A/N: I have just discovered my burning hatered for long, drawn-out dialogue scenes.

I had three versions of this "big reveal" conversation planned out and so I had to combine the three of them, which was hard because the different parts and questions of the conversations always happened at different times and so I had to cut and paste everything in an order that at the very least had a semblance of order and natural flow, which almost took an entire day in and of itself.

Urg! It was tedious.

Anyway, I thank you all for the enormous response and the reviews, even though I wasn't able to see them when they first started to trickle in which annoyed me immensly, I was still very happy to read your opinions, it always brightens up my days in ways that you wouldn't understand unless you knew me.

Okay, no more stalling, you want the chapter and you're going to get it.

So here it is.

Scene 7:

Reborn-sensei

Her voice held the undertone of an order.

A voice that put the teacher in a situation in which he had to fight in order to keep his smirk at bay.

With a little work, she would be more than capable of surviving.

"What do you want to know?" he asked, keeping the amusement away from his voice.

The teacher watched as her fingers clenched around the plushie, once again burrying her face into it's head as she took one deep breath after the other, her legs drawing in even closer to her torso. The heat surrounding her body began to once again build at a frightening pace.

"What happened back there?" she asked, voice shaking.

"Nothing to worry about." The teacher answered calmly.

Apparently, that wasn't the right thing to say as the temperature spiked within seconds. As black eyes moved over the girl, delicate-looking hands started to glow a bright orange color.

Quickly, the teacher settled himself down on the bed, the matress dipping down violently enough to make Tsuna's tiny body shake from the movement. The man grabbed hold of her shaking wrists, violently yanking them from where they had been wrapped around the plushie that was just moments away from meeting it's end.

"Tsunako, look at me." The man ordered, turning the girl around as he yanked her into a sitting position, forcing her to do what he asked of her. "What you're going through is completely natural."

Tsuna's eyes widened in what could have been confused for shock, but otherwise, her face seemed to be conforted in a strange kind of glare as she stared at the man in front of her.

"Natural?" she repeared, voice laced with a silent kind of disbelief. "What part of spontaniously combusting and coming out without a blemish could possibly be considdered natural!?" her voice grew and grew in volume with each words that passed through her lips, and then…

Her fingertips sparked.

It was a visible enough spark that both of their attentions immediately snapped to her hands, and the sight really didn't help with Tsuna's already frazzled nerves.

Immediately, The teacher moved his hands to her upper arms, giving her a shake.

"Breathe." He ordered, looking her firmly in the eyes. "You're right." He added, now sounding a lot more calming than he did before. "It's not natural." He agreed, but the tone he was using told Tsuna that there was more to it than that, and she was right. "For anyone outside of your bloodline."

This caught Tsuna off guard.

Momentarily forgetting her fear, she blinked at the man.

"Wha-?" he didn't allow her to finish.

"Tell me Tsunako." The teacher said, hands moving away from her upper arms, though he kept his eyes firmly locked with hers. "Have you ever been burned?"

Again, all Tsuna found herself capable of doing, was blink.

"What?"

The teacher wasted no time in enlightening her.

"Have you ever reached out to touch a flame when you were younger, or put your hand on a stove when it was on, or even picked up a cookie that had just come out of the over?" he looked her deep in the eyes, looking almost desperate for her answer. "Have you ever experienced the feel of extreme heat?"

Tsuna opened her mouth on reflex, almost rolling her eyes as she prepared herself to tell him that, of course she had, but to her surprise, the words caught in her throat. She couldn't get them out, and the more she thought about what he had asked her, the more difficult finding the words became.

She didn't remember much from when she was younger, but she did know for a fact that, even though she knew that she shouldn't touch fire or anything really hot as to not develop the serious injuries that could sometimes open the skin it it was bad enough like she had seen on Sakura a multidute of times or any other employee at the Crescent Bakery through the years, she couldn't recall one time when she herself had that type of injury.

And yet… one time, when she was nine, she had accidentally moved to take out a pan from the oven, forgetting to put on oven-mits in her rush to get to decorate the cake. Her mother had absolutely panicked when she'd seen her and rushed her over to the sink where she ran cold water over her hands for what felt like half an hour, spending the entire time comforting her, calling her brave and strong for not crying out in pain when she'd touched the pan like anyone else would have done.

Except…

She hadn't been in pain.

She had stood there feeling her hands almost go numb under the ice-cold water feeling absolutely confused as to why her mother had reacted the way she'd done.

It wasn't until days later when Sakura did the same thing that she'd realized how she should have reacted and she refrained from trying to take anything out of the oven ever since.

Now that she knew this… she felt as though she had missed out on an important childhood experience.

Slowly, other memories returned to her.

Playing directly with candle flames and wax for hours only for her mother to chew her out because she could, "hurt herself", and she had been confused them too because, at most, it had felt like moving her fingertips through something lighter than water but thicker than steam.

The first time she'd really felt any form of heat was when her arms were burning, and even then, now that she thought back on it, even that experience hadn't been painful.

Finally, she looked back up at the man.

"No…" she answered, voice low, eyes wide in disbelief.

The teacher nodded at her response.

"I thought so." He stated, lip twitching a little. "Everyone on your father's side of the family has a greater towards heat and fire than what normal people would considder natural." He watched with satisfactory as Tsuna's brown eyes widened. "Of course, just how resistant they are depends on how direct the ancestry, but it is still there." He leaned closer to Tsuna, a strange glimmer in those onyx orbs that made Tsuna feel a bit uncomfrotable. "I suspect that you have a lot more energy than anyone in your class right?"

That was an understatement, and something that she'd figured out herself a long time ago.

Several days when going to school, no matter how little sleep she'd gotten the night before, she always managed to keep up her usual behavior whilst blinking at the students who had gotten a lot more sleep than her almost falling out of their chairs after their desks automatically forced them awake when they leaned over them.

She'd never been dead-tired unless she'd been awake for days on end, but she'd never been really bothered by it, in fact, it was welcomed.

"Yes…" she slowly answered the man.

Now, he openly smirked.

"Another perk of your bloodline." He stated. "It is suspected that is it to make sure your family's energy sourses doesn't burn out as quickly as some one elses would have." He gave a brief gesture with his hand in the air. "See." He said, sounding less serious than before. "To you, it is completely natural."

Despite herself, Tsuna found herself nodding to his words.

"The only real down-side to this trait with be the increased sensitivity to foreign materials and rouch touches." His hand shot out to gently grab her by the forearm, holding it up as the sleeve of the blazer slid down to reveal her skin littered with horrible-looking colorful spots. "Bruises are easily formed." He stated as he pulled the sleeve back up, covering up the bruising again before he smirked up at her. "You're basically all spawning from that pea-princess in that short fairy-tale."

The princess and the pea. He's making jokes now?

"Th-that doesn't explain the fires." Tsuna forced the words out of her, stuttering slightly from the force and shaking violently at the last word even though she had been the one to say it.

That wiped the smirk from his face.

"Right, the fires." He repeated, despite clearly noticing the tremmor that shot through the girl sitting in front of him at the word. "It is actually the last stage of a three-level power sourse." He explained, holding up three fingers in the air. "A more generalized term for the flames on their own is actually," his eyes narrowed as he paused for effect. He must be doubling as a drama-queen somewhere. "Raw Anima."

A mix of Italian and Japanese, a language that Tsuna was more than aquainted with, not to mention fluent, so it took no time at all for her to translate the word in her head.

"Raw Soul?"

"Yes." The man answered immediately, sounding quite pleased that she knew the word. "We call it that because that's what it is." He explained. "Anima, in principle, is the manipulation and utilization of your soul's energy, and Raw Anima, is the materialization of said soul." He put a hand in front of his chest, almost as if he was trying to point on exactly where the soul was located. "Everyone in your fathers bloodline are naturally connected to this power." He let his hand fall back down. "Of course, not everyone is capable of actually producing it, but everyone is born with the potential of it." His eyes narrowed as he stared off into the air, his demeanor turning annoyed. "Some of them simply don't want to activate it."

Tsuna found herself frowning.

It sounded as though the man was personally offended that someone would not want to activate a power such as the one running through her bloodline.

But, for the moment, Tsuna couldn't bring herself to care.

"Then how come I didn't get this choice?" she found herself asking before she could stop herself.

Leaning back, the man let out a sigh.

"Sometimes, one isn't given." He looked at her with an expression that spoke more than she could gather in such a short period of time. "During times of great emotional stress, a Cuor DiLeone can be forced to awaken instinctively in order to protect themselves." He gaced at her almost pointedly as he said this, and this time, Tsuna understood the meaning behind the look perfectly.

Also…

Cuor DiLeone.

The sudden pure Italian words rushed over Tsuna, filling her with the strangest sense of almost foreboding familliarity.

"Lionheart?" she repeated, eyebrows furrowing. "What's with all the Italian?"

The man only smirked again at her knowledge.

"Cuor DiLeone is the term of which the people of your bloodline is refered to as a whole." He explained, leaning forwards again, resting his arms onto his knees. "DiLeone, being the last name the majority of your family and ancestry go by to more or less declare their lineage." He shook his head, giving Tsuna the impression of annoyance once again. "It's quite difficult to tell the main branched from the side ones anymore because of this." He glanced at her from the corner of his eye once the explenation was done. "You didn't know you were Italian?"

"Of course I knew I was Italian." Tsuna quickly deffended herself. "But a different name?" the man nodded. "I still have relatives there?"

The man raised an eyebrow.

"Why yes." He answered. "Quite a few of them in fact, you're so spread out it's impossible to keep track of you all should one find the need for it."

For a long moment, Tsuna just sat there, staring.

She had been begging both of her parents to tell her about their extended family for years but the both of them had never wanted to tell her a word, and now she suddenly discovers that she's got a small army of relatives on her father's side in a different cuntry?

How does this happen?

Shaking her head, she gathered up as much composure as she could.

"You keep repeating the word 'ancestry'." She pointed out, giving the man a look as though daring him to brush it off.

Thankfully, he did no such thing.

"I am." He answered as though it were as easy as breathing.

"Why?"

The teacher took a deep breath, silently telling Tsuna that this was going to take a while.

"Anima was first introduced to the world 400 years ago by the founder of your bloodline, Giotto DiLeone." He began. "He was well respected in his time even without the power he possessed and he mostly used it whenever it was deemed absolutely necessary. According to records, when he did use it, he was a force to be reaconed with." He stared off into space again. "It is described that the silent fury of the founder was the most frightening sight anyone had ever seen in their lives."

Tsuna took a moment to absorb this information.

She had an ancestor like that? Just how did someone like that look like?

Her hand moved up, brushing her hair behind her ear without her really noticing she was doing it, it was surprisingly steady despite the fact that her shoulders still hadn't gotten rid of that persistent tremmor.

She had to swallow before she managed to find her voice.

"Why can we do this?" she asked timidly.

"That is an excellent question." The man immediately responded. "Giotto never left any records on how he came to have the power, and many has tried to recreate it in other bloodlines with little success over the years." He actually let out a chuckle at this. "Most of the time, the subject burns up before the power can actually settle." Seeing the almost horrified look on Tsuna's face, he quickly changed the subject. "All that is known is that he passed on this unique talent to his descendants." He gave her a pointed look. "To you."

She blinked at the sudden statement.

"Why me specifically?"

The amusement almost radiated off of the man.

"Beacause, Tsunako." He spoke with a silent chuckle. "You're the latest to be born of the main branch."

Tsuna's eyes went wide, the words caught in her throat as the meaning behind the sentence fully registered.

"I'm… in direct relation to…" it was too much. The thought of her, the girl with the brain that had refused to fully develop at a young age, be related to a man whose anger had frightened what sounded to be hundreds of men. It just couldn't be true.

She shook her head free of the comment, sorting it away for later when she could probably handle the information better.

In stead, she focused on another thought.

"You mean to tell me, that there is a multitude of people running around Italy lighting themselves on fire?" she asked slowly, not looking at the man. "Papa included?"

"No."

The answer had come so quickly that Tsuna flinched at the sharpness of it.

"But… you said-" once again, she didn't get to finish her sentence.

"I said that those of your bloodline are born with the potential of using Anima." He elabourated. "However, the norm when using Raw Anima is for the person to use a specially developed object or weapon that they would use as their "match" of sort in order to materialize their flames as they are holding it." He glanced down at the girl's hands as she once again began to fiddle with her fingers. "Flames such as these are painful to the touch no matter how resistant you are."

Dread washed over Tsuna the more the man spoke.

"So… what I am really is unnatural." She mumbled.

To her surprise, the man rolled his eyes.

"Not at all." He said, making her look up at him in confusion. "Giotto, your ancestor, first activated his flames directly through his skin as well." Tsuna's eyes widened once more. "Only none of his decendants were capable of doing so without ending up with permanent scarring for as long as he lived." He took a deep breath before he kept speaking, the reaction to his own words caused a question to form in Tsuna's head. A question that she had to file away for later considdering the man looked as though he was only going to keep talking. "Not long after he died however, the second case of skin-released flames were documented." He pierced her with a meaningful look. "The gift you have is perfectly natural, it is just very rare. Only one of your kind can exist at the same time, you have to die before another can be born." Tsuna could feel a sense of foreboding creep up on her. "We call this person." The man paused for effect, Tsuna was seriously tempted to frown. "The Phoenix."

The Phoenix?

Seriously?

"This…" Tsuna mocked the man with her pause despite the tremmor in her shoulders. "All sounds like the premise to a fantasy novel."

"I suppose it does." The man replied with a smirk. "But you know very well that it is real." Tsuna glanced down at her hands, her skin beginning to tingle. The sensation made her furiously rub them as her skin began to glow. Seeing this, the man grabbed her by the upper arms. That was starting to become something of a regular occurrence. "The fires are natural Tsunako, they cannot hurt you if you do not loose control over them." He looked her right in the eyes. "They are yours."

Well, that was all well and good when you said it.

"I'm scared of them." Tsuna admitted in a breathy whisper.

"Don't be," the main ordered. Now it was Tsuna's time to roll her eyes, that was easy for him to say. "No really." The man spoke up, capturing her attention. "If you don't fear them, they can't controll you."

Tsuna found herself frowning.

This was too detailed, to informative.

"How do you know all of this?" she found herself asking before she could stop herself.

The man smirked that stupid, almost victorious smirk.

"I make it my job to know things." His job? "Also." He fiddled with the cuffs of his shirt, looking very pleased with himself. "I was sent here to train you, to held you during this particular moment in your life."

Tsuna blinked.

"Train me?"

"Yes." The man nodded. "I took up a class in your school so that I would be able to overview your progress outside of the house without having to appear like a stalker."

He had becoma a teacher because of her?

Even though he said it did it to not look like a stalker, right now, he felt like one.

"That's why you were so adamant about me joining your class." Tsuna mumbled, fingers fiddling as she spoke. "It's a class specifically for learning Anima."

The teacher smriked a little as he nodded, cofnirming her words.

"I named it, Anima Apprenticeship, but as I couldn't let any outsiders know what it was really about, it shortened it to A.A." he explained. "The principal was surprisingly accepting of every condition I put forward."

He wasn't entierly truthful.

He didn't believe the principal was surprisingly accepting, he had probably counted on that fact and had planned every step of the way in order to cement a place on the school faculty. It was just the feeling she got when he talked.

Of course, this feeling also brought forth a question Tsuna had temporarily put on the shelf as the time hadn't been right for it.

Now however…

"Who are you, really?" she asked slowly, leaning way from the man sitting in front of her, her eyes narrowed. Of course, the man didn't react the way one would imagine.

It just made her curiosity grow.

"The name I have chosen for myself, is Reborn." The man answered, a smug expression spreading over his features.

The name he had chosen for himself.

Meaning, it was not the name he had been given as a child, but some form of pretentious sounding alias that he had picked out later in life for one reason or another.

She didn't get to think about this fact for too long, the man probably realized her though process and immediately moved to stop it.

"Now." He spoke up, snapping her attention from her own mind. "Will you accept my tutolage, Sawada Tsunako?"

For a longer moment, Tsuna stared at the man.

He wanted to become her teacher in and outside of school to instruct her in a mystical bloodline ability that she had no idea she even had up till over an hour ago.

She didn't know the man, but she could still feel the fires churning underneath the skin.

Finally, she let out a sigh.

"I don't really have much of a choice." Came her response.

"No, you do not." Reborn agreed. Face once again taking on that stoik look, the man lifted up his hands, palms up in between the two of them. "Give me your hands."

Startled at the sudden demand, Tsuna shied away from the man.

"Why?"

"There is something that I need to check." The man answered, though, when she still didn't move to do what he asked, he allowed his expression to soften, looking her right in the eyes without actually showing any emotion in those orbs. "Please."

It didn't take much to realize that even now she didn't have much of a choice.

Shaking, Tsuna brushed a lock of hair behind her ear before she allowed herself to put her hands out towards the man, watching as his long fingers closed around her hands, almost swallowing them in the size difference between them. She shook as the man turned them over in front of him, looking at them with what she rexognized as an experienced gaze.

For a split second, she could have sworn she saw Reborn's eyes flash onyx to a bright, glowing yellow. It made her frown a bit for a moment before she decided to just brush the thought away.

Must have been a trick of the light.

Reborn watched as Tsuna's pale and bruised skin was coated by an aura of pale orange light, slowly pulsating at a pace that only serving to trouble him. The pulsating should have been something like the beating of a sleeping heart, slowly shrinking and expanding around the skin. But… with Tsuna, the pulsing was uneaven, irregular, fluctuating at an almost frantic pace. Which could have been brushed off as simply reflecting the state of her nerves, but even the pulsating should have had some regularity or pattern to it.

That was not good.

An uneaven rhythm indicated an unstable core, and that was incredibly dangerous for both her and those around her. It could end up with the flames getting out of controll, lashing out at anything and anyone.

It meant poor controll. And poor control is highly uncommon for a Cuor DiLeone.

How was that possible?

Frowning slightly, he looked up at the girl's wide-open face, the personification of gentle innocence, and suddenly, everything clicked into place.

"Damn it…" he cursed under his breath, his fingers clenching slightly around her smaller hands. He hadn't meant for the words to come out but the realization had brought forth a form of anger that he hadn't intended.

He really should have watched his words more.

"What is it?" Tsuna's voice shook in the build of fear that had suddenly come over her at the man's sudden outburst.

"It all makes so much sense now." He whispered as he let Tsuna's hands fall down to her lap, bringing a finger to his chin, sinking deep into his own thoughts for a breef moment, though he shouldn't have done so with the current state of Tsuna's nerves.

"What does?!" she asked almost frantically, her hands tingling furiously, just moments away from glowing.

"Nothing, it's fine." Reborn quickly corrected himself, putting his hands on the shaking girl's shoulders, forcing her to be still. "Keep calm."

Predictably, she did not react well to this.

"How can I?!" she screamed, her hands beginning to glow in her lap.

Quickly, Reborn looked around the room, frantically yet calmly around the room, searching for something, anything, that could help their case at the moment.

Finally, his eyes fell on a small group of metal buckets lining the wall. Pails of paint that were just waiting for the day that Tsuna decided to keep working on the scenery that she'd already established the theme of her room eventually taking.

Perfect.

"Work on your wall." He ordered, mantually turning the shaking girl's head in the direction of the buckets to ensure her thoughts were already moving in a different direction. "Keep your mind off of it."

He watched as her head bobbed into a shaky nod.

Taking a deep breath, Reborn rose from the bed, moving towards the stairs.

"Where are you going?" Tsuna's still frightened voice asked, making him turn back around towards her.

"Don't sorry." He ensured her. "I just need to make a few calls." He gestured towards the buckets. "You focus on your wall." He glanced towards the music box that had stopped playing some time ago without either of them noticing. "Play the melody." He locked his eyes with her one final time. "Don't think."

Turning back around, Reborn continued on the path he'd set out on.

The last thing he heard before he reached the door was the soft, timid voice of his new student.

"Okay…"

Closing the door behind him, Reborn paused in the hallway to fish his gem out of his pocket.

Swiping his fingers across the surface of the device, he quickly activated a certain secret speed-dial before pressing the gem against his ear, onyx eyes wandering over his surroundings to ensure that no one was listening in on the conversation her was about to have.

Finally, someone picked up on the other end.

"Nono." The man spoke before the one on the other end got a chance to say a word. "It's me." He leaned back against his students door, stuffing his free hand into his pocket. "It would appear that I do need him after all."

Tsuna was a fast painter.

By the time it had taken for Reborn to make his phone-calls, the girl had already begun the work on a very realistic river running through the grass-land she'd already created before he had arrived. Shades of blue and red, violent rapids and calm, clear currents clearly visible in the work.

No hesitation and with intent, she moved the brush over the wall in surprisingly graceful strokes despite the percistent tremmor still present in her shoulders. Reborn could feel his mood darkening drastically as the logical assumption of the reason behind this particular talents entered his mind.

She'd done it before.

Desperately turning to art whilst emotionally vulnerable.

She'd trained up her arm to remain steady whilst painting despite whatever state her nerves might be in, and this was prooving to be that skills ultimate test.

It was passing.

It should not be passing.

Aware of the state her nerves were in, Reborn ensured that Tsuna knew that he was in the room before he walked up to her, gently putting his hand on her shoulder to stop her arm from moving. Thankfully, she stopped in a way that wouldn't otherwise ruin the work she'd already done. She was still shaking under the material of his blazer that she was still more-or-less drowning in.

The small tilt of her head was the only indication that she was paying him any attention.

"You should clean up." He stated calmly, giving her fragile-looking shoulder a light squeeze. "You might feel better afterwards."

He didn't get much of an answer asside from a small nod.

Silently, automatically, Tsuna dropped her brush into a glass of water, the paint immediately seeping out into the liquid in swirls that momentarily caught the girls attention before she moved to put lids on the two pain buckets she used. He watched as she moved to her closet, quickly working the screen for the thing to eject the first available outfit on it's hanger for her to take.

With the change of clothes in hand, she disappeared into her bethroom.

Reborn listened to the door locking up before he let out a sigh, glancing around the room.

Teenage girls… he'd never been particularly good with them.

The temperature had dropped, which was good.

Now he just needed to ensure that it stayed that way.

As his eyes swept over the room, they caught onto a pair of bottles sitting innocently on top of his students desk.

Pill bottles, to be exact.

Eyebrows raised, the man stalked over to the desk, picking up the bottles in his hand before holding them up at eye-level as he studied them thuroughly.

"These are…" he mumbles as a frown etched itself onto his face.

A/N: Exposition, Exposition, Rushing out ASAP!

Tedious, dragged out and I really, really hope that you like this because I seriously don't feel like adding anything more to this particular chapter. It may or may not be shorter than the other chapters but it has dragged out longer than it stricktly needed to already and I want to get on with the rest of the story.

Please tell me what you think and I'll be back with the next chapter as quickly as I can, and the mere factor that I can write over 8000 words in a day will probably tell you how fast that can be done if I am interested enough and don't get caught up in exactly how I want a particular scene to play out.

I love you all you beautiful humans.

This has been.

A message from her Ladyship.

Again, please tell me what you think and I'll be back with another chapter as soon as possible.

This has been.

A message from her Ladyship.