A/N: I've been meaning to mention this for quite a while now, but I keep forgetting, so here we go. Timeline: Eyeshield 21: post Christmas Bowl, (Deimon victory,) officially AU now; considering the current story arc. Katekyo Hitman Reborn: post Ring arc, pre-Ten Year Later arc, ('Cuz I really don't know where that's going.)
I own neither ES21 nor KHR!
Thank you to my original beta, Shinnie the Meanie, who has started helping me with chapter nine already
And also to my new Beta, Mithras151. Without Mithras acting as a demon editor, I might still be messing around with my outline rather than having a whole chapter ready for you all.
--
Aki sulked in the public restroom-turned-changing room, waiting on his Nihon teammates. Seeing as the stadium boasted no changing rooms, the Machine Guns commandeered the local park's restroom. Not quite as glamorous as owning a whole semi-truck, but it worked. As he waited, he lit up a cigarette and slouched against the back wall.
He was still a little pissed that the fucking Vongola brat got his ass kicked out of the God-damned game, but the nicotine fix wasn't to calm him down from that. It was to sooth the nerves he was feeling knowing that his boss would be walking in any moment. If he was lucky, he'd just get his ass kicked.
The door slammed open and Aki jumped ever-so-slightly. Not that he'd ever admit it. Fortunately, it was only that little receiver, what-his-name, number 89.
"How'd it go out there?" Aki deigned to ask.
What's-his-name turned around to look his upperclassmen in the eye. Aki wasn't one to jump at shadows, but the fire in his teammate's glare before he averted his eyes clearly blamed his senpai.
"We did alright after you punched that kid. But after he got back up, we got murdered."
Had Aki been less of a man, he'd shuddered at #89's word choice.
"By the way, there's some blond kid waiting for you outside. I think he was the quarterback."
This time, Aki couldn't force himself to repress the tremor. Kid was fuckin' creepy, playing at the devil all the time.
With hands that were in no way trembling, Aki retrieved and lit a fresh cigarette. After #89 finished talking he changed silently. As Aki breathed in lungful after poisonous lungful of his nicotine addiction, he calmed down to the point that he could think more clearly. Number 89 had always been an asshole. He was probably just messing with him.
"Hey, Aki-kun! There's this weird kid with dreads waiting for you outside!" That one kid, #42 yelled, as he walked in.
Aki dropped his cigarette. Casually, he moved his foot to crush it out, as if that had been his intention the whole time. As he moved to salvage his dignity, he took the time to look over #42; the dumbass who lost the ball at the start of the game. Yeah, that bastard had a sick, sadistic gleam in his eye. He was probably working with #89 to fuck with him.
"Whatever," he growled and looking away, as if he'd lost interest in #42's continued existence.
Finally, #34, that running back kid who fucked up the first scoring drive meandered in with most of the rest of the team. With one noticeable exception.
"Where's the boss?" Aki questioned.
#34's eyes were alight with unholy glee. "I don't know, Aki-san. But there is that one kid from Oujou, you know, the one what was Tokyo's MVP last year? The one with the trident tackle? Yeah, he's waiting for you too!"
"Tch, what the fuck ever. I'm waiting for the boss." The lineman hissed.
Slowly, the makeshift locker room cleared out until it was just Aki and his cigarettes again. He checked his watch again. When he looked up, he saw three distinct silhouettes in the door way. 'Well, shit.' He slowly dropped his cigarette and crushed it out. He carefully shrugged his shoulders, and menacingly cracked his knuckles. 'Looks like the boss won't have to get his hands dirty.' He snorted sardonically.
-/-/-/-
"Sena-senpai lives here?" Gokudera asked.
Tsuna gave him a curious look, "Yeah, since before I was born, I think. Why?"
"It's a pretty big house, for Japan," Gokudera grunted and reached for the gate; only to pull back in surprise when it opened from the inside.
"Sawada. You're EXTREMELY late!! You and your friends are the last ones here!" Ryohei thundered.
"Eheh, we kinda got a little lost when the paparazzi were chasing us; if we didn't have Juumonji-senpai with us…" Tsuna trailed off. "Wait! Onii-san!? How did you get here?!"
Ryohei frowned a little, "Well, after you forgot about us, Mihae-san was kind enough to invite us over. She said that Sena-senpai would want us to hang out with him after the game." He turned around and led them inside.
"Sena-senpai is really EXTREME! He beat us here with his FIGHTING SPIRIT even though we took the train! It was really cool, but your friend Yamamoto and the other lineman suffered for it, Sawada," Ryohei reached down and exchanged his shoes. "He and Sena-senpai's friend have been napping this whole time. Well, I guess Sena-senpai's friend woke up a bit ago, but it sounds like they've done some harsh training, to the EXTREME!"
"You should have seen it!" Kuroki grumbled from the couch, "It looked like he was dragging two corpses behind him."
While he sounded upset, his eyes were dancing with glee.
'Probably with all the teasing opportunities this opened up,' Tsuna reflected.
"Um, where is Sena-nii?" Tsuna asked after a quick scan of the living room yielded no older brothers.
"He's up checking on your friend, he was MAX exhausted and passed out when we got here." Monta chirped from the other end of the couch.
"Up where?" Juumonji asked curiously.
"Up in Sena-kun's room, of course, Kazu. Where else would both he and that baseball kid be?" Toganou said with a hint of a smirk. "Oi, why don't you go fetch him, so that we can find out the game plan, so to speak."
"What am I? Your messenger boy!?" Juumonji raged.
"Umm… I'm going up to check on Yamamoto and talk to Sena-nii anyway…?" Tsuna trailed off, leaving the offer open to interpretation.
"Psh… whatever, I'm going." Juumonji growled and brushed past the younger boy.
Tsuna scurried after the taller lineman, taking the stairs two at time to catch up. Fortunately, they got to the top around the same time, so Tsuna could point with a meek, "This way," To Sena-nii's room.
Juumonji strode to the door and reached for the handle.
"Wait!" Tsuna protested. "Aren't you even going to knock? It's Sena-nii's bedroom!" He puffed out his cheeks indignantly.
"Why? It's not like they're doing anything private in there," which, to Tsuna's untrained ear, sounded suspiciously like 'they better not be doing anything private in there.'
"But Yamamoto might still be sleeping!" Tsuna insisted.
"All the more reason not to knock," Juumonji argued, and twisted the knob.
"Sena-nii, we're coming in!" Tsuna yelled through the door, despite the rather scary aura coming from the lineman.
The blond took three steps into the room and stopped dead. Tsuna, curious boy that he was, leaned around the much taller high schooler and looked for the hold-up.
The sight that greeted him was a rather odd one. Sena-nii sat on the edge of his bed and leaned over a sleeping Yamamoto; seemingly caressing his face.
Tsuna could practically feel the older boy next to him tense up, and his scary aura increased. Tsuna started panicking, wondering what he could do, and just what was happening.
Then Sena did the unexpected. He lifted the same hand caressing Tsuna's best friend's face to his own face.
Tsuna was terrified. He couldn't imagine the other boy being anymore scary.
Sena felt his own forehead and chirped, "Nope, no fever! He should be right as rain when he wakes up!"
All the tension seemed to drain out of Juumonji.
"Sena-nii!" Tsuna jumped at the chance to speak with his brother before the mysterious feeling came back. "We just got here, sorry we're late!"
"Psh," Juumonji spoke up suddenly. "It was his fault. He wondered around so far, he got lost."
"Yeah, but Juumonji-kun was really amazing! It was like he could find Sena-nii's house from anywhere! He was like a homing pigeon!" Tsuna expounded, hoping compliments would calm the other boy down.
"Idiot," Juumonji flushed. Well, at least it seemed to work.
"What's wrong with that one?" He changed the subject forcefully. "Kuroki's awake already."
"Oh, is he? I was going to check on him when I finished checking Yamamoto-kun for a fever." Sena stood up and brushed himself off. "I still feel really bad for dragging them at such speeds. Kuroki-kun's been thought the death march, so he would recover faster, but Yamamoto-kun…"
He looked a little worried as he bit his lip lightly in agitation.
Juumonji watched Sena's nervous habit almost absently and spoke up. "Yeah, but the other one plays sports too. Namimori's sports teams must be really weak if he's the ace baseball player."
"Yamamoto's amazing! You shouldn't pick on him." Tsuna stood up for his friend, despite his trembling. "It was bad luck all around."
The baseball-minded boy in question let out a deep sigh, sat up, and stretched. He slowly opened his eyes and asked with a grin, "Is that Tsu-kun I hear? Does that mean we're finally ready to go?"
"H-hey! I-idiot! Don't call me that!" Tsuna flushed and rounded on the blond lineman, "I take it back, pick on him all you want!" He sulked.
"Aww, don't be that way, Tsu-kun!" Yamamoto called to Tsuna's retreating back. "Maa, maa, is this Sena-senpai's room?" He looked around, easily distracted.
"Wow, is that the MVP trophy you broke, Sena-senpai? Haha, that's too funny!"
"Well, it sounds like someone's fully recovered." Sena grumbled at the teasing. "I'll just head down and set up the shower arrangements then."
"Ah, the guys are not going to believe I've been to Sena-senpai's house!" Yamamoto laughed as Sena left the room, and snapped a picture of the broken trophy on his cell phone.
"Hey."
Yamamoto looked up from fiddling with the settings of his camera phone to the grave voice of the oldest 'Huh-huh brother'.
"What are you trying to pull with Sena?" Juumonji demanded.
"Pull?" Yamamoto cocked his head to the side curiously. "He was dragging me!" He defended.
Juumonji dropped his head into his open palm. "…Never mind. Forget I said anything. C'mon, let's go, before you start sorting though his underwear drawer."
"… Where do you think it is?"
/\-/\-/\-
"I'm really, really sorry you guys!" Sena exclaimed, bowing low and shutting his eyes tightly. "The hot water heater is broken, and we don't have any hot water, and we can't get anyone in to fix it, and I'm really sorry, I know I said we could shower here, and I know that we were…"
"It's just broken?" Monta interrupted, eyeing Musashi subtly.
Or at least it would have been subtle if the rest of the team (minus Sena's friends, who were looking increasingly bewildered) hadn't been staring at him also.
"I'm an unlicensed contractor, not an unlicensed plumber. Hot water heaters are right out of my pay grade." Musashi declined firmly. "Why don't we use the bath house down the way?" He offered without any real interest.
Sena brightened noticeably. "I-"
He was cut off by his mom sticking her head around the corner from the kitchen where she was having coffee with Nana, Mamori, Suzuna, Kyoko, and Ryohei. Despite her protests, that nice girl with the eye patch had already had to leave, with those two rather rude boys walking her home.
"Sena, that nice team captain, Hiruma-kun, just phoned. He said that he phoned the owner of 'Kirei no Mizu' down the street, and negotiated a group discount!" She chirped, with a slight blush on her cheeks. That Hiruma-kun really was a charmer!
The whole Devil Bat team twitched subtly. Hiruma, nice?
"Hi-Hiruma-san wouldn't have…" Sena trailed off nervously. He'd never be able to enjoy the bath house again if Hiruma-san threatened the owner.
"Well, we do have a large group," Monta chimed in, answering his rhetorical argument. "And with your brother's friends, we'd probably take up the whole place anyway. Just think of it the same as when Hiruma-san unofficially/officially books a restaurant," he finished with a grin.
"Tsuna-kun, do you mind if you and your friends accompany us to the baths first, before we go out?" The ever thoughtful Yukimitsu gently asked.
Tsuna smiled brightly, "I don't mind, it'll be just like old times, right Sena-nii?"
"Is that what maman was talking about this morning?" Reborn asked with a smirk from Sena's shoulder (hey, when did he get there in the first place?), "That when you and Sena-chan were playing, you'd never want to let anyone else play either? Did you not even let him bathe by himself?" he mocked.
Tsuna flushed, "Sh-shut up!"
"Aww!! That's so cute! You didn't want to share your big brother with anyone!"
Tsuna jumped slightly and whirled around.
"Ah! It's cheerleader-san!"
Suzuna pouted, "How rude! I've introduced myself twice already!"
"I'm sorry," Tsuna started, "But I really do owe you my thanks for helping me, Yamamoto, and Gokudera get to Sena-nii after he was injured, Suzuna." Tsuna bowed respectfully.
Suzuna blushed brightly, "Sena, your brother has really good manners!" She enthused. "But I didn't give Goku-kun anything…"
She was quickly cut off by said silver-haired boy. "Where are we going after you all clean up?"
The group gave him a blank look.
"Shouldn't someone have thought of this, at least?" Gokudera scowled.
"Err… how about a movie?" Toganou offered.
"There's nothing out but chick flicks and anime," Juumonji complained.
"What's wrong with anime?!" Demanded Toganou. Sena silently agreed with this question.
"Let's go out to eat!" Kurita drooled.
"Fuugo!" Komusubi agreed.
"The non-athletes don't get hungry quite as quickly, Kurita-san," Yukimitsu smiled good-naturedly.
"O… Oh, that's right." Kurita looked down and pressed his index fingers together in a slightly dejected manner.
"Arcade," Kuroki decided.
"Hey, wait! Let's talk about this!" Monta protested.
"Nope," Kuroki grinned, "Sena likes arcades too. That makes it two against zero, seeing as there've been no other real suggestions!" He slung an arm around Sena's shoulder in an 'of-course-he's-voting-for-arcade, I'd-never-force-my-good-friend, now-would-I?' gesture.
"You'd better not be picking on Sena!" Mamori called from the kitchen.
Kuroki shuddered and removed his arm quickly. What a scary team manager.
"Actually, I do vote for arcade," Sena rushed to finish, "That is if no one else minds…"
"Tch. I guess we haven't been there for a while." Juumonji agreed, turning his head away to hide his slight smile at Sena's slight assertiveness.
"They have a new game I want to try anyway." Monta didn't bother to hide his affectionate grin.
"So arcade it is? What about your friends in the kitchen, Tsuna-kun?" Yukimitsu quickly dropped into organizer mode.
Ryohei leaned around the corner, having caught the tail end of the conversation anyway.
"MOCAP BOXING TO THE EXTREME!" He cheered, thrusting a fist into the air.
Gokudera twitched a little in irritation, but held his tongue after seeing the monkey kid and the Tenth's brother's matching smirks of mischief.
"Bet I can still own you in Street Fighter," Sena beamed at Tsuna.
"Who says 'extreme'?" Monta teased. "I do everything to the MAX!" Monta grinned at Ryohei.
Tsuna and Ryohei exchanged slightly startled glances at the shift from polite to challenging, before breaking out into their own grins.
"It is so on." They agreed.
-/-\-/-\-/-
Sena did a quick head count of the males preceding him into the changing area on the men's side of the baths while trying his hardest to ignore the slightly crying owner to his left. 12… 13… 14… He frowned. Where had Lambo-kun gotten off to?
"Tsu-kun? Have you seen Lambo-kun? I thought he was with you…" Sena stopped Tsuna, who fortunately the last one in line, and voiced his slight worry.
Tsuna, meanwhile, was having a full-fledged panic attack knowing just how much damage the five-year-old was capable of.
"Over here~! I'm going with Kyoko-nee, Copy-san!" Lambo shouted and flailed from said girl's arms.
"L-Lambo-kun! You can't!" Tsuna panicked, worried about not only the child's manners, but the child's Ten Year Later Bazooka.
"He's young enough, Tsu-kun," Sena put a hand on his brother's shoulder to restrain him from trying to retrieve the child. "If the girls don't mind, then let's just go relax, alright?
"But… He… I guess that's fine then…" Tsuna conceded.
After all, it wasn't like Lambo would bring a bazooka into the bath with him, right? And even if he did, it would probably get all wet and wouldn't work. Yeah, he had nothing to worry about. …unless, getting it wet lead to a malfunction! Look at what happened last time it malfunctioned! At that train of thought, Tsuna's eyes widened, and he moved to take Lambo back from Kyoko-chan; only to realize that he was no longer in the entry way at all. He was in the changing room, if he wasn't mistaken…
"Tsu-kun? Aren't you going to relax with us?" Sena questioned.
"Ye-yeah." Tsuna did his best to push the concerns out of his mind and get ready to scrub down before sinking into the blissfully warm bath. He quickly changed and hurried out after his brother.
Tsuna glanced around, trying to locate a spot where he could sit next to his brother in the blue-tiled rectangular wash room.
He quickly scanned the room like the young hit man beside him had always tried to drill into him. The Devil Bats alone took up the middle two rows, directly in from the doorway. Monta and Ryohei were actually the first ones changed and into the wash room; they wanted to compete to see who could with stand the heat of the bath the longest.
'Kurita-senpai and Komusubi-senpai were a close second, though,' Tsuna thought with a fond smile. He rather liked the way they got so carried away with the small things in life.
Ryohei and Monta sat closest to the doors of the actual bath, facing away from each other; after Monta sat Yamamoto, who was waving him and Sena-nii over to the row of seats. Sena waved back and sat next to him with a cheery greeting, and an inquiry as to Yamamoto's health. Tsuna quickly confiscated the seat next to his brother, and Gokudera sat next to him.
The three brothers finally wandered in and Kuroki took the seat next to Ryohei, with Juumonji sitting directly behind Sena, and Toganou behind Tsuna. Tsuna didn't see Musashi-san, Yukimitsu-san, Ishimaru-san, or Taki-san, so he assumed they were sitting along the far wall.
Tsuna was a little shy about wearing nothing but a towel around all these muscled football players (even Sena-nii had some definite muscle tone), but with Gokudera jealously guarding his left and Sena-nii on his right, he sternly told himself to get over it and filled his wooden bucket to dump over his messy hair.
Tsuna slowly cleaned himself, ignoring the baby at his feet, but his eyes continuously darted to Sena-nii's back and away quickly.
Sena-nii seemed really absorbed with talking to Yamamoto, but Tsuna really, really wanted to…
"Dame-Tsuna, are you checking out your brother?" Reborn smirked cruelly.
"Wh… Are you… I Wasn't… What… I…" Tsuna sputtered indignantly, before settling on a, "Gross!"
"Then why do you keep glancing at him like a blushing virgin?" Reborn taunted.
"I… wanted to wash Sena-nii's back." Tsuna hung his head and mumbled to the tiles.
"What was that, Dame-Tsuna? I couldn't hear your pathetic whining."
"I said I wanted to wash Sena-nii's back!" Tsuna yelled back. He froze in horror, realizing what Reborn had just goaded him into. He also noticed that his exclamation happened in the middle of a lull in conversation, so no matter at what volume he had said it, it would have sounded unnaturally loud.
Tsuna looked at the patterned tiles, wondering how in a life as weird as his, it was impossible for the ground to swallow him up.
"Sure Tsu-kun, I don't mind. Actually, thank you!" Sena beamed.
Slowly Tsuna let out the breath he didn't know he was holding and asked, "Are you sure, Sena-nii?"
"Of course, we are brothers." Sena reassured.
Tsuna smiled widely in delight and reached out to wash his brother's back that was now facing him. He hummed a happy tune to himself as he slid the soapy cloth around in soothing circles, and could have purred in contentment, his memories of a happy childhood overshadowing years of separation. "Sena-nii still has really good skin!" He chirped.
For some reason, Yamamoto made a choking noise, and rinsed off quickly, making sure there was no trace of soap left on him. As soon as possible, he bolted for the baths.
"I'm going on ahead, see you there." He called back, all but running.
Behind him Juumonji also made a weird noise, but stayed in place.
Tsuna reached out and rinsed off his brother's back.
"Thanks, Tsu-kun!" Sena smiled. "Your turn."
Behind him, Juumonji made the weird noise again, rinsed, and bolted as quickly as Yamamoto.
+-+-+-+-
Sena slowly sunk into the bath, letting out a contented, "ah" at the pleasant heat.
Beside him, his brother and his friends also let out blissful sighs.
"It's been a while, since we've gone as a group like this." Monta spoke up.
"Not since we went with Kakei-san, right?" Sena affirmed.
"Kakei from the Poseidons?" Ryohei asked, fascinated.
"Yeah, it's a funny story." Monta affirmed. "Mizumachi-kun thought the only reason to go to a bath was to swim or to peep on the girls' side"
As if on cue, a shout came from the girls.
"Lambo-kun! You can't bring that in here!"
Beside Sena, his brother froze in place.
"Ah, Lambo-kun must have brought a toy in with him." Sena tried to relax his brother.
"Eiiiii! Lambo-kun! Behave yourself!"
Tsuna started to hyperventilate.
"Don't cause trouble for Mamori-san, brat!" Monta yelled over the wall.
"BWAHAHAHA!! Lambo-san can do anything he wants! Lambo-san is invincible!"
Suddenly there was a loud explosion, and lots of feminine screams.
"Pervert!! There's a pervert in the baths!!"
"Tenth! Let me take care of this! I have my new water proof dynamite!"
"GOKUDERA! NO!" Tsuna cried out, too late. 'Where would he even have kept them,' he cried silently.
The resulting explosion destroyed the dividing wall between the male and female sides, and resulted in even more screams.
Tsuna and Sena sat next to each other, tears dripping down their faces.
"Why does this happen whenever we go to a bath house?" Sena asked miserably.
"Why does this happen whenever we go out in public?" Tsuna asked bitterly.
Suddenly, the door was kicked in.
"ALRIGHT YOU LAYABOUTS!" Hiruma stood in the doorway, looking inordinately pleased with himself. "Get out!" He punctuated his order with a spray of bullets. "Get out, get out, get out!" He crowed. "Get out and get dressed! We have places to be!"
"Hiruma-san!" Sena called out to the previously MIA quarterback. "Where have you been?" He asked curiously.
Hiruma turned slowly, ignoring the mass exodus surrounding him. "Oh, did someone have a question?" He smirked evilly at his running back.
"N-no!" Sena squeaked and grabbed his towel and brother to leave.
"Sena! Is Hiruma-kun picking on you again?!" Mamori demanded from beyond the damaged wall.
Sena took in said gaping hole, the empty, slightly messy (from the quick exit,) and bullet-riddled room.
"No, Mamori-nee!" He lied and ran.
+___+___+
I meant to get to the arcade in this chapter too, but this has already hit my record of eleven pages. And that's before the A/Ns. (Lots of notes today, lol!)
Down here, I want to thank my Anon source about bath houses, and explain the joke about Reborn picking on Tsuna. To wash another's back is very intimate. "Intimate - as in sibling intimate or intimate - lover intimate." So depending on perspective, what Tsuna yelled could have been really perverted.
Also, Mithras151 was the one who demanded this bath house scene. Originally the characters were going to go straight to the arcade -_-'' so all blame/praise goes to them.
Kirei no Mizu – Pure water/Beautiful (?) water. Again, from Mithras.
I'm not sure that bath houses even have owners, they might be a government service in towns (that's what I understood from one source I read), but either way, I guess I'm just bustin' out some artistic license :)
Thanks for reading and please review!