"Ha! So this is what the boss sent us to get? Looks like a piece of garbage to me!" said a teenager with long, silvery hair, looking at the small cube in his hand.
One of his companions, a much taller man with coarse black hair that looked as if it had exploded, grabbed what he was holding and said, "This 'piece of garbage' could potentially be one of the most powerful weapons in existance right now, so quit your incessant whining and let's get going! Do you want boss to kill us?"
"Shut up, scum! I'll do whatever the hell I want!" shouted the silverhaired teen, grabbing the object out of his companions hand and turning to walk away.
With a glare and a muttered curse, the black haired man followed after him to the vehicle where their other companions were waiting for them.
"Haha, this is so much fun! It's been a while since we've gotten to explore the town like this!" said a Takeshi with his arms behind his head.
It was summer break for a seven-year-old Tsuna, and since the family wouldn't be leaving for Japan for two more weeks, he was exploring the town with Hayato, Takeshi, and a grumpy Lampo.
"Why did I have to accompany the brats?" the greenette was mumbling to himself. "Couldn't one of their fathers do it?"
"Don't you like hanging out with us, uncle Lampo?" asked Tsuna, staring at him with big eyes.
Lampo, taken aback, didn't know what to say; he hadn't meant for them to hear.
"Haha! Uncle Lampo is making Tsuna cry! Should I tell uncle Giotto on you?"
Lampo paled; both at the thought of Tsuna crying, and at the thought of Giotto finding out that he was the one that had made his precious son cry.
"Of course Lampo like spending time with you guys!" he said frantically. "Haha, Lampo's just a bit tired, that's all! So, where do you want to go first?"
"Let's get ice cream!" shouted Takeshi immediately.
"Oi! Sugar freak! He asked Nidaime, not you!"
"Ahaha, that's true," said Takeshi, scratching his head sheepishly, not at all fazed. "So, Tsuna, where do you want to go first?"
"Umm, I don't mind going for ice cream first," said Tsuna shyly.
"Let's go, then," said Lampo eagerly, pointing to a nearby ice cream stand; he was relieved that Tsuna hadn't started crying.
After ordering three chocolate cones for the kids and a pistachio for himself, Lampo steered them to a bench and made them sit down.
As he tentatively licked his ice cream, a smile spread across Tsuna's face. "It's too bad that big brothers and Chrome couldn't come," he said a little sadly.
"Haha, well, it can't be helped, Tsuna! The twins are visiting their grandparents in Verona, Kyoya went with uncle Alaude to france, and Ryohei is sparring with uncle Knuckle."
"I think he knows that, idiota!" shouted Hayato. "Nidaime isn't stupid!"
As the two started bickering like usual, Tsuna saw something out of the corner of his eye. Looking at his uncle, Tsuna saw that he was staring longingly in the direction of the mansion.
Turning back to what he had seen before, the little brunette got up from his seat to go see what it was.
When he got there, he bent down to pick it up, and when he saw what it was, his eyes widened.
"Vongola?" he whispered in a confused voice. It was a small orange cube with weird designs and the word Vongola engraved on it, lying innocently against a wall at the entrance to an alleyway. For some reason, it looked a bit familiar to him.
After a bit of thinking, he suddenly realized where he'd seen it before. He'd seen a picture of it a few days ago on his dad's desk! When he'd asked his father what it was, he said that it was a new weapon that could be activated using flames . . . whatever that meant. Apparently, there were many more box weapons that weren't on the market, but this one (and six others) had been designed especially for his father and his guardians; they were supposed to arrive at the mansion today.
Picking up the box, he was going to head back over to show it to his uncle when, out of the darkness, a pair of arms appeared, capturing him.
He kicked out in terror, opening his mouth to scream. The next moment, though, a cloth went over his mouth, and before he knew it, his eyelids were drooping, and he was spiralling into unconsciousness.
Lampo was freaking out.
"Where is he?" he asked aloud for the hundredth time, pulling at his hair in frustration. Then, a moment later, he shrieked in pain when he felt a leg connect with the back of his knees, causing him to collapse face first into the hard cement floor.
Looking back at the perpetrator, he scowled at the little silverette; looks weren't the only thing Hayato had inherited from his father. "Get a grip, baka yaro!" shouted the kid using a Japanese insult his father had no doubt taught him. "You're the adult here!"
"R-right," said Lampo, collecting himself. "So, you guys didn't notice him leave?"
The kids both shook their heads and Takeshi said with what sounded like a forced laugh, "Hayato and I were having a conversation at the time."
"What conversation?" shouted Hayato. "I was-!" he cut himself off, remembering that this was not the time to be bickering; they had to find Nidaime.
"I guess that's good," said Lampo. "That means that he wandered off by himself and just got lost. If he had been kidnapped, we most definitely would have noticed a struggle."
The kids both nodded; he was probably right.
"Anyways, he can't have gotten too far. Let's get searching. I want you two to stay close, and don't leave my sight, got that? I don't know what I'd do if I lost you two too."
Just when Takeshi and Hayato were starting to feel a little touched that their uncle actually cared for them, Lampo continued.
"Lampo is already in enough trouble as it is with losing Tsuna; if I were to lose Hayato and Takeshi too, I would surely suffer a slow, painful death at the hands of G and Asari."
A vein appearing on his forehead, Hayato kicked his uncle once more, then walked past him, shouting, "Nidaime! Where are you?"
And so, the three of them began their search for Tsuna, thoroughly combing the streets of the huge city.
Almost three hours later, they still hadn't found the brunette, and Takeshi was begging Lampo to call Giotto.
"Hell no!" shouted Lampo. "I'm sure if we keep searching a little longer, we'll find him! There's no need for me to get beaten up and possibly tortured by Giotto!"
Hayato, who was way past frantic now, suddenly pulled four dynamites seemingly out of nowhere and planted his feet firmly in front of Lampo.
"Call uncle Giotto right this moment, or I'll blow you away," he said menacingly, wearing a glare scarily similar to his father.
Lampo's eyes dropped when he saw the dynamites the kid was holding. "You snuck into the weapon storage?" he asked in disbelief.
Hayato didn't say a word, instead making a great show of getting ready to light the explosives he was holding in his hand.
"Okay, okay!" shrieked Lampo. "I'll call him! Just put those away!"
A smirk grew on Hayato's face as returned the dynamites to wherever they had been hiding before and made a gesture as if to say, "Get on with it."
"What's wrong, Giotto?" asked G as he entered his best friend's office with two cups of coffee in his hands.
Giotto, who had been hunched over his desk, masssaging his temples, looked up at his friend and forced a smile. "It's nothing."
Shaking his head, G placed held one of the cups out to the blond and said, "I know that look, Giotto. Your hyper intuition is bothering you again, isn't it?"
Giotto smiled a little as he took the coffee from the redhead, nodding sheepishly. "My head feels likes it's going to split open. I've never felt it this strong before. Something absolutely terrible is about to happen."
A frown crossed G's face, but he didn't say anything, preferring not to voice the thoughts that were most definitely in Giotto's mind as well; there was no way anything would happen to any of the kids . . . was there?
Before any of them could say anything else, the ringing of a cell phone cut through the air. Immediately recognising it to be his, Giotto took out his phone and checked the caller ID. When he saw that it was Lampo, he was more than surprised.
Picking it up, he said, "Hey, what's up? Are the kids having fun?" His voice was almost desperate; he needed to know that Tsuna, Takeshi, and Hayato were okay. He needed to know that he was probably just overthinking things.
There was a second of silence before Lampo said three words he had been dreading the most, "Tsuna is missing."
The moment the words were out of the boy's mouth, Giotto dropped the mug he was holding and it fell to the floor with a crash, shattering into a hundred pieces.
His eyes narrowing, G placed his mug on the table and bent down to pick up the pieces of the broken mug. He very much wanted to know what Lampo had said, but he knew he had to wait until his leader was done.
Tightening his grip on the phone, Giotto tried to keep calm. "What happened?" he asked in a clipped tone.
"I don't know!" shouted Lampo in a panicked voice. "We were all having ice cream, and I turned my back for one second. When I turned back, he was gone! It's like he disappeared into thin air! We've been searching for three hours, and we still haven't found him!"
Giotto's eyes widened upon hearing this. "Three. Hours?" he asked in a deathly quiet voice. "And what the fuck took you this long to call?"
G stopped what he was doing to stare up at his boss; not once, in the decades that he'd known him, had G ever heard the man swear before.
Lampo, who was absolutely terrified, sobbed, "I'm sorry! We thought he might have just wandered off and gotten lost or something, so we didn't think it was necessary to-!"
"Enough!" shouted Giotto, cutting him off. "Come back to the mansion this instant! And make sure the other two get here safely! I'll call the others and let them know what happened."
Without even saying goodbye, Giotto hung up and turned to head towards the door.
Dumping the shards he held in his hands into the garbage, G followed closely behind him. "What happened?"
Without turning to look at him, Giotto said, "Tsuna went missing."
G's blood froze, and he had to force his legs to keep moving. "W-well, it can't be that bad," he said, trying to stay optimistic. "I mean, maybe he just got lost. We don't know for sure that he was kidnapped by another famiglia . . . right?"
"Oh, he was kidnapped, alright," said Giotto in an eerily calm voice. "And, before long, whichever family kidnapped him will be completely erased from the face of the Earth."
SkyGem: Ooh, scary Giotto . . . haha, and so begins another arc! What did you guys think of this chapter? Did you like it? Please do leave a review and tell me what you thought! Oh, and to all those who were wondering about Lambo; don't worry. The age difference in the manga between him and Tsuna was nine years, and I plan to stick to that, which means he'll be appearing eventually . . . probably even after this arc. Anyways on to another matter! I am currently in the middle of a dilemma! I've come up with an (imo) awesome idea for another KHR fic, but I already have too many ongoing series. Now, there are two options, and I think I'll let you guys decide. Option one: wait until a few of my Prince of Tennis fanfics are done to publish it, or, Option two: publish it now, and start updating this fic every other day instead of daily. I'm leaving the choice up to you guys. Just leave your vote in a review; I'm keeping the voting open until my next update (aka tomorrow). Anyways, here's the summary for the new fic:
Summary: Giotto and his guardians are hardly what you'd call parent material, especially considering they're all barely adults. So what are they supposed to do when eight toddlers (who barely speak Japanese, let alone Italian) seemingly appear out of nowhere? How will they find a way to return these kids to wherever, or rather whenever, they're from? Who'll take care of them in the meantime? And why the hell does everyone mistake the brat's to be their children? Read on to find out! No pairings.
Yes, yes, I'm obsessed with first gen/tenth gen fics, but can you blame me? They're adorable! And there totally aren't enough of them out there…oh, and you guys can always choose Option three: the fic idea is totally lame, nobody wants to read it.