Mia Tempesta

Summary: Reborn never liked being a (secondary) Sky, but he can't deny his nature forever, so one day he starts collecting his Elements. Except now there was a tiny Storm that packs quite a punch that he doesn't know what to do with. Denial leads to trouble, trouble leads to possessiveness, possessiveness leads to ... something else much more tender. Throw in Checkerface and the Arcobaleno Sky into the mix and things get quite complicated.

Reborn frowned down at the ... invitation that had arrived with his usual daily mail, not sure what to make of it.

When he had first seen it, he had immediately demanded from the manager that he view the security tapes because the damned envelope had two signatures, one of which belonged to the Donna of Giglio Nero, a woman he had never met nor really heard much about and he wanted to know who the hell had a death wish to deliver the invitation. It was legit, as it even had an actual wax seal on the front that glowed with strong, almost overwhelming Sky Flames. Reborn had felt sick and nearly vomited up his delicious morning espresso - brewed by none other than his young Storm - and the simple breakfast he'd had - cereal, for once, as both of them had felt too lazy for anything else - when they had lit up the second he had reached for the letter.

The security cameras showed no one and a zoom in showed that the invitation had not arrived with the usual mailman. Which meant a really strong illusionist was responsible. Reborn had a copy of the footage he was going to bring to Viper later at the emergency gathering he had called for after opening the letter and he kept it in his sight at all times as he stared down at the invitation and it's wording.

It was handwritten and yet he could discern nothing of the person's character from the curving, elegant words.

It was respectful, yet the whole thing felt like an insult.

It was meant to be flattering and yet Reborn saw it as a threat.

Because he was being summoned to convene with the strongest seven Flame users in the world, one of each Flame Type, and he was wanted for his pure, strong, powerful, bright Sun.

There was a time and place, as well as specific instructions as to how to reach the location, and he had checked out the coordinates. A mountain vacation home of sorts, really stylish, really expensive looking, extravagant, in the possession of the Giglio Nero famiglia, deep into a forest and the only way to get to it was by an unregistered path, which was why he got specific, detailed instructions.

The summit of the strongest was supposed to last for three months and its purpose was to, supposedly, make them even stronger, even better than they already were, to enhance the power of their Flames. 'They' being the 'strongest seven'. And Reborn did not like the sound of that.

It hit too close to home, to the nickname he and his Guardians carried.

But they had two Rains and the Sun was also their Sky.

Donna Giglio Nero had invited herself as the 'strongest seven's' own Sky, as if they would need one when they already have Reborn.

Yes, his weak Flames were pathetic compared to the ones radiating from the envelope, but no one had ever said anything bad about his Flames, no one had ever found them wanting and he had six Guardians, though one was still unofficial. These people didn't seem to know that he was the others' Sky and that was for the best, but even this unknowing insult pissed him off.

But what worried him more was the second signature on the invitation. What the hell kind of name or alias is Checkerface? He's never heard of someone bearing that name, but maybe someone with a better information network than him had. As far as he could tell, that could be only two people: Viper and Fon, both of whom he will be meeting later as the HQ. Reborn's sources were good, but if he hadn't heard of him, then he had to be good at hiding. And Reborn had this gut feeling that he was the little delivery man for the invitation, the mysterious Myst that could not be caught on camera. Only really strong Mists can hide from the artificial eye.

He doubted they can hide from an actual Esper like Viper.

He also had a very bad feeling about all of this.

Since the moment he had seen the envelope, he felt like he had been sucker-punched by his Sky intuition, which had been dormant long after he had become Flame Active. Really, his intuition had worked only on his Guardians so far, though Reborn sometimes suspected that his ability to all but read people's thoughts might come from it. Maybe he had been blind to just how Sky-like he had always been because he refused to acknowledge his secondary Flames because he didn't want to be a freakin' Sky. He couldn't ignore it now. Definitely not now.

He was just glad Fon had decided to go check out his old place for mail today and do some errands after breakfast because he didn't want the boy around these Flames radiating from the invitation. Reborn had felt more than once a Sky trying to draw in an Element and while he himself was a Sky and could easily dismiss it, Fon was an unbonded Strom. He could fall for the thrall without even realizing it and then, one day, he'd just disappear and it could be too late for Reborn to find him. Fon may be young, but he was a seriously strong Storm and a ridiculously skilled master of martial arts. Any famiglia Sky would want him.

Donna Giglio Nero was definitely a famiglia Sky.

One who might be up to something, something that endangers his Elements and himself.

"Leon," he called his partner chameleon from where he was napping on the couch and the green lizard glided into the kitchen in the form of a kite, landing on Reborn's shoulder and transforming back into his original form. "We might have some hunting to do, soon."

Leon turned into a miniature hound and pretended to have caught a scent while Reborn put on his jacket and fedora, which is when the shapeshifting animal jumped up onto its usual place as they left the apartment, envelope and invitation carefully packed into a plastic refrigerator box so that Reborn would not have to expose himself to the Flames that really made him nauseous.

00000

"You got it, too, kora?" An equally sick looking Colonello asked as he , Lal Mirch and Reborn ran into each other in front of the house, the blond holding a suspicious ammunition case that had Reborn's gut churning just like the plastic box in his hands did. Lal was carefully standing a good three feet away from the box and refusing to even look at it, hence she was - possibly - the receiver of the invitation.

"I was hoping that the name was a coincidence," Verde said as he opened the door of the house to let them in, looking just as uncomfortable as the other two. "The others are not here yet, so we may actually hope that it was only the three of us, but this is already too much of a coincidence for it to be chance."

"Hey, guys," an unusually subdued Skull called just minutes after they had set side by side the boxes - Verde's was a hazardous chemicals container, probably from his laboratory - containing their own invitations as he walked into the 'meeting room' - the kitchen, really, because of the big table that can fit all of them - carefully holding a taped over glass aquarium away from himself as far as he can while not losing his grip on it. "Oh. Did you get some suspicious mail, too?"

"I didn't, but Lal did, kora," Colonello explained, while said woman was in the corner of the kitchen and glaring at the assembled boxes like a pissed off cat. Really, the only thing missing would be for her to extend her claws, hunch her shoulders, arch her back and hiss in a threatening manner. "You too, huh?"

"It came into my personal mail," the stuntman said, sounding a bit frightened, which made sense as no one but Skull's manager knew where the Cloud lived. Any fan mail or work contracts he usually received through his manager.

"We have ourselves a bit of a stalker here," Reborn commented, though it had been no news to him. He, too, had received the invitation at his actual home address, something which he was not happy about.

"Any news from Viper or Fon?" Verde asked from behind a big scanning machine he had dragged out of his lab in the basement so he can try to figure out the signature of the Sky Flames on each of the envelopes. Dying Will Flames were like a bio-signature, a thumbprint. You can literally identify people by Flames, but so far it is beyond the scope of technology and only people can recognize each other's Flames. Verde was supposedly hoping to remedy that and such a machine would truly be useful now. If they could track down Donna Giglio Nero with a click of a button ...

"I'm here," the Mist said as they appeared out of thin air, sounding pissed as they dropped a cardboard shoe box next to the others. They looked the most uncomfortable out of them all, their face was actually considerably paler than usual and Reborn even had to reach over to catch them when they swayed and stumbled right out of the air. Fantasma circled down to look at its master and hiss in worry as much as snakes can. It would seem that cardboard wasn't enough to isolate the Flames enough for the person to remain mostly unaffected. Or it could be that the foreign, intruding, thralling Sky Flames simply did not go well with Viper's ESP abilities.

"I have video footage from my building's lobby's CCTV," Reborn told his Guardians, Leon coughing up said footage from where he had been safekeeping it in a fake stomach that they both used for storing important things they didn't want disappearing. "I've studied it but I can't see anything except the letter being pushed into my mailbox. When you recover a bit, you should probably take a look. It's our only lead about this Checkerface for now."

"I'm fine," insisted Viper as they pushed themselves off of Reborn but kept carefully away from the table of boxes. "Put it on in the living room and I'll pry away the illusions. Whoever these fuckers are, they're dead." The rest of them nodded in agreement and Colonello and Reborn followed Viper into the living room.

The kitchen was just next door and it was open so Reborn overheard Lal telling Verde she'll be going outside to call Fon to check up on him because he was almost running late now and none of them wanted to risk it. Not after the sequence of events from the last couple of months. They were being targeted one way or another, that much was clear. And none of them was going to let that slide.

It took Viper watching the video three times to find and eliminate all the effects that the illusion had on the CCTV recording but when all layers of the illusion were thorn away, it didn't help much, because the person who had put in Reborn's invitation was dressed up like a scary clown and had a checkered mask on their face. They were a fucking creeper, as far as Reborn was concerned, but what actually worried him was how the man - if it was indeed a man - knew where he lived and if he knew he had a flatmate.

"Well, that's creepy as fuck," Lal commented as she came back from making the call. "Worrying, too. Was there anything for Fon in there?"

Damn his Guardians for thinking exactly like him.

Or maybe it was more of a blessing, really, but it was still annoying.

Reborn shook his head. "Fon still keeps his old place for mission requests and the such." The kid had a mobile phone, of course, but the physical reports on his missions he got in the mailbox of a shitty little apartment in the shady part of town. Reborn had went with him once since Fon had packed up and moved out of the place and they had both been propositioned by at least three individuals of both sex - and one transgender, if he remembered correctly - been all but assaulted by drug dealers desperate to sell their goods and some drunk pimp had asked Reborn how much he was asking for Fon's services. Fon had let him run wild on the neighborhood for about five minutes because Reborn had handed him Leon as compensation to not go and kill every single one of those filthy lowlifes who had dared to insult him like that before his Storm had calmed him down and dragged him off to finish what they had come there for in the first place.

Reborn had been forced to carry Lichi around until they left and Leon had stayed with Fon, so that the monkey could calm him and Fon could control how much damage and chaos he can cause, even if only a little.

Leon had been far too smug for Reborn's good as he settled against Fon's neck and wiggled his tail teasingly at his master. Reborn had been tempted to shoot him, but that would only make Leon sulk and give him the cold shoulder and Fon might get disappointed at him and Reborn had seen Fon's disappointed face, okay? It's not pretty. Skull had spent a week trailing after the martial artist to make up for whatever it is he had done to earn it.

It was devastating.

"Did you reach Fon, kora?"

Lal shook her head. "He couldn't answer the phone, but he had sent a text saying he should be getting here soon."

"Why wouldn't he be able to talk but have the time to text?" A confused Skull asked, doing his best not to look in the direction of the kitchen. Reborn was tempted to just say 'fuck it' to Verde's experimentation and burn the fucking letters to atoms. Only problem was, Fon was the Storm and the only one who can actually do it so that all traces of the Sky Flames are gone completely. The harmonizing factor and the thrall they were radiating was seriously messing them all up because they all had a Sky and Reborn was one, even if it was secondary. It was an intrusion and none of them liked it. Hated it, even.

"Well, technically, if he's running, he'd need just a moment to type something out as opposed to answering a phone and explaining everything. Fon has fast, deft fingers," Reborn explained, frowning when the others all stared at him. Even Verde in the kitchen had looked up from his screens to stare at Reborn. "What?"

"Reborn, what exactly is your relationship with Fon, kora?" Colonello asked warily, sounding hesitant but as though he had been meaning to ask this for a long while now. "I mean, you guys have that strange sleeping arrangement-"

"Are all domestic-" Skull added, only to be interrupted by Verde.

"He brews you fresh, handmade coffee, Reborn-"

"And since when do you go around braiding people's hair?" Lal asked, offended, because the one time she had asked Reborn to help her get her hair in a bun, he had pulled out one of the wigs he uses for his cosplays, put it on and proceeded to demonstrate how to do it without actually helping her. Lal had given up and just pinned her hair haphazardly in place with Colonello's bandanna, nearly causing him to faint at the spot because his heart had squeezed too hard at the lovely sight. Never mind that Lal had been covered in gore from one of the missions Reborn had accompanied his Rains on that usually looked like a bloody war zone, emphasis on the bloody.

"And now you're talking about deft, fast fingers? Good grief, if you're going to be so insistent that he's legal to make the decision of bonding with us, at least stick to it in the sexual department as well."

Reborn felt his face blank in that murderous way when he's about to kill a really annoying target. "Get your fucking minds out of the gutter. We're just friends and flatmates and potential Sky and Storm living together in a strange situation. How can you even be so disgusting, anyway? And no, not because it's Fon or whatever, but because he's a kid."

"What's my age wronged you now?" Said 'kid' asked in exasperation as he set foot into the house just in time to hear that part.

"Not me. These morons are just presuming we're sleeping together and not in the literal sense."

Fon stopped in the doorway, face flushing to match his tunic in a second. "Oh."

"You're still not legal and they actually think I'd take advantage of you." He turned to his official Guardians and sneered at them. "It's disgusting. Is that how you really think of me?"

"I would prefer it if we had this conversation after we get rid of those letters," Fon sighed again, a full body sigh that practically had the same meaning as his disappointed look, and they all just barely prevented themselves from wincing. "You know, after we can all think straight without being on edge because of an attempted Sky thrall?"

"You aren't affected?" Verde asked, confused and curious, and Reborn realized that Fon, indeed, did not look to be coping as bad as the rest of them, which should be impossible as Fon should be even more affected than they were. He was the unbounded one, after all.

"Hibari don't just deal with the helpless, civilians Skies, but also the 'greedy fucking famiglia' ones, too," he replied, quoting one of Reborn's most recent rants against famiglia Skies that have all but become a daily routine after the incident with Timoteo Vongola. Reborn cleared his throat a bit uncomfortably when all of his Guardians looked at him, clearly recognizing the true source of the words. "So we know how to resist the thrall. Not for long, certainly not forever, but long enough to get out of its range. I had rather hoped not to come across this signature a second time."

"So you got one, too?" Lal concluded and Fon nodded. "Where is it?"

Fon looked a bit sheepish. "Lichi threw it away through a conveniently open window as soon as the Flames ignited. There was a trash fire in a can outside, so it kind of got burned." Lichi, who had been hiding in his master's jacket - it was getting cold as winter approached just around the corner - poked his head out and chirpe a happy monkey chirp, clearly proud of himself for protecting his master. Good for him. He deserved it.

"So you don't even know what it said?" Reborn asked and pondered for a moment not to reveal the contents of the letter to Fon at all, since the kid had already dealt with it.

"It's a summons for the strongest Flames users in the world of all types of Dying Will Flames of the Sky to convene at a provided location and time," Verde took the decision out of his hands, but he guessed it was for the best for Fon to be informed, anyway, in case Donna Giglio Nero decided to take action when she realizes none of them will be answering said summons.

Fon, unexpectedly, paled. "And you all got one?"

"I didn't," Colonello said, raising his hand. He didn't even sound bitter about it, as though he knew Lal was stronger than him already and had long since accepted it. Whatever the case, he was more concerned about the situation than the fact that he came in as second despite how competitive he can get. It was all usually in good fun, but there was nothing funny about the situation they were in now, especially if Fon, who had a different upbringing than them and different information networks, looked so unwell all of a sudden and it had nothing to do with the Sky Flames thralling from the kitchen.

"You can't go!" The Storm exclaimed, definitely looking alarmed right now. "It's a trap!"

"What do you mean?" Viper immediately questioned, turning their attention away from the image of 'Checkerface' to face their youngest member. "How would you know that?"

"Because every few decades, the Man in the Iron Hat would gather the strongest Flame users in the world of their generation and no one would ever see or hear from them again!"

"Is it that man?" Reborn asked, pointing at the mysterious illusionist that had delivered his own and probably all of the others' invitations as well. "Does he go by Checkerface as well?"

Fon took one look at the image and nearly fainted on the spot.

"Fon!"