Chapter 55: The Weight of a Life
Gokudera coughed out a cloud of smoke and growled as he threw the cigarette to the ground. That brand wouldn't work either. The ingredients would react terribly with the current mixtures and also would fail to make perfect circles no matter how he blew the smoke out. For the green mix, a perfect circle was crucial.
Instead of opening the next packet of cigarettes, Gokudera turned it on its side instead and read the ingredients. Another scowl marred his features, and he threw the box hard onto the ground.
"So you finally figured out that those things are going to kill you?" said a very unwelcome voice. "No need to react so violently though."
"Go away, perverted old man," growled Gokudera, taking out another packet of cigarettes. The ingredients of this one didn't match any of the necessary specifications either, and Gokudera nearly threw it onto the ground and stomped on the packet. But he couldn't. Not with Shamal watching him. The perverted doctor would never let Gokudera forget such a childish tantrum. But it wasn't a childish tantrum! He needed some stress relief and fast. He had already decided to quit his former brand of cigarettes in order to acclimate to new ones. But if he didn't find the proper ones soon—
"It's not like I'm here because I want to," said Shamal. "In fact, I'm only here to train my replacement. I highly doubt I will be able to escape from here otherwise. That sky of yours has too strong a pull and entirely too many strong allies already. Best to leave them with a competent physician so they won't come looking for me."
"If you're talking about Shoichi-san, then you're losing it," said Gokudera. "Shoichi-san's an inventor, not a doctor."
"Someone in your little famiglia needs to know how to stitch up wounds, and it's not going to be me because I don't treat men," said Shamal. Gokudera clicked his tongue, but he decided to ignore the perverted doctor. If he wanted to lose an opportunity to be part of the greatest famiglia the world will ever know (because it couldn't be less with Tsuna-sama leading it), then that was the pervert's problem.
"Considering you keep pulling out cigarettes from that bag of yours, I suppose that you aren't actually deciding to extend your already short lifespan by quitting those things."
"As if I would tell you what I'm doing," said Gokudera. He added in a whisper, "It's not like you'd understand it."
"I suppose that Shoichi could be told where you were and given time to come over and brainstorm with you some more," said Shamal lazily. "If I were given a good reason. Right now, he's having some fun with a hundred and so paper planes."
Instantly, Gokudera's eyes snapped onto Shamal's.
"What are you teaching him?" Gokudera growled so low it was almost a hiss.
"Wouldn't you like to know?" asked Shamal with a loose smirk. "But then, I don't take students that can't see what's right in front of them. Unless they're women, in which case I will take them however they come as long as they are beautiful."
Clicking his tongue again irritation, Gokudera turned away from the perverted doctor, dug through the bag, and yanked out another packet of cigarettes. Who cared what the perverted doctor taught Shoichi? Whatever the training dealt with could only help the famiglia later on. Shoichi would be stronger, and that was all that mattered. Not a little boy who had pleaded and pleaded to learn how to hit the paper planes or the man who refused to teach him and then left without looking back. That sort of thing didn't matter. At all.
"Don't worry, Hayato-kun. Your soon-to-be boss can't see it either."
Gokudera faced the perverted doctor without realizing he turned around.
"Don't you dare demean Tsuna-sama," yelled Gokudera, his orbs in hands along with several mini-bombs he had been working on. The pervert doctor would make the perfect practice dummy. "He and I are nothing alike."
"Yes, you are," said Shamal with a self-satisfied smirk. Thinking over what he had just said, Gokudera's face heated as his teeth ground together, and the smirk grew annoyingly large. "Both of you are too blind to what is right in front of you. If you don't take care of that, how do you plan to take care of anything else? How can you protect anyone without first protecting your own life?"
"You're not my father. I don't have to stand here and get lectured," growled Gokudera, but the growl was quieter than before. He clutched his current packet of cigarettes. The perverted doctor was wrong. Gokuder's life wasn't worth the same as Tsuna-sama's.
"Of course I'm not your father," said Shamal. "As beautiful as your mother was, we never met. Besides, if I was, I doubt I'd be here lecturing you."
Teeth clenched hard enough to send uncomfortable shockwaves through Gokudera's skull and body. The perverted doctor was right. The Uragano boss would have given his son a disappointed look and already left.
"Besides," Shamal continued, "I'm not lecturing you. I'm merely asking you a few questions. If you're not going to answer them, you could just say so. No need to get so upset. This is why I prefer ladies. They are always so polite."
"Che, shows what you know," said Gokudera returning to his cigarettes. If the perverted doctor could say that after meeting the stupid wench then he really had lost it.
"I have to return to shaping my replacement," said Shamal as he turned back in the direction he came. "And since I know you're not going to answer my questions, I guess it wouldn't hurt to ask one more. What will happen when you so carelessly destroy what you refuse to see? I doubt your precious 'Tsuna-sama' would be too happy with that."
The packet currently in Gokudera's hands crumpled as their owner was suddenly blinded by a flash of lost, dark brown eyes. The same ones that had decorated Tsuna-sama's face as he realized that his sorry excuse of a father was dead. The same ones Tsuna-sama had worn when he had run away. The ones that still stayed in the lingering shadows of the newly cleared eyes Gokudera had glimpsed that morning.
A bag full of cigarettes smashed against the hard ground and proceeded to become shreds of plastic, paper, and spilled tobacco.
Hana believed she had waited long enough. Tsuna had come back, had rested, and had trained. No matter who had already had a heart-to-heart with the stupid, self-sacrificing idiot, she would have a turn. He was not going to escape her. Hana would make sure this time, absolutely certain that he would not let such reckless, unnecessary thoughts pass his brain. None. This self-destructive behavior would stop. As Hana sat on the counter stool facing the darkening entrance, she mentally went over exactly was unacceptable for any friend of hers to attempt.
And then her phone rang.
"Moshi, moshi," she said, her eyes still glued to the entrance. Tsuna's master and tutor would have to return Tsuna soon. They couldn't train him in the dark, not after training all day.
"Kurokawa-chan," said the voice at the other end quietly. "I don't know if you remember me from fourth grade—"
"Sakurai-chan. I remember your habit of collecting erasers. I gave you one shaped like a fox for your birthday," said Hana, connecting the voice and tone to the only girl taller than her in fourth grade. "You moved to Tokyo, didn't you?"
"Yes!" came the enthusiastic reply. "You remembered! I still have my Karuma—"
"I'm sorry, but I am waiting for someone. So if you could tell me why you called, I will try to call you back as soon as I can to catch up," said Hana. She did genuinely want to know what happened to the sweet if sometimes strange girl, but Hana had an idiot to educate. And she had had enough strangeness for one day.
"Oh, sorry. I didn't know I was interrupting something. But then Kanade said that you were wondering about what might have happened to a Nakimori Nagi," continued Sakurai. Hana would have straightened if it was physically possible. The grip on her phone turned her knuckles white.
"I was," said Hana, not exactly relieved to hear that her attempts to gain information had been successful. Considering the time of night, Hana highly doubted that the situation was as benign as she had hoped.
"I don't know how to tell you this. It happened so sudden, and everyone in school is talking about it. We can't believe that something so terrible could happen to one of our own, no matter how strange she was. And then her parents' reactions, especially her mother's—"
"What happened?" Hana asked. Or she tried to. The words came out too sharp to be anything but a command.
"She was run over by a car," said Sakurai, her voice wavering but picking up strength as she continued. "Her organs were destroyed, or that's what one of the girls whose father works at the hospital they're keeping her in said. Another of the girls said that she needs at least four transplants. The doctors asked her mother is she would at least donate a kidney, since that would be at least one less problem, but she refused. From what I heard, other than paying for the machines that are barely keeping her alive, her parents are having nothing to do with her."
The disgust bubbling in her stomach curled and pushed against her esophagus insisting to be let out as a venomous tirade. But Hana reined it in. This girl, for all her apparently gossiping ways, was not at fault. And Sakurai had proven herself useful. Hana knew better than to burn bridges she might need later, even without the stupid three-hour phone call she had received that afternoon beginning to instruct her on how to manage a famiglia from behind the scenes.
"Thanks for calling me. I will try to call you tomorrow or Saturday in order to hear more about your life in Tokyo," said Hana in a tone she hoped was friendly and not filled with venomous undertones.
"Only if you tell me what is going on in Namimori. Even a small town like that has got to have changed over the years. Do you still think all the boys are monkeys?"
"No, I've met some that have changed my mind." Even when they act worse than monkeys and ran away leaving everyone nearly drowning in worry.
"Really? You have to tell me about these not-monkey boys. Are they cute?"
"We'll see," said Hana, her word becoming a clipped. An old image of Tsuna with a puff of yellow in his hair popped across her mind. This was not the time for that. Pressing the button harder than necessary, Hana disconnected the call. Immediately, she scrolled down her contact list, picked a rarely used phone, and pressed call. She stood up and briskly made her way to the entrance.
The ringing in her ears nearly distracted her enough from the slumped, short figure entering the shop. Exhausted brown eyes met her own, and she gave them a good glare. After a flinch, the mouth under the eyes started to open, but Hana cut the cowardly idiot off.
"You are forgiven, but if you do it again, I will find some way for Irie-kun to invent a tracker to put on you. I have to go take care of something, so consider your lecture postponed."
The beaten down expression briefly flicked into a mix of surprise and maybe disappointment. Again, this was not the time. She brushed past him, but a pressure and yank on her wrist stopped her.
"Hana-chan, I'm—"
"Didn't I already say your lecture is postponed?" snapped Hana. She had all of three more rings before the voice on the other end answered. The cringe and loosening of the fingers on her wrist softened the firm lines on her face. She quickly hardened them again, though she couldn't completely firm the undertone of her next few words. "Postponed does not mean canceled. I will get back to reminding you why running away from your friends is a very bad idea."
A flutter of relief passed across Tsuna's face, down through their connected hands, and into her chest where it tickled her heart. Mentally lecturing herself, she slipped out of the worn-out boy's grip and raced out the door. There was no time to waste, and certainly no reason for such ridiculousness.
"Hana, I wasn't expecting you to call. Is there trouble at your friend's house? Are you going to need to stay there?"
"No, mother. I simply wanted to request that we move up the family vacation," Hana said, keeping to formal language. Her parents would appreciate the effort. "There's something I would like to do in Tokyo…"
The lost look on Tsuna's face was broken by a quick kick to the boy's head. Tsuna's face quickly met with the floor, and Tsuna found himself sympathizing with every complaint and whine Tama-kun had ever muttered, declared, or screamed about Reborn. A groan escaped Tsuna as he realized that many of those comments could now be applied to his usually kind Shishō. Fon had been tough on his before, but today….today, Tsuna didn't know which of his tutors was worse. Though the one currently digging his heel into Tsuna's head likely held the advantage.
"A boss should never allow a subordinate to brush him off like that," said Reborn, and Tsuna couldn't dredge up the energy to argue that Hana was a friend and that thinking of her as only a subordinate would never work. Hana wouldn't let anyone treat her like that.
"Hana-chan did seem to be in a hurry," said Fon, almost sounding like he was coming to Tsuna's defense. Tsuna's mouth would have curved into a smile at his Shishō's returning kind demeanor if he had had any energy left or if Tsuna truly believed that his Shishō had forgiven him yet. But Tsuna knew (with his hyper intuition as Reborn had been teaching him to call it) that Fon had not completely worked out his anger and frustration with Tsuna's disappearing act. Or his worry.
Another kick unbelievably sent Tsuna flying through the air and back onto his feet. His legs could barely keep from collapsing under him. Over 1,500 practice Kaze Ryu forms along with several hundred (it's hard to keep track when someone is gunning for your head) laps could wear out even the strongest legs. And that was only the morning workout (read torture session). Tsuna currently had no idea what a part of your body felt like when it wasn't screaming in pain.
"What are you waiting for, Dame-Tsuna? Go after her," said Reborn. Tsuna sent a wide-eyed look at his tutor that was partially widened with surprise that he had the energy to throw even a look at anyone at the moment. Considering that the current pain would only feel ten times worse in the morning, Tsuna would almost prefer to keep the sun from ever rising. How did his tutor think Tsuna had any energy to chase anyone? "A boss does not let his subordinates run around wherever they want without checking with their boss first."
Tsuna wanted to protest that when said boss could barely put one foot in front of the other, he very much doubted than any boss would chase their subordinate or anyone. Two reasons stopped him. One, Reborn was angry enough to put a bullet in his student's brain, and Tsuna was not suicidal whatever certain members of his famiglia thought. Two, his hyper intuition (if Reborn hadn't been drilling the term nearly literally in his head via a barrage of bullets, Tsuna would most definitely not use it) burned under his skin. He had to go after Hana.
"A boss can also send someone else after the subordinate," said Fon, and hope fanned inside Tsuna's chest. Maybe Fon wasn't as angry as Tsuna thought.
"Hmph," snorted Reborn in obvious disproval. "He can."
Quickly going through his mental list of friends (subordinates sounded wrong – Tsuna didn't want subordinates, he wanted friends), Tsuna headed over to the phone Yamamoto-san kept behind the counter. No one else was in the sushi bar, but Tsuna guessed that they were all preparing for whatever Nono had planned. Hopefully his teachers would lessen his training (aka torture or personal hell) so that he could contact Gokudera to get the details. Maybe he would see Takeshi before going to bed and could get a brief run-through. Takeshi wasn't as good at details as Gokudera, but Takeshi could at least give Tsuna the basics. Besides, Tsuna hadn't really had a chance to talk to the other boy since—
Putting aside the embarrassing (heart-warming, relieving) memory, Tsuna dialed the number he never learned but somehow knew. It was whispered from under the sleeve of his right shoulder.
"Kawahira's Antiques. How may we help you?" asked an extremely chipper voice that Tsuna could almost place, but the recognition kept slipping away from him. His exhaustion and worry overruled curiosity, and so Tsuna ignored the thought for now.
"Is Lancia-san there?" asked Tsuna.
"Yep!" chirped the voice followed by an odd laugh.
"Could I talk to him?" asked Tsuna after another moment of silence.
"Oh. Do you want me to get him?" asked the voice, and Tsuna reminded himself that banging his head against the counter would only result in a sorer head later and Reborn had done it enough damage.
"Yes," sighed Tsuna. A series of unidentifiable noises followed (or rather Tsuna didn't want to exert the energy needed to figure them out), and then a recognizable voice came across the line.
"Tsunayoshi."
"Lancia-san, do you mind going over to check on Hana?"
"If you want me to check on Kurokawa-san, I will go check on her," said Lancia in a way that sounded almost like Gokudera, and Tsuna's insides squeezed and shook. Tsuna took a breath to settle his trembling stomach and focused on Lancia's next question. "Where does she live?"
The house did not call attention to itself unlike the Sawada house. Not that the Sawada house had any truly memorable markers, but something about the house, or more likely the people inside it, called out for passersby to take another look. Takesushi had that same feel, but this house…it felt utterly ordinary. The house wasn't even remarkable in its ordinariness. It simply was.
Lancia checked the gun in his left pocket and the thin but strong chain coiled in his right. The chain was a poor substitute for his Steel Serpent Ball but he wasn't in a position to be choosy. The idea of using a chain like they did didn't settle well with Lancia, but he highly doubted that the Vindice would ever return his weapon to him. And while his strength was bare fist fighting, he needed something for attacking over long distances. Sooner or later, Lancia would have to settle for a new weapon, but he had to deal with his mission first. This mission was his first true one from Tsunayoshi, and he would not let the young soon-to-be-boss down.
"What are you doing here?" asked the Kurokawa girl, irritation wrinkling her forehead. Honestly, Lancia did not understand Tsunayoshi's attraction to this girl, but he supposed every man had his type. She was certainly a capable woman when the situation needed her to be.
"Tsunayoshi asked me to check in on you," answered Lancia. Honesty appeared to be the best policy with this girl-near-woman.
"I told him his lecture was postponed, but if he wants it that badly, I can make some time before I go," said Kurokawa. Tsunayoshi had said nothing about the girl travelling anywhere, but as he peered around her and into the house, Lancia noticed several suitcases set near the door.
"Where are you going?" asked Lancia in as respectful tones as possible. The girl had not shown herself to be someone who ran away or left things half done during a crisis. And with the two weeks slowly morphing into one, now was hardly the time for a pleasure trip.
"Not that it is any of your business—"
"It is," said Lancia, tamping down as much as possible the frustration that continued to crop up in dealing with these young, developing Mafiosos. Draghi had had a long history, and despite the various new arrivals in the form of the boss's strays, the famiglia had been run with experience and efficiency. These children were all too often making decisions from a civilian viewpoint instead of a mafia one. "Tsunayoshi has trusted me with your safety, and I will make sure that nothing threatens it. Travel is something that should be attempted with great caution. One does not know when an attack can occur."
"I doubt anyone will attack me. When Tsuna officially becomes this Vongola Decimo, then maybe we'll have to worry about that—"
"Do not underestimate the mafia intelligence," said Lancia before he could stop himself. He knew he should be as respectful as he could of the boss's woman at all times, but this one was going to get herself killed. And Tsunayoshi could not afford another death tearing into his heart. The soft, caring organ would never beat properly ever again.
The Kurokawa girl gave Lancia an appraising glance with crossed arms. Then she nodded.
"Fine," she said. "My family is going to take a trip to Tokyo so that I can take care of a problem there."
Lancia said nothing. He waited and didn't move. The girl frowned but uncrossed her arms and let the door open further.
"A girl that is close to Tsuna's heart is in very real danger of dying," said the Kurokawa girl. "I'm going to make sure that doesn't happen."
A surge of respect flowed through Lancia for this girl, this woman. Most boss' wives were fiercely jealous of any woman who got near their husbands. To find a woman who was both accepting and protective of the other females in her boss' famiglia was a strange and wonderful success. Her acceptance was probably aided by the fact that Tsunayoshi would be unlikely to take any of the other females as mistresses, but even then the feat was still impressive.
"Who is your escort?" asked Lancia, half-expecting the answer.
"Escort?" the girl near snorted. "My parents are going with me. I think that's enough 'escorts' for now."
"So if an enemy famiglia were to attack you in order to gain some leverage over the newest and only viable heir to the largest and most powerful famiglia, your parents would be able to defend you," said Lancia, using the girl's own speaking style against her. The technique had the right effect as the girl scowled and didn't argue the point. Lancia took the opportunity to go above and beyond what Tsunayoshi had asked. "I will escort you to Tokyo and back."
"Fine," said the girl irritably. "I assume you'll need a suitcase."
"No," said Lancia. "The young Shoichi has been experimenting further with his boxes and gave me one of the older models to store my belongings. I am prepared to go at any moment."
The Kurokawa girl gave him another examining look.
"Just when I think one of you monkeys is somewhat normal," she muttered. Her dark brown eyes attempted to pin him under her gaze, but for all her effort, the girl was still too young and inexperienced to affect Lancia. "I don't have to worry about you developing stalkerish tendencies like a certain idiot monkey, do I?"
"The young Gokudera has a protective passion that is commendable," answered Lancia keeping his tone even. "I admit he is a bit too…over passionate at times. However every good Mafioso should be prepared for emergency, especially when they are not stationed in a home base."
"I see," said the Kurokawa girl in a way that implied that she really did. "In that case, you are more than welcome to come with us."
"I do have one more suggestion," said Lancia, sticking his hands in his pockets. He didn't particularly like the idea, but he couldn't dismiss using such a valuable resource.
"And that is?" said the girl, the irritation returning and tensing her voice.
"We should bring along the young Shoichi and his teacher," said Lancia. "If the person in danger of dying truly is female, even he can have no protest."
