Sorry I haven't updated in a while! I was going to update at the beginning of this month but Choir things, science things, junior medical conference things, etc, etc took over my life for a while, and now I'm on thanksgiving break (thank god!) so I'll probably actually have two chapters written by the end of this week! :D

Ignore my whining and enjoy this chapter!

~8~

Hide yawned in class and continued to listen to the horribly boring lecture that the teacher giving. The door slid open, but nobody reacted to it other than Hide, who idly looked at the open door and saw a girl with straight, purple hair. The girl looked very strange to Hide, he kept on wondering if her hair was dyed or something, she looked about a year or two younger than him and she was dressed almost entirely in black.

She looked around the classroom, there still was nobody reacting to her presence even as she walked in. She continued searching the class for something until she stopped with her gaze on Hide.

"Vongola Twelfth, I presume?" she said.

The boy nearly fell out of his chair upon hearing this, he quickly looked around and realized that everybody had kept on staring at the teacher, who was still teaching his dreadfully boring lesson, as if nothing had even happened. As if this girl was some sort of ghost.

"What are you doing?" he whispered to her in a suspicious tone, "Are you some sort of ghost? Is this a dream?"

The girl stared at him blankly and leaned over to pinch his arm, "Does it feel like a dream, idiot."

"Ow!" Hide yelped and quickly covered his mouth, nobody around him made any motion to move not even Hanabi, "Why isn't anyone doing anything?" he wondered aloud.

"Yeah, that would be the illusions."

Illusions? the boy thought and then remembered his encounter with the God Boxes at Namimori Shrine, "Illusions!" he exclaimed.

"Geez you're loud," she muttered while covering her ears, the purple-haired girl leaned down to him again and examined Hide, "I can't believe you're related to those guys, you look almost nothing like them…"

"W-What? What guys?" he gulped and leaned back in his chair.

"Well duh," she rolled her eyes and had her arms crossed over her chest as she continued, "The other Vongola Twelfths."

~8~

"Reborn!" Hide immediately called to his tutor as he searched the school halls, "Reborn, where are you?"

"Ciaossu," he looked down and saw the box used to hold the fire extinguisher swing open, Reborn was inside the box and was sipped a tiny cup of espresso in a very comfortable atmosphere.

"I don't think I want to know…" his student muttered before shaking his head and asking, "Reborn! Did you hire an illusionist to follow me?"

"Maybe I did, maybe I didn't," the infant said elusively and sipped on his espresso.

"I'm not joking here, Reborn!" Hide shook his head furiously, "A weird little girl with purple hair just walked into my class room and told me she was an illusionist!"

"Purple hair? That's probably Chloe then," Reborn said thoughtfully.

"Great! Is she another one of your weird assassin friends?" the blonde asked reluctantly.

"No, not really," he shook his head and said, "Chloe is part of the Varia, an elite assassination squad by the Vongola that is said to have assassins that are almost inhuman in terms of strength."

"I-Inhuman?" Hide gulped.

"They are also known for their mercilessness as well," Reborn added cheerfully.

"The Varia?" he said weakly and quickly regained his composure, "Hold on, did you or did you not call an assassin illusionist to follow me around?"

"I didn't," his tutor stated.

"But you said she was part of the Vongola," Hide verified, "Look, I just want to know one thing, Reborn. Is she going to kill me or not?"

"I see no reason why she would want to kill you or have any need to kill you," Reborn replied, "But then again, she may just hate you."

"What!"

"Let's get things straight first," the infant began, "Did she say she was going to kill you?"

"No, you're the one that brought up that topic!" he pointed out.

"What exactly did she say to you?"

"I don't know," he shrugged and added sheepishly, "She said something about the former Twelfths and then disappeared in thin air."

Reborn seemed to think about what Hide said for a few seconds, before he dismissively shrugged and said, "That's Chloe for you."

"What the hell is 'That's Chloe for you' supposed to mean?" the boy paled.

"Twelfth!" Hide looked up and saw Hanabi and Suzuki coming after him.

"Hey Hide?" the raven-haired boy greeted him, "Why the big hurry after the school bell rang?"

"I had to find Reborn," he said tiredly.

"Then what are you doing sitting in front of the fire extinguisher's case?"

"Idiot!" Hanabi began to scold Suzuki, "The Twelfth can sit anywhere he damn well pleases!"

Hide looked back to the fire extinguisher's case and saw that the door had closed.

"Hide, are we still going over to your house to study?" Suzuki asked while holding up a text book, "Because I seriously need help with history."

"Huh?" the blonde glanced up to him and looked back to the fire extinguisher's case, "Yeah, sure."

"If you're going to the Twelfth's house, then I am too!" Hanabi declared.

"Weren't you going to come anyways?" the baseball player pointed out.

"Nobody was talking you, baseball-idiot!"

"But you just were."

Hide was stuck the Hanabi's one-sided argument with Suzuki the rest of the walk home. But he wasn't annoyed, in fact his thoughts were on something other than the two.

"Hide!" Suzuki snapped him out of his thoughts and he realized that he was standing in front of his house, "Are you alright, Hide?" he asked with concern.

"Hm? Oh, yeah, just thinking about stuff," he shrugged and opened the door to his house.

"Like what?"

"Um," Hide thought the idea of telling the two about what he saw today in class and decided against it, "Nothing important."

If it had only been Suzuki there, Hide might have told him, but since Hanabi was there also he decided against it. After all, she probably would have gone crazy over the fact that she didn't see Chloe and also would have threatened to possibly kill/blow up anything around him for the next 24 hours.

"Mom, I'm home!" he called as he entered the house, "Suzuki and Gokudera-san are here too!"

"Oh my, Hide-kun!" his mother called from inside the kitchen, "There's a friend here for you!"

"Friend?" he questioned and walked towards the kitchen, he nearly fell over when he saw Chloe sitting at his kitchen table with a cup of tea in her hands, "W-What the heck!"

"I have to go to the grocery store, Hide-kun," his mom said as she got up from the table and began to leave, "Take care of the house for me!"

"Mom! Wait-!" he began hurriedly but she had already left, so he turned back to the purple-haired assassin that was currently sitting at his dining table.

"Hello, Twelfth," she said conversationally.

"You!" Hide spun around and saw Hanabi pointing an accusing finger at Chloe, "What the hell are you doing here!"

"Oh, well if it isn't the Smoking Bomb's kidnapped sister?" the girl observed before adding, "Or should I say, the new Smoking Bomb?"

"Shut up and just answer the question!" the bomber said testily.

"Huh? Gokudera-san, do you know her?" asked Hide as he looked from the two frantically.

"Do I know her?" Hanabi scoffed, "Of course! She's the first Twelfth's Mist Guardian!"

"His what?"

"Former," Chloe clarified, "Former Mist Guardian. He is dead now after all. How's that dumb brother of yours doing, by the way?"

"He's doing perfectly fine without your screwy illusions messing up his head," she growled.

The illusionist shrugged and muttered, "Geez, I was just asking."

"Why you-!" Hanabi began angrily and started to take out her cards but was luckily stopped by Hide.

"W-Wait a second!" he yelped, the whole room fell silent and he looked over to Chloe, "So you're an assassin who knew the former Twelfth," he then turned to Hanabi and said, "And your brother worked with her, right?"

"Y-Yes, Twelfth," the bomber muttered obediently.

"That sounds right," Chloe nodded.

Hide sighed with relief and asked, "Then why do you two seem to hate each other so much?"

"I wouldn't call our relationship hate, young Twelfth," the purple-haired girl began, "It's more like a mutual dislike for each other."

"Really? Because I would call that hate," Hanabi pointed out, she then turned to Hide and said apologetically, "Twelfth, please excuse my rudeness, but the reason why I don't like this…" she paused to looked at Chloe distastefully before turning her attention back to Hide, "illusionist is because she's in the Varia, I hate anyone in the Varia."

"Why?"

"Because they're a bunch of creepy nut-jobs," she said flatly.

"I would also like to say something," Chloe spoke up, "First off, I'm not in the Varia anymore. I quit a while ago."

"You don't quit a job like killing people so easily," Hanabi said suspiciously, "It's not the same as any other job."

"It is for an illusionist," she said in a tone that suggested this was fact.

"Isn't that against the rules?" asked Reborn, who had just suddenly appeared at Hide's feet.

"Reborn!" the boy yelped and almost had a heart-attack at his tutor's sudden appearance.

"If it isn't Signore Reborn," Chloe smiled to herself after seeing the infant, "To answer your question: yes, I believe it is against some rules, but I've never been a stickler for rules like the Smoking Bomb-siblings."

"Does Nagi know you're here?" Hanabi asked.

"Nope, and I plan on making it stay that way," she stated flatly.

"Uh," Suzuki began cautiously, "Can anyone tell me what's going on?"

Chloe looked up at him and asked, "Are you a swordsman, by any chance?"

The baseball player stared at her blankly for a few seconds before grinning sheepishly and saying, "No, not really, but if it helps I used a sword once."

"I see," she stated and looked over to Reborn, "I have to say, Signore Reborn, this is quite a disappointment you've gathered here."

"I know," he said calmly.

"These Family members for the Twelfth are weak, no matter how I look at them," she continued, "Their strength looks to be at least average to that of any normal Mafioso."

"What did you say, you little twerp!" Hanabi growled while eyeing the girl threateningly.

"I know," Reborn replied.

"These children you've gathered all would be dead by now if they were up against the original Twelfth's Family," Hide became startled when she said this, his eyes widened and he continued to stare uncomfortably at her, "I would have thought you'd have gathered people who were much stronger."

"I've done the best I could do under the given circumstances," the infant shrugged, "Hide's luck is exceedingly bad compared to other people's."

"Well, I guess that explains a lot," she sighed, "He looks pretty weak also."

"Yeah, he's the weakest."

"You guys do realize that I'm still here, right?" Hide waved a hand in between the two's vision of each other.

Reborn grabbed his hand and twisted it until it almost broke, "Don't interrupt me."

"Ow, ow, ow! Okay!" he yelped.

"Wow, you really are weak," Chloe commented.

"Don't insult the Twelfth, you little twerp!" Hanabi threatened and began to pull out her cards again.

"Are we going to play cards now?" Suzuki asked cheerfully upon seeing the deck.

"No!" she yelled.

"Gokudera-san, what did I say about throwing explosives in my house!" Hide yelped when he, too, saw the deck.

Hanabi sighed reluctantly and muttered, "That I shouldn't do it."

"Thank you!" he sighed with relief as he watched her put the deck away.

"Chloe-san, right?" Hide spun around as he noticed Suzuki talking right towards her, "Are you on our team?"

"Team?" she questioned.

"Suzuki!" the blonde hissed and tried to pull him away from the assassin.

"Relax, Hide," he grinned confidently, "I'm just asking a fellow player what team they're on."

"Oh, you mean if I'm on your side or not," Chloe concluded, "Well, I wouldn't exactly say that I'm on your side or not, but I won't hurt you."

"So you're like a neutral party?"

"Yeah, sure," she nodded, "Neutral. At least for you."

"Then you're not going to kill me?" Hide asked carefully.

"What?" she raised an eyebrow, "Who said anything about killing anybody?"

He gulped and began nervously, "W-Well, Reborn told me you were an assassin, so I only thought…"

"You're not only weak, but an idiot too," she said flatly, "That strangely reminds me of useless weakling I once knew."

"Don't look down on the Twelfth, brat," Hanabi warned, "Even if he is slow at times!"

"That's not helping, Gokudera-san," the 'Twelfth' sighed tiredly.

"Heh," Chloe smirked, Hide noted that this was probably the closest he was going to get to her actually laughing, "What is this? A comedy? Signore Reborn, the family you've gathered may be weak, but they sure are comical."

"That they are," Reborn nodded with a smirk and watched her suddenly stand up.

"Oh yeah, I came here for a reason," she reminded herself, "I have something to give back to the Vongola, Signore Reborn" she turned to Hanabi and said, "Look, Smoking Bomb, my proof of resignation."

Chloe held out a hand and a small indigo-colored cube appeared in the palm of her hand along with a ring that had an eyeball in place of where the stone should have been, "I have no use for these trinkets any more. Here."

She handed the two items over to Reborn, who took them and made them quickly disappear.

"Hmph," Hanabi stuck her nose up at this, "Doesn't change the fact that you were part of the Varia."

"No, it doesn't," the younger girl shrugged.

"What was that?" Suzuki asked curiously.

Chloe looked at him as if she was staring at a moron and asked, "You don't know what that was?"

"Nope!" he shook his head while giving off his cheerful smile, "What is it?"

"Um…" she hesitated before explaining and continued in a struggling manner, "How would you say it in this language…um, cube…tool?-Cube Tool? Or perhaps Square Arms…?

Hide held back the urge to laugh at her failed attempt to translate what he was sure she meant, 'Box Weapon'. Suzuki did the same, though for a different reason.

"Haha! That's such a weird name for something!" he laughed.

Chloe's face became bright red but she quickly hid this fact from everyone in the room and turned around.

"How stupid, I should have come when it would only be me and Signore Reborn!" she stated, "I'll take my leave then!"

"W-Wait, Chloe!" Hide began, but the girl had already disappeared, he went limp as soon as she disintegrated into the air and muttered, "There were so many things I wanted to ask her…"

"I hate her," Hanabi stated after Chloe left.

"Really? I thought she was pretty cool," Suzuki said cheerfully.

"That explains a lot, because I hate you too."

"Haha! That's hilarious, Gokudera!" the baseball player laughed cheerfully.

~8~

Later on that night, Chloe was sitting outside on top of Hide's roof. Her elbows were resting on her knees and her hands supported her head as she listened the crickets chirp besides her.

"Yes, Signore Reborn?" she questioned, not even needing to turn back to the infant that was right behind her.

"Why did you quit the Varia?" Reborn asked without any hesitation, he walked over to her and was now standing besides her.

"Still as straightforward as ever I see," she muttered, her dark eyes wandered up to the star-lit sky, after a few seconds of star-gazing she mumbled, "For certain reasons."

"What about your apprenticeship under Viper?" he continued the interrogation despite the vague answers that were being given, "He's not the kind of guy that would take on students for free much less at all, if you stayed in Italy you would have grown ten-times stronger than you are now."

"Don't you think I know that?" Chloe raised an eyebrow at him and laid herself down on the roof tile, "I felt like a sudden change was in the air, so I got out of that old country as soon as I could. My education under Master Mammon was very nice, but I don't feel like I can learn all that much from him anymore."

"Then were you offered a position in Japan from the Tenth or Eleventh?" he questioned

"The Eleventh?" the illusionist scoffed at this and said sarcastically, "The Eleventh has become a complete and total loon since I last saw him, he's about as much help to the Vongola now as rock. Nobody has even seen the Eleventh since his last son died."

"That really didn't answer my question, Chloe," the infant said coldly.

Chloe smirked and said, "That demeanor of yours can change real quickly, can't it? Well, if you must know, I just came to give you that Hell Ring and my Twelfth generation Varia Box."

"Then why did you come straight to Hide when you came to Japan?"

"Mere curiosity," she shrugged and continued, "Don't expect me to stay for very long though. That boy is annoying, tiresome, and very depressing to look at, there is no way in hell that you can expect me to stay in this dingy little place for long."

"So you're going to leave then? And where are you going to go?"

Chloe looked back up at the sky and hummed thoughtfully before replying, "No clue, but I want to go traveling for a bit. Maybe I'll come back again because of curiosity."

For some reason, Reborn seemed satisfied this answer and smirked, "I had a feeling you would."

"And why is that?" she asked, but before he could answer the window to Hide's bedroom slid open and Hide stuck his head out.

"Reborn!" the boy called, "Are you up there? I heard some voices."

"I'm with a friend," the infant replied and looked back to where Chloe was but she had completely disappeared from where she supposedly was making Reborn smirk, "I'm sure you'll be back here soon, Chloe. After all, you did look like you were having fun down there."

"Reborn!" Hide called again.

"Shut up, idiot," his tutor scolded as he jumped down from below and kicked the boy on the back of his head.

"Ow!" he yelped in pain and fell to his bedroom floor while rubbing his head, he turned his attention back to his tutor and asked, "Reborn, was someone else up there with you?"

Reborn stared at him straight in the eye and asked innocently, "Why do you ask that?"

"Because I thought I heard two voices up there," he explained, "And I thought you said you were with a friend too."

"Yes, I was speaking to the raccoons that live on your roof," Reborn stated, "They are quite fond of me."

"Eh! There are raccoons on my roof?" Hide yelped, "I-Isn't that unlucky?"

"No, I only trained them to kill weak Mafia Bosses, so you should be fine," the infant said and then added thoughtfully, "Oh wait…"

"Don't joke around!" he yelped.

"Boss," a voice began to speak from underneath his bed, "I don't mind if you're scared of raccoons and all, but if you're going to worry could you please do so with the lights turned off?"

"Why are you even still under my bed, Adam!" Hide paled.

The closet swung open and Anna jumped out, "Don't worry about it, Boss, I'll do it for you."

"And why are you still living in my closet!"

"To protect you, Boss," she stated before turning the light switch off.

"Go to sleep, idiot," Reborn ordered and kicked the boy until he was unconscious.

~8~

Chloe watched from outside with a smile on her face, but upon realizing that she was smiling she immediately frowned and started leaving. "I did not have fun," she muttered.

~8~

I hoped you all enjoyed this chapter, the next one will be an extra which will focus more on the Eleventh and his Guardians. If you wish to talk about this chapter and other things, come on down to my forum: Just another Forum, which has its newest moderator, Nehszriah who is author other Next Gen fics such as Vongola Unidicesimo and Zio Hayato!

Also, the poll for the next extra is still open on my profile if you wish to vote and haven't yet! :)

Anything Katekyo Hitman Reborn!-related belongs to Amano Akira!