Warning: Anticlimactic stuff. Please don't expect anything dramatic.

Recurring

Although some people wished to charge straight into the fortress where the frozen man was kept, the majority agreed that they should take a few days to rest and come up with a plan before actually attempting the break in. Also, Daemon had to go get more information about the layout of the entire place.

In Tsuna's awfully honest opinion, they probably should just leave the man alone. His idea was vetoed, as expected. And then Reborn kicked him out, on the basis of 'if you aren't going to contribute anything useful, Dame-Tsuna, you must as well go get us some coffee. I want an espresso'.

How Reborn expected Tsuna to get them coffee, when Tsuna didn't even understand the slightest bit of Italian, was a mystery. Being a total, utter coward, Tsuna didn't even dare to point out the holes in Reborn's plan before scampering off to the nearest café, not wanting to get shot. In hindsight, he probably should have spoken up. Getting shot was most definitely better than being lost in an unfamiliar country, not knowing both the way around and the spoken language.

After much trial and error, and frantic checking of the many tourist maps Tsuna snagged from the airport, he managed to get to a café he believed Reborn would like. He hesitated outside the café, unsure of how to order. Was ordering in Italy the same as ordering in Japan? Or was there some sort of etiquette that he needed to follow? All these questions piled up in his head, chaining down his feet and making him unable to even take a step into the café.

"What's wrong, are you okay?" a voice asked in a foreign language.

Not expecting someone to talk to him, Tsuna jumped in surprise and let out his trademark shriek. The person chuckled at that.

"That was cute, but you didn't answer my question. Are you alright?"

Tsuna turned to face the person and saw a man with blonde hair and warm brown eyes. Tsuna let his eyes trail up for a moment to take in the orange words above his head.

[Dino Cavallone, Level 43]

Tsuna forced himself to lower his gaze before he spoke.

"S-sorry, I don't understand that language," he smiled awkwardly. The man blinked and smiled back at him.

"My apologies," he said in fluent Japanese. "Are you okay?"

"Yes, I am." Tsuna was confused by the question. "Why wouldn't I be?"

"Well, you have been standing outside the café doors for around ten minutes or so," Dino pointed out. Tsuna immediately flushed red.

"I'm just… not sure how to order coffee, that's all," he tried to explain. His worries sounded silly now that it was in the open, but Dino didn't seem to judge.

"Oh? Would you like me to order for you?" Dino asked with a smile. Embarrassed, Tsuna nodded.

"Yes, please." Dino laughed.

"C'mon, you don't need to be so formal! My name's Dino, and I like helping other people. How about you?"

"Um…" Tsuna paused for a while. This guy was weird, but he seemed genuinely kind. Also, none of his skills were acting up, which was another plus. "Tsuna. I like spending time with my friends and family."

"Well then, Tsuna." Dino gave him a charismatic smile. "What coffee would you like?"

Tsuna took a moment to remember Reborn's very complicated order - too complicated for a simple espresso, in Tsuna's opinion. Upon hearing it, Dino froze up and something similar to fear flashed through his eyes. He quickly covered it up with a grin.

"I didn't peg you to be the type to enjoy that sort of coffee," Dino commented. Tsuna gave him a wry smile.

"It's not for me," he admitted. "It's for… a friend. He has pretty high standards."

"Oh, I knew someone like that too!" Dino exclaimed. "Although, if your friend's taste is similar to what I'm thinking of, the coffee here isn't going to cut it."

Tsuna worried his bottom lip with his teeth as distress crept up on him. "Oh no, what am I going to do?" he muttered to himself. Dino looked contemplative.

"Why not I bring you to another café? The person I knew used to get his coffee from there." Tsuna jumped at the opportunity.

"Thank you so much!" He tried to express every bit of his gratitude through his smile. Dino's eyes widened and he quickly looked away, scratching the back of his head.

"It's no problem."

The person accompanying Dino introduced himself as Romario. Tsuna felt a little guilty that he hadn't noticed the suited man before. Romario didn't seem to take any offence, which made Tsuna feel even worse.

Dino was an amiable person, and didn't seem the least bit awkward around Tsuna despite the fact that they were practically strangers. He filled the silence with idle chatter, talking about almost everything under the sun. Strangely, Tsuna noted, he never said anything about himself.

As Tsuna listened to Dino, he noticed the crowd of people around them beginning to thin. Normally, Tsuna wouldn't really care, but something about how the people around them moved set Tsuna on edge.

Well, that and the fact that there weren't any words floating above their heads.

Tsuna slowed down as he continued to take greater notice of his surroundings. The more Tsuna became aware of it, the more everything around him felt wrong. It was almost the same feeling he got that day Hana had requested Kyoko to trap him in a terrifying, almost traumatizing, illusion for her revenge.

…Actually, it didn't feel almost like an illusion. It felt exactly like an illusion.

Tsuna stopped walking.

Dino paused as well, turning to face Tsuna. "What wrong, Tsuna?" he asked with a hint of confusion in his voice. Tsuna hesitated, wondering if he should inform Dino of his suspicions. Would it be the right decision on trust Dino? Well, if Dino was bad, Tsuna's Sense Danger and Hyper Intuition skills would have alerted him to that fact, right?

Another moment passed, and Tsuna decided to take a leap of faith. He gestured both Dino and Romario to come closer.

"Um, I… don't know how to put this, but something about our surroundings seems wrong," he whispered. Clarity overtook the confusion in Dino's eyes before his gaze sharpened and he exchanged a look with Romario. So Dino had known about it as well?

Then Dino turned back to Tsuna was a disarming smile. It's probably your imagination, Tsuna," he said, and Tsuna had to resist the urge to gape. "Oh!" Dino exclaimed suddenly as he pointed to a random, dark alleyway. "Here's a short cut to the café I was talking about. Let's go!" When Tsuna didn't move, Dino grasped his hand and pulled him along. It didn't escape Tsuna's notice that Dino's grip was a little too tight, and his steps a little too quick.

They went through the alleyway, which led to another, and then another. Tsuna was pretty sure alleyways weren't supposed to last that long and, judging from Dino's slightly strained tone, he thought so too. Dino was really something, Tsuna thought to himself, to be able to continue talking as if everything was normal. Romario was rather cool, too, to able to keep his calm like that. Tsuna was pretty much on the verge of panic right now.

And then he received four alerts from his Sense Killing Intent and Sense Danger skills.

Without missing a beat, Tsuna threw himself at both Dino and Romario with surprising force, just as the loud and familiar sound of gunfire ran clear. A bullet whizzed by behind Tsuna, and would have buried itself into Dino's head had Tsuna not pushed them out of the way.

Just his luck. He came out to prevent himself from getting shot only to, once again, face the threat of getting shot at. Only this time, it was a lot scarier because Tsuna was pretty sure the gunman was out to kill.

"D-Dino-san! What's going on?" Tsuna asked the blond. The gunman was probably after Dino, after all, and Tsuna didn't remember doing anything to offend anyone in the short period of time he had been in Italy.

Or maybe… he had actually broke some sort of coffee etiquette rule and now the coffee assassins were after him!

…

Yeah, that was a little too absurd to be true, even for his life.

"I'm so sorry, Tsuna. I didn't mean to drag you into this." Dino looked so sorrowful and apologetic that Tsuna couldn't help but to say he forgave him. It kind of annoyed and unnerved Tsuna in equal degree. Was this what getting hit by Dazzling Smile felt like? If that was the case, he should probably cut down on his usage of that particular skill.

"Dino-san, Romario-san, we need to get out of here!" Tsuna hissed. Dino paused for a moment before he nodded and reached into his jacket to take out a whip. Tsuna stared at it. How was a whip going to go against a gun?

Dino flicked his wrist and the whip lashed out, curling around a heavy piece of debris on the ground. He flicked his wrist again and the debris went flying through the air. It made a perfect arc and landed on the roof of a fairly far away building. There was a strange, muted, 'thump' and the gunfire stopped. Tsuna slowly turned away from the building to stare at Dino.

How the hell—

The surroundings melted away and Tsuna found himself standing in a vastly different alleyway than he was before. So his theory was right, it was an illusion. He closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose to stave off his upcoming headache. He couldn't give in to his urge to curl up in a corner and scream; he still needed to buy coffee for Reborn!

"Tsuna…?"

"So, are you still up for bringing me to the café?" Tsuna turned to look at Dino and gave a tired smile. Dino seemed a bit surprised at Tsuna's words.

"You're… You're not afraid?"

"I am, but honestly? I've seen weirder things."

Then, to Tsuna's surprise, the world went dark.

"You have established a bond with Dino Cavallone. Your Dino Cavallone bond is now level one!"

Tsuna paused. He had established a bond with this stranger. Does this mean that Dino was going to be a recurring character in his life?!

Scouting, to the limit

"We should break in at midnight," Haru whispered dramatically. A few people agreed with her.

"We shouldn't break in at all!" Tsuna protested, but of course no one heard him.

"I don't think midnight would be a really good idea," Chrome pointed out. Ever since she had run away from home, she seemed way more confident and unafraid to make herself heard. "Research has shown that human beings are least attentive during the periods that at just before dawn and dusk. If we were to break in, we should do it then."

"I see! Dawn attacks and dusk attacks right?" Kyoko added. "I've read about them too, but it seems a little risky to attack at five in the morning or seven in the evening. I suggest attacking at around three? Not many people are awake then, and it's probably nearing the end of the guard's shifts too, so they'll be a little less alert."

"Personally, I think we should scout out the area first; confirm when the shifts begin and end before we try anything. It's better to be safe than sorry, and it'll highly increase our chances of success," Hana pointed out. Tsuna started to agree with her before he caught himself. Why was he agreeing with her? He didn't even want anything to do with this!

"Daemon-san," Shouichi turned to look at their ghostly companion. "Is it alright for you to help us spy on the guards and give us their shift timings?" Daemon looked amused.

"Yes and no," he said. "It is possible for me to help you, but I would prefer it if someone accompanied me. It would be good experience for them, after all." Daemon stole a glance at Tsuna and Tsuna paled.

You are not going to drag me into this! He tried to telepathically convey his message to Daemon. It didn't work. He turned to plead with Reborn but, to his horror, Reborn looked as if he agreed with Daemon. Of course he agreed with Daemon, Reborn was a tutor. Tsuna was a fool to ever assume otherwise.

"This place's defence is really good," Tsuna whined. "How in the world are we supposed to break in?"

"I prefer the defence system they adopted when I was still alive," Daemon sniffed. Tsuna blinked and turned to look at Daemon.

"You broke into this place before?" Tsuna asked incredulously. Daemon laughed.

"Something like that."

For some reason, Tsuna felt that his words were really foreboding.

"So? How was it?" Ryohei asked excitedly when Tsuna and Daemon arrived back at the villa they were staying at. Tsuna, too tired to entertain anyone, just breezed past him without a word, walking to a corner of the room. He then lay down, curled up, and went to sleep. Ryohei stared at him for a while before turning to Daemon. "Does that mean that the spying went extremely great?"

"I thought it went rather well, to the limit." After saying that, Daemon looked rather horrified. "I apologise, I do not know what came over me," he quickly added, still a bit disturbed. Ryohei blinked, and a grin slowly crept onto his face.

"'To the limit'?" He pumped his fist into the air. "That's another extreme saying, to the limit!" he exclaimed. Daemon resisted the urge to bury his face in his hands; he was a noble and repeatedly hitting his head against the wall wasn't something a noble did. Although, that action looked more and more tempting by the second.

"What have I done…?"

Right

"Do we have all that we need?" Kyoko asked. Reborn had appointed her as the unofficial captain of this rescue mission.

"Yeah, we do. Everyone has their flame boots and headset-masks on. Shouichi-san has the equipment, and we all are equipped with our best weapons," Chrome replied after checking. She was the second-in-command for this mission. Gokudera had loudly protested on Tsuna's behalf, saying that Tsuna was better suited to be the captain or, at least, second-in-command, but Tsuna strongly declined.

"Kyoko-chan and Chrome-san's abilities will benefit us a lot more if they take the lead this time," Tsuna had tried to explain to Gokudera. He didn't look convinced, but backed down as it was clearly seen that Tsuna supported Reborn's decision.

They then proceeded to divide themselves into three teams; one team to enter the building, one team to help the first team in case things went bad, and one team to provide backup through their headsets. The first team consisted of Tsuna, Gokudera, Hibari, Kyoko, and Hana. Reborn and Daemon were content to stay with the backup team.

Tsuna had a lot of misgivings about this arrangement. Mostly because Gokudera with his bombs and Hibari with his "bite you to death" threats weren't very conspicuous, but there was no other way around it. The second and backup team had to stay together, and Tsuna knew leaving Hibari with Mukuro would only end up in disaster. Also, Gokudera refused to leave Tsuna's side, and hence the team was fixed. Tsuna just hoped that Kyoko's illusions were strong enough to make up for everything.

"This is trespassing. Breaking and entering. It's against the law!" Tsuna protested in one last attempt to talk his friends out of the situation. He didn't know why he even bothered.

"Hahi! But it's for a good cause! We're saving someone!" Haru shot back, and Tsuna couldn't think of anything to refute to that, so he left the matter alone and adjusted his mask. Their masks served as both a disguise and a way for the back-up to communicate with them. How Shouichi and Haru had gotten it done in such a short time was a mystery to Tsuna, although he was pretty sure Gokudera had helped too.

Hana stood beside him. "Hey, let's make the best out of this situation. For one, we're in the same group," she pointed out. Tsuna laughed.

"Yeah, I guess."

"Alright, it's time to move in." Kyoko walked towards them. "Let's do our best, Hana-chan, Tsuna-kun!"

"Yeah, you too," Hana replied. Tsuna only gave a nervous smile as his fear gripped him once again. Hana took one look at him and hit him over the head. "You're not doing this yourself, you have us. We will watch your back as you watch ours." Hana paused and her voice dropped to a whisper as she gestured towards Hibari. "And we have that violent monkey on our side too, so don't be afraid."

Tsuna closed his eyes as he tried to control his breathing, already feeling a little less afraid due to Hana's words.

She always knew the right things to say.

Anticlimactic everything

This was a train wreck.

"Hibari-san, if you smash the cameras, it will immediately alert the guards to our area," Kyoko patiently explained for the umpteenth time while Gokudera discussed with Shouichi as to how to deal with the security cameras in their way.

"Take a video of the empty hallway then play it on loop," Hana suggested. "At least until we've passed the corridor. They still need to see the footage of the guards walking by in…" Hana turned to Tsuna.

"In fifteen minutes," he replied. Gokudera nodded his head and relayed what they said to Shouichi. There were a few nerve wracking minutes of waiting before Shouichi's voice crackled over the headsets.

"Alright, the corridor is safe to walk through for at least three minutes. Please hurry."

The hallway was long, so they had to run. However, they were already near the room where the frozen man was kept, having used the vents for most of the way since they were small enough to fit. It seemed easy enough.

Which meant that something had to go wrong, of course.

"Careful! The guard patrol is early today!" Chrome all but yelled over the speaker. Everyone froze up for a good two seconds before they started to panic.

"W-What should we do?" Hana asked.

"Run?" Tsuna squeaked. Hibari gave him a long, level look.

"The hallway is long. There is nowhere to run."

"We'll…" Kyoko took a deep breath to calm herself down. "We'll just have to fight, then."

"Understood," Chrome replied over the headset. "We're sending out team two now."

"Thanks, Chrome-chan." The group readied their weapons just as a group of suited men rounded the corner. Giving them no time to react, Kyoko quickly weaved a subtle, near unnoticeable, illusion that made their senses perceive everything to be two seconds slower than they actually are.

And then Hibari happened.

In retrospect, Tsuna shouldn't have been so surprised. He had seen the level above the men's heads, after all, and they were all in the thirty to forty level range. Hibari, on the other hand, was already nearing level seventy. Coupled with Kyoko's illusion, they didn't stand a chance.

"Well," he heard Hana say from behind him. "I guess we can move on now."

"Tch, herbivores." Hibari sounded a little disappointed as he made his way back to the group.

They reached the room without much difficulty after that, and met with a whole new problem.

"We… didn't exactly plan a way to transport him out, did we?" Tsuna laughed awkwardly. The five of them stood around the giant chunk of ice, looking at each other and wondering what to do next. Gokudera stepped up to place a hand on the ice.

"We could try to melt it?" he suggested. "Or disintegrate it. Kurokawa and I have storm flames, after all. The red ones," he clarified when the group stared at him blankly. Comprehension entered their eyes and they nodded. Hana stepped up as well.

"Let's try it," she said and the both of them started to emit the red flames. A few minutes passed but nothing happened. Hana grew frustrated. "Oh my god," she hissed. "Why can't we have something normal for once?! Not shitty ice that defy the laws of nature!" She immediately removed her hand from the ice. It appeared untouched. Gokudera removed his hand as well and frowned.

"How is this possible?" he asked himself before he started to mutter about complicated science things Tsuna had no hope of understanding despite his high Academic skills. Hibari grunted in annoyance and whacked the chunk of ice with a tonfa. He continued to whack it, each hit increasing in intensity, when he saw that he was having no effect. A grimace grew on his face and Tsuna quickly had to intervene before it turned into a scowl.

Tsuna quietly tried to call up his inventory, but found that he couldn't. Just great, the one time he needed the game mechanics and they refused to show up. Was he in the middle of a cut scene or something? He already knew he could store sentient beings in his inventory…

"We're all wearing flame boots right?" Kyoko suddenly spoke up. All eyes turned to her. "And the ice chunk is pretty easy to hold on to, so if each of us hold one part of it…"

"You can't possibly be suggesting—" Tsuna started, but Hana cut him off.

"No, no, it's a feasible idea. A little weird… but still possible. What else can we do?"

"I guess…" Tsuna gave in. "But one of us has to be ready to counter attack, so they can't carry the ice," he pointed out. At that, everybody turned to look at Hibari. He seemed a little amused as he nodded.

"Okay," he said, and prepared his tonfas. The rest of the group took their places and clutched onto a chunk of the ice. It was rather heavy, but the weight was split between the four of them, and they had gone through Reborn's training after all. Transporting a giant chunk of ice wasn't that hard for them.

"Let's go."

"Vooiiii!" There was an obstacle standing in their path. A very loud obstacle who was screaming weird stuff in Italian and had long silver hair and a very intimidating sword. "How dare you!" He was strong too, Tsuna noted when he saw the [Superbi Squalo, Level 56] above his head.

"Don't let the intruders get away!" he yelled at his men. "Kill them all for touching the boss!"

This was trouble. There were at least ten men, excluding Superbi Squalo. It was a risky battle, even for Hibari. Before he could suggest to put the ice down so they could lend a hand, however, another familiar voice rang through the hallway.

"Hahi, there's so many people here!" Haru exclaimed. She nodded at Kyoko's general direction. "Don't worry, captain, and focus on the mission! The others have split up and we're now getting rid of the reinforcements."

"Vooiii! Do you think a bunch of brats like you can get rid of us that easily? We're the ninth's elite assassin group!" Superbi Squalo turned to glare at Haru.

"Don't use that sort of tone with me!" Haru scolded. She held her knitting needles in her hand and they crackled with green electricity. Superbi Squalo's eye's widened.

"Flames…?" he muttered to himself. "This is bad."

"Let's not waste any more time, I trust in our friends' abilities," Hana said. Kyoko faltered for a moment before she nodded.

"Right, let's continue!"

They passed by Yamamoto and Ryohei, who were in their own battle with a blond man wearing a tiara; and then Mukuro and Ken who were fighting against a black haired man with many umbrellas. At first Tsuna thought he, too, was an illusionist like Kyoko but he was proven wrong when he saw the umbrella shoot out green electricity.

Well then.

They were almost stopped once or twice, but each time, Gokudera and Hana just dropped a few dynamites and cards, respectively, that were charged with red flames. The result was very bright, and seemed rather painful. Tsuna preferred not to think about it.

Finally, they reached a dead end. In front of them was a large window, and behind them were many suited men.

"What should we do?" Tsuna asked. Gokudera nodded towards the window.

"Throw it out," he said seriously. Tsuna gaped.

"B-but, won't that harm the man inside?"

"Hibari didn't deal any damage, so it should be fine," Gokudera replied. Tsuna floundered for a moment while Kyoko thought over the situation.

"On the count of three, then," she decided. "One… two…"

The resulting crash was magnificent as the broken bits of glass sparkled in the light of the rising sun, just like little gems or stars raining down from the heavens. Along with a giant chunk of ice. You couldn't miss the ice.

Another one

"Damn it, guys!" Tsuna yelled over the headset. "This isn't some sort of competition you have to win! As long as you guys are alive, I don't care about anything else so get out of there right now!" He didn't listen to any of their protests as he tore off the headset and glared at it, desperately resisting the urge to throw it onto the ground. His friends were stupid, why did they feel the need to win against anyone they fought?

"Jy-jyuudaime?" Gokudera looked both concerned and startled by his side. Tsuna forced out a smile for him.

"I'm fine, Gokudera-kun, just a little angry. Our friends were stupidly going to get themselves killed when we could have all escaped together. They should cherish their lives more, can't they see that they are important?"

"I'm… jealous," Gokudera muttered under his breath as he turned to look away. Tsuna managed to catch his words, though, and frowned.

"Jealous? Why are you jealous, Gokudera-kun?" When Tsuna saw that Gokudera was going to deny it, he quickly cut him off. "Please tell me the truth. Aren't we friends?"

"…it's because you care so much about them, because they are so important to you. I, on the other hand… I'm just disposable."

Tsuna was too high strung to be tactful.

"Gokudera-kuuunnnn!" he all but yelled as he grabbed the silver haired boy's shoulder and started to shake vigorously. "You're are not disposable! For goodness' sake, you are precious to me too! It doesn't matter if it's a result of a situation, or an item, or anything, you all are more important to me than any of those! There's only one of you in the entire world and absolutely no one can replace you why can't you idiots see that?!"

"Jyuudaime…" Gokudera breathed, looking at Tsuna with almost worshipping eyes. It made Tsuna blanch and let go of Gokudera, backing away.

"I'm sorry Gokudera-kun, I don't know what came over me."

"No I… Thank you, Jyuudaime. I couldn't ask for a better boss… and friend." Gokudera smiled shyly, which made Tsuna smile back.

"You feel closer to Gokudera Hayato. Your Gokudera Hayato bond has gained a level! You have chosen the Romance Route answer. Gokudera Hayato Romance Route has been activated!"

To Gokudera's alarm, Tsuna suddenly spun around and walked to a corner of the room where he started to cry.

Continue?

(Yes) (No)

Author's note

Before I planned out the whole rescue/Varia arc, I was going to put in ring battles like in canon. Gokudera's RR was gonna activate then, so I thought why not now. (Oh man, and he was supposed to be the first to activate too)

Yeah, it's short. Yeah, it's incredibly anticlimactic. I researched on how to write heists, but I couldn't come up with anything so I winged it. Probably was searching in the wrong places.

I probably forgot about a lot of characters while I was writing it. There's too many ahahaha. I know for a fact I forgot of Hibari's existence until I was forming the teams

Reviews

Guest123Life4 I don't think there's going to be a future arc. It's too complicating for me to even think of touching. Sorry about that. Also, thanks. It's nice to hear that I can make you laugh.

yuki This arc will feature characters from the ring conflict, but the conflict in this arc is not about the vongola rings…

I don't know if I've replied to all of you because I miss days on the computer and I can't really remember. I try to check my inbox, though. If you have a question you want me to answer, feel free to ask. I'm not ignoring anyone on purpose, I promise.