Chapter 23: Kokuyo health land
This is my fault, Tsuna thought when the old man finished his explanation of what would happen to Kyoko and Haru if he wouldn't let himself stabbed by the knife. Tsuna knew that he was the one that was involved with the mafia, not those girls. He knew that it was because of him that they were now in danger and he regretted involving them.
He regretted endangered them.
The bottles of sulfuric acid was already raised above the heads of Kyoko and Haru when Birds, the old man, ordered the twins to stop for a second. Tsuna was relieved that neither of the girls were burned by the acid yet, but the relieve quickly turned into horror when he noticed the smaller shadow next to Kyoko's and Hana's shadows on the fence.
"Pan the camera." Birds ordered his bird.
"N-no way…" Tsuna stuttered when the monitor that showed Kyoko, Hana and one of the bloody twins panned to the eleven years old Primo. The girl that was now showed was completely oblivious to the danger she was in and opened her mouth to ask a question.
'How is your brother doing, Kyoko-san?'
"You are sick…" Bianchi scowled when the old man smiled brighter as he observed Zero.
"Isn't this just great?" Birds asked rhetorically. "That little girl over there will be the first, I can't wait to see what happens if she gets sulfuric acid poured all over her small body. I'm sure that her voice will be sounding entirely different then…"
"Stay away from her!" Yamamoto shouted and Gokudera glared at the man while cursing inwardly.
"I am not doing anything… as long as you follow my orders of course." Birds smirked while one of the bloody twins on the screens proceeded to tilt the bottle of acid above the head of the smallest girl on the monitor.
"STOP!" Tsuna shouted just before the first drop fell. "Stab me with that knife or whatever! I can't let her face anything like this, she is just an eleven years old girl!"
'Freaks like you are so obviously into the Lolita complex.'
…what? Everyone looked at the monitor again… just in time to see Zero on one of the monitors dissolve into indigo and white flames. The grey haired man that appeared in place of Zero scowled and barely avoided the acid that was poured down.
'That was close! I should have known that the enemy is a pervert who would attack the youngest and most innocent looking target first!'
The man exclaimed as the acid fell on the ground.
'Like we haven't noticed that yet!'
The brunet who was now standing in the spot where Kyoko was shouted. He picked some vials that were awfully familiar to Tsuna from his belt and threw it at the misformed man.
'You guys… actually didn't need me here.'
Shamal who was now in Hana's spot sighed as the vials broke and the bloody twin exploded.
'You aren't the one who did anything, pervert! And what were you saying about Lolita complexes?!'
'I was talking about the pervert who was doing this!'
'Be happy that he asked Zero-sama to keep them safe, Vongola. Don't worry about those civilians, they are safe now… just be sure to not to strip too often.'
Joseph stated when Shamal and Christiano started an argument in the background.
"…Those are the pervert and the midget's uncles, aren't they?" Gokudera muttered while staring at the screen.
"Ah! Haru is saved as well!" Yamamoto announced when he saw what was showed on the other screen. Haru was indeed saved by the ten years older I-pin and Lambo.
'It's a good thing that we were watching out for Haru-san like we were told to.'
The older I-pin said as the other bloody twin fell to the ground. Tsuna looked at the incredible scene and sighed in relieve. They were safe… but who asked them to keep the girls safe? C-could it be…
"Ahem, family help each other… allies as well." Reborn smiled, though he wasn't smiling on the inside… if she wasn't there, then where is Zero?
…
"Achoo!" I sneezed. I blinked a few times in confusion before I noticed that I was lost in my thoughts again. The scenery outside was already the scene of Kokuyo instead of the scene of Nanimori and the bus was emptier than before.
"Next bus stop: Kokuyo health land." The mechanic voice announced as the doors of the bus closed again and I sighed. Just one more bus stop according to the tracker…
I checked the screen of the disguised tracking device, the one disguised as a gaming console, and frowned when I saw that the red dot on the screen was standing still. This could mean that Bianchi threw the goggles away or that she isn't moving for some reason… though it could mean that they found the tracker in the goggles as well and got rid of it.
Really, if those idiots just listened to me and let me tag along I wouldn't have to do this!
"Zero-chan?" someone asked. I looked up and my frown dissolved into a fond smile when I saw who was talking.
"Hello Nagi-san." I greeted. The girl looked still as thin as before and the frown returned on my face.
"T-thank you for last t-time." The girl blushed.
"You're welcome Nagi-san… I wasn't lying when I was saying that you needed the brownies more than me." I sighed. "Are you eating well?"
"…" Nagi blushed a deeper red and looked at the changing scenery outside the window. Her silence confirmed that she was still not eating properly.
"You shou-" I began but the mechanic announcement interrupted me.
"Next bus stop: Kokuyo health land."
"…I have to get off the bus here." I sighed, there wasn't enough time to confront the girl about her eating problems now… however. I opened my bag and somehow managed to find the object that I was looking for before I had to leave the bus.
"Take this." I ordered as I forced the business card on Nagi. The girl stuttered something incomprehensible as she was forced to accept the card, but did accept it willingly in the end.
"…Nemo company?" She read out loud.
"Don't worry about that, it was a joke from a friend of mine. But the phone number on the business card is real, so call me when something goes wrong." I smiled and winked before closing my bag again and leaving the dumbfounded girl in her seat. "I hope to speak you soon." I waved as the bus left without me.
When the bus was out of sights, my smile dropped and I sighed. I'm almost here, I mused as I looked at the old amusement park in the distance.
Kokuyo health land.
…
Kokuyo health land was exactly what I imagined an abandoned amusement park to be. Old, tattered and slightly creepy… the perfect place of holding a Halloween party if you ignored the dangerous hole in the ground. I wanted to make sure that I avoided that huge hole since falling in could break all my bones… but something made me approach the hole in curiosity.
A groaning sound.
I looked down the dark hole and saw the teen that was tied up in the dim light that illuminated the underground room. He looked like he was hit by a baseball bat and a big rock, in other words: completely beaten.
"Are you alright?!" I shouted.
"Does it look like I'm alright?!" The blond boy retorted. I suppressed a chuckle and thought a bit about what could have happened here. It was most likely that he was beaten by Tsuna and the others… but that would mean that he was part of Mukuro's… gang.
I was still uncomfortable with thinking that Muku-chan had a gang now, I mean that cute boy and a gang? I simply couldn't imagine that! But if this teen was a part of that gang, he could tell me some stuff about Mukuro!
"Wait a minute! I'm going down!" I shouted as made an illusionary rope ladder and threw one end of the ladder down the hole. After making sure that the ladder won't suddenly fall down I climbed down while ignoring the protests of the scarred teen.
"Why are you coming down, you idiot byon?!" he asked when I reached the ground.
"Because you look like you've gone to hell and returned." I stated before looking for some bandages and scissors in my bag. I found the bandages, but I couldn't find the scissors so I took one of the many knives stored in my bag instead. After closing the bag again I approached the teen who was suddenly giving me a horrified look.
"What are you going to do with that byon?!" he asked.
"…You aren't thinking that I'm going to kill you, are you?" I deadpanned. The blonde didn't respond, though he did start growling at me, so I sighed and walked closer to cut the ropes and to give the boy some emergency treatment while muttering 'The youth of these days.'
"Why are you helping me byon?"
"Why do you keep on asking questions?" I retorted. "And well… because I want to get out of this hole."
"You can climb up your ladder again byon." The teen frowned, clearly confused by whatever I said.
"Not really…" I stated as I dissolved the illusion, fully aware that I won't have a way up anymore. But this is my chance to find out whatever is happening…
"…But… the ladder… was there." The teen muttered.
"What is your name?"
"…Why do you need my name?" he asked.
"If you aren't going to give me your name I'll have to call you Scarface or something like that." I flower-smiled.
"…Ken." The said teen answered with a blush after a small moment of silence.
"Nice to meet you Ken… are you hungry?" I asked when I heard his stomach rumble.
"No-"
"Let's eat then." I smiled as I retrieved two bento's from my bag. I pushed one of them in the hands of Ken before I opened my own box. "Why aren't you eating?"
"Why are you eating?"
"Well… you can't run properly when you are hungry. What if we get caught by the evil people?" I asked innocently. Lesson one of how-to-extract-information by Renatus Sinclair, try to let them talk and distract them from the fact that they are talking with bribes.
"We aren't evil byon! Especially Mukuro-san, he saved us all!"
"Saved?" I asked while wondering about two things. I didn't expect this to be so easy and Saved from what?
"After living like that… everyday, children were dying. Every day was like a hell. No matter where we go, how much we struggled, there was no way for us to live. And Mukuro by himself managed to safe the most of us, he even gave us a good life to live!" Ken ranted while opening his bento. He put the first thing that he got his hands on in his mouth, ignoring the chopsticks and the appearance of the food, and started chewing. For a little while it was silent… and I was glad for that because I needed the silence to progress what Ken just said.
He just implied that he was an Estraneo subject as well…
"Mukuro-san, despite his discomfort, did what was the best for us. Even if that meant that he had to give those guys a chance." Ken continued after swallowing whatever he was eating. "He said that he did it because someone asked him to give them a chance… and he did. For five whole years we had the chance to either live as normal people despite whatever happened before or to travel around with Mukuro-san. To see the world that we never knew… He gave us a reason to live."
"H-he sounds like an amazing guy." I whispered when Ken finished his history, not really able to keep my eyes dry because of many reasons.
Why is this happening even though Mukuro was able to live a good life?
So he managed to safe other subjects?
He actually listened to my lame speech?
He is still the same Mukuro I knew…
…
"Use the stairs on the left side to go back." Ken stated. "And don't run into trouble byon."
"…Thank you, Ken-chan." I smiled. Though the talkative teen was probably unaware of it, he managed to make me more resolved to find Mukuro than before. After hearing that Mukuro hasn't changed at all in the six years that I haven't seen him I needed to know what caused him to attack innocent civilians.
And I will find out.
Ignoring the stutters and demands to retract that nickname from Ken, I started to climb the stairs as fast as I could. The stairs ended up somewhere in a forest, probably close to the hole where I was in before but I wasn't sure about that. After trying to find out in which direction I had to go in I opened my bag to find the tracking device… just to find out that the device had ran out of energy.
"Damn it." I muttered as I looked around in the forest. In a situation like this there is only one thing left to do… survive like Serena Sinclair taught me.
I shivered slightly in horror when I remembered the hellish training but recovered pretty fast. Following the orders in my memories I started to look for signs that someone went through this part of the forest. It wasn't long before I found some bushes that had broken twigs and footprints that led to… somewhere.
"Here goes nothing…" I muttered as I followed the footsteps. It took quite a while, but in the end I finally reached the end of the forest. I looked at something that could only be described as a battlefield and two wounded people… is that Yamamoto?!
"Yamamoto!" I shouted as I started running to the battlefield.
"Z-Zero?" Yamamoto muttered absentmindedly when I reached him. "I guess that your prediction came true… I made a choice that made me more lost than before… but I don't regret it at all. What are you doing here?"
"You're talking gibberish, Yama-kun. What happened here?" I frowned while gave his arm some emergency treatment.
"The fake Rokudo Mukuro." He managed to say. "Help him first."
"The… fake Rokudo Mukuro?" I echoed. "…You mean that guy over there who doesn't look like him at all?"
"…"
"Yama-kun?" I tried, but he already lost consciousness so I gave up on talking with him. I finished bandaging his arm first before approaching the man who was leaning against a wall. After a quick observation, the man opened his eyes.
"Who-"
"Don't talk, you're poisoned like Goku-chan was. I should have the cure somewhere in my bag." I stated before looking around in my bag again.
"Why-"
"Am I carrying a cure for the poisoning around? Because Goku-chan was poisoned with it of course."
"No, why are you helping me?"
"…Hold on, this might sting." I muttered as I used a syringe to inject the cure in his body. the man tried to say something, but fainted before he could. One of the side effects of the cure… now I think about it, Goku-chan didn't take the permanent kind of cure. I should deliver this medicine to him too then…
I frowned when the man's body went from tense to relaxed and observed the not-lookalike of Mukuro.
Why was he Mukuro's supposed to be lookalike? Why not someone who actually looked like him or at least someone who had that weird pineapple hairstyle?
I sighed because I honestly didn't know and started treating some of his worst wounds. When I wanted to check his head for wounds as well I noticed something that wasn't supposed to be there. He had a permanent illusion planted in his head and I recognized the flame signature.
So that is why Mukuro chose him.
…
Omake: wrong
"Kufufu."
Tsuna was freaked out by the blue haired teen who was asking him questions and honestly wanted to return to his friends. He was worried about them after all, but something made him turn around and face the teen again.
"First of all, there is one 'fu' too few and it is supposed to be higher pitched. Secondly, it is supposed to sound more amused than sinister. And lastly don't laugh like that around me please, when it comes from you… it's just disturbing." Tsuna stated before running off again.
"…What in the six hells did just happen?"
Hey guys, doubleyy here.
You didn't really expect Zero to sit and wait, right? Especially since it is Muku-chan! good job to the ones who guessed that right :). Well, you can see that I don't really like Birds... but who does actually like this man-who-looks-older-than-he-actually-is? More changes in the plot because of Zero's meddling this time told by Ken! I personally think that Ken is the most talkative person of the gang and then this happened... let's say that this chapter was kind of the result of an accident. Anyways, because Mukuro actually listened to Zero, he stayed with Lanchia's Famiglia instead of killing them and getting into the Vindicare... that was kind of the result of an accident too. I was talking to some friends when someone mentioned that if they didn't listen to their therapist, they would have ended up in prison ages ago... (I still hope that they were joking)
That actually sounds hilarious, Grizzmon XD
You'll find out, Stellar Nymph, kufufufu.
And... let's just say that the results of Zero being sad wont' be pretty, mysterious guest...
More changes and explanations of the situation will come in the next chapter! Anyways thanks for reading and please review.
Doubleyy out.