Chapter 34

I created the sound of madness

wrote the book on pain

somehow I'm still here to explain

that the darkest hour never comes at night

On The Horizon

There was something to be said about the moment your flight or fight instincts kick in. Not that I was particularly happy about the fact that I'm always having to go Into defensive survival mode.

But that it gave me something to zealously focus on in my darkest or harshest moments. I have no doubt that had I been in these same moments but locked away and left immobile, my own thoughts and misery would long undo me before any of my enemies had a chance.

Even if I'm fighting with very little chance of winning or running; it still is something to do. Something to keep me going and away from my own mind. Which is a cage in and of itself.

However, my situation has taken an unexpected turn.

The only thing worse than running for your life away from a sicko who just finished absorbing your now dead fiance, is having said dead fiance talking to you.

As if it wasn't bad enough my life is in danger, now I'm also probably schizophrenic.

Man, if I manage to survive this, I'm going to need a good psychiatrist.

To be fair, it's not like I'm hallucinating him. Rather it's one minute, I know I'm running in the darkness through these desolate part of the wood. Then next I know, I hear his voice in my head and images of mansions, or vineyards, or mafiosi.

Which probably is worse.

So good news is that while his body is dead, and Alphonse pretty much absorbed 90% of him. 10% of him, his memories, still lives on inside me.

Yeah, that still doesn't make me feel any better. No matter how much I try to say that in a positive tone.

By the time I had gotten out of the woods, it was dark. It had to be after 7pm. It was still a bit light out, but not enough.

I felt the cement underneath the soles of my feet, on this road next to the woods. I allowed myself to rest my weight on my knees, as I breathed hard.

I decided to not dwell on the multiple cuts that I had on my legs and arms from rushing madly through the woods. I fell a couple of times, in cause of the tense and uncertain terrain, with the only thing I knew was that I had to keep running forward. I felt dirty and sweaty, I could feel my body burning and all I could repeat in my head is not yet, not yet. Don't give in yet.

I tried to make sense of where I was. I didn't remember this road, I had no idea where I was.

To a distance on my right, I saw fields of grapes next to what appeared some sort of stem vegetation. They weren't in full season since we weren't in summer anymore, they showed various forms of decay. Then suddenly once again, the scene in front of me transformed.

No longer, was there this night scene with a far off field with vegetation in different states. Now it was in full bloom in the middle of the day. And I knew, as I looked on past the fields, that there was a town past those fields. Small, but good enough as a starting point.

I had always felt my intuition, as it directed me through my life. It had been my greatest ally through this whole mess, in my amnesiac state. Now during moments like this, I felt not just my own energy but someone else's.

And as crazy as it sounds, I felt him. I knew it was Federico. It was as if my soul was but a flame on a candle, and I could feel another brighter flame, lighting me up. Molding itself with mine, reassuring and guiding me.

Which was why, with no logical explanation or reason, I took hold of my breathing and began running in the direction that I just knew I was supposed to go. Ignoring the tendrils of doubt that entered my mind, as I abandoned meticulous thought and relied on these new feelings of instinct.

There was no time to doubt myself.

As I walked through the streets, sure enough a small town did appear. It looked so quaint and comfortable, it was enough to lull anyone into a sedentary life.

Which only made what I needed to do that much worse.

First things first, as nice as the town was I needed to get the heck out of here and quick. I couldn't very well call coach or more importantly the varia mansion itself.

They didn't have cellphones in the unlikely (but prominent risk) they were one day to be tracked. Cell-phones were one of the easiest ways their plan could be uncovered.

Imagine, all that hard work and effort to be brought down by a simple cell-phone tracking? I would be beyond upset. It was a pathetic end for a grand enterprise.

But a phone would certainly be useful.

I heard noises fast approaching on these desolate town streets near the field and immediately ducked into the nearest crop.

I waited a couple of moments to see who it was. I could discern that who ever it was, luckily it was only one person. While it did help a bit, it didn't completely soothe me.

I was going to start underestimating any one varia member soon. Whether they are in group or not, each one is lethal in their own way. After all the varia wasn't made up of weaklings.

With bated breath, I dared sneak a peak at who had followed me. And what I saw surprised me.

Oh, it was just the town drunk. He staggered as he walked, still holding on to a bottle of alcohol in his hand. He had two and when he saw that one of them was empty he discarded it. Seeing that it was coming in my general vicinity out of reflex I grabbed it. Since it was still dark, and the guy was drunk, he luckily didn't see this movement. Simply walking along, muttering and singing some Italian song.

I waited as he passed me as I hid. I waited as he passed, with the bottle in my hand, I crept lightly behind him before after a few cautious breaths, I whacked him on the back of the head with the bottle.

He collapsed as the bottle broke. I must've not measured how hard I was going to hit, he wasn't bleeding out so I knew he wasn't going to die. "Sorry about that. It's just business, you know?"

And to think this is what I had come down to. Mugging town drunks, I fervently searched his pockets for a cellphone, and luckily for me it had battery and signal.

Now came the hard part, who do I call? I thought hard, while I began getting stressed feeling each second as it passed. Each second feeling closer to a death. It was hard to concentrate when all I could think was, I am going to die.

Help, please, I need a number someone to call. I fervently asked.

You know what to call. Your memories are there, waiting for you fiorellina. Allow me to show you.

Then I felt it again, I felt that other presence. I felt him as, he went through some dark part in my mind that I couldn't access. I felt myself immobile, as I felt tendrils of warmth across the back of my head.

Angela sat on her daughter's bed. Lost and aimless. She had just recently finished cremating her daughter. She had no more tears to run down her face. She simply had nothing left to give. It was like a part of her soul was savagely ripped out from under her.

David hadn't been there, Angela scoffed. As if that was new but that was low even for him. To not be their at their daughter's cremation?

She buried herself into her daughter's covers and let out a sobless cry. How was she supposed to go on? Celeste was her life's purpose. My baby, my poor baby. The endless mantra repeated itself, and she stayed like that a while. Until eventually it stopped, she lost consciousness eventually, Angela wasn't sure when.

Only to be woken up by the sound of her phone ringing. She hadn't wanted to answer, in fact, Angela was angry. Because of 10 glorious seconds, from the time she awoke to when she realized the phone was ringing; Angela had forgotten.

She had forgotten that Celeste wasn't coming home again. That the phone ringing wasn't going to be her daughter.

Angela heard the ringing, and felt every second as everything came back. The pain, the crying, the sheer grief as it eroded her. She wasn't going to answer but then she did. Angela picked up the phone, perhaps out of habit, perhaps to have control over one little at least.

"what?" Her voice was dead, emotionless. It sounded alien, even to her. She had never heard such a noise come from her voice. She hadn't even known she was capable of such a lifeless tone.

"Um," the voice hesitated. "I know this may sound weird but I think I'm supposed to call you."

Her eyes widened and she choked as she heard the voice in disbelief.

"C-celestica?" She asked, her voice barely above a whisper.

There was a garbled sound on the other line and a cry coming from deep within the receiver's throat.

No, it couldn't be.

Not when she had just finished burying her daughter.

Was she hallucinating? From her medical experience she had often heard of patients, deranged from grief. Hearing voices, imaging people.

And then the sobs and wails on the other line began, and it hurt and wretched Angela's very soul and she knew.

"M-m", the girl hopelessly hyper ventilated amongst her sobs. "Mama." She wailed, in sheer and utter agony.

"Mi bebe!"

And then Angela dropped to her knees for the second time that day and began to cry too.

Mama was the only word her daughter repeated over and over again. Like a protective spell but underlying it, what something that filled Angela with panic. She heard the fear, fear that it would escape her if she didn't repeat it. As if she were nothing but a wisp of an idea that she had finally grabbed hold of after so long of trying.

"Where are you? Are you okay?"

Static began to appear on the other line as Angela heard her daughter trying to speak while she was crying. Which was always hard for her daughter to do, when she was truly upset, she couldn't breathe when she was crying. Celeste would be gasping for breath as she tried to speak, usually failing miserably.

"Celestica," Calling upon her familiar nickname, Angela knew she needed her daughter to calm down. "Cálmate aunque sea duro, respira profundo, y después ya puedes hablar."

Celeste began to take deep breaths in-between her sobs. What came next was not what Angela could have ever prepared for mentally. "Mama, I'm going to die."

"W-what?"

If Angela had felt panic before, at hearing the fear in her daughter's voice earlier. Now she felt sheer and utter terror. It wasn't just the fact that her daughter just said she was going to die, but the finality in her voice. It was a truth, there was no escaping it. It was simply a matter of when, and from the lack of emotion in it, she knew it was soon.

Celeste had come to terms with the idea of her demise. There was no way a parent could ever be okay with hearing that. It went against the very laws of nature, she was supposed to die first not have to bury her daughter.

"i'm in Italy mama, with no way of getting back. I have absolutely no ID-" Her mother cut her off. "Italy!? Vos que en el MUNDO estas haciendo en Italia!?" Angela had reverted back to her native tongue under the sheer stress and anger of the moment. Though it wasn't directed at Celeste, she knew that much.

"I was kidnapped mama, I can't remember anything, I lost my memory. So even if I had been able to contact you, I wouldn't have been able to."

That explains so much, but at the same-time it raises so many questions.

"Then how do you know your name, how do you know me?"

"It was the last thing," Angela heard Celeste getting choked up as she spoke. "F-Federico told me before he was killed." She cried again, she had stopped momentarily. "Me remembering you was finally the universe working in my favor. I'm glad I got to hear your voice again one last time."

At that point Angela couldn't speak. Her eyes had widened in shock at the mention of Federico. It couldn't be that very same Federico? And even as her mind tried to deny it, she knew deep down it was exactly that Federico.

Ay dios mio, what in the world was going on over there? Angela began to pale and clutched the phone as she began to get a sinking suspicion of what was going on. There was going to be a war now, if it hadn't brewed already. And her daughter was damn right in the middle of it.

"I'm so scared Mama. You didn't see what he did to Federico. He's gone, beyond gone. There is nothing left of him but bones. Just bones. What that man did to Federico," Celeste shuddered and went quiet from remembering it. "There's been a warrant on my head for ages, and that man wants me dead for as long as I've been here. He has so much power and influence, and he is strong."

Angela didn't know what she could even say at this point. How in the world could this have happened?

"I hate it but he is strong mama, and I'm not. I don't know what to do anymore. If I could have even done anything in the first place; I've probably been living out some fantasy that I would be able to win. I don't want to die, but there is nothing for me to do now. I'm stuck and hiding, it's only a matter of time."

Of course her daughter wouldn't have any clue what to do. It's even a miracle, and Angela knew it, that Celeste had survived this long in Italy, in that mafia atmosphere. There was no doubt in her mind now, what her daughter was involved in.

The very thing she had tried to protect her from all along.

Angela flashed back to the last conversation she had with David.

"I never thought it would be my daughter. It's always the neighbors kid until it happens to you."

"Do you know her birthday just passed? I didn't get to celebrate my own daughter's quinceanera." Tears swelled in Angela's eyes. She crashed her face into her hands, willing it to swallow her whole, falling to the ground, sobs molding themselves into screams. To the point they became indistinguishable.

"My baby." The only words that she could utter, masked in grief, disappointment and heartache.

"I had been a mother for 15 years, David. You never stop feeling like a parent, but the problem is, what good is a mother with no child? What does she become then?"

"How about the father who never got to be with his daughter because her mother took her away?" He asked pointedly. "What does he become then?"

Angela went livid. "Don't you dare compare yourself. You know why I had to go. Your lifestyle isn't the ideal place for raising children. She would've gotten hurt because of your work." She spat the word.

"Well then, congratulations. She never got hurt, she ended up dying instead."

That day he said those words, it had been like someone had gotten a knife and twisted it so hard she bled out. It had hurt her and she thought that had been the worst of it. That there was no way those words could ever hurt her more in intensity than they had in that moment.

It is not to say that they hadn't kept on hurting. She had kept on repeating that conversation, and most importantly those last few words. It was a dull pain, she would live, numb and dull with that echo in her head as she had buried her daughter.

It was a meaningless existence, but one with closure. Once Celeste had been supposedly found, even if it had been dead; she had been found. Angela hadn't had to go through every waking second, desperately trying to find any clue about her daughter. Not knowing if she was dead or alive, it had been the not knowing which was the worst of all.

As bad as losing her daughter was, it wasn't hard on her soul thinking she died in a car crash, not knowing any pain. That is not to say that it makes it easier to get over the loss of a child, and learning how to move on with life. Simply, it allowed a sense of security amongst all the bad.

Angela no longer had any security or sense of peace left.

Celeste had been suffering god knew how much. Who knows what hunger she's had to endure, what pain she has to have felt, who she has come across. Countless emotional and physical scars must she now bear?

Now this is the moment those words he said, had the power to hurt more than they had that day. Because they are a point blank reminder of how she failed the one person she loved more than anything.

"Mama," Celeste croaked. "I hear footsteps, drawing near." She said quietly.

"Celeste!"

"I love you mama, I'm sorry." Her daughter was sorry? Now, it was her that was to be apologizing on her knees. Her daughter had nothing to be sorry for.

"Celeste, wait, don't hang up, don't go!" Angela heard on the other line a rustling and Celeste screaming before the line went dead.

Angela shuddered, clutching the carpet on the ground, wailing and agonizing.

At the end of the procession, Iemitsu, had stayed behind to check on Angela. He could only imagine how devastated Angela must be feeling right now. It was a parent's worst nightmare to have their child disappear and even then, once they are found again, they are found dead.

Thoughts immediately entered his mind, of imagining the same happening to him. If Tsuna suddenly went missing and no matter how hard he looked, nothing could be done. Or if his cute little son died, how that would utterly devastate nana. It would break them both.

Tsuna was only slightly younger than Celeste had been. Which made this whole experience only the more raw for the young lion of the Vongola.

A child was both a source of great strength and great weakness.

Iemitsu ran a hand through his blonde locks and sighed. Where was David in all this? That was a prominent question he churred in the back of his mind. But there was no asking Angela this question anyways. Both for two very different implications.

The first was that he had been with Angela and David since the inception of their relationship. He had known David for practically all of his life, they had grown up together. Iemitsu had been there to witness the span of their relationship, from their unlikely introduction, the chaotic courtship though neither realized it at the time and their eventual coming together.

He had seen it all. And he knew without a shadow of doubt as the man who had accompanied David through life; that for as cold and ruthless as David was, he had never loved anyone like he had loved Angela.

They had been together for 12 years before Angela's abrupt but justified departure. Iemitsu knew very well that Angela had every right as a mother to do what she did. He had been there that day when Celeste's failed kidnap and assassination attempt occurred.

Celeste had been very young at the time, and he had personally afterwards scrubbed her memories of the whole affair but Angela never forgot. He still remembered to this day, the panic on Angela's face, the sheer fear as the time ticked away with her daughter's life hanging by a thread.

David had many enemies, that was no secret. He was a powerful man, involved in the dark and dangerous aspects of the mafia. David had always taken that portion of the lifestyle away from Timeoteo, and it was by that same example that Iemitsu had followed.

But he never was involved in the same affairs as David had to deal with. Or rather took upon himself to deal with. David knew he was good at what he did, and didn't trust others to do a job for him.

David hadn't been there when the attempt on Celeste occurred. It had been him who was on call nearby, while David had been away.

Angela never forgave David for it. Part of that anger was for his absence in the affair, since Angela had always been a highly protective sort of individual. Practically born to one day raise a family, she exuded motherhood and affection.

But Iemitsu had known that the more essential part of that anger which was what forced her to pack her bags and take her leave from David was what that event signified for their future.

It was but a taste of what Angela had known could happen but never had to witness it firsthand. David was never going to leave his lifestyle, she knew that. Instead his life-style would suck their daughter in. Celeste would never know peace. Their daughter would always be on guard for her life. Her father's enemies, which always just kept on growing would be her biggest and deadliest inheritance.

Angela did the biggest sacrifice of all. Angela had loved David, and who knows if she still does. But there was something Angela loved even more, her daughter. She preferred to sacrifice her own happiness, and live a mundane life it meant a better life for own her daughter.

It hurt all of them. Angela, David, even himself. He had been there to see the little girl just start to grow up. It was hard to not grow attached to Celeste. But he never held it against her. A part of him, even as he watched David seclude into himself, respected what she did.

Because in the end, for all of Angela's faults, no one could ever say she wasn't a good mother. That event showcased just how much she was willing to leave behind for the good of Celeste.

She left it all that day. David, the security of wealth, her relationships with others, and even her own family.

The worst of all was that he had no idea what to tell her. He knew the tremendous gamble she took, he could imagine how hard it must've been for her to adapt and raise a child as a single mother practically cut off from the family. And now, all that hard work, all that going for naught, because in the end Celeste died anyways.

What in the world could he possibly say? Or should he even say? Iemitsu had no idea how to approach this delicate subject. He could not just let it go, and not say anything. If anything, this was the moment she needed someone more than ever.

Iemitsu stood outside the door for a very long time. There was conflict in his eyes, barely showing the doubt in his heart.

Wouldn't it be worse for him to stand in front of her, and offer condolences, when his own son, slightly younger than Celeste was alive and well and with his mother? Carrying out precisely that life that Angela had always dreamed for her own daughter?

He knocked on the door before entering, to give Angela time to compose herself if necessary.

"The day I left, I wasn't leaving David. I was leaving that life. You were there when Celeste was almost kidnapped." Angela turned quiet for a second, her eyes far away and clouded with the memories of ghost past. "I remember running to her room in Italy, bodies strewn and bloodied against the floor. I had gone out that day to talk with Timeoteo and had to rush out of that mansion to get to her.

I stole a car because Timeoteo wasn't going to let me leave. It's dangerous, he said. That only made me want to leave more. What kind of decent parent stays in safety while their baby is in danger? I took that damn car, and rammed it out the Vongolan mansion gates."

Angela's voice was hollow, a husky ring to it, bringing every haunted world to life. It was almost zealous in it's pronunciations.

"When I got home, my heart stopped. The place was in tatters, bullet holes in the wall. Blood splattered everywhere. My daughter's stuffed toys mangled and tattered. Each drop of blood I saw, the only thing I could think was is this my daughter's?"

Iemitsu winced at the memory. But Angela continued on, lost in that trance.

"I screamed her name, crying it out. Looking under the mess and the debris to find her. I even began looking under the dead bodies of the servants and guards out of desperation."

"Angela," He began but she gave him a look, she wasn't done talking yet.

"You want to know where I found my baby eventually? In the kitchen, hidden within a metal pantry. Shivering, eyes wide, covered in blood. She wasn't crying though, but her eyes, you didn't see her eyes but I did. They were eyes that could not process what they had just seen and could not give an adequate response. Eyes that know crying was futile."

Angela grabbed onto the edge of a chair to steady herself, her eyes were red and swollen. She was outpouring a memory that never left her, and had slowly ebbed away her life.

"Celeste was 7, for god's sake. And she had the same eyes I had seen on women in the units in the mafia hospitals, I nursed who had just seen unspeakable things. After their lives had shattered right before them, and everything they knew was gone. They were the eyes of a broken woman. My 7 year old, in her little polka dot dress, had those eyes."

Do you have any idea how much of a failure I felt like in that moment? David appeared 3 days later, he stayed for a little bit and left again. Celeste was never the same. She would barely eat, she became quiet and withdrawn. Whenever any stranger would approach her, she would flinch. And in the nights, Celeste always had nightmares, in the middle of the night she would be screaming.

He wasn't there for that. Of course, he wasn't there for that. He doesn't know what it's like to see your own flesh and blood suffering and be powerless to do absolutely anything. There was always another mission, another family, more money to be made, always. But I was there, as I always had been."

And the rest was history. Iemitsu now knew the rest of the story. That was when he had entered. It got to a point where Angela couldn't take it anymore, and though she had always been highly against the practice; she had asked that he scrub Celeste's memories.

When David found out, he had been livid. Angela was even more so at his apparent anger, and they had one of the worst fights in the history of their relationship. As strange as it may seem, they had actually never truly fought before. Sure, they had argued, but a fight? Never, they were that well suited for each other.

This time though, Angela was in no way willing to forgive or forget. Iemitsu hadn't been there for the fight itself. But he remembered hearing Angela yelling, and David yelling back. And David never yelled.

"I didn't want my daughter to be a part of that life anymore. She deserved a shot at something better, something like the type your son had. That no matter when he was seen, he always had that innocent wide-eyed look upon him. Eyes that didn't know blood, mafia or darkness.

But David wasn't willing to leave that life."

There was no resentment in those last words, there should've been. Once upon a time, they might've been. But many years have passed, and time changes people. She did not hold it against him, did not hold that he choose his ambition over her and their daughter. There was nothing to it more than a wistful memory. It was like being next to an open window with a cold breeze coming in. At the beginning, the shivers and the uncomfort is there. But after a while, it is your body that adapts and chills, and you don't notice the cold anymore.

Iemitsu looked into Angela's brown eyes, and saw the unclouded look of conviction. "So I had to choose between him and my daughter."

And that had been the end of that. There was no need to say anymore about the years in between. Angela left and filed herself into the stack of mundanes an ocean away in New York. A mundane life that has taken the toll on her.

That was not to say that Angela looked haggard and withered, but there was an erosion on the young spirited girl she once was. There was a tired and weathered gleam in her eyes, wrinkles that weren't there before have begun to lightly appear on her dark tanned skin.

Her hands have the calloused look of working hands, as does the angle of her shoulders.

But yet she was still beautiful. It was not the beauty of unshattered perfection. It was not the beauty of a woman who never left the comfort of her pristine home, and never knew fear or hunger. This was beauty of age, beauty of resilience, of still daring to stand and not bend under the sheer weight of the world.

"And I will continue to keep on choosing my daughter, which brings me to my next question." Angela suddenly placed herself in-front of Iemitsu, in sudden and purpose filled strides. "Will you help me?"

Iemitsu didn't even hesitate. "Of course."

"Can I trust that you will not plan, or more so, discuss anything with David?"

Her face did not change, but her dark eyes almost black showed that this was a most ardent question. Iemitsu knew that there relationship was not tense preciscly because it was non-existent. But even in their distance, had it been any other woman, he would've thought she resented or harbored ill feelings towards David. Angela was not such a woman, which is what made her so great.

Iemitsu wasn't sure what this entailed, but he had a feeling it must be something very important and delicate. Even though he had known David since their teen years, and it was through David that Iemitsu met Angela; the bond between Iemitsu and Angela is highly strong.

He wasn't blind to either of their flaws. And while he cared for them both in his own way, Iemitsu knew that Angela would not ask this of him without proper reasoning. She wasn't the type to be asking exorbitant demands of the sake of it or upon any obstacle always needing someone to help her. Angela prided herself on her independence and her own ability to survive and succeed.

Which is why he knew, without her telling him, that she had faith in him. She always had, even before he had risen to his current position of CEDEF. And for the life of him, Iemitsu never wanted her to lose that faith in him.

"I won't."

Angela smiled at him then, nodding. It was the barest of smiles, compared to types he had been used to seeing from her jubilous and bright nature. Then again, considering their circumstances, it spoke legends of her that she still was able to smile in any regard.

"I am putting my trust in you Iemitsu, as I have other times. But what we are to do now is a very delicate enterprise. So what I am going to say next allow me to assure you, it is not a threat. It is a promise that I will carry out in the event you break that trust."

Her eyes flashed then, with a sudden burst of emotion. Even while she was shorter than him, her words and eyes imposed a great deal of authority. She was serious.

"In the event you break my trust, or I find out you did things without my consent; I swear to god, I will destroy your picture book life. And I think you know exactly what I mean by that."

He did. Which is why he couldn't even bring himself to feel anger at her words. By virtue of their close association, she knew a lot of things about not only their lifestyle but about him as well. Angela had always been silent as a tomb, never once disclosing any of the information about his private or family life all these years even though she could've easily done so.

Angela wasn't the type to make threats. She had never once threatened him. In fact she wasn't a fan of fights or wars. Which only served to showcase the severity of the situation Iemitsu had bound himself into. Whatever it was, Angela was taking no risk.

The young lion of the Vongola nodded his assent. That was all he could do. Angela relaxed slightly.

"We are going to go to Italy to get my daughter." Angela raised an impatient hand to stop him before he went on a condescending conversation on how her daughter was dead. "Whoever was that we buried, as horrible as it makes me as a person, was not my daughter and I am both glad and saddened by it."

"How can you even be sure-" Angela cut him an angry look. "I just finished talking with my daughter who is in Italy, in the heart of the mafia, on the verge of being killed. Are you going to say that I imagined? That it was an act of grief? Trust me I thought that in the beginning. But then I heard the fear in her voice and knew it was real, I heard the finality and then her screams as the line suddenly ended. Are you going to tell me that I imagined that too?

Iemitsu couldn't believe it. Celeste was alive? Though that lifted a weight off his heart, since he too felt her loss another thought entered his mind.

David.

"I am not quite sure what situation I find myself in or more importantly my daughter, but all I know is that it is a dangerous one."

His mind kept on bugging him about David. Afterall, isn't it strange that there had been no word on her disappearance. Then his daughter dies and he isn't even present for the funeral? Or any part of the process?

He disappeared as quickly as he came. Iemitsu had gotten word as CEDEF head that Nacho was in Italy.

There were just too many coincidences for this to not be correlated. And he didn't need his intuition to tell him that.

"What exactly do you mean by mafia? Are you positive it is famiglias and not some gangs?" Even though the mafia did rule primarily in Italy, there were always other bands notoriously infamous, even if they aren't famiglia related.

Angela nodded in complete chagrin. "Yeah, and there is something else too." And judging from her grave tone, Iemitsu knew this tale wasn't going to get any better.

"We are running against the clock here. Soon enough, full scale war will ransack Italy. If by that time Celeste is still alive, that will-" She stopped there and looked away from him. Angela couldn't finish that sentence, not even bear the thought. It was as if the simple saying it uttered it into existence.

Iemitsu understood her apprehension and her desperation and so he attempted to quell the only thing he could. "You may have not been involved in mafia matters of many years now, but the Vongola are still the strongest famiglia in the mafia. War of the magnitude you are imagining will not break out because we wouldn't allowed it."

He spoke with such confidence that Angela was momentarily sadden to have to break that image he had. She gave him a sad smile.

"Federico is dead, Iemitsu."

Angela said no more then. Iemitsu stared but he was not staring at her. He was away now, far far away in the recesses of his mind. There was no sound in that moment, only a swarm of intangible chaotic thoughts.

He stayed stoic, Angela knew the feeling. That one sentence had profound implications. Not only for the Vongola, but for him as well.

Angela knew that as Iemitsu fulfilled his job as CEDEF, and as the events around Federico's murder appeared, Celeste would be found. There was no doubt that they were linked, one would lead to the other. She wasn't sure what David had any to do with this. Not that she thought him capable of killing or having anything to do with the events surrounding what has occured with Celeste. But it did not hide his guilt and history. He was hiding something, she was sure of it. And more importantly than that. Change was on the horizon, he had chosen his to maintain his lifestyle over his daughter once already.

There was no guarantee that when it came to it again, his ambition against a girl he was never there to raise; he wouldn't do so again. Angela wasn't going to take the chance this time around. She needed to be ready for anything that may be thrown her way, including anything that may come from the wild card that was David.

Iemitsu was also lost in his thoughts. He could already see it now. Having to have that conversation with Timeoteo about Xanxus. Dear god, if Xanxus inherited the Vongola, his eyes flashed to Angela's then.

Blood. Battle. Bones. No mercy. What was going to happen to his son? What did this mean for his son? For his future? Was he still entitled to one?

His abject horror hide to mask. She knew what he was thinking.

"Life as we had known it, as the elders had planned it, as Timeoteo had seen it, as you had felt it, has just shattered from under everyone. Federico was the last son left. My daughter saw him get killed."

"So you tell me Iemitsu, you still think a full out war isn't on the horizon?"

End of Chapter 34

Told y'all things are starting to gear up. A storm is brewing folks, wonder who is simply going to get wet and who is going to get electrocuted.

Your thoughts and reviews are always lovely :D