stood out against the tan of his skin.

He also seemed to only know Italian. The man spoke very rapidly in the foreign language while Filip listened attentively and nodded his head at the right moments.

To Anja's surprise, her father was also proficient in Italian. The Croatian answered the other man's questions slowly with no discernible accent. When the time came to introduce her, the girl only understood her full name and the mention that she preferred being called 'Anja'. Or at least she hoped that was what Filip told his friend.

After taking some money from one of his customers, the man turned his head to the side so that he could regard her properly. ''Sono Giuseppe.'' He ruffled her hair, picking a mandarin from a crate. Then he removed his hand from her head and thrust the fruit towards her. ''Per te, piccola Anja.''

She might not have spoken any Italian, but that did not mean that she did not understand what he had said. It did not take a genius to guess that. As such, Anja took the ripe mandarin and smiled thankfully. ''Grazie?''

Her thanks sounded more like a question than anything else and she had probably butchered the pronunciation dreadfully as well, but the man did not seem to mind at all. He just returned her smile tenfold and uttered a quick what she guessed to be 'You're welcome'.

Later, on their way home when Anja was forced to walk because Filip's hands were occupied by two crates full of mandarins, the young girl started peeling her gift. She let the peels fall onto the ground and then almost hesitantly put a piece of the mandarin between her teeth.

A mixture of sweetness and sourness exploded inside her mouth. The heavenly taste shocked her momentarily and as she watched the smug expression Filip sent her way, Anja realized that her father truly did know what he was talking about.

Never before had she tasted such a good mandarin.


XI.


They did not go to the beach the next day. It took Filip more than a week to convince the circus director to let them go during a work day. And even then they had to be back for the evening show.

The ride to the coast was both interesting and tiring. Italy's landscape was beautiful, but gazing at it got boring pretty quickly. Holding onto her father for a few hours while they drove up and down mountains was something she was used to, however, that did not mean that she enjoyed it. At the end of their journey, Anja's arms felt as if they might fall asleep due to how hard she had been holding on to her father.

Seeing the sea for the first time in this new life was well worth whatever pain she might have felt.

(...No, it truly wasn't...)

It was a windy day. The waves were crashing loudly against the sandy beach as a few couples walked along the coast while holding their hands. Stormy clouds hung above the endless ocean with a promise of spring rain. Anja had to forcefully stop herself from ripping her hand out of her father's hold to run down the few stone steps leading to the beach.

Not for the first time the girl wondered how the fair sand would feel against her feet.

''How about some ice cream?'' Filip asked while checking his small leather wallet for some coins. What he found seemed to be satisfactory because he nodded his head resolutely. Afterwards the young man pointed at a nearby ice cream parlor with his left pointer finger.

Although, like most children, Anja loved eating sweets, she did not want to miss the opportunity to explore the beach. From the looks of it, rain would come soon, so they did not have the whole day to wander around outside. For now, Anja just wanted to fulfill one of her less significant dreams. Food was something they could get later. ''No, I wanna go to the beach first.''

The look he sent her way seemed to question her sanity because since when did sweets stop being a child's top priority?

''Lead the way then,'' he muttered after scratching the back of his head. ''Just don't get too wet. It's too cold outside for that today.''

And then he let go of her hand and Anja was suddenly racing down the uneven and coarse stone steps until she finally reached the fine sand of the beach. It felt softer than the stairs but it was still pretty rough. Some small grains of sand got stuck between her toes and she had to wiggle them to lessen the unpleasant sensation.

For no other reason than to see how it felt, Anja pushed one of her feet into the sand, getting it buried in the process. Almost immediately the girl started regretting her action because the deeper she went the colder and damper the sand was.

She retracted her foot and put it onto the other one to slightly warm up its cold toes.

A low chuckle reached her ears as Filip lowered his hand on her shoulder. ''The water is even colder.''

Normally, such a statement would have stopped her from pursuing her next goal. Anja hated the cold and while she did not mind laying down in the snow during winter, that was only because she wore several layers of clothing on such occasions. Taking a dip in the cold sea was something she generally considered as a no-go when it wasn't warm enough outside, but this had been one Eliza's dreams.

The dream to feel the cool waves lapping at her feet. To stand on the wet sand and maybe to even run on it.

And so she did just that. The girl ran forward, straight into the water and then down the beach. After a while the shocking cold stopped bothering her and only joyous laughter could be heard in her wake. Anja ran and laughed and ran some more, Filip watching her with a content smile all the while.


XII.


It ended like this: They were driving back home after eating too much gelato when it started to drizzle. To protect her front from the cool droplets of water, Anja leaned heavily against her father's back and tightened her grip around his waist. The road they were driving on was very narrow and had many turns. Mountains grew in front of them and occasionally another vehicle would drive past them.

At some point—she did not now how or when exactly—the motorbike swerved to the left and the next thing that Anja knew was that she was falling...

...her grip around Filip loosening and body tipping to the side...

...

...tires screeched loudly as someone screamed in fear...

...

...

...She must have blacked out for a few minutes because the next time she opened her eyes, Anja was laying on the dirty road. Her whole body hurt and her eyes stayed out of focus. Something wet was dripping down her temple and onto the road...

...

...Anja couldn't move...

...

...The young girl just laid on the road, her head throbbing and hands desperately trying to move upwards. Panicked breaths escaped her lips and tears started to flow down her cheeks because of how familiar this situation was.

Her spine, there was something wrong with her spine.

Sobs jostled her whole body as the taste of blood trickled into her mouth. Was this how she was going to die again?

Black spots appeared in her vision and Anja despaired...

...

...she did not want to die again...

...

...she did not want to start over or perhaps risk not receiving another chance at all...

...

...

...in all of her rather unimpressive twenty-four years of live, Anja had never truly lived. The girl had not managed to achieve any of her dreams yet and she could not fathom losing her most likely last chance to do so...

...

...Anja could not, no, would not die. Especially not in such a horrible and familiar way...

...

...

...More than anything else, Nina Lubanja Filipović wanted to live.

Something inside of her shifted at that thought. A gate seemed to open and then purple filled her vision.

Out of nowhere, Anja burst into flames.


XIII.


Skull's story begun like this: There was an accident that revealed a horrible truth. Flames that danced across her body and healed injuries that most would consider to be lethal. The pain caused by the healing was worse than the injuries themselves. Once her spine was finally mended, the girl was forced to push a rib back into her body, otherwise her injuries would have healed with a bone still protruding out of her stomach.

Anja blacked out once again only to wake up a few minutes later with an almost fully healed body and the realization of where exactly she was.

She stood up on shaky legs and walked over to the lump that might have once been her father.

Filip was partly trapped under his motorbike, one of his arms missing and skull cracked open.

Anja did not know whether she should cry or laugh hysterically at the irony that had become her life. Minutes ago she had been forced to relive her worst nightmare. She had been close to dying or becoming an invalid once again, only to realize that none of it would happen because she had been reborn into the world of Katekyo Hitman Reborn as the female version of a character that was known for his immortality.

Skull de Mort.

The girl would have liked to pretend that none of this was true. That she was just seeing things that weren't real. However, there were to many happenstances that confirmed her theory.

She had purple hair and purple eyes which even in this world were considered as unusual colorings. There was also her connection to the stunt-business and her name that literally translated into 'Skull'. Last but not least, she had just burst into purple Flames that seemed to make her immortal.

Neither Eliza nor Anja had ever been fond of denial, so girl quickly managed to come to a conclusion.

Skull de Mort. She was the female version of the Cloud Arcobaleno.

Falling to her knees, Anja tried and failed to bite back a sob. She reached out for the still attached hand of her father and squeezed it in hope of receiving a reaction.

Filip did not move and Anja could not stop herself from screaming in utter despair.