Leilani was definitely nervous and something in here was still oozing with the familiar feeling of distrust. Something could happen, definitely. Maybe all of this was just a sick joke and they invited her to steal the airship but… Lorenzo had given her his flame seal and she had found out that this was a tamer version of the unbreakable vow. Flame Seals were binding, didn't challenge your life but had an impact.

She had waited until the meeting had long begun. She figured 20 minutes would be good and with a still racing heart and the obvious fear that she was doing something very foolish she stepped in front of the door. A gryffindor didn't step back from a challenge after all. It was reckless and foolish and plain stupid and that was the thing she had used to survive Hogwarts. So she was fairly certain that it was a patented success recipe.

Her plan in itself wasn't much better, a very stupid prank and an even stupider entrance but this alone was what made her do it. She was young after all and she wouldn't harm anyone… just annoy. Probably badly annoy and it might have repercussions but it didn't change that she wanted to do it.

She took another deep breath. It would be fine. She always turned out fine after all. No matter what life had thrown at her she had always managed, maybe not always graceful but she had done it and today she made the rules. Sure, it was their meeting but she would still steal the show.

She used her magic to throw open the door, already positioned to throw a generous amount of confetti in the air "The great Skull-sama has arrived!"

She stared at plainly speechless faces. She even saw a few weapons pointed at her but no one moved.

Leilani kept it going as she stepped inside, still throwing confetti "You can cheer. Autographs get handed out afterwards."

Colonnellos snicker broke the silence. The guns were put away and Lal had facepalmed herself but Skull could see the smile she was trying to hide.

Honestly it almost freaked Leilani out how much relief she saw in their faces, even Verde smiled! The Verde, the grouchy, mad scientist, smiled at her. Maybe she should have done something worse for her entrance. But it didn't matter. The main reason she was here for was to thank Reborn in the end.

Fon had stood up, slowly coming towards her "Skull. I'm glad you could make it."

"Skull-sama had some time leftover in his busy schedule and couldn't disappoint his fans after all."

"We appreciate it." He pulled the free chair back and gestured for Skull to sit down.

Leilani did manage to climb onto the chair before looking back in the round. She still didn't feel any kind of warning from her magic and it relieved her greatly.

Reborn was mustering her but even he had an almost soft smirk on his lips and she did her best not to wrinkle her nose at it. A nice Reborn was always freaky.

"The carcassa are to your liking?" the hitman asked.

Leilani was almost hesitant to admit to it but she nodded "Very loyal fans but it's understandable after all they are dealing with me."

Verde pushed his glasses up "Any kind of complications with your motorcycle or the airship?"

"No, everything is fine and dandy. I'm a master at taking care of them."

"Contact me if issues occur."

Leilani just nodded "I'm only here to finish all of this up though."

Lal paused, "You're not staying?"

"No, Skull-sama has better stuff to do. But I had to deliver something."

"And that would be?"

Lelani pulled the card out of her pocket, pushing it towards Reborn "I made you a card Senpai."

She carefully watched as the smirk deepened a bit as the hitman took up the card and opened it, only to be blasted by a small burst of purple glitter.

The hitman stared at it for a moment before laying the card open on the table for all to see 'Thanks for being such a long term fan and supporter. The great Skull-sama can even appreciate a stalker once in a while'

"Very funny Lackey."

Leilani grinned "I thought so too."

She watched his next move with hawkeyes though.

The sun naturally had started to brush off the small amount of glitter only to have it duplicate as soon as he touched it "Lackey?"

"Yeah?"

"You can make it stop."

"No, no. I think glitter would brighten up your dark complexion. I'm very certain this will help you find some friends. After all, someone without a soul should have problems with that."

The geminio curse kept on multiplying the glitter at this point and Reborn reminded her more of a disco ball than an actual human.

"Lackey!" he gritted out.

Leilani had already jumped off her chair, running to the door "Little advice; Don't start shit with shirtless werewolves!"

It wasn't hard to escape and honestly Reborn would do himself a favour if he didn't run after her. After all, she had managed to link the spell to her proximity. As long as she was so far away that her pacifier stopped glowing the glitter would shrink back to the original amount. She wasn't that heartless after all.

Apparently her tactic hadn't fully worked as the invitations kept on dropping in. She ignored them this time though. Sure, her thank you hadn't been the greatest but the words thank you stood in the card and she had spent a lot of effort into making the curse work.

Still she was happy. It was around another year later when instead of an invitation Colonnello had appeared in front of her when she left her airship to visit the Carcassa.

The rain grinned at her "Skull, kora!"

She paused in her activity "Colonnello?"

"Yeah, you know you don't have to stay away from the meeting. Reborn's not mad."

She shrugged, "Skull-sama is not afraid of Senpai."

"Then why are you missing? Honestly we all are just sitting around for the most part. You know, worrying about you and stuff, kora."

Leilani raised an eyebrow "Worrying about me?"

"Yeah, honestly you should have seen it and well… Lal misses you, kora. I'm sure even Viper would let you prank them if it meant you would appear."

"Viper? But… why would.."

The rain stepped closer, still his easy going smile on his lips "Well you're one of us, aren't you?"

"I'm not" she immediately shot out.

"I get that you were a civilian but well… you are still a fellow of us cursed. That alone makes you one of us."

She considered her next actions for a moment "Colonnello... Do you even know what happened between us? Why I refused to meet with any of you?"

The former soldier shrugged "Well… I know that they messed up with Luce and all that."

She bit her lip. Colonnello hadn't been involved… Maybe she should give it a chance. "You want to come in?"

He paused "Really? Sure."

She immediately turned around to climb back into her airship. She had never let anyone else besides the Carcassa in it but well Colonnello was different. In a way he was probably the only one she could really relate with on the curse aspect. He hadn't participated in any of it.

He looked around as she led him to her table "You want something to drink?"

"No, I'm good, kora."

she shrugged but pulled one of the sodas out of the fridge for herself before she plopped down on the seat opposite of Colonnello.

"You know I never wanted to join the group. I refused Checkerface every time he came to ask. Never even considered it."

She didn't even put in the effort to put on the Skull act, instead pulling her legs to her chest and hugging them.

"What changed?"

"Nothing. Checkerface was just over it and straight up teleported me into the savehouse. I blew up and I escaped five minutes later after I heard about the fact that I was dumped into a room full of criminals."

The rain nodded, obviously fascinated with her change of behaviour but intently listening.

"Sure, Reborn caught me again but I never gave up. I kept up my stage presence to annoy them and whenever I had the opportunity I ran away."

"I saw that."

"Ah yeah… you were watching… Well one time after they caught me again Luce made me a promise." she paused to take a sip of her drink. Even thinking about it still hurt her "I'm not from here… actually I'm from very far away and… I got no way to go back. I tired for a long time but… it just wasn't possible"

He raised an eyebrow at it but didn't interrupt.

"Luce promised to get me back home after the missions were done and I… Well, I fell for it. I even helped them out. I was nice and I even started to like them. They were… nice in their own way and I was just so happy to finally be able to get back home…"

She absentmindedly started to pick at her leather pants "Well.. you know it was a lie as I'm still here and well we are cursed but I really didn't know. I completely trusted Luce, which obviously was my own fault but… the rest knew. They knew that Luce was lying but not one of them thought it necessary to inform me about it."

Colonnellos eyes narrowed as it clicked into place.

"Well… and then we were cursed as you know. I know it might not seem reasonable to you but… promises mean a lot to me. I don't break them and where I'm from no one does. I really wanted to get home. I still do but I know now that it's not possible… but back then? I was devastated. I had been so hopeful but at that moment it just crashed down on me that I would never be able to get back and they let it happen. They let me fall into the trap. They could have stopped it at any given time, maybe even stopped the curse completely…Luce admitted after all that it wouldn't have worked without me and… you know at one point I would probably have managed to get away."

Leilani laid her head on the top of her knees "And then I had to leave the circus… the only family or anything resembling a home I had here… I lost everything once again that day. My hope to get back and the place I had made mine and well… I became homeless."

Colonnelo had leaned forward, his hands folded as he looked seriously at her "You know they regret it, right?"

"Do they regret getting cursed because of it or do they regret that they omitted the lie? I'm not sure."

"Both."

"It still happened though."

"It did… but do you want to let that stop you?"

"Stop me from what?"

"Well… we are all bonded aren't we? Sure, we're missing a sky but we are a set and you're one of us. You belong within our set, kora. We are the only ones that actually understand what it means to be trapped in a toddler body as well."

Leilani shrugged, "I managed on my own."

"But it wasn't great, was it?"

She looked away.

"You don't have to be alone. You know you don't have to come to every meeting. You don't have to play nice and pretend but I'm fairly certain that it would do you good to come to terms with it. Maybe even get a real apology for all of it. I know Lal would give you one if you gave her the chance, kora."

"I just don't trust them."

"But you can."

"Why?"

"Because they were all betrayed. In the end we are all stuck together with the exact same problem. Do you really think anyone would risk making the same mistake again now? After everything that happened?"

"I don't know."

"You don't have to love them or anything but… why not give it a chance? Kora, I would even pay you to see you prank Reborn again. Honestly he was fuming for the rest of the day. Viper even managed to take pictures of it."

"I don't know."

"You know… I would step in if that reassures you. I spent decades with them but well I wouldn't stand for it. Sorry by the way for kidnapping you at our first real meeting. Kinda didn't expect all of it to turn out that badly."

"It's okay… I guess."

"But yeah I can give you a pinky promise if you want. You know you don't break them and I promise that I won't let them pull that over you again but like… give them a chance to make it up to you, kora. Let them prove themself. Just one real meeting. They are seriously not that bad and they miss you. They really do."

"I doubt it."

"You know Reborn permanently had a picture of you in his pocket to ask around, Lal went through masses of newspaper to find you every day, Verde hacked in numerous location to even find a hint that you're still alive, Viper gave information for free if they brought legit informations about you and Fon kept on destroying any kind of child trafficking ring he could find because he was afraid you could be in one of them.

They seriously were worried. No one was ever trying to cage you again; they were just plain and simply worried about you. And can you imagine what kind of crash everyone had when they found out you were homeless… you are important to them."

She didn't know what to say to that.

"Really I can understand that it's hard to trust them afterwards, kora but… they are trying. If you gave them the chance they would try to prove it. They are very willing to go far for it."

Leilani was chewing on her lip again, still not sure how to reply.

"Living afraid isn't really fun, is it? And you're missing out even if it's just on chances to prank them."

She slowly nodded, he wasn't wrong but… it was still hard but maybe… maybe she could start small? She was a gryffindor after all and they didn't hide "Do… Do you want to play some games?"

The rain smiled at her "Sure but I will certainly beat you completely, kora."

"Dream on."