Title: Of Sparrows and Princes
Author: sllebswap
Beta'd by: MelissaRose85
Characters/Pairing: Miura Haru and Belphegor
Type: OneShot Collection (InComplete)
Genre: Romance/General/Humor
Word Count: 4581
Rating: T (Contains content not suitable for children)
Disclaimer: Kateikyoushi Hitman Reborn belongs to Akira-san.
Summary: TYL ficlet. Various one-shots depicting the complicated relationship between Belphegor and Haru.
Chapter Last Revised on: 06/08/10
Chapter Twenty Five
"Tch. You are still alive and kicking, I see."
Surprised by the gruff, oddly familiar voice, Haru turned her head quickly to the source, her eyes widening when she saw a certain silver-haired, chain smoking right hand man of their Juudaime leaning casually against the doorframe of her suite.
"Hayato?" she called out, sounding genuinely surprised—and incredulous. "Is that really you?"
The Storm Guardian rolled his eyes. "Stupid woman, apparently even the fresh country air in Italy cannot curb your imbecilic penchant for asking the obvious," the man muttered sarcastically. Haru glared at him. He was definitely the same smart mouthed, super annoying Gokudera she knew, that was for sure.
"Don't call me a stupid woman, you idiotic man!" she shot back at him, easily falling into their usual mode of communication—arguing. They had been sniping at each other pretty much since the very first day they met, and ten years later, nothing had changed.
Haru stalked up and brushed past him to leave the room, and hardly offended, the lanky, suited male followed her out to the hallway. It was roughly noontime and she had been making a brief stop back to her room to drop off some notes to peruse later that night when Hayato had made his unexpected appearance at her door, and despite her usual irritation at the offensive man, Haru was actually quite glad to see him, someone from her country.
"What are you doing here in Italy, anyway?" the brunette asked grudgingly after a moment of silence.
"Vongola business," Hayato replied promptly, with no further inclination for providing details. Haru didn't mind. She really didn't want to know, anyway. The silver-haired man had a distinctly harried, unhappy look on his face. "Why else would I bother to return to this godforsaken country?"
It was at the tip of Haru's tongue to protest that Italy really wasn't that bad, but she understood the reason behind Hayato's dislike for this country, and so she held her tongue. By now, almost all of the original members of Tsuna's Family were aware of the Storm Guardian's tumultuous past with his blood family, and it made sense that returning to Italy, his homeland, must have stirred some pretty bad memories for the man.
And so, Haru tactfully changed the subject.
"Huh, how did you find me so easily, anyway?" she asked. "I didn't see you at the hall during lunch, so that means you must have just arrived. This castle is so huge I don't believe that you could have run into me by mere chance alone."
Hayato glanced sideways at the curious woman. "I located you with the GPS tracker, of course. Don't you know that our Boss had a tracker surgically implanted into each of us?" he asked quite seriously.
Haru gawked. She had definitely never heard of any such thing. "No, I didn't know!" she exclaimed, surprised. "Tsuna really did that?"
It was most unlike the Juudaime to do such things behind their backs, so what was going on?
"No, of course he did no such thing," the silver-haired man deadpanned after he had a moment of amusement confusing Haru. She stared at him. "I was just kidding. As for your question, I asked a passing servant for your whereabouts."
The Storm Guardian smirked slightly.
"You are a bit slow as usual, aren't you?"
Almost immediately, Haru was blatantly reminded that it had been over half a year since she last tried to do the universe a great service by attempting to murder one Gokudera Hayato. It was really half a year too long.
"Hayato, can you do me a favor?"
The man in question eyed the saccharine sweet expression on her face, though it badly hid the visible twitch of aggravation on her forehead. He arched his brow.
"Stay still for five minutes so that I can kill you," she demanded irritably.
He shook his head at her.
"Stupid woman," he told her. "You will need more than five minutes if you really want to do me in."
Whether he was boasting about his own abilities or plain undermining hers, Haru was not sure. Either way, his flippant reply really annoyed her, and she reacted the way she always had when dealing with this silver-haired menace. The young woman reached over to wrap her fingers around his scrawny neck, a practice that she had been following diligently since the first time they met. However, it was getting harder and harder over the years to actually succeed in strangling Hayato. For one, he had actually grown much taller than she had, and was obviously not that scrawny any longer.
Still, Haru gave it her best shot, spurred on by the increasingly amused expression of the Storm Guardian as he easily hindered her efforts by keeping out of her range.
"Quit moving, damn it!" Haru growled as she pounced towards her childhood friend/rival, and Hayato barked with laughter as he evaded her attempts to do him bodily harm. It was as if they had both regressed to the age of fourteen once more, taunting each other just for the hell of it.
And it was this familiar sight that Belphegor stumbled upon, had found his lover and the Vongola Storm Guardian in; the usually scowling man was grinning with unholy amusement as he kept an irritated Haru at arm's length with his hand splayed against her forehead, and she was alternating between muttering curses and yelling at him as she tried to overcome his longer reach but to no avail.
"What is going on here?"
Hearing Bel's voice cutting sharply down the hallway was enough to snap Haru out of her tunnel vision when it came to besting Hayato, and the brunette ceased in her struggles against Hayato to glance at Belphegor in surprise. The golden-haired Varia was standing at the mouth of the passageway, some distance away from the duo, his expression neutral as he observed the spectacle before him, and Haru was immediately embarrassed to be caught in such a childish display.
Her silver-haired partner-in-crime did not seem to share her chagrin, however. The Storm Guardian merely straightened as if he had done nothing out of the ordinary, and sent the other man a faint, mocking smile.
"Hello to you too, Belphegor," Hayato remarked even as he dropped his defending hand back to his side, confident that the she-devil would behave herself in front of others. He started to stroll towards the Varia executive, and after a brief moment of hesitation, Haru followed as well.
Belphegor watched Haru closely as she neared. She looked a bit self-conscious and could not seem to look him in the eye, and he started to frown. The blonde swung his attention sharply back to the Vongola Storm Guardian.
"Gokudera Hayato," he acknowledged with a sharp smile. "What are you doing here?"
The smartly suited male gave the Prince a look. The man was certainly a bit irritable today, Hayato noted.
"I'm here on official business, of course. Escort detail."
Belphegor did not miss what Hayato did not say.
"That means Sawada Tsunayoshi is here as well." It wasn't a question that the Prince was asking, though Haru quickly perked up at his remark.
"Wait; Tsuna is here?" She sounded pleasantly surprised. She quickly turned to Hayato for confirmation, and when the man nodded, a large, happy grin spread across the brunette's face.
"Why didn't you say so at the beginning?" Haru half-scolded the Storm Guardian. "Where is he now? I want to see him!"
She looked entirely too happy to only have had a typical relationship with her leader, that much Belphegor could quickly surmise. Judging by the complete lack of surprise on Gokudera's face, her affection towards Sawada Tsunayoshi was definitely nothing new to the Storm Guardian.
"Oi, hold your horses. Boss is in a meeting with Xanxus right now." Hayato rolled his eyes. "I swear you act like an overexcited Chihuahua every time Juudaime is mentioned."
Haru promptly blustered at the unfortunately apt analogy. "I do not act like a Chihuahua!" she denied, reaching out to smack the silver-haired man in the arm. She stuck out her tongue at him. "Tsuna is dear to me!"
Hayato didn't look like he cared one way or another, though standing beside him, Belphegor was starting to look quite irritated. He wasn't scowling outright or throwing his usual temper tantrums, but his facial expression had smoothed out completely, and superficially, he appeared downright disinterested, bored, in fact, of the conversation.
But Haru knew for a fact that Belphegor was seldom blank faced. He leered, he smirked, he taunted. He hid his emotions behind the various sardonic, jester-like masks that he switched about easily at whim, and the one and only time she had seen him looking deliberately placid, it had turned out to be only the calm before the storm—literally.
Faintly, Haru wondered what it meant if she was beginning to develop the ability to read her lover's mood, but still could not grasp what he was thinking at all. It was frustrating, especially at times like now, when she wasn't quite sure how to act around him in the presence of her friends. He wasn't giving her any hint of how to proceed at all, and she was flustered and felt like she was blindly fumbling about with no clue whatsoever of the direction she was supposed to be heading.
After all, their relationship had never been properly defined; it wasn't as if he had wooed and courted her to become his girlfriend—or had even had the decency to ask for her to be so. No, the dratted man had just decided one fine day that he wanted her, and that was that. He seemed to see her as his private belonging or something to that extent and she had reluctantly allowed it at first because he could be so very persuasive when he wanted to be and he had never really learned how to take 'no' for an answer.
Then later, much, much later, when she had gotten to know him better and could at rare occasions glimpse the 'knight' in him under all that pile of tarnished armor, she began to develop some feelings for him, enough to actually no longer mind being with his usual brash, irritating self. Haru had just accepted their strange little arrangement as what it was; neither here nor there but evidently it still suited their needs perfectly, and there was really no need to fix something that wasn't broken in the first place, was there?
Unfortunately, Haru had foreseen a long time ago that it was going to be next to impossible to attempt to explain that to her friends and family back in Japan. Besides, their relationship had happened so suddenly that she didn't know what she would say anyway, and so Haru nimbly nipped the problem in the bud by not mentioning it to anyone back home at all. It had worked quite well until now, where the problem had somehow grown to headache-inducing proportions and had flown over from Japan to Italy to bite her in the backside.
It was a split second decision that she had made, but Haru quickly decided to act normal. She wasn't about to cling to Belphegor and hope that her friends would just accept things as they were, but she wasn't going to pretend that there was nothing going on between them either. If Hayato and Tsuna found out, then she would come clean and tell the truth, but if they failed to notice what was going on, then it would be one less problem for her to handle.
Besides, it was not as if Belphegor would be thrilled to have an entire horde of the Vongola core members poking their very interested noses in his private affairs, and therefore Haru really could not think of any reason why the golden-haired Prince would object to her relatively simple plan of keeping their relationship low profile.
Hayato distracted her from her thoughts with his usual smart aleck-y remarks, and Haru promptly gave him a withering glare.
"Anyway, who else is here?" she asked the silver-haired man grumpily. "Yamato? Ryohei? Kyoko-chan?"
"It's only the Boss and I. This isn't a vacation, stupid woman."
She whacked him sharply on the back of his head this time, irritated.
"Quit calling me that!"
They were sniping at each other like a pair of unruly siblings, their reluctant camaraderie obvious in their comfortable interactions.
Hayato quit antagonizing Haru in favor of glancing askance at the golden-haired Varia standing in their midst. The older male was observing them with a quietly gathering air of annoyance around him, and Hayato was quickly reminded that it really wasn't a good idea to ignore the Varia executive if one could help it.
No matter what Tsuna said, Hayato still felt that it paid to be wary of the Varia. With the exception of Lussuria and perhaps Squalo, the rest of the Varia Commanders had only ever indicated bare tolerance or even downright indifference for their Vongola counterparts. They certainly weren't enemies anymore, but they weren't exactly one big happy family either.
Surprisingly enough, Haru seemed to have adapted quite well to life here. She was obviously healthy and well, and she hadn't looked mistreated or abused in any way. Judging by the strength of the wallop that she had packed to his poor, bruised head, she had definitely gotten even more violent in the last six months that he hadn't seen her.
It was as the woman had always insisted through the web conferences and phone conversations that she regularly exchanged with the various members of the Famiglia back in Japan; she had adjusted well in Italy and was perfectly alright, and that there really was nothing to worry about.
"Bel, would you mind terribly if we don't head down to the dungeons for the rest of today? I'd like to spend some time with Tsuna-kun and Hayato-no-baka here."
Haru was asking very nicely and so politely that for a brief moment, Belphegor only gave her a mildly disbelieving stare. The woman had never behaved this submissively and meekly around him before, not even on the first day when they were had been made to work together, and it was definitely suspicious now that she was being so modest and demure-like.
Then, he saw the neutral, pleasant, unnaturally shuttered expression on her face, and he immediately knew what she was up to. He stiffened imperceptibly with irritation.
"Yes, I would bloody mind," the Varia's Prince snapped rather ungraciously. "Stop that right now."
She was so startled by his harsh order that she had stared at him in surprise, but before Hayato could draw his own conclusions, Haru recovered hastily and quickly explained.
"I have mentioned this to Tsuna before; Belphegor is my assigned guide and protector here in the Varia. He…is the most familiar with me, out of all the others who reside in this castle." Haru quickly finished the last sentence before she completely lost the nerve to do so. It was the vaguest explanation that she could think of without lying outright, but still, she diligently avoided Bel's gaze.
Hayato huffed with quiet amusement, seemingly unaware of the undercurrent of tension floating around him.
"At least you were being looked after by one of Varia's Commanders," the silver-haired male acknowledged with a small smirk. "I feel sorry for Belphegor though; for us combat types, it is boring as hell babysitting you."
Before Haru could say a word to refute the Vongola Storm Guardian, Belphegor cut in with a sleek, shark-like grin.
"I don't mind. I was able to occupy myself with various interesting pursuits," the man remarked silkily with underlying meaning. Hayato did not necessarily understand what he was saying, but Haru clearly did. Her face promptly flooded with color, and she redoubled her efforts not to look at the golden-haired devil who happened to be her lover.
Hayato did not miss the abject look of embarrassment on Haru's face this time. He quirked his eyebrow. This was interesting. Obviously, whatever Belphegor had done had caused the brunette some fair amount of grief, and Hayato found his curiosity piqued.
"Oh? Do share. I find myself looking after this troublesome woman back at the home base more often than I'd like. Perhaps I'd try what you do next time."
Haru's eyes widened and she gaped at Hayato in disbelief. She risked a glance at her lover and was quickly alarmed to see that he was no longer amused.
For a brief moment, Belphegor looked blank. Then, he started to smile slowly, though it was by no means a friendly expression, even by his usual standards. He looked quite eerily pissed, actually, and even Hayato could see that. The poor man appeared mildly confused, not sure just what he had said or done to offend the other Storm Flame user.
"What I do with my charge is none of your business," the blonde replied at last, his tone surprisingly tempered and cool. His smile turned into a dangerous smirk. "In fact, I might have to kill you if you try it, Vongola Storm Guardian."
By now, Hayato had definitely gotten the inkling that something was afoot, though for the life of him, he couldn't comprehend what. The silver-haired man gave the Prince an odd look and shook his head inwardly when he further saw the surprised expression on Haru's face.
"You know what? I don't want to know," Hayato announced. He waved his hand idly in the air. "The truth will come out sooner or later anyway, and I just want to get this done and over with so that I can finally get some rest. I didn't get a wink of sleep on the whole damn trip from Japan to Italy. Come on; let's go wait for the Juudaime to finish his meeting."
He was starting to look quite grouchy too, but Haru wondered how much of it was only for pretense. Despite being irritating and idiotic most of the time, it was true that Hayato had rightfully earned his place as the Decimo's right hand man. He was more observant than he let on and had a razor sharp mind that missed little. Haru had no doubt that he at least suspected that something was up between herself and Belphegor, but the damage was already done.
Even though she was quite exasperated by how things were turning out, Haru had to admit that she felt a bit less tense now. It was a never nice feeling to deliberately deceive your comrades, after all.
As the trio continued down the hallway as a group, Haru could not help but spare a glance for Belphegor. She had somehow gotten sandwiched between the two men and since Hayato was walking slightly ahead, she saw no harm in trying to decipher the Prince's current state of being. The slight purse of Belphegor's lips indicated his annoyance with the situation, but he said nothing and appeared to be ignoring her for the moment, though she wondered about the small fuss he had made when she had attempted to gloss over their relationship with nonchalance.
Haru especially could not deny the small thrill that bolted through her at his mild display of possessiveness at Hayato's unwitting comment. He didn't tell her outright, but his actions showed that he did not intend to pretend that their relationship had never existed, though he certainly wasn't about to go around advertising it, either. Still, that was enough for Haru, and it warmed her heart to know that he had no intention to throw aside this yet unnamed thing they had between them and feign ignorance before her friends.
The affection she had for him in her heart was beginning to grow to unimaginable proportions, and right there and then, Haru had the most overwhelming urge to kiss him. Only the fact that Hayato was with them curbed her unusual impulse. A part of her wondered just when it was that Belphegor had started to affect her so deeply, and that same part warned that he now had the ability to hurt her deeply if he so chose. It was too late for her to do anything to change the course of matters, but perhaps it would be prudent for her not to remain so closely attached to the assassin Prince.
That was, if she could actually manage to keep away from him, and if she even wanted to.
They finally arrived at Xanxus' wing of the castle then, and were just in time to see a formally suited Tsuna walking out of the Varia Leader's office with Lussuria in tow.
Haru's eyes immediately lit up at seeing one of her most favorite people. The ten years or so worth of experience of throwing herself at this particular man quickly kicked into place, and before she knew it, the brunette was hurrying towards the head of the Vongola Famiglia, a happy cry of his name on her lips as she launched herself at him.
"Tsuna!"
The powerful Vongola Decimo was no longer the scrawny, scared child of the past. Although not as tall as any of his Guardians, Sawada Tsunayoshi had grown to become an exceptionally handsome man. His regal, reserved demeanor attracted attention no matter where he went, and there were speculations that he looked exactly like his most well known predecessor, the Vongola Primo.
Ten years ago, Tsuna would have cowered with alarm at the enthusiastic greeting, desperate to evade Haru's joyful tackle, but the Tsuna of the present merely gave the pretty brunette a small, genuine smile and easily caught her smaller frame in his arms. He returned her embrace fully.
"Haru, you look well," the Vongola leader greeted her with warm affection, his even, smooth voice calm and soothing to her ears. Tsuna drew back slightly from the beaming woman and ran his dark amber eyes over her carefully. Then he fingered her hair thoughtfully. "You grew out your hair. It looks good," he complimented with quiet sincerity.
Haru smiled, blushing slightly at his praise. She would have to be a robot not to feel flattered when someone as influential and as good looking as Sawada Tsunayoshi was praising her appearance.
"Thanks," she replied cheerfully. "You look quite spiffy yourself, Vongola X."
By the sideline, an amused Lussuria wondered if he was the only one who noticed the annoyance on Bel's face as he surveyed the evidently close friendship between Sawada Tsunayoshi and Haru-chan.
Haru-chan wasn't flirting with Tsunayoshi of course, but she was certainly being quite affectionate, and Lussuria would bet that wasn't sitting well with Belphegor at all. Oh, Bel was also definitely not going to like it when he learned of what the Decimo had been discussing with Xanxus earlier.
Standing beside the Storm Unit Commander of the Varia, Hayato spared the man a mildly disturbed look when he heard him growl in irritation. Hayato glanced between the Prince and Haru curiously, a small realization eventually dawning on him. It couldn't be that…
"Lussuria," Haru called out then. "You guys are done with the meeting?"
The colorful martial arts expert beamed at the young woman. "Yup, we just finished. You were the main focus of this meeting, actually."
Haru was definitely quite surprised to hear that. She looked to her leader for confirmation. "Eh? I was?"
Tsuna had finally let go of her by then, which was not a moment too soon as a quietly simmering Belphegor was seriously starting to contemplate cutting the man's overly touchy hands off. The dark-haired Decimo nodded.
"All of us missed you back home," Tsuna informed her gently. "You have been gone for a very long time, Haru. I understand that this is a huge, long-term project that you are involved in at the moment, but we have been looking for a way to allow you to work in Japan instead of here in Italy."
"We have consulted Shouichi and he has confirmed that it's possible for us to link up the servers over here to ours back at the home base without causing any breach in security," Tsuna continued. "You should encounter no problems altering the codes remotely back in Japan."
Haru stared at Tsuna in mild shock.
"So that means…"
"You can return home with us," he finished for her with a small smile. "I have just cleared it with Xanxus—they have no objections on this side as long as the project is successfully completed in the end."
She could go home. She could work back at the Japanese home base and be near her close friends and family again, no longer closed off from the rest of the world in this huge drafty castle in Italy, with only a bunch of powerful, eccentric assassins as companions and a perverted, short-tempered Prince for a lover…
If she thought of her current situation that way, it was a no brainer to determine what she would choose.
And it was rather evident by the look in her eyes that she had missed her homeland dearly despite the upbeat and generally sunny nature that she had typically shown during her stay in Italy. He was certain that she would definitely grab this chance to fly back to her country and be amongst her Famiglia, basking in their warmth and companionship, and the image that he formed in his mind was so sickeningly, disgustingly blissful and idyllic that it made him want to go out and kill something right away.
Worse of all, it hinted that she was willing to leave him and that simply would not do. He was not done with her yet, not by a long shot, and if she thought that she was going anywhere without him, then she had better think again. Quickly.
"So?" Tsuna enquired, gazing affectionately at this young woman who was one of his important people, who had always shown such unwavering support for him through the years. The Tenth placed his hands on her shoulders. "If you are in agreement, we will start making the arrangements right away."
It was at the tip of Haru's tongue to say yes but when she opened her mouth to agree, nothing came out. A funny look crossed her face. Despite her apparent eagerness to return home, she seemed to be hesitating, and the reason for her indecisiveness happened to be glowering right behind her. Haru was astonished to realize that the thought of parting with Belphegor left her strangely anxious and reluctant, and she shook herself inwardly to clear her unexpected feelings.
This was not the time to be conflicted over her feelings! Her leader had come all the way to Italy, offering her a means to return with him to the Famiglia, and every shred of common sense she had told her that she should take it. So why was she hesitating? Haru resolutely pushed away the warm and tender feelings that she had recently began to get whenever she thought of Belphegor and started to nod her head in acquiesce of Tsuna's plan. Her earlier indecisiveness ensured that she was just a bit too late though, for her golden-haired lover decided to speak up at that exact moment.
"The two of you have come for nothing, Vongola Famiglia. The mother of my unborn child is not going anywhere."
::owari::
Questions That I Would Like To Answer Before You Ask:
It's kinda too late to say this now, but Cliffhanger Alert! Most of you are probably not sure what had happened in the last portion of this chapter, but I assure all of you that everything will become clearer in the next installment. For now, well, it seems like Belphegor is going to be a daddy soon, eh? I don't know about you, but trying to imagine our favorite assassin Prince as a responsible parent made me burst into uncontrollable laughter. I can just imagine an aghast Haru in the background already.
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Well, some of you have asked at one time or another of the reaction of the Vongola Famiglia regarding Haru's relationship with Belphegor, but as you can see now, there are none because they have been more or less kept in the dark about the entire affair. Not for long, obviously. Hayato and Tsuna are going to be in for one big surprise come the next chapter!
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As always, thanks for reading and reviewing, ladies! You know I love reading all your wonderful feedback!
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-sllebswap