Xanxus' Adventures in Parenthood Piracy by InsaneScriptist
Beta'd by the surprised Umei no Mai
Summary: Xanxus could only blame the damn scientists for stranding him in an alternate dimension. However Xanxus could only blame himself for allowing that woman to foist her child onto him. Drabble fic.
Varia
The Varia organization was officially the youngest of all of the Vongola's Houses. The Vongola was comprised of several organizations, all supposedly working synergistically; checking and balancing each other in an intricate system. The truth was the whirling dance of words and violence that was mafia politics had long since devised a pecking order. The Varia existed outside of it, only answerable to the Vongola's Boss.
In comparison to an organization or House like the CEDEF, which had been around since Primo's time, the Varia was an unruly terror of a problem child. Officially anyway.
Ricardo, the Secondo, was the person who created the position that would eventually become the hitman in the mafia, at first as a way to keep the peace and then as enforcers of it in anyway possible; it was not a proud accomplishment but it set the bones for what the Varia would eventually be. It was the mercenaries, that Ricardo kept on retainer as hitmen, that would eventually be the first incarnation of the Varia, long before it was the Independent Assassination Squad.
Having highly skilled hitmen on retainer was from then on a Vongola tradition, as they could then go out and kill whoever was needing to be killed. Nono, just happened to have the Greatest Hitman in the World on retainer, but other Vongola Bosses didn't have Reborn. Admittedly Nono had Reborn from long before the man actually was recognized as the World's Greatest Hitman, so you could argue the man had just gotten lucky.
It was however war that defined the squad of hitmen, turned assassins into what they would eventually become.
Italy had a history of being dominated by foreign powers, so learning languages had always been a must, as was the court politics and all the details of foreign and local powers; most of the older mafia families required their heirs, bosses and top people to be fluent in at least three. As assassins it was especially needed if they wanted to be successful at getting somewhere to kill whoever since travel and information moved so much slower then. Letters could take months to reach the recipient, and travel could take equally long if not longer. This had resulted in screw-ups before the Vongola's Quinto decided that if he was going to have assassins on retainer, they'd at least have a base in every country or region of importance; few bases survived World War Two but at least if one assassin went traveling another could follow through on the killing order.
It was in the 1800s that a lot of political set-ups eventually led to the wrong political party getting power in Italy. That was how Benito Mussolini managed to involve the nation in World War Two.
World War Two was mostly credited with a lot of destruction, particularly of the Italian economy and death of its citizens, particularly in the north. It was however what had birthed the Varia, in its official present state.
It was the Ottava who unofficially created the Varia, as the Independent Assassination Squad. The original intention was to be able to have more highly capable teams of people dismantle the Fascist Regime, which they did with great efficiency and glee. The Independent part was required because communication with each other was limited due to spies and they had to go to work without Ottava micro-managing their every move. It was the Varia who killed Benito Mussolini and hung him upside down in Milan to show off the fact the dictator and German puppet was dead.
However, post-war, a lot of the Italian Resistance turned to crime out of desperation due to the destroyed economy and that was the birth of the modern mafioso image. Guns, violence and crazy soldiers all trying to stay alive and protect what was important to them. The Vongola had to protect its people and its territories from these new upstarts, so they found a way. As Daniela and her Guardians could only do so much, she relied on the group that supported her fully during the war.
Thus the Varia in its modern incarnation was born, and made semi-official.
Having a pack of highly trained assassins on call, after some very public hits cemented the Vongola's reputation as top-dog of the mafia. It also stopped a lot of the petty feuding between bands, as they organized into famiglias of their own and sorted out their businesses and the like so as to avoid meeting a messy end.
In some ways, the Varia were the peacekeepers Secondo had wanted; they were proactive in ensuring it and willing to kill to keep it too.
First
While some people like Dino would claim Tyr was the first Boss of the Varia that was a lie; he was the first officially named Boss of the Varia in the general mafia history books. Some histories, like the origin of the position of hitman and of the Varia were kept secret and buried.
The unofficial Primo of the Varia was a Visconti; the original squad had their names immortalized in the Varia history books. They didn't make it through the Second World War, but were remembered forevermore nonetheless.
The Visconti family, being traditionally Clouds, might also be why the Varia was the Independent Assassination Squad, based away from proper Vongola territory. No one is quite sure how the Varia ended up with an actual Moorish castle, but post-war, they made it their headquarters. Then as chaos of rebuilding continued, they fought, recruited and fought some more, frequently among themselves. During World War Two, the Varia ran through a number of bosses and members. Post-war, the survivors looked at each other and said that's the standard ability that the Varia needed to have.
Post-war had the Varia at loose ends, which was dangerous for assassins to be at. So the idea of taking on other missions that people couldn't, wouldn't be able to do, much less survive came about. It kept the Varia busy, visible and rich. A lot of that money was funneled towards the Vongola House to fund various projects needed to pull off the Italian Economic Miracle and turn the Vongola into 'the richest, most influential Mafia family in the world.'
Honestly, the Vongola had always been affluent but supporting its people and territory during and immediately after the war had drained their liquid funds to previously unheard of levels. The Varia being made out of patriots and converts to the Vongola cause were willing and happy to donate to the rebuilding efforts.
That probably gave rise to a lot of the 'Vongola is built on a mountain of corpses, drenched in blood and sin' business too. Because, that's how Vongola got the money to become the modern empire it was.
Tyrant
The Varia quickly built their traditions, their organization and the like by keeping the war model they had been using. A few traditions however were unique to the Varia, being ceremonial fights or duels to the death or first blood. One very unique aspect was the fact that killing your superior was a legitimate way to gain that position as Bel proved back when he was eight. The last was that dignity really didn't have any place there. There was nothing dignified about death after all, no matter where or how you encountered it.
This was an organization of assassins, made by assassins, for assassins. Normal things like job training didn't happen except on rare occasion. If you couldn't do your job, you either learned, died or found someone to do your job for you; any method was allowed for persuasiveness so long as it worked. There was a reason that Squalo was able to hold the Varia for him, even while he was frozen; some of the old timers had later remarked that Squalo had found a good Boss for them.
At the time it had been incredibly patronizing for Xanxus to hear -it was, however, not the worst thing he had ever heard about himself- but it was more a compliment to the shark's ability to find someone to do the job he obtained by killing Tyr so the shark could get back to doing what he wanted. That was pure Varia sentiment there; once you were Varia there were remarkably few rules beyond survive and get the job done, so threatening to kill another member so you could get out of guard duty was allowed. So passing the position of Boss over to an outsider? Allowed, and acceptable provided he or she was Varia Quality.
Still in that post-war environment, the Varia was semi-officially created and organized but unofficially a mess of assassins recruited from every corner of Europe and a good chunk of Africa and Asia and willing to kill anyone they didn't respect.
It was in that environment that Tyrant first entered the Varia, promptly killed the then Boss and took over.
Sixteen corpses, seven people crippled for life, numerous broken bones and even more numerous bleeding wounds later, Tyrant reigned supreme and untouched. Tyrant's first order? Clean yourselves up and stop bleeding all over my floors.
Tyrant was obeyed.
Office
The office was very barren, in the emotional sense. The desk was handsome wood, the bookshelves full of rich looking books, the carpet plush and darkly hued. The walls were off-white due to age. There were however no paintings, no mementos and nothing else to leave a hint of personality.
The retired Head of Varia Housekeeping looked just like Xanxus remembered. Tyrant's face was a little wrinkled, the eyes still a glowing shade of blue and the artfully styled hair still blond, although Xanxus didn't know if that was natural or dyed.
Instead of saying anything, Tyrant pulled out a file and handed it to him to read.
Troll
Reading the file was interesting. Not interesting in the 'oh, that's neat' or 'this could be useful.' It was interesting in the 'fuck me sideways, I'm doomed anyway' interesting.
"Any list of locations that you know of when and where my people will show up?"
Tyrant pulled out another file, and opened it. There was a list of date and times both locally and at home on the first page. Also included was who went where and what had happened. It was very lacking in detail, but that was probably intentional on his future self's part since his future self knew his past self would figure it all out... eventually. He knew how he thought after all.
"So, I'm going to be working to avert paradoxes for a while. At least my calendar is mostly clear."
Receiving memories of your future self once was enough; this was clearly no time travel on his part however. Everyone else however? The timelines between dimensions mis-matched and sometimes quite fucking badly. In a few cases, he was actually there to meet whoever was there but clearly however they wouldn't or couldn't bring him back for some reason or another. Some of them he had given something, orders or goods or whatever to send back like he had clearly done for Tyrant. Tyrant wouldn't have the information and still be here otherwise. In theory anyway...
At least they were trying to bring him back, even if they were failing quite fucking spectacularly at actually accomplishing it. Some people ended up here decades before he did in local time.
Those that were at least were on record. He was reasonably certain the records Tyrant handed over to him were altered, possibly on his own future order. Some of the initial 'oops' tests before they figured out how to recall people back across dimensions? He wouldn't be surprised if Rosso and the like were at least partially descended from them. It at least explained Rosso's accent. If he was in his home dimension he would place her as clearly from Venice.
As the Sawada-brat and his guardians proved, speaking a different language with completely different pronunciations could be difficult when you didn't learn it young even if you had been speaking it for years; even the Varia had people mispronounce things on occasion when their brain got confused. Considering how long Japanese had been the main language worldwide here, he expected some corruption of the language and accent. Rosso's was tellingly and disturbingly clear.
"No, but you do give me an order for when I go back to put myself on active duty once again."
"The time between dimensions isn't stable then." Xanxus commented more than asked.
The evidence was in his hand and in his face. He clearly couldn't do anything about that. He was however, more than a little amused at the idea of there being two Tyrants keeping an eye on the Varia for him in his absence, at least for a bit; he wasn't sure how long this Tyrant would be over to give orders on his behalf before the past Tyrant was sent back or decided to come back to this dimension. One was already more than most people could cope with.
That is if the timelines allowed that; the cow-guardian's bazooka only exchanged your present self for your future self -specifically a future you that was ten years older- for five minutes. As this was between two totally different dimensions, who the fuck knew what was possible and allowed? That five minute time frame could stretch for hours, if not longer on either side.
Still, at least his preparations here weren't going to go to waste.
"It depends on your Flame Attribute, or that's the working theory." Tyrant replied, understanding the implied question and answering that.
"Give 'em hell, Tyrant, and pass on a message for me."
"Oh? Do tell."
Internet is fixed. Cue celebration.