(ii)

Atsuko's first meeting with Hibari Kyoya consisted mainly of her squeaking out words and him probably internally laughing his ass off at her squeaking and calling her an herbivore.

Meeting number two wasn't so bad, Ryohei was there too. Except he actually was laughing his ass off at her squeakiness. Excuse him.

Gradually, Atsuko gained the confidence needed to speak with Hibari about the boxing club. She'd probably die on the spot if she had to actually have a conversation with him, though.

That would be a really dumb way to die. Atsuko would prefer to die like a badass, not an 'herbivore', thank you very much.

"Hibari-senpai," Atsuko greeted as she entered his office. This was much more bearable without that stutter that she had had two years prior.

All budget requests had to be submitted directly to his royal highness, King of Namimori, as Atsuko liked to refer to him as in her mind and to Kyoko, Ryohei and the rest of the club. True though it may be, she had no wish to be bitten to death for mocking Hibari.

That was an even dumber way to die.

Hibari looked up from whatever paperwork he was busy with. He was very pretty, she could admit. The Hibari Fanclub was not unjustified in their secret, cult-like idolization of the guy. Suicidal, yes, Hibari would so not be happy with the creepy little detail of their existence, but certainly not unjustified.

"Morishiba. Why are you here?"

He had only just approved of a budget request a few months prior- for new uniforms and such. Atsuko highly doubted he would be very happy to approve of this request either.

Running the boxing club was actually pretty expensive. They had to pay for buses to take them to their many tournaments- which they usually won, mind you- and the best equipment since Ryohei wouldn't really settle for anything less and could easily defend his requests with the club's huge win streak. School prestige, and all that.

The club was made up of a bunch of muscular dorks, but they were hardworking dorks and deserved nothing less than the best. That was the only reason why she risked her neck and dignity on a regular basis- they were her dorks and it was only fair that she cared for them like they did for her.

After all, Atsuko was terrible at making friends. She only talked to most people if she needed something or for a project, but aside from that? She just had Ryohei, Kyoko, and the rest of the club as her only friends.

"The boxing club needs a small budget expansion, senpai," Atsuko responded.

"Why." It was less a question and more a command. Atsuko could already feel the cold sweat trickling down her neck.

"There was a bit of an accident with one of the punching bags," she explained, attempting to maintain eye contact and barely succeeding. "We need the extra money to replace it with something more durable and buy a few extras to avoid having this happen again."

"The boxing club already receives more funding than over half of the other clubs," Hibari pointed out, silvery eyes narrowed. "You have been spoiled enough as it is."

"Spoiled?" Atsuko couldn't restrain herself from snorting. She could see the light already… "The members of the club work harder than anyone else I've ever met, senpai, and their results speak for themselves. A quarter of the middle school's trophies were won by us in the past two years!"

The only club that succeeded more than them was the baseball team, but they had Yamamoto Takeshi so that was cheating.

Atsuko has never spoken to Yamamoto, nor did she particularly want to. While most other people likely would have befriended him in order to stop his suicide attempt or whatever, Atsuko had no such desires. She was already involved with three canon characters to some degree and she had no wish to be involved in all the crazy that would be going on.

While it was completely inevitable for her to end up in the plot somehow, what with Ryohei's involvement and the fact that she would gladly follow her greatest friend to the ends of the earth, but she was so not digging herself in any deeper.

If the dude wanted to die so badly then he could go die for all she cares, cruel though it may be to say. So long as he didn't bring Kyoko nor Ryohei down with him, then he can do what he wants.

"Considering your lack of social abilities, I highly doubt that the former statement means anything, herbivore," Hibari dismissed, though he did seem a bit surprised at her outburst. Ha. "Is your club really so weak as to let its performance go down just because of an equipment failure?"

"Of course not," Atsuko responded. "Our performance won't suffer at all, but the missing punching bag will cause time deficits during training because more people will have to take turns using the remaining ones."

"Then schedule more practices to make up for them."

"Most of us are in our last year of middle school, senpai," Atsuko protested. "If we schedule more practices then that would be taking time away from academics and result in lower grades."

"Morning practices take away from academics?" Hibari questioned with a raised eyebrow.

Well no, but they took away from Atsuko's sleep, which was very precious since she never really knew when she'd find Ryohei bursting into her room at sunrise to get her on her bike to accompany him on his morning jogs.

"They take away from sleeping time," Atsuko said instead. "Which can be very unhealthy."

If she was going to lose sleep then it would be because she had been up all night reading, and not because Hibari was being stubborn.

"The baseball team has no issues with it."

But they're a bunch of superhuman freaks! Atsuko wanted to scream. Hibari clearly knew what she was thinking, if the look he gave her meant anything.

"Um, but they're… them?" Atsuko finished lamely. She really couldn't argue this one, especially since it's all Ryohei's fault for being too hard on the damn bag.

Hibari almost looked amused at the admission, but she was too stupid and herbivorous to really elicit any kind of emotion from him so Atsuko chalked it up to fear-induced hallucinations.

"If you win the tournament in one week then I will consider it."

That wasn't a yes, but it wasn't a no either.

Atsuko straightened up. "Thank you for your consideration, senpai. We won't disappoint you."

"Leave, herbivore," he commanded, going back to his paperwork.

Atsuko dipped her head and then ran out of the room as though the shinigami himself was on her tail.

"I feel like I'm being bribed here," Atsuko commented, nibbling on her chocolate. Her favorite idiot had presented her with the delicious bar as soon as she exited the committee office, suspiciously enough.

Ryohei shrugged innocently. "Why would I have to bribe you, Atsu?"

"Because you still need me to have a second chat with Hibari next week because of your stupidity. Ugh, the guys will never let me hear the end of this…"

"You're just extremely easy to tease," Ryohei informed her comfortingly. "And your reactions are extremely funny too."

"That doesn't make me feel any better!" Atsuko grumbled, taking an aggressive bite out of her chocolate. "Why can't they find something to tease you about?"

"Um," Ryohei responded eloquently, pulling a thoughtful frown. "They tease me about how hard I train?"

"But that's playful commentary, not teasing!"

"That I'm all brawn and no brains?"

"That's just hypocrisy and a statement of the obvious, you're all a bunch of muscle-heads."

"Give up Ryo," Atsuko sighed dramatically. "Until we can find a girl to ship you with, you shall never share the pain I go through every time someone decides to bring up his majesty."

Don't get her wrong here- Atsuko had absolutely no feelings for Hibari that did not involve tolerating his intimidating-ness and wishing that she could cower behind Mister Sunshine over there every time she was in his presence.

However, after she first came back to the club after a meeting with Hibari she was a total stuttering mess - she didn't know how to deal with him back then, after all. And the fanfictions she could remember had her half convinced that one slip of the tongue and she'd be at the mercy of his shiny, metal tonfas.

She didn't want to die a la tonfa, that would be kinda sad.

This stuttery-ness resulted in the club's running joke- that Atsuko was secretly madly in love with Hibari and that she would end up being Namimori's future queen.

Atsuko hated her friends. Every last one of them. Even Kyoko joined in all the time!

Speaking of…

"Onii-chan! Atsu-nee!"

"Finished up your student council duties already, Kyo?" Atsuko questioned, greeting the girl with a lazy wave.

Ryohei pulled his sister into a tight hug, flashing yet another one of his too-bright grins. Atsuko was going to go blind from those things someday. "We extremely missed you, Kyoko!"

Kyoko giggled, returning the hug with full force and reaching over to pull Atsuko in as well. Atsuko sighed exaggeratedly, knowing resistence was futile. "It's only been a few hours, Onii-chan."

"That's still too long!"

Atsuko snickered. "Sisa-con."

Ryohei ignored her. "Atsu just came back from the throne room," he said and Atsuko instantly knew where this conversation was going. She wanted to die, again.

Kyoko put a hand over her mouth in mock surprise, a mischievous look taking over her supposedly-angelic face. "Oh, really? That's great, Atsu-nee! One step closer to completing the courtship!"

"Ryo, Kyo, stop it," Atsuko groaned. "Evil, evil, little creatures of the light…"

Kyoko frowned. "Onii-chan, I think she's using that tone with the wrong Kyo."

Ryohei nodded seriously. "She must still be confused after that meeting. Looks like we have to fix her!"

Atsuko buried her head in Ryohei's side. "I feel like sadism is a feature of the light and not one of the darkness. Pop culture lies."

Kyoko tilted her head slightly in what was supposed to be innocent confusion, not that Atsuko could see it of course, her face comfortably hidden from the brilliant light exuded by the Sasagawas. "But how does treating you to sushi make us sadistic?"

"Sushi is the best way to fix you after being exposed to Hibari, after all," Ryohei agreed.

Atsuko lifted up her head suspiciously. "I don't trust either of you. At all. Whatsoever."

Kyoko snickered. "You're so mean, Atsu-nee. Besides, Hibari-senpai isn't that bad, I think? I kinda wanna fight him, to be honest."

Ryohei and Atsuko stared at her incredulously. "Kyoko," Ryohei began slowly. "If I tried to fight him you'd have a heart attack, but you want to do it yourself?"

Kyoko nodded enthusiastically. "If you tried to do it, you'd die, Onii-chan. Your style is too rigid so it would be easier for someone with a more flowy style like his to take you down. My fighting style can match his better, so if I fought him I'd probably be just fine!"

"You're both insane," Atsuko decided. "So, so insane. Why am I stuck with you people?"

"Because you love us to the extreme," Ryohei replied without missing a beat. "So if I learned a less rigid fighting style, you'd be okay with me fighting Hibari?"

Kyoko nodded. "As long as you don't push yourself too hard!"

"I question you both, so much," Atsuko muttered. The anime missed so much with these two that Atsuko had been rather unprepared to actually be dealing with them on a regular basis. She had expected a nitwit and a damsel in distress, not this.

Or had fanfiction created a bias? Hm.

"Then I'll just have to work hard to the extreme and-"

"Oh no," Atsuko hissed. "You are not doing that because that means more time in the gym and less time at home with my laptop and sleep. No."

"But, Atsu-"

"No."

"Atsu-"

"No."

While he could probably just go train on his own, Ryohei and Atsuko did pretty much everything together. If he was training then she would sit on the side with a book, waiting to patch up any injuries he got. If she was reading on the couch then he would be sitting right next to her so that she could lean on his shoulder as he finished up some school work or looked up new boxing techniques.

Sure, they didn't spend every single second of the day together, that would be kinda weird, but there were some things that they just didn't do without each other. It would feel wrong- habits built up like that over so many years didn't just disappear. Training was one of those things.

Besides, if not for Atsuko then who else would make sure that he didn't come home with bloody knuckles? He could get an infection or something! And that would be bad. Like, really bad. Because he has such a high pain tolerance, Ryohei often forgot that he had any serious cuts from punching things too hard without gloves, ("for stamina!"). It was a legitimate concern!

"I mean," Atsuko began, "- I guess if you really wanted to I wouldn't mind that much, but wouldn't it be a bit too much? We already get home at around seven all the time."

She really was weak against those eyes, okay? Okay.

Kyoko had that smile on her face in the background, like she knew exactly why Atsuko was relenting and found it to be very endearing.

Atsuko was tired of people reading her today.

Ryohei brightened up considerably. "Once a week it is! Teach me your extreme ways, Kyoko!"

The younger girl grinned back. "Gladly, Onii-chan! You should join in too, Atsu-nee!"

"Never," Atsuko denied vehemently. "Let me be weak and scrawny in peace, damnit."

"That's boring though," Kyoko complained. "Please, it'll be fun!"

"You know, sometimes I really want to punch you in the gut, Kyo," Atsu said. "It should be illegal to be this cute. But then I remember that I'd probably break my hand trying, so I don't. But the answer is still no."

"Give it up, Kyoko," Ryohei sighed, shaking his head in disappointment. "I've been trying to convince her for years, but she just wants to be all skin and bones forever."

"And just bones, eventually," Atsuko added cheerfully.

"Atsu!"

Kyoko laughed at them both. "Come on, I'm hungry and sushi sounds very nice right now."

And so they went, laughing and grinning and torturing poor Atsuko. Atsuko wondered what she did in her first life to deserve such a good second life, but then she decided it was best not to wonder so that she doesn't jinx herself.

She jinxed herself anyways.

A/N

Thank you all for the wonderful responses! Seriously, you people and my readers from Clouds in the Sky make me blush. A lot. Why do you do this to me.

Anyhow, Tsuna's should be making an appearance next chapter. I have plans for this one, you see.

Also, please note that Atsuko/Hibari is not a thing, at least not for now. I haven't actually decided on a pairing for this yet aside from Hana/Ryohei, so feel free to send in suggestions. I'll probably do a poll later on.

Ciao!