New chapter! Yeah! Your reviews MADE MY DAY! I hadn't expected such positive responses from you guys after the creation of such a short chapter! Love you!
To DarkIceAngelFlare:Lal is an adult here since this fic is held after the manga; since Lal was partially cursed and not fully like the others, she became an adult immediately after being de-cursed, unlike the other Arcobaleno, who still resemble infants. Hoped that removed your doubt. :)
I apologize for the late update. Things known as exams and projects came into the equation and, well, when you have to submit two dozen or so projects, the last thing any normal person will worry about is how Tsuna is going to survive, right?
Fact is: I AM ABNORMAL.
Enjoy!
Arashi, taking in a deep, troubled breath, watched, with no little amount of annoyance, how far Tsuna was from them. The brunette was engrossed in a conversation with Lal Mirch, which was a huge surprise. Lal did not seem to like the sort of woman to talk with lame people—but there she was, talking with Dame-Tsuna and looking interested while doing so.
It pissed Arashi off.
"How the hell is he doing that?!" Hinata exclaimed, wiping sweat from her brow. Arashi did not need to ask her who she was talking about.
Beside him, Takahira bristled, not succeeding at hiding his ire.
It was a wonder, after all, how the weakest student with no flair for sports (or walking, bluntly speaking) was keeping up with Lal and Alessandro who were, for the record, insanely fast. And Tsuna was talking animatedly while doing so! Arashi did not have enough energy to breathe, and that was probably the understatement of the century.
Arashi continued glaring at the brunette a few hundred metres away from them.
They finally arrived at a little clearing Lal instructed them to make their tents in. Nobody jumped into doing the task—earning glowers and disdainful looks from Lal in the process—because they figured that resting was what their bodies seriously needed.
Takahira hurled himself towards the ground with a grunt, taking in a deep breath. His legs felt like fucking led.
He glanced at Tsuna who was standing in the middle of the clearing awkwardly.
The brunette did not even look tired; in fact he looked positively rejuvenated. Not a single bead of sweat clung to his body—they had been trekking under the goddamn sun for five freaking hours; how the hell did he not even look tired? They had been requesting for breaks after the first hour and a half, only to be threatened to be left behind if they did not get their asses moving.
Takahira was pretty sure that he, along with the others, were busy staring at Tsuna with various expressions of awe and annoyance.
Tsuna shifted, awkward, when he felt five pairs of eyes on him.
"Is something wrong?" he asked tentatively.
"You," Arashi snarled immediately, "you are what's wrong!"
Tsuna cocked his head to one side inquiringly.
"Excuse me?" Tsuna asked, bewildered.
"Sawada."
At Lal's interruption, Tsuna looked at the ex-Arcobaleno who was calling him over. Glad to have an excuse to leave, he readily agreed to dash up to her, looking at Lal questioningly when the woman shoved a roll of polyethylene towards him.
"Make the tent," she ordered.
"Eh? Now? I want to rest!"
Lal gave him a disbelieving look, "And you expect me to believe you? Really, Sawada? Has Reborn been going soft on you?"
"No, but—"
"Thought so. It is physically impossible for Reborn to be soft on anyone. Since that's the case—no dilly dallying."
"Lal—"
"Look," Lal interrupted, glancing at the five who had been staring at the two curiously during the entire conversation. Making sure to increase the volume of her voice, she stated, "your classmates are pathetic. I am not even exaggerating. Just a simple climb, and they look like they have been running for over a month continuously."
Out of the corner of his eye, Tsuna saw Takahira and Hinata bristle.
"Well, excuse us for being tired!" Arashi yelled indignantly.
Lal ignored the comment, "And you evidently do not look tired, so yes. Make. The. Tent."
"It's useless to give the job to Dame-Tsuna!" Arashi declared, irate at being dismissed so easily, "He will end up making a mess of it like he usually does!"
Lal turned to Arashi frigidly, and Arashi froze at the cold glare tossed at him.
"Did I ask you of your opinion?"
Arshi gulped, perspiring, replying immediately, "No, mam. Sorry mam."
Snorting at the lack of a protest, she tapped at the roll of polyester in Tsuna's hand, and left to make her own tent. Tsuna sighed and got down to work, fishing out the required pegs and a dutiful hammer. With panache he had no idea he was executing, he completed the work in five minutes flat, only to find himself being stared at incredulously by five pairs of eyes. For some reason, Hinata and Hanabi were blushing brightly, while the faces of the boys were suspiciously colored.
Shifting, he gave them bemused looks, "What?"
"No-nothing," Hinata mumbled quickly, staring at the ground, noticing how the others quickly followed her action.
Lal smirked to herself at their reactions. It wasn't an unknown fact to them that whenever Sawada did something with meticulousness and integrity, he made everybody pause in their actions and stare at him in awe, either because of the flair he did the action with or because of how—suddenly—insanely good he looked. Lal frowned in slight annoyance; though Tsuna did affect people like that, the brunette was painfully oblivious to it. It was thoroughly annoying, to say the truth.
With an exasperated sigh, Lal went back to the task at hand, noticing Alessandro hastily following her actions.
The next day's morning was insanely chilly; despite the cold, Tsuna woke up at four, having learnt that staying with Reborn meant that waking up at such an ungodly hour became a genetic problem rather than a mental one. Gently stepping out of the tent he was sharing with the the boys, he made sure not to wake up any of them, feeling the grass tickling his bare feet once he stepped out; he smiled at the feel. Brushing his teeth and getting ready for the rest of the day, he decided that he wanted to run.
After twenty minutes of aimless running, he came across Hibari and paused in front of the prefect.
"What are you doing here, Hibari-san?"
Hibari pursed his lips, eyes narrowing. If he was trying to be intimidating, he was failing pathetically because it had become somewhat difficult for Tsuna to fear Hibari—even if he was a terrifying, psychopathic megalomaniac hell bent on biting Tsuna to death. Hibari did not reply and apparently the prefect preferred it to be that way. Tsuna glanced at him, noticed the subtly troubled expression, and looked at skylark's head.
"Where did you last see him?" Tsuna asked after a moment, "I'll help you search for Hibird."
If Hibari was bothered by how Tsuna had read his mind, he said nothing, stalking past Tsuna. The brunette gave an exasperated sigh, lips tilting up in light amusement. Hibari was a stubborn person by nature, refusing to ask for help because it was too 'herbivorous'. Hibari hadn't said no to Tsuna's offer for help, though, and that was the closest the other could get to saying that he required help.
"I'll bring him to you once I find Hibird!" Tsuna called after him. Hibari didn't bother pausing before being swallowed by green and nature.
Tsuna looked around, wondering from where to start, when he heard intermittent clicks. Sharp ears catching the sound immediately, his eyes zeroed on a tiny red and white monkey on a tree branch. It took him a moment to recall that it was Fon's pet, Lichi. Lichi made a few more clucks, before scurrying away, jumping from one tree branch to the other. Tsuna followed.
He came across a bush Lichi was standing near. The monkey pointed at it, prompting Tsuna to look at the bush quizzically.
"What?" he asked in confusion.
Lichi flicked her tail, and wrote something messily on the ground.
Tsuna gave an impressed grin at the messy katakana of the word 'Hibird' on the ground, accompanied by an arrow pointed at the bush.
"Who knew that you would be capable of writing?" Tsuna asked in awe, placing a hand in front of Lichi.
Looking inquisitively at the appendage, Lichi jumped on it, scurrying up to Tsuna's shoulder. Momentarily disappearing into the bush, Tsuna emerged with a bleeding Hibird, dropping to the ground and fishing out a roll of bandage, cotton and some antiseptic from his pocket. It was a good thing that he always carried them with him.
Hibird chirped feebly in pain; his left wing was broken, Tsuna could see, and tiny, thankfully non-life threatening, scratches adorned the bird's body. Tsuna treated the wound, applied the gauze and got up, Hibird cupped in his hands with Lichi 'kikiki'ing from her position on his shoulder. He left for the camp.
"Where is Sawada?"
"Dunno, Lal-san." Takahira hissed out in ire.
They had been woken up to snakes being dropped on them at five in the freaking morning; Takahira was absolutely livid.
Alessandro looked suspiciously pale—Takahira shuddered at what the other had to go through in the hands of one Lal Mirch. She was terrifying.
Dame-Tsuna emerged from a thicket of bushes with a… monkey on his shoulder?
"Where did you disappear off to, you idiot?" Lal demanded.
Tsuna raised his cupped hands, and Lal raised an eyebrow. Trying to get a proper look at it, Takahira realized that it was Hibari Kyoya's pet. Hibari-san's pet. With Tsuna.
Shit, if Hibari-sama gets to know of this, he'll kill Dame-Tsuna and we will all have to die with him!
Lal, however, simply sighed as if used to Dame-Tsuna kidnapping the pets of serial killers. Tsuna grinned sheepishly, took a curt nod from Lal as an assent, and dashed into the tent. Takahira sulked at how lucky Tsuna was—the brunette had not been woken up to snakes; which begged to question:
"How the hell did he wake up before us when he was the last to go to sleep?" Takahira wondered out loud.
Tsuna came bustling out a few minutes later, Hibird on his head, nestled in between his brown locks, a banana in one hand. He offered the fruit to the monkey on his shoulder as if it was a perfectly normal thing to do. The monkey accepted it, but stayed stuck to Tsuna.
"Now then," Lal announced, "I have prepared some… things for you students to make the camp more memorable."
Tsuna's eyes narrowed. If Lal noticed, she did not comment regarding that, fetching out, instead, a remote with a typical red button in the middle. Looking positively giddy, she pressed it with her thumb, and Tsuna's Intuition sparked. The ground shifted, fissures and cracks appeared, and before anyone knew it, what looked like a large training area emerged from the ground.
The ground was cemented in some places, wide and stretched out to a distance of about two hundred meter. Resembling a particularly barren street, it looked plain and empty and not at all intimidating.
"How did you do that?!" Five voices exclaimed, while Tsuna just looked on in resignation.
"Technology." Lal replied simply, and turned to Alessandro, jabbing a thumb towards the Italian, "This guy will show you a demonstration. The rules are simple—walk through this area once I say so, and then dodge, fight, whatever."
"Wait." Alessandro protested, wide eyed, "What do you mean I have to go? I never agreed to this."
Lal raised a disinterested eyebrow, "So what? You've been trained in Vongola, haven't you? This is child's play."
Alessandro tried protesting, but a glower from Lal effectively shut him up. There was a reason why Lal was chosen as one of the strongest by Checker Face, after all.
As Alessandro stepped forward, Lal continued, "It's pretty simple. Just run up to the finish line. Dodge, attack, and just don't let things hit you. Kind of like dodge ball but you can touch it to get it away from yourself. The trials won't be the same for everybody.." Lal turned to Alessandro, who had himself steadied, and announced, "Go!"
Alessandro did. He dodged the bullets which whizzed by with ease, ducking at the huge tree which flew at him from nowhere, had a spike go through his foot, before tripping and falling face first into what felt like water. He blinked, realizing that it was water and that there was something nipping at his feet.
Several somethings, actually.
"The piranhas haven't been fed for a pretty long time!" Lal chortled happily.
Everyone, with the exception of Tsuna, stared at her, wide eyed, before carefully inching away from the insane woman.
"There is a reason why I did not want to be in the middle of a training field planned by an Arcobaleno!" Alessandro hissed out savagely. Trying to stifle screams of terror whenever flesh was nipped out from his feet, he swam as fast as was humanely possible, and thankfully stepped out of the water.
The ground gave away, he fell and it mechanically closed.
Lal gave the area where Alessandro had disappeared a disappointed look, and murmured, "Reborn asked him to come with Tsuna? What the hell is he thinking?" Shaking her head, she looked at Arashi, announcing, "You are next."
Arashi paled, and was literally kicked by Lal to the starting line.
"Your classmates are pathetic!" Lal declared, after the five had gone through mini-Hell, "How the hell do you stay with them in the same classroom is still a mystery to me, Sawada."
Tsuna gave a small smile, glancing worriedly at his classmates lying, two hundred meters from them, flat on the ground. The one to be least injured was Takahira—problem was, Takahira would have been dead if not for Tsuna all but ordering the boy to dodge when a bullet had been aimed to his heart. He had stepped on two mines, currently had three arrows stuck to his back (which were being plucked out by a medic that had appeared out of God-knows-where), had been chased by a man-eating spider, and had been forced to walk through a quagmire. And that wasn't even half of the whole thing.
Tsuna looked at the other four and winced. They were conscious, thankfully, but bloody. The only reason why they were alive was because a panicked Tsuna had told them to move to the right, the ground is crumbling, jump and the like.
"It's your chance next."
Tsuna stepped forward. He wasn't planning on being serious for this; he had an identity to hide, after all.
"By the way, Lal?"
"Hm?"
"Alessandro. Um, what happened to him? Is he okay?"
"Of course he is. The medical team will be arriving with him after some time. But that is not important. GO!"
Obliging to the barked order, Tsuna ran.
Laughter rang out from the other side as he tripped, and fell face first on the ground. Picking himself up, he continued running, ignoring his scraped knees. Spikes erupted from the ground, piercing through his toe, and Tsuna bit his lower lip. The thought of the pain was short lived; Tsuna yelped as the ground gave away.
There was a cry of "Sawada!" from Lal. Tsuna's fingers dug into the ground, and he hissed at the lack of something sturdy to stand on. Wincing, he looked down, at the deep, black abyss, and thought:
Fuck this, I don't want to die.
With practiced ease he pulled himself up, and continued running. The air in front of him shifted, and he ducked, not bothering to give the bullets which whizzed past his head another glance. He heard Hibird, still on his head, chirp, while Lichi gave what Tsuna supposed was a squeal of glee. Five baseball bats came flying at him, all of which he swiftly evaded, easily evading the bombs which were flung at him next.
The next area he came across was not cemented; one glance at the subtly raised grounds informed him that it was a mine. Nimbly stepping on the areas incapable of blowing him into blood and gore (likely to be incinerated by the fire—Tsuna was glad that none of the others had gone through this), Tsuna stepped out of the area. An arrow came flying at him next, but Tsuna gracefully caught it in between his fingers, snapping it into two, clean pieces.
He looked at the tip, sniffed it, frowned and then turned to Lal accusingly. Distractedly, he dropped the arrow on the mined ground, which promptly blew up, but Tsuna paid it no mind.
"Are you trying to kill me?! It had poison on it!"
Lal shrugged her shoulders, "Don't blame me; Reborn said that you were used to it."
"I would be paralyzed! My organs would dissolve, and I would die a painful death—oh my God, did Reborn put you up to this?! I stole his coffee a month ago!"
Lal did not reply, and even if she did, Tsuna did not get the opportunity to hear her, as a volley of arrows flew at him. Resisting the urge to scowl, Tsuna ducked and rolled out of the way as spikes erupted from the ground, saving his body from being impaled by them. Kicking away the killing machine which chose to swing a missile-enabled chainsaw at him, Tsuna vaguely wondered how this was his life before ripping the machine's head with his bare hands.
By the time he reached what Tsuna had dubbed as the 'The-Zone-Whose-Existence-Had-Always-Seemed-Like-A-Too-Good-Dream-To-Me', Tsuna was hardly tired but more than a bit pissed off and rumpled (God, his hair) thinly glad at the lack of usage of Flames.
He also realized that five pair of eyes, wide and, for some reason, plain hilarious, were fixed on him, and that the same number of mouths were agape.
"At least you are not slacking off, Sawada." Lal told him, appearing beside him.
The (still hoping never-to-be) Neo Vongola Primo gave her, and his classmates, puzzled looks, before looking at the direction Lal's thumb was jabbing at.
His eyes came across two uprooted trees (Tsuna lamented; he liked trees), four murdering robots with their heads ripped off and limbs lying around pathetically, the various signs of bomb explosions prominent on the training area, poison coated arrows sticking out from the ground, an overturned tank with the main gun and the tracks manually, but blithely, crushed and other miscellaneous… objects which would have otherwise killed a normal human being.
Hell, it would have killed an abnormal human being, too.
Hell, it should have killed Dame-Tsuna
Tsuna glanced at his classmates again and uttered only one sound:
"Oh."
Hibird chirped.
Please tell me your thoughts!