Note from the author: Hide's name is pronounced HEE-deh not Hyde like from "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde" which written by Robert Louis Stevenson
~8~
"W-Why…?" Sawada Hideyoshi, aka Hide, cried in the jail cell, he had been arrested for public nudity and had accidently broken out of the cell a few times already. So now, he was half-naked, his entire reputation was destroyed in his hometown, and he had technically been arrested five times for the same thing in less than a half-hour. His life in Namimori City had been happy, normal, and completely fine up until the moment he had met Reborn.
"Sawada Hideyoshi-san," the cell door slid open with the guard talking to Hide, "Your guardian is here so you're free to go, don't let us see you here again."
"Thank goodness!" Hide cried with joy as clothes were thrown at his face.
"Geez, not even Tsuna got arrested this many times," said the familiar squeaky voice.
Hide pulled the clothes off his face and quickly tried to pull on the pants while arguing with Reborn, "What the hell was that? You shot me didn't you!?"
"Yes."
"Don't act so calm about it!"
"Well, that was the only way to show you I was serious."
"Now you're acting innocent!" Hide took a deep breath in as he pulled on a shirt, "Anyways, I have questions I need to ask you."
"I have answers."
"First off, how come when you shot me I came back to life?"
"The bullet in my gun is called a Dying Will Bullet," said Reborn and he began to explain the cause and effects of the Dying Will Bullet to Hide.
Hide stared blankly at Reborn for a few seconds before getting up to leave.
"Where are you going?" Reborn asked.
"Home," Hide answered, "before I lose anymore normalcy in my life."
"But your life isn't normal," he pointed out.
The boy's eyebrow twitched and he spun around and pointed an accusing finger at the infant, "What are you talking about!? My life has been plenty normal up until now!"
Reborn sighed, "You really don't know why I'm here, do you?"
"Of course I don't know!"
"Then read this," the infant handed Hide a letter which he quickly started reading.
Dear Hideyoshi-kun
If you are reading this, you must have met Reborn. I remember the first time I met Reborn I laughed at him and he kicked me in the gut. The bruise stayed for weeks. Anyways, I am truly sorry for pushing this responsibility on you. Reborn is a good tutor who has taught the best of the best and they've all turned out to be rather successful later on.
Once again, I beg you to forgive me for not being able to tell you this news in person. But you will find that as you grow older, you will be scared, angry, and happy; you will find yourself with more friends, and nothing will be the same; then maybe you will think of this as a blessing even though it is far from it. Now my sentences are getting mixed up, probably because I'm old. You will be mad at me for this, hopefully one day you'll understand my reasons. One more thing please do not tell your mother about this.
From your grandfather,
Sawada Tsunayoshi
Hide choked on his spit when he read the last sentence, "Grandfather!? He was the one that hired you!?"
"Did you think it was your other grandfather?" Reborn asked.
"That's Gramps; Grandfather is a weird, senile old bastard who has brought me nothing but trouble since the day I was born!" Hide grimaced at the image of his father's father, "And what's with this whole 'Don't tell your mother about this' crap?"
"Let me see that," Reborn took the letter from Hide and read it, after mumbling, "Stupid Tsuna," he rolled up the letter and whacked Hide with it.
"What the hell!?!?!?" he yelled.
"You remind me too much of him," the infant stated.
"That's still no reason!" he argued but got hit on the head again.
"Well I guess since that No Good has left it up to me to explain…" Reborn began; he took off his hat and took out a roll of paper then put his hat back on, "You are the Twelfth Boss of the Vongola Family, the most powerful Mafia Family in the world. And me? I am the Home Tutor Hitman, Reborn!"
"A what? And what does that bastard have to do with this?"
"You're grandfather is the Tenth Boss of the Vongola," Reborn unrolled the paper, which turned out to be a scroll of a family tree with Hide's name on it along with Hide's grandfather's name, "And your uncle is the Eleventh Boss of the Vongola."
"I have an uncle?"
"That's not the point," Reborn rolled up the paper and put it back in his hat, "Your still the successor of the Vongola Family, and you still have a responsibility."
"Responsibility? Is this some sort of joke? I am not gonna grow up to be a mob boss," Hide shook his head in disbelief, "Isn't there someone else who can take this job?"
"Well, there were originally four other candidates," Reborn began, "But the first candidate, your uncle's oldest son, got in a bar fight and was killed in the confusion; the second candidate, your father's youngest brother, was stabbed to death in a knife fight; the third candidate, your uncle's second son, was poisoned to death; and the last candidate, your uncle's youngest son, disappeared in the ocean."
No matter how you look at it, I'm not getting a very long life expectancy out of this deal...Hide lamented.
"You can still live a long life and be a Mob Boss," said Reborn.
"How'd you know what I was thinking?" the boy asked.
"A hitman knows how to read others hearts," he replied.
"That's ridiculous!" Hide yelled, then he realized he was currently talking to an infant claiming to be apart of the mafia outside of a police station, "Y-You're ridiculous! This whole thing is ridiculous! This has to be a dream or something, right? Right?"
"Where are you going?" Reborn asked as he watched the boy walk off.
"Home! To sleep! And then maybe I'll regain some normalcy and dignity!"
"Sawada-san?"
Before Hide could respond, he had collapsed into the person that had said his name. When he looked to where the person was he saw Tanaka Megumi, the most popular girl in school and the girl that Hide liked. She was his exact height and had long, red hair that was tied up in a pony-tail with a red ribbon; she had dark green eyes and appeared to have just come back from school because she was still in the Namimori Middle school uniform.
"Megu-I mean Tanaka-san!" Hide stammered.
"Sorry I bumped into you," the girl apologized, "But what are you doing here in front of the police station?"
"Huh? Uh, uh…" Hide looked around for an excuse and realized that she had no knowledge yet of him running around the town half-naked, but he then remembered that she would probably hear about it the following morning.
"Oh yeah, you're probably wondering what I'm doing here," she interrupted.
"Um, yeah! Why are you here?" he asked mechanically.
"Well, my dad is a policeman, in fact my entire family is full of policemen!" she giggled, making the boy almost melt in his shoes.
"Just like Tsuna," Reborn spoke.
Shit! Hide thought to himself and glared at the infant, I forgot he was still there!
"Wow!" Megumi exclaimed and kneeled down to the little baby, "How cute! Is this your cousin Sawada-san?"
"S-sure…"
"He's so cute! Why are you a suit though little boy?"
"Because I'm with the mafia."
He didn't just say that! Hide thought in horror, he feared that Megumi would start calling him a freak and run away screaming.
Instead, the red-head just squealed with delight, "That's adorable! I have to go now though, bye little boy, bye Sawada-san! I'll see you at school!"
"B-Bye," said Hide in a trance.
"So that's the girl you like?" said Reborn slightly skeptically, "She sort of reminds me of the girl that Tsuna liked."
"Shut up okay? Megumi-san just happens to have a soft spot for little kids," Hide started walking off grumpily.
"It's called Mafia Seduction."
"That's it I'm going home…"
"Have you confessed to her yet?"
Hide practically fell down at this question; he looked over to Reborn and yelled, "Are you crazy? Megumi-san is way too popular for me! Besides, I heard that any guy that goes near Megumi-san will get chewed out by Sakuraba Morita!"
"Oh yes," Reborn said thoughtfully, "He's on the list of most hated guy, right?"
"I don't hate him," Hide sighed, "I'm just seriously scared of him, and everyone in school is scared of him! He's huge, scary looking, and he's in the boxing club so that's like a license for punching people!"
Hide sighed in defeat and started walking back home while in deep thought about ways to avoid Sakuraba Morita.
~8~
"What? Why are you coming with me to school?" Hide asked the next morning when he was getting his shoes on.
"As your tutor I need to see your environment at school," was Reborn's excuse.
"You are not going to follow me," the boy immediately refused, "If you come to my school, you'll ruin every piece of normalcy in my life! And don't you have elementary school or something?"
"Hitmen don't have to go to school."
"That's ridiculous!"
"Sawada-san!" Hide turned around and saw Tanaka Megumi waving at him, she was standing next to her friend who asked:
"Who's that Megumi-chan?"
"That's Sawada-san, he's in our class remember?" Megumi giggled.
"Oh right," her friend nodded and then they continued on walking towards the school.
"Wow...Megumi-san actually remembered my name..." he said dreamily.
"What about that Sakuraba-guy?" Reborn interrupted the boy's daydream.
"I doubt Sakuraba Morita-san knows that I talked to Megumi-san today," he shrugged and continued walking to school.
"What about that little stunt you did yesterday?"
Hide froze and paled; he had completely forgotten the events until now and realized that by the time he reached school Tanaka Megumi would never talk to him again.
"Eh? Sawada-san ran around the town half-naked? What a weirdo!"
Images arose in Hide's head of the various scenarios that he would probably encounter at school. First, he would be shunned by his friends; Second, he would never be spoken to by Tanaka Megumi ever again; and third, he would be beaten up by all the jocks at his school including Sakuraba Morita. Now that he thought about it, he would never be able to show his face again at Namimori Middle or town. And before he realized it, he was already at the gates of Namimori Middle. The whole school seemed to go silent to Hide and everyone that was in the courtyard were all staring at him.
"Yeah! Way to go Sawada!" a cheer busted from the crowd, thus breaking the silence.
"Yeah!" another person joined, after that even more compliments joined and praised the boy on his doings.
"Sawada, I didn't know you had the guts to do that!"
"Way to start off the new school year Sawada!"
"Sawada you were so cool yesterday!"
Hide looked around in surprise; he was completely clueless as to what was going on and then he saw Megumi walk up to him with her hands clasped together.
"Sawada-san, I just heard what you did yesterday!" she said with utter delight, "You ran around the town naked? No wonder you were outside the police station yesterday! To be honest, I thought that you were really plain and bland, but now I can see that you're actually pretty cool!"
"I-I am?" Hide blinked and soon found himself surrounded within a crowd of people who were praising him and showering him in admiration and compliments. He tried looking back to the spot where he was talking with Reborn but didn't see anyone but the usual crowd there. Then, he looked back to where Megumi was, she saw him looking over to her and she gave him a friendly wave.
Maybe this was a good thing that this happened, but his friends...well his friends were...