The heavy atmosphere lay thick, like a blanket. The intensity was almost tangible. The stand off was beginning to fray Tsuna's nerves as he felt a bead of sweat roll down the back of his neck. Behind him he felt Gokudera's back facing the circle of enemies - holding a gun like a lifeline. His backpack dug uncomfortably into his spine and he ached to tell Gokudera to hurry, but he new he couldn't rush things. It was vital that plans were followed impeccably. There was absolutely no room for mistake.

Suddenly, the plane made a jerking movement and the group of hitmen surrounding them were jolted for a millisecond. Tsuna needed no more than that millisecond. With lightning-fast movements, his hand shot to his mouth and two small pills slid down his throat. Before one of the unlucky hitmen knew what was happening, he took a knee to the jaw and watched, dazed as Tsuna spun in mid air and kicked him directly on the forehead. He hit the floor before anyone could so much as flinch.

Gokudera had also made his move while Tsuna took down one of the enemies. His eyes had been roaming over the group circling them while they had bought time, and they had returned a few times to the largest member of the group. He was quiet, calm and collected. Obviously confident, but not foolish. Experienced but not cocky. Strong. Gokudera grinned. He had chosen his first target. When he felt the boss shoot from his back, his box weapon flashed open half a second after. A shield made of black bones appeared at his side just as an array of bullets slammed into the transparent wall. He aimed the skull-like gauntlet at the tall man and let loose his flames. The man had seen it coming, apparently, since his face remained unchanged as one of his subordinates jumped in front of the torrential red fire in order to protect Gokudera's opponent. As the man fell wailing to the floor - his jacket, shirt and skin scorched to a crispy dark redish black - his superior sighed in contempt and kicked him out of the way.

"Che. Glad to see such obvious friendships still exist in the mafia," Gokudera commented dryly.

"He was too weak. To be taken down after one blow - trash," His voice was gravelly and deep and Gokudera suddenly got the impression of a walking, talking boulder. Maybe singling him out hadn't been such a great idea. Hopefully the Tenth was doing better than him...

He was right, actually. Tsuna's side of the circle were piled in a heap on the floor next to the plane's right-emergency exit. The boss, himself, stood inspecting a finger bent at an odd angle, 'How didn't I notice this happen? Didn't it hurt?' he wondered. Then he noticed two hitmen circling around Gokudera's unprotected back.

'Ha. As if I'd let you,' he thought in disgust. Tsuna raised his arms behind him and let his sky flames shoot him forward towards the offenders. Just before he collided with the first one, he swung his hands in a diagonal upwards streak and stuck his leg out. He swept his feet out from under the hitman then rose into the air. He stuck his left elbow out and shoot down, hitting the poor guy directly in the rib cage. He heard his breathing halt for a minute before he took an unsteady gasp, but Tsuna was too preoccupied to check if his opponent was still alive. The second man had noticed Tsuna and attempted to aim at the darting figure with a sawed-off shot gun. Tsuna snorted at the man's pitiful attempt to shoot him as a bullet soared a few centimeters wide of his head, catching a few of Tsuna's longer strands of hair in the process. Tsuna accelerated towards him, swung his body around to and delivered a roundhouse kick to the man's unprotected head.

The hitman was closer than Tsuna had estimated, though, and when his foot connected, instead of simply catching the man's cheek, his heel struck his temple. He heard a crunching noise and froze. Blood spurted from the dent in his head and flowed onto Tsuna's shoes. Tsuna shot away from him as quickly as possible, in any direction his hands took him, and ended up crashing directly into the reinforced steel-lined hanger wall. He felt the handle of the plane's other emergency exit catch on his backpack and he shrugged it off in a panic.

He stared with wide eyes at the unmoving hitman lying on the grey floor as blood leaked steadily from his head. Tsuna felt a shiver run up his spine and his blood turned cold. He just...he just killed someone. Not someone evil, or someone who deserved it. Just a man who was following orders...

Then he paused. 'That man...would've killed Gokudera, given the chance. If I hadn't...intervened, Gokudera would be lying there instead. I had to- to choose, and I chose Gokudera. Right...and I would do it again...' Tsuna was still a little shaken when he heard an incredibly loud bang. It hurt his ears and he immediately covered them with glove-clad hands. He looked over to where Gokudera was fighting his opponent and what he saw definitely wasn't was wanted to.

His storm guardian was barely standing as a moving mountain stood towering over him, holding a smoking gun. Around him, a mess of black bones lay shattered. Gokudera was clutching his bleeding arm as it dangled uselessly by his side. Tsuna raised his hands to join his right hand man to finished off the monster of a man, when suddenly, the view of a bloodied man laying dead on the floor in front him flashed in front of his eyes. He caught his breath and felt the hard skull crack under his foot again. He closed his eyes for a second then snapped them opened and yelled to Gokudera "Operation B!"

The storm guardian gave no inclination that he had heard his boss, but Tsuna knew he had, because of the next bomb he threw. Gokudera reached inside his jacket pocket and withdrew a stick of dynamite. He grinned at the large man and lit his ring flame. Slowly he fed the string through the red fire until it caught, then threw it directly behind him - at Tsuna. Tsuna caught the dynamite in mid air, shoved it into the nearest bag rack and flew as fast as he possibly could towards Gokudera.

As his hands slid under his guardians arms, he heard a loud explosion coming from the stick of dynamite he had just set. The sudden exposure to the atmosphere took the inhabitants of the cabin by surprise. The sudden escape of air immediately became apparent as the hitman gasped and fell to one knee. Seat belts and unsecured items spiraled wildly around the small space as the air made a mad dash out the small hole in the roof of the plane. Tsuna yelled over the rush of wind, "Is it ready?"

Gokudera spat a wad of blood at the walking rock before answering, "full to the brim. I'd give us...15.2 seconds 'till they're splatter-art"

Tsuna grimaced, behind Gokudera's unaware head. The image of his victim flared to life in the front of his mind again but he shook it off. He had other things to worry about, "Then we'd better be off"

The gap made from the dynamite was barely large enough for Tsuna and Gokudera to fit through, and Gokudera's pack snagged on a jagged edge of metal. He swore loudly and shrugged it off immediately. Tsuna hovered just above the aircraft, still clutching Gokudera's arms, however he was now being dragged down, along with the slowly declining plane. Gokudera struggled free as an incessant beeping halted. He threw himself into mid air no more than a second after a loud explosion was heard from the cockpit. In a matter of nanoseconds, roughly twenty more bombs went off, sending violent, unstoppable shock waves rippling through the air. Tsuna was thrown back up into the air as Gokudera took the brunt of it and shot forward as though shot from a canon. Fire exploded from the windows and windscreen of the plane and it began to fall even faster. The storm guardian felt himself caught up in the spiraling air current and started being sucked down along with the heap of useless metal.

Tsuna saw his right hand man spinning through open air and yelled at him to open the parachute when he remembered the horrible tearing noise that had come from his pack as they escaped. He had no way to land.

'Oh shit!i Tsuna raised his hands behind him and began shooting towards the silver haired man as fast as his flames would allow. The ground seemed to be approaching too quickly. Water streamed from Tsuna's eyes and he felt his hands beginning to shake from the pressure of his fire. The storm guardian seemed to moving just as fast as Tsuna, no matter how much he sped up, though.

Gokudera desperately tried to straighten out and fall in the typical 'star-fish' pose that he had seen sky divers use so many times before, however, maneuvering in mid air is harder in reality than in theory. Finally, after much struggling, Gokudera ending up with his head and shoulders pointing towards the ground. 'If I'm going to die, at least the impact should kill me immediately - none of this waiting around bullshit,' he thought sarcastically. Then he caught sight of and orange speck approaching rapidly.

'Jyuudaime!' All thoughts of 'dying quickly' flew out of his mind as soon as he saw the reassuring figure speeding towards him. Tsuna was wearing that expression again. His eyebrows furrowed, eyes narrowed, nose all scrunched up and mouth drawn into a tight line. It was quite familiar. Gokudera had seen him look like this every time Tsuna was beginning to feel the stress of a fight. Maybe Tsuna would reach him before the ground did...

Tsuna felt a spark of hope. Gokudera was only meters away - 100...90...80...70...He increased his flames even more, and halved the distance. Finally, he reached out a hand and caught onto Gokudera's forearm. He felt the storm guardian's fingers curl around Tsuna's arm and he slowly brought his right hand down to halt the sickening fall. Gokudera's weight threw him off for a minute, but his flames were more than enough to support the two.

The pair were silent for a minute or two as they hovered a hundred meters from the hard earth. Tsuna was panting and Gokudera felt as though his heart might burst from the stress. The mood was serious and Gokudera prepared to thank Tsuna for his hard work and apologize that he had become a burden on the tenth. However...Tsuna grinned down at Gokudera.

"Close call, huh?"

"Yeah...but did you expect anything different?"

They were silent again, then Gokudera felt a rush of unexpected laughter bubble up through him. Tsuna stared at him oddly, then he too felt a strange urge to laugh. Soon enough, the two were in stitches by the time Tsuna gently let Gokudera step onto the ground.