Chapter 14
An explosion happened amongst the trees where Hibari, Nozaru, Tazaru, Ryohei and Lambo were lying in ambush for the Cloud Funeral Wreath.
"Corne Fulmine!" Lambo screamed as his Vongola gear turned into a shield and helmet, releasing a shock of electricity to the Velociraptors surrounding him, killing them.
"Yosh! That's it Lambo! Kangaryu, Cambio Forma!" Ryohei shouted to the extreme in the top of his lungs. His animal box weapon turned into the Vongola Sun gear of the first Sun guardian. "I'll make sure to defeat you in three minutes!" he told Kikyo.
"Ho-ho, is that so? Then come!" Kikyo replied. They commenced in an air battle. "The reason why you set a time limit for yourself is because your power could only last for three minutes," he said to Ryohei.
"Tch," Ryohei was irritated, "Maximum Cannon!" he put all his Sun dying will flames in one awesome, mighty punch yet Kikyo wasn't even injured.
"Futile," he mumbled, "is this all, Ryohei, sun guardian of the Vongola?" his Velociraptors erupted from the ground, severing Hibari Kyouya's arm who was staying out of view among the greenery. More of his dinosaurs wounded Ryohei's companions. "Hmm? There's something… wrong…." Kikyo furrowed his eyebrows.
Meanwhile on the other side of the forest which became a battleground, Gokudera was being overwhelmed by Zakuro's power. He was too strong. Just as he was about to resign to the thought of dying by one of Byakuran's minion's hands…
"Ushishishi, how pitiful," in a nick of time, the Varia appeared from the smoldering trees.
"You…" said the amazed Gokudera. He didn't think that the Varia Assasination squad would help out in the final battle against Byakuran.
"VOOOIII! Give it a rest; it isn't fair that you guys get the entire spotlight," shouted Squalo.
"Tch, fine then," Gokudera mumbled, leaning against a tree as Lussuria set to work, curing his injuries.
"You bastard, who the hell do you think we are?" Xanxus muttered. A hell of a battle issued against the Varia and Zakuro, the storm Funeral wreath. Bluebell, the rain Funeral Wreath, joined in as well. Bluebell succeeded in encasing Xanxus and the other Varia present inside a bubble like thingy, drowning them.
"Ehh… they seemed surprisingly weak," Bluebell said. "Chotto… na-nani?" The figures of Xanxus, Bel and the other Varia disappeared.
"Ushishishi…. Fran, why did you make us die like that?" Belphegor asked, his knives gleaming as the Vongola guardians and Varia members emerged from the clearing of trees.
"If it wasn't gory, then it wouldn't look real, wouldn't it?" was Fran's tactful answer.
"Tch," Bel threw his knives on Fran's frog hat. "And how long are you going to keep that illusion of Mukuro Rokudo?"
"Senpai," Fran scolded, "Master's not an illusion, he's real, he escaped from the Vindice prison."
"That's right," Mukuro said. Everyone around him gasped. It was impossible! Yet, he was here.
"Ushishishi, then did you guys escape with Aoi?"
"Uhh… no... the plan was only fit for one person," Fran replied.
"Ja, I have to get my box weapon from Chrome," Mukuro announced. He vanished, after a few seconds, Fran followed afterwards.
"VOIII! What the hell is that?" Squalo shouted, pointing to a large, humanoid-ish giant.
"It's huge!"
"Nani? It's sucking up our dying will flames!" Basil said clinging to a tree.
"Yabai… This is bad," Yamamoto mumbled.
"Tsuna, go, you are needed there," Reborn told the tenth a hundred or more meters away from the battle.
"Un," Tsuna agreed, swallowing dying will pills that enabled him to go to Hyper Dying Will mode.
"Tsuna-kun, gambatte!" Kyoko and Haru said.
"Hai. Then, I'm off!" he shot through the sky, headed to his comrades in danger.
"Kyaa! Nande? Byakuran-sama! Nande?" Bluebell screamed as she and Zakuro were sucked in by Ghost (which was the name of the humanoid thingy). All attacks against him were ineffective, as Xanxus and Gokudera soon found out. It still continued its pace, absorbing all the dying will flames.
"Zero Point Breakthrough!" Tsuna said as he did the attack of the Vongola Primo. It was a battle between absorbers. Who would win? Who did win? As you may have guessed, it was Tsuna.
"That's our boss!" Gokudera preached.
Tsuna however was puzzled. Why didn't he feel any surge of power as he always did after absorbing the ghost?
"All of his power came to me," Byakuran explained as he appeared from the sky. "He was another form of me in another parallel world."
"You…" Tsuna gritted his teeth.
"I'll bite him to death," Hibari raised his tonfas.
"Trash, stand down, I'LL bite him to death," Xanxus loaded his guns.
"I believe the honor goes to me," Mukuro said, gripping his trident tightly, with the hand that bore his two hell rings and Vongola mist ring he got from Chrome.
"Stand back, I have unfinished business with him," Tsuna ordered, a sudden burst of dying will flames appeared from his forehead.
"Hmm? Really?" Byakuran smiled. He let Tsuna attack him first. The tenth scored a few hits to Byakuran's body. But then, the Millefiore boss showed a few of his tricks. Within a matter of minutes, Tsuna was on the ground, badly injured. Byakuran laughed, "Is that all?"
"I, I can still go on…" Tsuna stood up, emitting such strong sky deathperation flames. It collided with Byakuran's. After a few minutes, another ball of intense dying will Flames connected, it was Uni!
"Hime-sama!" Nozaru and Ganma shouted, "what are you doing there? Get out!" they made ready to fire their weapons but…
"I-I can't move," Gokudera said, as he strained to move his limbs.
"Neither can I…" Lussuria mumbled.
"Wh-what did you do?" Tsuna asked Byakuran, as he himself was unable to move.
"Why do I have to explain it to you?" Byakuran smiled… evilly. He made a crushing motion with his hand and then a huge fist crunched Tsuna's bones, causing him to black out.
"Juudaime!"
"Tsuna!"
"Tsu-kun!"
"Tsuna-san!"
"Sawada-dono!"
His comrades' voices reached Tsuna's ears but he still couldn't move. "Nngh…" he struggled, but all efforts were still useless, he still couldn't break free.
"Tsuna, stand up," Reborn ordered. A few tense minutes passed, nobody could do anything to save the tenth.
"Ehh… that's unfair!" a girl's voice rang from above, carrying a wicked scythe which she used to penetrate through the sky dying will flame dome. Because of this, Byakuran momentarily lost his hold over the Vongola Boss. Tsuna fell to the floor, still unconscious. "Did anybody miss me?" she grinned roguishly.
"You… how did you escape from Vindice?" Byakuran asked, fuming, his plans might just get destroyed because of Aoi.
Ryohei, Gokudera, Yamamoto, Chrome, Spanner, Irie and Basil were shocked. "Vindice?" they all shouted. Hibari and the rest of the Varia raised their eyebrows. Reborn remained silent. There was something familiar about the girl. They could understand it that Mukuro escaped… but a girl? An especially weak-looking girl?
"Oni-chan, that was mean; leaving me behind," she pouted.
"Oni-chan? Who was she talking to?" Gokudera thought.
"It can't be helped, how should I know you would get caught," Mukuro replied, "Besides, the plan was only for one, there wasn't any time to make modifications to it."
"Che, what a lame excuse," she replied.
"O-oni-chan… she just called Mukuro, oni-chan? Who is she?" Yamamoto asked.
"Arara, you guys haven't met Aoi-chan, haven't you? She's the Cloud Guardian of the Varia," Lussuria answered.
"C-cloud Guardian?" Basil stuttered.
"VOIII! But in the past few months, she was sought by the Vindice and got imprisoned there for murdering a bunch of people when she was a kid," Squalo added.
Aoi surveyed the area and noticed a certain baby, "Ah! Uncle Reborn! You're alive?" she waved her hand, while ignoring Byakuran. She dodged his attacks. "You idiot…" she said to Byakuran. She was pissed off now. Weapons clashed. A heated fight between Byakuran and Aoi was unfolding. "I'll pay you back for last time…" she muttered.
Suddenly Byakuran clutched his head, "Agh! What the…"
Aoi smiled, stuck out her tongue, "Baka, did you honestly think that only you have that kind of ability?" she teased as he writhed on the ground.
"Just kidding," Byakuran said.
"Eh?" Aoi was took by surprise and received a White Dragon dagger attack that pierced her right shoulder. "Teme…"her vision blurring. "How cowardly, coating it with poison…" she ripped it off. Her red eye suddenly glowed. She opened all six paths of hell at once.
"Sugoi…" Ryohei muttered, "She's so strong, but how come she's using the mist rather than her cloud flames?"
"Oh right! I still have that!" Aoi remembered; she heard Ryohei's rhetorical question. She fired up her Cloud Varia Ring, her dying will flames were roughly the size of Hibari's and launched an attack at Byakuran that sent him unconscious.
"N-Nani.. is it over?" Gokudera asked.
"Of course not! Tenth, get up! It's your turn to beat that guy into pulp," she stretched out her hand. To everyone's astonishment, Tsuna grabbed it and allowed himself to be hauled up by Aoi. "You okay now?" she asked.
"Hai, daijoubu desu, demo, h-how did you-?" Tsuna asked, puzzled on how Aoi knew that he needed time to be able to receive 'Vongola's sin' and to be able to recuperate his strength. She just winked back and used her scythe to slice her way out of the dome of sky deathperation flames.
"Oh yeah, Uni-chan, if you're gonna do 'that' better start now," she called as she walked through the crack.
Uni was taken aback, how did this stranger know that she was going to sacrifice herself to bring the other arcobalenos back to life? She smiled. "Hai!" She began to feed her dying will flames to the pacifier she was holding. It was good that the girl bought her more time.
"Right! I remember you now!" Reborn said.
"Hm? What is it Uncle Reborn?"
"You're that little seven year old kid that the other arcobalenos took care of," the baby said. "I was busy training Tsuna at that time."
"Oh yeah, Uncle Fon, Uncle Collonello, Uncle Skull, Uncle Verde, Aunt Aria, Aunt Lal were the ones who took care of me," she smiled and stumbled.
"Ah," Fran said, automatically catching the falling Cloud Guardian.
Lal was struck by the Aoi's proclamation. "You-you survived?"
"Ehh… Aunt Lal's in human form… yes I did, the Vongola ninth took me in a few weeks before he died, at that time, I apparently became aware of my lost memories before I was seven and was trying to remember, the ninth told me to join the Varia, which I did. When I finally regained my memories, the vindice found me and took me to prison," Aoi explained before falling unconscious.
"Ehhh… so that's how," Lal muttered, as Fran carried Aoi over to a tree to let her rest.
"Yabai, she might die because of the wound," Fran announced. Immediately Lussuria opened his Box weapon to heal Aoi.
"Ganma-aniki!" Nozaru screamed as Ganma passed through the crack that Basil's animal box weapon made after it had combined with the other box weapons. Ganma had disappeared along with Uni as they both used their Flames in order to bring the other arcobalenos back to life.
"Byakuran… I won't forgive you for this…" Tsuna said, clenching his fists.
"Oh? You won't forgive me? You made me lose one of the tools I need to rule this world!" Byakuran screamed in rage.
"Tool? Stop calling Uni like that!" Tsuna went to the stance of his X-burner while Byakuran's legs were wrapped with roots, stabilizing himself to the ground.
"X-Burner!" Tsuna shouted, his voice full of hate. It was unforgivable! UNFORGIVABLE! Byakuran made Uni sacrifice herself! The power of his X-Burner was huge, it was overwhelming, Byakuran lost and disintegrated from the heat.
"It's over," someone exhaled.
"Juudaime, you did it!" Gokudera ran to Tsuna.
"Demo, it is really worth it? Uni sacrificing herself like that," Tsuna pondered out loud.
"Baka-tsuna, take a closer look at the pacifiers," Reborn said.
"It's glowing!" indeed, the pacifiers were glowing white, suddenly, the Arcobalenos appeared.
"Kora! We're back!" Colonello shouted. There were smiles, laughter and sighs of relief all around.
"It's not working!" Lussuria said.
"What's not working?" Bel asked.
"The wounds on Aoi aren't healing up even a little bit!" the sun guardian was distressed. A wet blanket swept over the Vongola. Even if the others didn't know her that much, it was still painful to see someone who aided Tsuna in the verge of dying.
"Move over! Let me try!" Ryohei used his sun deathperation flames to cure Aoi but nothing happened. She was barely breathing.
"Ushishishi, maybe if we hurt her, she might wake," he let one of his knives fly and watched it lodge to Aoi's arm. No response. "Try healing that, probably it's just your box weapons that are malfunctioning," he snickered.
"Hai hai" Lussuria tried again. The wound she got from Bel healed immediately but she wouldn't wake.
"OI! Mukuro, do something about this! She's your sister right?" Gokudera shouted at the Vongola Mist Guardian.
"Hm? Why are you dragging me into this? We're not even blood related; she's just a duplicate of me. Besides, she won't wake up. She lost her will to live," Mukuro replied.
"You bastard!" Gokudera attacked Mukuro.
"That's unforgivable! Even if she isn't related to you, she still sees you as her brother!" Ryohei joined in the battle.
"Ryohei-nichan, Gokudera, Mukuro-san, stop fighting!" Tsuna pleaded, he was still in Hyper Dying Will mode, but even so, they wouldn't stop. The three caused such a ruckus that the rest of the people around watched, they were too focused at the small battle that seemed to get bigger as other guardians as well as the Varia joined in that they didn't notice on what Fran was up to.
Dark. It was dark. Am I alone again? I'm scared. Where is everybody? Aoi's eyes welled up. She was in an extremely black room. No light was present. It was just her. She sniffed, unable to contain the tears any longer. "Waaah!" she cried.
Suddenly, she felt a 'force' pulling her towards the corner of the room which seemed to be glowing. Aoi figured out that it was a way out and didn't resist the 'force'.
"Ngghh..." her eyes slowly opened. Eh? W-what? Wh-why is F-fran–? She felt something over her lips. She slightly parted them open and Fran's tongue took the opportunity to slip inside. "Kyaaa!" she screamed after punching Fran in the chin, sending him backwards. She stood up, "WHAT THE FUCK WAS THAT FOR? DIDN'T I TELL YOU NOT TO DO THAT AGAIN?" She shouted, her cheeks red, her fist still shaking. Immediately the battle halted.
"Sh-she's awake…" Tsuna stated the obvious.
"Seems like she found the will to live," Mukuro said.
"But how?" Lal asked.
The Varia looked from Fran to Aoi, from Aoi to Fran and back again. They noticed that Aoi was red, Fran was looked slightly embarrassed. They didn't miss the bruise Aoi gave Fran in the chin. Lussuria was the first one to piece over the evidence.
"Arara, Fran you did this… chuuu~" Lussuria imitated a kissing pose, waggling his hips, observing his and Aoi's reaction. Immediately, both reddened.
Squalo, Levi, Yamamoto, Gokudera, Tsuna, Chrome, Ryohei, I-pin, Basil, Lal, Nozaru, Irie, Spanner, Haru, Kyoko, Nozaru and Tozaru all blushed once they realized how Fran managed it. Hibari, Xanxus, Bel, Mukuro and the arcobalenos had no reaction.
"Ushishishi. Really now?" Bel said, he threw knives at Fran's and Aoi's direction. "Getting soft-hearted are you?"
"Chotto! Why are you including me?" Aoi screamed, dodging them. She blocked a tonfa attack to her left.
"Hahhiee, H-Hibari-san?" Tsuna sweatdropped.
"I'll bite you to death," Hibari told Aoi.
"Eh? I'd like to see you try," she replied.
And so, the battle between the guardians commenced.
"VOIII! Aoi! Get your fat ass here! We're going back to Italy!" Squalo shouted. He got hit in the forehead with a well-placed kick as Aoi held Hibari at bay.
"IDIOT! My ass isn't fat! Are you blind, Mr. Oh-my-hair-is-so-long-and-sparkly?" she taunted.
"I'LL KILL YOU!" Squalo shouted.
Tsuna could only stare and as he watched the damage Aoi, Hibari and Squalo caused. It was terrifying how they could wreck havoc at such a short span of time.
"Ushishishi, the boss says in three seconds, we would be leaving without you," Bel announced.
"One!" Levi counted. Aoi broke Squalo's sword.
"Two!" Lussuria counted. Aoi grabbed one of Hibari's tonfas and used it to score a blow in his stomach, sending him to the ground. She tossed the tonfa back to him.
"Ja ne! Let's fight next time!" she called as she caught up with her fellow Varia officers.
"Three!" Levi counted.
"URUSAI! I know how to count dumbass!" Squalo shouted as he was able to reach them in time.
"Trash. Let's go," Xanxus ordered. They began to walk away from the Vongola Guardians to their transport that would take them back to their base in Italy.
"Ahahaha, they never changed, didn't they?" Yamamoto laughed goodheartedly.
"H-hai… you could say that," Tsuna replied.
"Tch. They're ten years older and yet they act as immature as they did when they were ten years younger," Gokudera added.
"Un, that's the Varia for you," Ryohei agreed.
Reborn kicked Tsuna in the head, "Let's go home."
"Aye!" the Vongola guardians and their companions shouted happily. Now, after so much arduous training, intense battles, some tears here and there, they could finally return back to their era.
Ahahaha. Aoi's back! :)) This is the second-to- the-last chapter people. :)) Thanks for all the support and reviews you gave me so far! I love you all! :))
Fran and Aoi both send their thanks as well. :PP