Disclaimer: I don't own anything but my OCs.
I sat quietly at the table. My legs folded under my body neatly as I glared down at the table in front of me. My mother had just told me that my father is not to know anything about my search for Domenico Cavallone. So now I was shouldering two secrets. The first being the secret from my father and the second being that I already know where Domenico Cavallone is located.
"So you are not attending university in Italy? Then are you returning here to finish your education?" My father was practically glaring across the table at me but I knew better than to be scared. That was just his natural expression.
My father, Hibari Yuuta is a strict and silent man. Raven black hair, steely gray eyes, a sharp jawline, well rounded shoulders, a lean body line that was obvious despite the loose yukata, and long legs that I didn't inherit.
I hesitated, "I'm… not going to go to college. I've already found a job."
Kyoya's eyes twinkled in amusement. His eyebrow arched as if to tell me that he was predicting that I would get in trouble in a second when my father would ask what my occupation was specifically.
As Kyoya suggested, my father hummed in approval, "As expected, are you employed full time?"
Again I paused, licking my lips nervously, "I'm… I work on my own schedule."
My parents exchanged looks of wonder and then pride. Kyoya snickered behind his bowl of miso soup, leaning his head back to get a better look at my expression.
"Marvelous!" My father smiled at me for the first time since he saw me tonight, "So then you have a position of power already? How long have you been employed?"
"Ahh…" Oh jeez. When did I join the Varia? "Not sure."
Oh that's right. I joined in middle school! There's no way I can tell my parents that I've been "employed" since middle school. They would catch on for sure.
"So what is your position exactly?" My father asked, "Come on. Don't be shy! Employment is something to be proud of, Kira!"
Oh, yeah it is. I'm not ashamed of it at all. Just… I can't tell you!
"Umm… I'm an officer of the Varia…" I said carefully, making my mother gasp.
Oh, I'm busted. I glanced at my thoroughly confused father and then heaved an internal sigh of relief. Did my mother know about us? Then again… She did say that she knows Domenico Cavallone is the boss of the Cavallone Family.
"The Varia?" She hissed at me, "Young lady, you are-!"
"I can call my coworker. He came to Japan with me. In fact, he's coming to pick me up later tonight." I smirked at my mother as I cut her off. I was challenging her to reveal my secret. If she did, I would tell my father immediately that she ordered me to search for Domenico, "He might explain our work better than I can."
Kyoya, having eaten his fill in the time that we were having this little scene, put his chopsticks down and excused himself. He was clearly amused and holding down a smile. I rolled my eyes at him as he left.
"It's a lucky day." My father mused, "We can meet your coworker? What kind of man is he?"
"He's loud and obnoxious." I told him without batting an eye. I couldn't imagine describing Squalo-senpai in any nice words when loud and obnoxious would do him justice. I snickered, "But he does know his stuff. He's a very talented swordsman."
"Swordsman, you say?" He arched his eyebrow at me suspiciously, "Is that his hobby?"
"No." I said without flinching, "That's our occupation. He's a swordmaster. We teach lessons to the weak and operate as a sort of bodyguard agency."
My father had bought the act but my mother seemed to know full well that my occupation title would officially be named: assassin. He didn't know how to feel about labeling me as someone's "bodyguard" but he sighed and nodded, saying he was working in a similar field anyways. But I didn't lie to him. We are kind of like bodyguards to the Vongola Family except we kill people in the shadows instead of protecting people up front. No shame in that, right?
Appeased for the moment, my father told me to eat my fill before the food got too cold and so I did. My family had never been much for small talk so the rest of the night was pretty much just me getting in the bath to clean myself and then coming back out to have my father ask me a few more questions about my job.
When Squalo arrived, I hurried to the door to greet him and I muttered under my breath, "I need you to come inside and tell my father I'm a bodyguard."
"H-Huh?" Squalo was obviously trying to whisper but his voice was naturally loud, "What do you mean?"
"Shh!" I hissed, "Senpai, I can't tell my father I'm in the mafia but he wants to know what kind of job I'm doing now."
"Why can't you just tell him?" Squalo grumbled.
"My father works for the government." I whispered, "I'm fucked if he finds out."
"Oh." The swordsman went sheet white and heaved a shaky sigh, "You didn't tell me you were the daughter of a government officer. You traitor!"
"He's not an officer." I hissed, "Cut it out before I-"
"Ahem." My mother was standing down the hall sizing Squalo up. Her crimson red eyes reminded me of the boss' for a moment as she glared down at us, "Well, Kira, introduce us."
"Ah…" I paused, waiting for my father to fully reach the end of the hall as well, "So, this is my coworker, Superbi Squalo. And Squalo-senpai, these are my parents."
"N-Nice to meet you." Squalo-senpai was not good with this kind of stuff but it was touching to know that he would do this for me.
"Indeed." My father was almost trying to scare Squalo away with that nasty glare but I knew he was just taking in Squalo's stature, "Your Japanese is very good."
Oh, man. Of course it is. If it was bad, he would never have even gotten me to join the Varia.
"Thank you." Squalo didn't know what else to say but he was certainly not losing out here.
My parents are very impressive in their looks but Squalo-senpai is good-looking in his own way. My mother glanced down low on his body and then back at me and her lips curved into a smirk. I froze. Did she just check for a bulge?
Oh boy. I had always known that my mother was brazen but this was a whole new level. Is it because I'm an adult now that she can show me this side?
My father's gaze was quick to shift back and forth between the two of us and I imagine a lot of things went through his mind just then. I mean, if I had a child and he or she was standing so close in proximity to a stranger of the opposite gender I would also probably assume that there was more to them than meets the eye.
"How did you meet Kira?" My father asked carefully.
"In middle school." Squalo grumbled much too honestly, "We attended the same school."
"Is that so? Did you attend classes together?"
"I'm older by a year."
My stomach clenched and I knew what my father's next question was before it left his mouth, "Do you know that if you touch my daughter in the wrong way that I'll skin you and feed you to the vultures?"
Squalo nearly fainted. Well, no he didn't but you get the point. He was shocked into silence and it was great.
"Father!" I hissed, "He's my senior and no more."
As if to add fuel to the fire, my mother cooed, "That doesn't mean those feelings are mutual."
My poised and controlled father, in the most aggressive yet quiet manner possible, snarled, "Oh, I'll make sure they're mutual."
"Senpai." I said, grasping Squalo's hand tightly.
"Yeah?" The long-haired mafioso murmured back.
"Run." I turned and yanked him out the door.
The sound of my father's tonfas whistling through the air as he swung at Squalo made chills run down my spine.
"You let go of that hand this instant, you herbivorous swine, or I'll make you wish you never met her!" My father's threat would only be empty if we out ran him and I did not want to know what would happen to poor Squalo-senpai if my father caught him.
"Run. Run. Run." I repeated, "I'm not scared of guns. I'm not scared of Don Vongola. I'm scared of my father."
I could tell that Squalo was too. That's the thing about my father. If you're a good fighter, you won't fight him unless you're an absolute nutcake because he might be old but he's not weak and most people can tell just by the way he carries himself. He was the type of man that made sure you would be afraid of him for the rest of your damn life if you were ever on the other end of his tonfas.
Fancy fact. My brother picked tonfas as his weapon of choice because of the man that chased us all the way across town aka my father.
O~O~O~O~O~O~O~O~O~O
"Hey, Squalo-senpai." I called to my coworker on our plane ride home. I had gotten through with all my business in Japan within a few days and now it was time for us to return to headquarters.
Squalo barely looked up from his shining sword. He insisted on cleaning it. Oh, we're allowed to have our weapons cause this is a private jet for Vongola Family business.
"Is the Cavallone Family still under Domenico's leadership?" I grumbled, making him look up at me with a sneer, "My mom says he owes us something."
"Didn't you hear?" He snorted, "Domenico is dead. He died last year so Pipsqueak Dino has taken over."
Oh. The color drained out of my face and I had to think about my next question for a moment, "So… Does that mean whatever that man owes us isn't going to be paid back anymore?"
He rolled his eyes and gave me a meaningful look, "You really think that dirt poor family could pay back whatever they owe a rich family like yours? Thanks for telling me that you were rich by the way. I wouldn't have invited you into the Varia if I had known you were a rich kid from a government agent's family."
"Stuff it." I hissed, "I don't tell people that because it doesn't matter. They can't stop me from doing what I want anyways. If they had their way, I would never have left Japan in the first place."
"So did you know that your family needed to collect from the Cavallone's before you came? Is that why you came to Italy?"
"No… I didn't know until today. You really think I would have beat around the bush if I knew they owed us something?" I rolled my eyes at him.
He thought about it a moment and grumbled, "Yeah. You might've killed him. So how are you going to get him to pay back the money?"
"Domenico is dead so I don't think I'll collect from Dino. I just have to call my mother and tell her the man she's looking for is dead." I sighed, "Maybe she'll just let Dino off the hook."
Squalo shot me a dirty look, "So you're going to keep babying Cavallone?"
"I never babied Dino." I told him strictly.
"Yes, you did." He said just as sternly, "When are you going to admit that you were in love with Cavallone? That was so many years ago. Everyone has childhood crushes."
"... I'll admit it when you admit there was someone you liked too." I huffed, turning away to signal the end of our conversation because I thought Squalo-senpai would never admit to such a thing.
"Alright." He said, making me turn with eyes wide and filled with shock, "I'm a person too. Everyone has someone they liked as a kid."
"Who?!" I was completely shocked. There was no way that I never noticed that Squalo liked someone. We were almost always together. I mean, not that I ever took an interest in love stories but Squalo?! Really?!
"Are you seriously asking me that question right now?" He shook his head at me in shame, "Fuck you!"
"What?!"
In the end, he didn't tell me.
O~O~O~O~O~O~O~O~O~O~O
The years were going by faster than I could imagine now that I was out of school. I didn't have to attend meaningless classes and I could totally focus on assassinations. Ottavio was sending me on "appropriate" leveled hits but I really think he's underestimating me and when I brought it up with Squalo, he said he thought the same. It gave me one more reason to hate the guy.
I was going up to complain when I heard his voice coming from behind a closed office door in a hushed yet angry hiss, "What do you mean? Xanxus is out of the picture. If we take out Squalo now too, the whole thing will fall to me for sure. If you're uncertain we can take out Lussuria too. Then there's no one to stop us. We gathered forces for ages just for this day! You can't back out now!"
My blood ran cold. Take out Squalo? I knew it. When Ottavio told me he wanted to make Squalo the next boss it was just so that he could take Squalo out like he took out Xanxus.
All the memories of our defeat came rolling back to me. The way the Ninth Generation Vongola Guardians glared down at us as if they had defeated us fair and square when our plan was supposed to be flawless. Ottavio was the one who told them not to leave the base because we would invade. In fact, Ottavio was supposed to be part of our invasion troops so why was he not among Leviathan's Lightning Squad? There is only one answer-Ottavio was our traitor and to save himself from the same fate as the rest of us he sat back at base and waited.
"Don't be ridiculous." Ottavio continued, answering whatever question the person on the other end of that blasted phone call had just asked him, "Hibari Kira isn't even from this country. If Squalo dies, it's also very likely that she'll just leave the Varia. She's only here because he's here. I'm sure of it."
Now, I can only do two things from here. I can immediately run in there and beat the snot out of Ottavio or I can set up something bigger. Clearly, Ottavio is not the only one that participated in the scheme that caused us to lose our well-planned victory that night. Years ago, I never thought I would trust anyone enough to let them in on my plan but I proved that wrong on this very day.
I sprinted down the hall towards Squalo's room and demanded, "Come with me. We have to go see Lussuria."
"Are we being invaded?" Squalo was slightly annoyed to be disturbed but of course, he stuck by me, "What's going on? Should I gather the rest of the officers too?"
"Yeah." I hissed, "But not yet. We don't know who we can trust."
"Wh-What?!"
"Shhh!" I slapped my hand over his mouth and dragged him along, "I trust you for sure. And I trust Lussuria."
He gave me a skeptical look that just told me he thought I was nuts but I dragged him along anyways. I knocked on Lussuria's door twice, got a groan, and stormed in. Lussuria had been on a stake out all of yesterday and it ran into this morning. He gave his report, had lunch, and was just about to crawl in here and go to bed.
"I need both of you to keep quiet about this but-"
"You're in love with Squ-chan?" Lussuria finished my sentence and waved me off, "I'm going to sleep! Don't bother me until tomorrow!"
Annoyed, I threw Squalo aside and stomped up to Lussuria's bed and snatched his comforter from him. I threw that to the floor and said, "You're going to get killed by Ottavio."
Both of my fellow officers laughed a good, long laugh until they realized that it wasn't a joke.
"Kira… Ottavio is the weakest of our current officers." Squalo reminded me, as Lussuria began to sit up in bed, "Lussuria is in our top three which consists of you and me and him. There's no way Lussuria's going to get killed by Ottavio."
"Senpai, I heard Ottavio on the phone just now with someone saying he wants to be the boss of the Varia by killing you." I told him, "There's no way I misheard. And I told you that Ottavio has been acting weird since before our failed coup d'etat. Ottavio could have a whole team in on this for all we know."
"And… So how do you know I'm not part of this supposed team?" Lussuria huffed, finally sitting properly with his legs thrown off the side of the bed and his feet firmly on the floor as if to get up, "What if I'm part of the 'overthrow Squ-chan' plan?"
"Well if you are, get off it." I demanded, "Because Ottavio said you're probably the only other competitor and he plans to kill you too."
Both of my senior assassins paused, shared a look of distaste and said, "What about you?"
"Huh? Is that really important?"
"I'm offended, Squ-chan." Lussuria growled, "Ottavio doesn't think Kira-chan is a candidate for leadership because of what?"
"EXACTLY! I HAND FUCKING PICKED HER!" Squalo roared, "How are you going to kill us off and leave her?!"
Okay… Are they offended because Ottavio's going to kill them off while I get to survive or are they actually offended because Ottavio doesn't think I'm a potential future boss?
"Oh my god!" Lussuria shrieked, "I'm going to march right over there and let Ottavio know that if he killed us, Kira-chan would definitely be the next boss!"
"No, you're not because I'm going to cut him in three and dump his corpse in the sewer!" The swordsman snapped, "Ottavio is the last in line to be the boss! There's no way this group of rowdy assassins would let a man that never fights be our boss!"
"Guys, shhhh!" I hissed, "We can't let Ottavio know that we know."
"And why not?!" They chorused.
"Because we have to find out who the others are."
"Even more of a reason to march over there and take him prisoner. We can beat the rest of the traitors out of him!"
"We can't!" I said and before they could complain about my lack of faith in their skills, I added, "Because Xanxus would want to do it himself."
"... We're getting our boss unfrozen?" Squalo asked incredulously.
We had discussed this on many occasions but never had we executed any plans to follow through with our words because we were always heavily under watch and we didn't want our plan to go wrong a second time.
"We thought of so many different plans, Kira-chan." Lussuria reminded me, "There's no way we can get in the main base without being seen and even if we get the boss out they would just hunt us down again."
"That man put his faith in our strength and we failed. If we don't rescue him, I might as well drop dead." I hissed, "My strength has grown in the years that we sat here doing nothing and so has yours. We can get him back!"
"Kira." Squalo said sternly, "It means just as much to me as it does to you. So trust me when I say we're going to get him… Today's just not the day. We need to put more serious thought into this and we need some way to compare our strength to that of the current Guardians and-"
"Or we can be sly and sneak in and out since we're assassins and all?"
"Sneak into Vongola Main Base?" Lussuria rolled his eyes, "We're confident not stupid, Kira-chan."
"We will get the boss and we will punish Ottavio so be patient." Those were Squalo's words and I held them close to my heart for the next year.
Thanks for waiting guys! :) I hope you're all having a great November so far!