Disclaimer: I do not own Katekyo Hitman Reborn


I suppose I should have seen it coming. After all, anything can happen when the mafia, especially one as extensive as Vongola, is involved. The reality of the incident remained cemented in my thoughts ever since I realized it was inevitable. Even now, when I look back, I wonder if fate had decided from the very beginning to chain me to Vongola.

Vongola, the largest and most influential mafia family in the world with branches reaching even the most distant countries… I wanted none of that power.

---

Hachiro's phone rang around eight o'clock in the morning of the fifth day. The body guard twitched and pulled the covers over his head, too lazy to pick up and half deluding that whoever was calling would give up. As he predicted in his dreamy haze, the ringing stopped, and Hachiro felt his consciousness begin to slip away again when the blasted object began ringing again.

Groaning, he grabbed the phone and was about to chuck the object through the paper door when he saw a strangely familiar number on the little flashing digital screen. Hachiro sat up immediately, throwing off his blankets, and answered the phone.

"Hello? Seventh?" Hachiro said, failing to stifle a yawn. 'Great impression, Hachiro…' he told himself.

"Hibari-san? Is that you?" To his surprise, he instead heard Nico on the other line.

"Ohayo gozaimasu!" Fritz's overly excited voice joined in. "Wait, it is morning over there, right?"

"What's going on?" Hachiro asked irritably, half ready to hang up on them. 'How can they call me like this? Maybe it was good that they interrupted my dream about… What was it again? Oh right, we had duck for dinner last night… ducks… flying… food…' He was about to fall over and go back to sleep with the phone on.

"I don't know; the Seventh suddenly called and then put us on hold," Nico answered him, and Hibari's head almost touched the pillow.

"Where is Daniela?" the person in question came into the conversation, jerking Hachiro awake and back to his sitting position.

"Not in immediate sight. Why?" he said, frowning. 'Something must have happened to the other heirs…'

"Good, then let's start," Fabio said. "This regards Miss Daniela."

"Did something happen with Alberto and Valentino?" Fritz hit the mark.

"They were murdered yesterday."

"So…" Hachiro began. 'Thought so…'

"I want Daniela back in Italy as soon as possible. We can't afford to lose any more heirs. Friedrich will return to Germany, and Dietrich is to stay at the mansion for now. Two of the Varia are on their way there now to take Friedrich's place. I expect Daniela on the next flight going back to Italy," he dictated.

"Should I tell her what's happened?" Hachiro asked.

"If you must." They heard a sound indicating that the Seventh had hung up. Hachiro assumed that he had a myriad of other people to deal with now that the next heir is female. He knew for a fact that the Seventh had a bit of trouble assuming power due to his weak Sky Flame and made up for it with a gun, but Daniela, who has never shown any promise in leadership nor combat, worried him.

"He's a brief person…" Nico sighed.

"This isn't too good though…" Fritz muttered. "Wait? Did he just say I have to go back? Why? I wanted to see Daniela!" he lamented.

"Yes! Go back to Germany before you set off another bomb!" Dietrich yelled somewhere in the background.

"Hey! You tripped on at least two of them yesterday, and you didn't help me clean!" Fritz retorted.

"Hibari-san?" Nico called the other's name while Fritz and Dirk continued arguing.

"Hm?" he snapped out of his reverie.

The butler hesitated. "Please hurry."

"Jyaa, mata," he told the other and hung up.

"Hibari-san?" he heard someone call him and turned around to see Daniela standing in the doorway, already dressed in the kimono they bought the other day.

"Oh, ohayo gozaimasu," he greeted her, trying to keep a straight face. 'This might be a little difficult.'

"Did you just get up? Hurry or all the viewing spots will be taken!" she told him, and he suddenly remembered that they had decided to watch the sakura today.

He smiled. "Okay okay!"

'Just for a little while longer…'

---

They walked on foot to the nearest park, which had an adequate amount of sakura trees and remained surprisingly empty that morning. The fully bloomed flowers let loose their soft pink petals into the air, covering the scene with little waves of color and fresh scent.

Daniela breathed in the scenery, closing her eyes dreamily. "There was a saying," she said, "that under the cherry blossom trees there are bodies."

"Yeah, it was story written by Motojiro Kajii," Hachiro informed her.

She fell silent for a while, and the two watched the petals flutter in the soft wind. "Hey Hibari-san…" Daniela spoke, her voice contemplative.

"Hm?"

"When I die, tell them to plant a sakura tree over my grave, will you?"

He chuckled, "Why think of such things now? You're still young."

She shook her head. "When dealing with Vongola, one cannot calculate one's remaining life."

"You are getting philosophical," he replied and suddenly realized but hoped that he was wrong. "Why now all of a sudden?"

"I overheard you this morning when I came to wake you up," she said simply.

He grimaced at being right about his instinctual thought.

She smiled sadly. "It's not your fault." The wind picked up, and she sighed. "I… I can't… I refuse to become next heir."

"It's not a choice that you can make."

"I know… but…" She shook her head, sighing again and trying to sort the thoughts in her head. "It was because of Vongola that my family died. If my parents had never been part of the mafia, then nothing like that would have ever happened," she said bitterly.

"Well, your father was the Seventh's brother after all."

Daniela didn't answer him but instead fixed her gaze on the sakura, away from him.

"What can you do about it?" he asked her.

"I don't know." Her eyes moved to the base of one of the trees.

He hesitated, wondering if he should ask the next question; he knew the answer wouldn't be good. "What would you have me do?"

She froze for a second. Daniela slowly turned around, her gold eyes meeting his dark ones "Kill me."

"What?"

"You heard me. I said kill me. Isn't that the only choice I can make right now? Life or death is the only decision I can make."

"You would go to such extremes?" he muttered.

"Yes," she said resolutely and looked at the trees. "After seeing your family, I… I don't even remember my own now; the memories of them just keep on fading away a little every year…"

"Daniela…"

"So that's why…" She waited for a reaction and when the other didn't move, she yelled, "Do I have to say it twice?" Before Hibari realized what was going on, she took the case out of his pocket, removing one of the sai in the process.

"You're not going to get anywhere with that," he told her.

"I can still…" she held it like a dagger and attempted to submerge the mini-weapon into her abdomen. Despite its miniscule size, the fork-like piece of metal was still as sharp as any dagger.

In an instant, Hachiro grabbed her hand, stopping the action. Daniela struggled. "Let me go!"

"Stop it!" he yelled at her.

She jerked away from him, and he swatted the sai away from her hand. She suddenly felt a pain from her left temple down to her cheek. Flinching, the girl looked on the floor and saw flower petals, a few of which that were covered by drops of blood, and realized that the weapon had hit the side of her face before flying away. She reached up to the shallow cut, touching it gently.

"Ah…" Hachiro flinched, shocked. "I… I'm sorry."

She glared at him and looked at the weapon on the ground.

He ran over to it and picked it up before she could reach for it. Daniela watched him like a cat as he raised the weapon to his eyes, examining the blood now stained on the tip of the sai. He looked at her. "Is this what you really want?"

She nodded, removing her hand from her face and studying the blood on her fingertips. 'Just like that time…'

Hachiro walked over to her, letting his Cloud Flame cover the sai and restored the weapon to its fighting size. Daniela smiled and closed her eyes, preparing herself for the anticipated pain. She felt metal against her cut, almost tenderly, and she opened her eyes.

Hachiro moved the side of the middle prong along Daniela's cut, wiping the blood onto the weapon, slowly brining it from the top of the wound to the bottom. He withdrew the weapon, now covered with a thin layer of red liquid along the circular middle spike.

"What are you…" she began.

"I've murdered the eighth heir of Vongola and will accept all responsibility…" Hachiro said without looking at her. He turned around and began walking away, leaving the awestruck girl in the middle of the hallway of trees, the bloody sai clasped tightly in his hand.

'Did he just?' Daniela looked at her blood stained fingers again. "I'm…"

"Vongola will kill him," an accented voice said behind her, making her panic. Juro was seated comfortably on the branch of one of the trees. He jumped down and began to walk away. She watched as the youngest brother disappeared out of the park and into the hurricane of petals that danced in the air as the wind picked up.

---

Hachiro threw the rest of his stuff into the suitcase and stared at the contents, frowning. 'I have to learn to travel lighter.'

"The next plane is tomorrow morning, right?"

Hachiro whirled around to find Daniela, dressed in her normal clothes and the side of her face bandaged neatly.

"You…" he gasped, surprised.

She looked away, her cheeks a little red from embarrassment. "Your mom helped me bandage it. I told her a bird crashed into me."

"A bird?" If it wasn't so serious, he would have laughed at her impossible lie. They stared at each other for a moment.

"Why? You could've done anything you want," Hachiro finally broke the silence.

She looked away, averting his gaze. "It's not worth it. I don't want Hibari-san to die because of me."

Hachiro raised an eyebrow. "Am I that weak?" he teased her.

"Hey! I was trying to be considerate!" she snapped.

"Then why did you try to kill yourself with something the size of a fork? It'll hurt a lot more, you know."

"I…" She stopped sighing. "I wasn't thinking. I'm sorry, I was being selfish."

He grinned. "Glad you realized that."

She threw him a glare before looking outside at the moon, its soft light illuminating the rock garden. "Let's go home…"

"Are you sure?" Hachiro asked her. He wanted a resolute answer like the one she almost gave him back at the park.

"Yeah," she smiled.

---

The plane's engine roared to life as the machine began lifting off the runway towards the heavens. Daniela looked outside her window, eager to watch the ground fly away from her view like the first flight. It was a good half hour before they were safely in the air and were told that they could freely walk around.

"I'm sorry about the cut," Hachiro said out of nowhere. After that, they were silent for a while with only the plane's engine and some other passengers 'quiet conversations filling the air. "Is it… is it going to scar?" he hesitantly added, unable to take the silence.

She shrugged. "Don't know; don't care. Aren't all mafia bosses ugly old men anyway?"

That caught him by surprise. "Your uncle Fabio isn't old!"

"Too bad. I'll get a tattoo over it or something later if it bothers you," she said casually. "Something cool like a skull or dragon…"

"You're into that kind of stuff?" He always thought Daniela was more of the nature kind like flowers and feathers.

"No, but I'm sure Nico would flip if I got either one of those tattoos," she said, grinning.

---

'Home…' Daniela thought as the car neared her mansion in Italy. She saw Nico waiting outside for her impatiently walking in circles.

"Ah! Daniela! What happened?" Nico exclaimed when she stepped out of the car, pointing at her bandages.

"A bird crashed into me," she said simply.

"How did a bird crash into you? Ah, let me see that." He gently removed some of the bandages to study the extent of the damage. "Let's put some proper ointment on it. It might scar a little. When did you become so careless?" he fussed over her.

She shrugged. "I was stupid."

Hibari watched as the two walked off towards the mansion, the older fussing over the younger. He looked at his hand. "A choice… huh…"

---

After dinner, the three once again found themselves in the comfort of the familiar drawing room, suitcases piled up in the corner like two years ago when Hibari last went to Japan. Dirk had somehow avoided them the entire day, making the excuse of sickness for staying in his room. "He's probably just embarrassed," Nico and Hibari had mutually agreed early on.

"So, did you get me the…" Nico asked eagerly.

"Catch," Hibari opened the largest suitcase and began throwing its contents out.

"Wah!" Nico caught book after book, balancing them in his arms. They rained down on him like hail, and he eagerly took each one head on.

Daniela chuckled. "He caught all twenty. He beat you."

Just then, Nico lost his balance and landed in a heap of books and limbs.

"I take that back…" the girl muttered.

"You okay?" Hibari asked, trying not to laugh.

"Thank you!" Nico yelled under the pile of cookbooks.

---

Who knew that Juro-kun would be the most considerate one out of us? And the bird… I've never told Hachiro about why I chose the bird. Well, thinking back, I guess it was because I knew "Hibari" meant "skylark." So in a way, he really did crash into me.

Needless to say, life at the mansion began to change quite a bit afterwards… I wouldn't say it was for the better or the other, but definitely more… lively…


Note: Ah, the sweet relaxation of Spring Break… Oh, so the sai's only sharp at the tip; it's not like a sword (just in case). Think toothpick XD.

Thank you for reading!