A/N: This next chapter is long as all fuck (not really, just nearing 6K words, but longer than the others), because I kind of got out of hand, hahaha. It's just that all the characters of KHR are the loveliest, saddest little things and I just want to love them all and hold them and give them all the attention in the world, okay.

I got the most requests for a character introspection piece on each of the Guardians on their relationship to Tsuna, so I delivered, ohoho. Well, actually. I'd like to do a piece later on on their relationship with Tsuna, but this one is more of- why they choose to follow Vongola X.

My favorites in particular are the pieces on Gokudera, Hibari and Mukuro (because they're the most damaged and my heart bleeds for them) – but I just love all the Guardians, so.

Let me know which character piece was your favorite (as well as what you thought about the thing in general)? A lot of these are just my headcanons so I hope that they seem reasonable, hahaha. Also let me know what you want to see in the next chapter!

Disclaimer: I do not own KHR.

chapter ii.

summary: the Guardians of Vongola X and how the Decimo managed to call them his own.

Gokudera.

People don't really understand it – his obsession with being the right-hand of Vongola Decimo. His family had been indescribably proud, of course, that one of their own had made it into such a prestigious position in none other than the famed Vongola Family; some assume that it's simply because it's such a powerful position and honor that Gokudera wants it.

It's not.

What they don't understand that it's not the Vongola position he wants, at all. It wouldn't matter if it were a measly third-rate family or one of the dominating famiglias of the underworld – he'd follow Tsuna to the ends of the world, to hell and oblivion and back because the place he wants to stand upon is right beside Sawada Tsunayoshi, wherever he may be.

And yeah, people might not understand that, but that's fine. Gokudera doesn't need people to understand.

They don't realize that Gokudera Hayato had spent fourteen years feeling isolated and alone, like he was always an outsider looking in, desperately wishing he belonged, had spent fourteen years feeling very much like a small child who had been cast aside by the very people who were supposed to have protected him.

He was an illegitimate child. Blood was a tricky thing in the mafia, a tricky, irrefutable thing (and that's half the reason Xanxus went off the edge, wasn't it?), and people talked. Yeah, his dad had lied and told everyone that he was his rightful son, but he'd forsaken Gokudera's mother to do so, and it's not like anyone believed him, anyway.

(Later, a matured Gokudera will realize that he'd been drowning in love – from his father and his sister – but he'd been too busy being hurt and angry and alone to ever realize this when it mattered).

Five year old Gokudera, walking down the hallway clutching his favorite toy when he hears some of the maids- "Dirty blood, and the Master's trying so hard to make it seem like he belongs."

Ten year old Gokudera, practicing his beloved piano: "Look, he's playing the piano again – just like that wretched slut mother of his."

He hadn't even known that she was his mother when she died.

So yeah, he has a few anger issues and a problem with authority in general, but what of it? He's fourteen and pissed at the shitty excuse of a world that had killed his mother, given him 'dirty blood' and made him an outcast by social and biological construct. He was biologically an outsider, and how shitty was that?

He's fourteen and feeling hateful towards the world, his so-called family, feeling as though there's no place he really belongs and as though he never really will belong, not completely. He's fourteen and frightened whenever he stops to think about it for too long, so he's fourteen and carrying dynamite and gets himself the label 'Smoking-Bomb Hayato' even though there's no mafia family willing to take him in.

He's fourteen and alone, when he meets Vongola Decimo.

At first the sight of the pathetic Decimo upsets him. Because it's not fair, is the thing, that Gokudera is- he's a fucking genius, musically talented and with brains sharper than any Mafioso and with a deadly nickname like Hurricane Bomb by the time he's fourteen, but still, no family will take him because of blood illegitimacy. And you're telling him that this pathetic excuse for a boy has everything Gokudera has never had, everything Gokudera has ever wanted, all because he was lucky enough to share the same vein of blood as Nono.

It's not fair.

He's fully intent on taking this kid out, especially when Reborn tells him that he can become a candidate to become Vongola Decimo if he does so (and he needs this, he needs it desperately; he needs to belong and needs to show everyone who's ever told him that he wouldn't amount to anything because he doesn't have the right blood that they can go fuck themselves).

He loses (of course he does) and he fully expects to die as a result of his own fuck up. Deep down, Gokudera doesn't even mind; it's not as if anyone would be sad if he died, anyway, and he'd been tired of always, always being by himself.

But then the stupid Decimo kid saves him.

He does more than save him from the bombs; Tsuna takes him in, gives him a place as a Guardian and a smile and gets angry when people say bad things about him. Sawada Tsunayoshi gave Gokudera Hayato a home, is what it is, gave him a place to belong and in doing so, also gave him a purpose to live at all.

He's the first one to have looked at Gokudera and said "Wow, you're amazing, Gokudera-kun," the first one to have ever treated him as if he's worth something. During the Ring Battles, Tsuna gave up the goddamn Vongola Ring for his life – and if that isn't worth Gokudera's undying devotion for the rest of his life, than what is?

Tsuna treats him like he's important, like he has worth and like he's someone who matters – and for the first time, Gokudera Hayato stops feeling like an outsider.

So yeah.

Gokudera would do anything for Tsuna and there's really no limit on how far he'd go, or how deep off the edge of the abyss he'd fall. He'd die for Tsuna, would cut open his own chest to offer his still-beating heart if that's what Tsuna wanted, would kill for him, too.

But that's the thing about Tsuna.

Tsuna's never asked him to die for him – only to live, has repeatedly asked Gokudera to live, and there's really no one who's ever asked that of him, either.

So Gokudera lives for Tsuna.

Yamamoto.

Yamamoto's always had a pretty nice life, all things considering.

If anything, his lack of a mother figure might be what people point out as his 'dark side' – but to be quite honest, it's never been some great source of anguish and unresolved tension for him. His mother passed away when he was very young due to illness, and he'd been too young to really know what it meant or to grieve her loss too much, and his father had taken on both roles seamlessly.

Yamamoto would go as far as to say that his mother's death simply doubled the love he had for his father – his dad's the most important person in his life, and will remain so for years, until he really settles into the role of the Rain Guardian (at which point, Sawada Tsunayoshi takes that spot – but just barely). His dad's been there at every cornerstone, trying almost comically hard to fill the void left by his mother, to the point where Yamamoto had once grinned and told him stop trying so hard, Oyaji – you've always been enough for me.

He's popular in school ever since primary, because he's tall and pretty attractive and his personality's one of the most easy-going ones anyone's ever encountered. He's confident, charismatic and an all-around good guy – what's not to like?

Then he plays baseball, and he's really, really good, and girls never even stood a chance.

He's doing pretty well.

Until suddenly baseball stops being an option when he breaks his arm.

Yamamoto surprises even himself with how quickly he falls off the edge, how rapid his descent into the dark abyss of despair and hopelessness and anger is. It's just.

Baseball's always been that constant in his life, is the thing. His dad had gotten him started on baseball when he was barely three as a way to get him out there and socialize with other kids (secretly because his father needed to give both himself and his son a distraction from Yamamoto's mother's death), and through the years, it became his source of comfort and stress release.

And then it became his identity, his moniker, "oh, that guy who's really good at baseball."

For a guy so cheerful, the sharp edge of- without baseball I'm nothing –comes frighteningly quickly, and Yamamoto – who's never faced an emotional hardship at all – cripples in seconds.

It's Sawada Tsunayoshi who saves him.

He saves him as he falls off the roof, yeah, but it's his words that reach out and pull Yamamoto out of the dark funk he'd found himself in – that one oughtn't die until they've done everything they could with a dying will, and it makes him realize he's stupid and that he should get the hell off this ledge.

Sawada Tsunayoshi, who hadn't even really been on Yamamoto's radar until the rooftop incident, suddenly becomes one of the pivotal people in his world.

On the surface level, it's just fun to be with Tsuna. With Tsuna comes Gokudera (they're rather a package deal), and it's fun even to argue with Gokudera, funny to see how worked up the boy gets over the smallest of things. There's also this talking infant that follows Tsuna around, too, and gosh Tsuna manages to get himself into the weirdest, most interesting situations.

It's fun.

But it's more than that.

Yamamoto's always been an easygoing guy. He's always had things easy, has always been complacent and happy with whatever's going on around him.

It's only when he meets Tsuna that Yamamoto learns of other emotions – things like regret, bitterness, anger, things like relief, trust and anticipation. He's felt things like that before, yeah, but only when baseball was involved; the emotions he learns to feel after meeting Tsuna run so much deeper than the shallow things he'd felt in regards to baseball.

After all, how can one compare training for a baseball game to training to inherit a ring worth generations of pride and the life of a friend?

Tsuna teaches him humility, teaches him desperation, teaches him what it's like to live with the dying will. Tsuna reaches in and throws away the stupid notion of complacence and easy-going, because such things shouldn't be used to describe life – instead, Tsuna replaces those things with passion and fervor and wanting something so bad you could die.

It gives life a different intensity, a different flavor.

It gives his vision Technicolor.

And with Tsuna, Yamamoto learns what it means to feel like you're really, honest-to-god alive.

So he doesn't understand the people who call him Dame-Tsuna, doesn't understand how people can't see what's achingly obvious: that he's brave beyond all measure, that he's this boy who will die for his friends and will do the very thing that haunts his nightmares if it means that they can smile a little brighter. That Tsuna's the person who showed him what life is supposed to be like.

Later, Yamamoto will become one of the legendary guardians of Vongola Decimo; he'll stop laughing at it like a game (but he'll never stop laughing, not when he's surrounded by his beloved friends and enjoying life the way Tsuna showed him how to), and he'll trade in his precious bat for his sword, because Tsuna's a hundred times more important to him than the sport.

(And the way Tsuna finds it in him to apologize, to look so heartbroken over Yamamoto's loss of baseball as if it were he giving up the sport, only confirms Yamamoto's decision to do so).

Lambo.

Nobody really knows why Lambo was chosen to be the Lightning Guardian (at least, not until he turns fifteen).

It's not like anyone in their right minds would willingly choose a five year old child perpetually wearing a cow onesie to be the holder of one of the most powerful positions in the world; even Tsuna did not choose him, not really.

He was more thrust into the position out of convenience, because when the Varia struck, they were all only fourteen and Tsuna was still reeling from the idea that the mafia was a very real thing and not urban legend.

He's always the weak link, always the one that the household maids whisper scornfully about – the "useless child," the one that others sometimes try to take out in an attempt to take up the position themselves. And until he's older, he's always the one who needs to be taken care of, held up and shielded from the real battles.

Really, what else could be expected? Lambo is a crybaby, a child, a little boy from a nondescript family who suddenly finds himself amidst battles between the most powerful figures in the underworld. How could he have been expected to react accordingly at all, to stay and fight?

But when, upon his fifteenth birthday (fifteen, because fourteen is the age when most of the Guardians had to accept their rings, and Tsuna-nii insisted one more year, Lambo needs to think this through carefully, he's always been young-), he's taken aside and officially asked: "Lambo, do you want this ring? You're so young, you know, and being in the Family doesn't have to mean being the Guardian, you can walk away whenever you want-" he hadn't even let Tsuna-nii finish the sentence.

(And whenever people criticize him for being weak, whenever people question his place among the almighty Guardians, he doesn't even have a chance to speak – one of the older Guardians has already snapped at the person questioning Lambo's validity, and Tsuna-nii always, always vehemently protects and defends Lambo).

Because yeah, Lambo's young, and yeah, Tsuna-nii will never stop feeling the crippling guilt for dragging a small child into this dark world, will never stop questioning himself on if he did the right thing on bringing Lambo in.

But he doesn't realize that Lambo – the five year old Lambo, the fifteen year old Lambo, the twenty-five, thirty-five, however old Lambo – has never found more happiness than by Tsuna's side. Even later on, Lambo will remember vividly the memories of his five-year old self: laughing with I-pin and Fuuta and Maman, driving Tsuna and Gokudera up the wall but never left behind.

Everyone else has always disregarded him for being young, for being annoying, for being weak. Any mafia boss in his right mind should have just left Lambo behind, if he knew what was good for him.

But Tsuna-nii gives up his own ring – the Vongola sky ring – to save his life. His, stupid Lambo of the Bovino Family.

Tsuna-nii has given Lambo everything he's ever treasured – friends, family, happy times; even the sad times always had something that made Lambo happier than anything else ever has.

Tsuna-nii's never left Lambo behind, not for anything. He's never called Lambo useless, has never, ever complained about having to protect the weaker child from his enemies. Instead, he's only gotten twice as angry at those who dared to attack Lambo to begin with, has only worried twice as much when Lambo gets hurt.

(It's the entire reason he works so hard to perfect the Elettrico Cuoio – to prove that he can protect Tsuna-nii, too, to be someone that can be of use to his precious older brother).

He gives Lambo a place in his Family, takes him in and shows him love and laughter and happiness.

And later, Lambo will become someone who can silence his doubters on his own; he'll become someone so powerful that the Decimo hardly ever receives any damage, because Lambo will have drawn it away unto himself first – he'd rather die of pain before let even the smallest of attacks hit Tsuna.

But for now, five-year old Lambo is content and indescribably happy to even pull on Tsuna-nii's hair.

Sasagawa.

People think Sasagawa Ryohei first met Sawada Tsunayoshi the day the latter had entered dying will mode and accidentally pulled him to school at high speed.

They're wrong.

Sasagawa actually meets Sawada Tsunayoshi the third week of middle school. He's a second year, but Kyoko's just started her first year of junior high; he meets Sawada Tsunayoshi on accident. It goes a little something like this:

Kyoko comes back home crying one day because she's lost the small star necklace Ryohei had gotten her for her birthday last year. She says she took it off for P.E. like usual and put it in her desk, and when she came back to change, it had been gone. This is the first week of school.

They try to find it and they can't, and Kyoko's eyes start to water again so Ryohei tells her not to worry, that onii-chan will find it for her (she doesn't want a new one, she wants the one her older brother bought her for her birthday).

He's beginning to lose all hope of ever finding it when he turns the corner to go pick up Kyoko from her classroom; she's had to stay late on cleanup duty. He pauses when he hears something along the lines of Um, Kaneda-san, that- that necklace- I think it's Kyoko-chan's.

The girl vehemently denies it, but the boy (later Ryohei will learn that this is Sawada Tsunayoshi, when he sees Kyoko saying goodbye to him after school one day) remains firm. Eventually, the girl huffs indignantly, mutters whatever, you freak, you can have this stupid necklace if it's that important to you.

That afternoon, Kyoko comes home beaming, saying that her necklace had magically reappeared in her desk (Ryohei doesn't tell her what he overheard because if Sawada hadn't thought to tell her, then he won't betray the supposed secret, either – it's a bond between men).

So to be honest, Ryohei's known who Sawada Tsunayoshi was before that fateful morning (Kyoko also talks about him a lot, and apparently kids call him Dame-Tsuna, but he's a good kid).

The second time he meets Sawada Tsunayoshi, he meets the first person he's ever encountered who can rival his own enthusiasm for life.

Overall, Sasagawa Ryohei has always been fairly popular – it's hard not to be when you play a sport as well as he does, and really, Kyoko's attractive looks are generally genetic. But he's always felt a bit out of place, to be honest, because nobody really gets him.

People are scared of his fervor, of his exuberance, and instead of sharing his excitement most people back up in fright. He doesn't mind because most times he's too caught up in enjoying the moment to be brought down by the people around him.

But it's still hard, and it kinda gets him down sometimes that nobody ever really understands.

Sawada does.

Sawada doesn't think his excitement is weird – instead, he says "wow, Onii-san is always in the dying will state – that's amazing," as if the rest of society doesn't find him weird for that exact same reason. Sawada pushes him to savor it, tells him that it's a good thing to be so pumped up, instead of telling him to calm down and would you chill out like most others do.

(He also makes Kyoko happy, and a happy Kyoko is a happy Ryohei).

It makes Ryohei happy that someone has a use for his fists and his high-adrenaline energy and his fierceness.

He gives Ryohei worthy opponents (later, he and Lussuria will have a boxing match tradition – once a month, every month, without fail); he gives Ryohei a drive to push himself even more than he'd ever thought possible; he gives Ryohei a place to put his fists and a reason to fight.

Sawada's a good guy.

Hibari.

Contrary to popular belief – that Hibari Kyouya did not have parents, and in fact, spontaneously spawned from the darkest and most terrifying dredges of the world – Hibari did have parents.

His father is a rather weak man, a nondescript stockbroker who, despite his lofty salary, firmly remains ensconced in the section Hibari has reserved in his mind for herbivores.

It his mother, then, who is a predator, from whom he presumably inherited his distinctly carnivorous traits. His mother – barely thirty five when he was fifteen – had given birth to him at the tender age of twenty; she executed simultaneous motherhood and higher education flawlessly, and by the time Hibari entered junior high, had established one of Japan's top security firms.

It's easy to defeat opponents, she'd said, what's hard is protecting something else. Because in order to protect, one had to simultaneously defend and attack.

It made sense.

So a thirteen year old Hibari chooses to protect something, too, if only to prove just how carnivorous he was. He chooses Namimori Junior High (and this perpetual habit of his to protect something in a twisted display of his own strength will continue on into his adult life; later it will be Namimori High, and later, Namimori. Much later, it will become Sawada Tsunayoshi).

Hibari was raised in a household with very, very little rules. His mother was the kind of person who found such things trifling – all she needed was for Hibari Kyouya to be strong and a predator, because in a world full of herbivores, the strong survived and made themselves kings.

In fact, there were only three rules in the Hibari household.

One. Do not be weak.

Two. Do not fail – at anything.

Three. Do not needlessly harm innocent things.

Rule number three is the reason that Hibari has an inherent kindness towards small animals and, grudgingly, small children (small innocent children like I-Pin; children like Lambo are not innocent, for they repeatedly commit the fatal sin of crowding and being annoying).

So Hibari Kyouya is not used to rules, to anything that restricts his person in any way, shape or form. He was raised without curfews, permission slips or limitations.

By the time he's thirteen, it manifests in a distinct dislike of anything that restricts him, to the point where it grows into such an aversion that it borders a phobia (but not phobia, because fear is a weakness, and Hibari Kyouya has no such things).

He even wears his uniform jacket on his shoulders, because the way it closes up around his chest and buttons upwards is suffocating.

By the time he's fourteen, the entire student population of Namimori Junior High knows three rules vital to their survival: do not break any school rules; do not defy the disciplinary committee (read: lethal gangsters loyal to Hibari Kyouya); do not crowd Hibari Kyouya.

So Hibari Kyouya and 'freedom' are synonymous with one another by the time he's fourteen, and even school administrators know better than to impose such things on Hibari; in fact, they stopped giving him homework assignments and deadlines his third week of school his first year. The student council doesn't dare ask Hibari for paperwork regarding the Disciplinary Committee, and the principal doesn't dare argue when Hibari takes over his office for his own.

Everybody knows: Hibary Kyouya answers to no one and nothing, and god help whatever poor soul makes the mistake of trying to impose any kind of expectation on him.

So Hibari Kyouya is fifteen and used to complete and limitless freedom; he's fifteen, and for fifteen years, no one has ever asked a thing of him.

He's fifteen and free of expectations when he meets Sawada Tsunayoshi.

And Hibari's not going to lie, he's confused as to the very existence of Sawada Tsunayoshi; one day he's the utter runt of the herbivores, and the next, he's triumphing over very respectable carnivores. It doesn't make sense, and really, as time passes, Hibari will come to find that the more he learns of Sawada Tsunayoshi, the less sense he makes.

Moreover, his existence irks Hibari. It irks him that this herbivore constantly comes running to him for help, asking him for things, to participate in some dumbnut battle and to wear some useless ring – who does he think he is, daring to restrict the uncontainable Hibari Kyouya?

He ignores Sawada Tsunayoshi at first, and any semblance of cooperation he ever gives comes only from his own selfish desires: to fight the deceptively strong infant; to fight the predators targeting Sawada Tsunayoshi; to fight Bucking Horse Dino; to have the infant owe him a debt. He couldn't care less about the stupid ring all these idiots are running around over, couldn't care less about some inheritance, couldn't even care enough to spare a glance in Sawada Tsunayoshi's direction.

But then.

It's stupid, Sawada Tsunayoshi is stupid, because everyone – his own parents included – know better than to impose something as stupid as expectations on Hibari Kyouya. They don't ask anything of him, never have, but suddenly there's this exasperating herbivore, who won't stop asking him to do things.

And in the times that Hibari does end up showing up (due to purely selfish reasons), Sawada Tsunayoshi is there, acting relieved and happy that Hibari has shown up, smiling at him and thanking him.

For the first time in his life, Hibari Kyouya is rendered completely baffled.

He doesn't understand why the herbivore insists on entrusting him with things, on repeatedly counting on him and expecting him to show up. Because that's what he does, Hibari's realized – Sawada Tsunayoshi asks him for things not like someone taking a shot in the dark (as any normal person should when asking things of Hibari Kyouya), but more like he actually expects Hibari to show up, trusts him to show up.

No one's ever done such a foolish thing, and it's this awful, heavy feeling, and Hibari feels like he's choking on the expectations and limits.

The more Sawada Tsunayoshi believes in him, the more he pulls away, because he can feel a claw closing in on his neck, cutting off his air supply.

Hibari Kyouya hates restrictions.

But then, the fact that the herbivore actually keeps believing Hibari will show up – like some twisted dark knight – leaves this bitter taste on the back of his tongue, and before he knows it, he's showing up without the infant having to come and fetch him first. He doesn't stand around the stupid circle with the others (only herbivores crowd together), but he's there, leaning against the rooftop or a distant pillar, sharp eyes zeroing in on the Decimo.

To this day, Hibari's not quite sure what triggered it.

He's unwilling to admit that there's a small, painfully human part of him deep down that feels the urge to show up if Sawada Tsunayoshi is depending on him to do so (that's foolish and weak).

But then, there's also never been anyone who did such a thing as to dare to expect things of Hibari Kyouya, and it's almost for amusement's sake that Hibari goes along with Sawada Tsunayoshi's wishes.

There's also a part of him that's inherently attracted to Sawada Tsunayoshi's strength – it's not quite as strong as his, yet, but there's this potential there that Hibari can smell. It's there, and in a bit of time, he will become someone that can entertain Hibari very, very well.

There's a part of Hibari Kyouya that will remain bitter to the very end that he'd somehow been tricked into playing Guardian, because by being the Cloud for the Family, he feels binded, in one way or another.

(But there's also a part of him questioning if he ever stood a chance – because by nature, the sky encompasses and envelops everything, clouds included).

Chrome.

Chrome. Nagi, technically, but Chrome chooses to take on the life that Mukuro gave her rather than the one that had been left to die by her parents.

And that's basically a poignant summation of her life by the time she's thirteen – always alone, antisocial to a fault, but not because she dislikes people. She's just always been quiet and withdrawn, and teenagers were cruel, is all; they poked fun at her and gave her a wide berth, because they said she was weird and creepy.

Society shunned her, and really, even her parents depraved her of the love she thought she'd receive from her family. She's always tried to convince herself that she doesn't care about any of it, not really, but there's always a white cast to her features when she remembers her mother's damning words: "It isn't just me. No one wished for that child to stay alive this long."

It was Mukuro who picked her up, who gave her life, who told her that she could be powerful and live, who told her to live.

Mukuro has the first place in her heart – until she meets Sawada Tsunayoshi, Vongola Decimo.

And in the world that had left her to die – that had compelled her to do so, even – it was Sawada Tsunayoshi who came to her with a smile and a kind hand. Mukuro may have been the one to save her life, but it was Sawada Tsunayoshi who gave her a reason to live at all.

When Chrome thinks of him, sometimes she sees him as a brilliant, all-encompassing figure of white and wings, because he's kind of like an angel in her eyes; an avenging angel when his friends are endangered, a benevolent one towards people like Chrome. Mukuro and Chrome are one and the same, but Boss is the first separate entity in her life – with nothing to gain by helping her – to have reached out and pulled her up from the edge of the abyss from which she'd dangled.

She's never known kindness like his, never known a heart so pure that it blinds (Mukuro-sama always tsks and says it'll get him eaten one day).

She's never known such a warmth as when he gently holds her hand and tells him not to worry, because he's here for her.

When he smiles at her, it's as though she stops feeling cold for the first time in her life (the cold of the operating room, the cold metal of the hospital bed, the cold of the dirty concrete walls of an abandoned Kokuyo land).

It's almost addictive, the kind of warmth and love that emanates from Vongola Tenth's being.

Mukuro-sama will always be the most important person in her life, but Chrome thinks that it's alright if she loves Sawada Tsunayoshi just as much – because as much as he loathes to admit it, Vongola Decimo is almost just as important to Mukuro, too.

Mukuro.

They locked him up in the Vendicare – said that he had committed unspeakable crimes against the mafia itself, punishable only by something as terrible as an unending agony, because even death would be a reprieve.

They're all dirty, dirty liars and hypocrites.

To take a child and experiment upon him until he's walked through all the levels of hell; to take him and to mutilate his body over and over and over again in the name of science. This is alright, this is not a crime – but when the child finally grows strong enough to escape his terrible captors, he becomes the criminal.

This is the dirty, hypocritical law of the bloody Mafia world – the world that had subjected Mukuro to unspeakable hurt and abandoned him there, left him broken to die, and when it seemed that he would live, locked him up in prison.

For all he cares, every last Mafioso can burn in the deepest pit of hell, until he can smell his own flesh burning and gag on the stench, until he feels the flames lick at his bones and his insides, until his blood turns to tar and gags his throat and his vision.

Rokudo Mukuro is fifteen – awe-inspiring criminal of the mafia world, embittered survivor and frightened child – when he meets Vongola Decimo.

Vongola Decimo is not at all like what he envisioned. The boy is weak, brittle and a whiny child, someone wholly unfit to lead the mighty crown of the underworld. He's stupid and naïve and clueless about what kind of a dirty, dark world he's just stepped foot into, and his naivete makes Mukuro want to devour him alive.

So Decimo becomes his new goal.

Mukuro will possess him, and use his useless body to take possession of the sinful world that broke him.

He doesn't know when he started to lose sight of that vision.

Perhaps it was when Vongola Decimo refused to abandon Nagi (Chrome was the name he gave her, but she is Nagi to him), even when she lacked vital organs and would only be another source of weakness to him and his empire.

If not then, then maybe it was when he saw the anger burning in Decimo's eyes upon hearing of the crimes that had been committed against Mukuro. Maybe it was when Decimo turned to Mukuro with surprisingly firm eyes, told him- I'll help you. (In a world where Sawada Tsunayoshi had just inherited the largest crown of the Underworld, he turned right back around and spit at the empire that told him to stay far away from Mukuro).

If not then, it must have been the time – or times – that Sawada Tsunayoshi practically tripped over himself in the haste to get to Mukuro – to protect him, to clutch at his wounds and ask if he's alright, to shield the worst criminal of the world from his attackers.

At first, it pisses him off.

Because Mukuro just wants to be angry at the world, wants to resent it, wants to let it burn for all he cares. It is Sawada Tsunayoshi who comes in and makes him question his grudge against the world that had killed him six times over, who's damning kindness is almost Mukuro's undoing. Why can't that stupid, stupid boy just stay away and let him be angry?

But he wins over Nagi, first, with his soft smile and what Mukuro thought was a deceptive kindness, at first. (It's not deceit, he's horrified to learn later – Sawada Tsunayoshi is even kinder than he'd thought).

And really, when the prince of the Underworld turns to him and offers him his protection and his kindness and his loyalty and a place in his Family – when he has no need to, when he already has the kingdom at his feet and would only lose things by taking in Mukuro – how did anyone ever think he stood a chance?

Sawada Tsunayoshi is not a Mafioso, he'll give him that; he's just a stupid, stupid little boy with a heart too soft for his own good. (So Mukuro supposes that he'll stay – so that he can be the dark side that's necessary for Tsunayoshi to preserve his kindness, because in a world as dark as theirs, he won't survive if he's left to be as good as he is).

But he's Rokudo Mukuro, and he still has his pride – so if anyone asks, he'll insist that he's only sticking around to lunge at the first chance to possess Sawada Tsunayoshi.

(And in the future, Tsunayoshi will only laugh and smile brightly, as if he's privy to some inside joke about it all. Because it's been ten years, and it's a known fact that Sawada Tsunayoshi constantly and unendingly lowers his guards around his precious Guardians – and he's yet to possess him yet, as he?)

A/N: Yeah, Chrome / Mukuro's was a bit shorter than the rest, but that's because I view them as two halves of a whole.

Let me know which piece you liked the most and what you thought about it? Oho - and what you'd like to see next.