Authors Note: KHR doesn't belong to me, we've established that. Can we stop torturing me now? By the way, it wouldn't hurt Akira-sensei to make a continuation on how our beloved "Dame-Tsuna" acts as a boss. Just a suggestion, mind you.

Moving on. Still haven't hit my writing stride. It sputters and dies like a really, really bad motor running on a bandage, spit and prayers. Hopefully, it will create something that won't make me cringe. Here's to hoping. And thanks for those amazing guys who reviewed this and all my other works. It warms my heart to see you take pleasure from my attempts.

UPDATE 12/8/13: Tweaked the first chapter so much that I need to fix all the rest but the good news is that I now have a rough outline of where this story is going. YEY! I'm not lost anymore. Now, as to how I get from Point A to Point B isn't your problem, really but mine. That being said—how the hell do I do that?

Big Trouble in Little Tokyo

"Sometimes I lie awake at night, and I ask, 'Where have I gone wrong?'

Then a voice says to me, "Uhm… yeah…right. This is going to take more than one night."

-Anonymous

You know how it is, when people come up to you and say that they need to tell you something and when you actually bother to respond and waste your time caring despite your own less than stellar existence then they tell you it was nothing and just to forget about it?

Well, this wasn't one of those times.

This is one of those times you wish it was the kind that would just get you pissed-not pissed and then killed. All while being aggravated and annoyed and wondering how you ended up being entangled in a mess that isn't even yours.

8 Days before Doomsday

Namimori, Sawada Residence

Friday night, as was her custom, she made a phone call to the Chief Adviser of the famiglia to tell him that the children will be on their way according to their usual schedule. This routine has been established since her son has taken on the mantle of the famiglia head and has never been diverted from, unless one of the children was sick or had prior commitments in school. When the Chief Adviser inquired as to any other developments, she only made a breezy comment about some young men who stopped her a couple of times when she went out to shop and assured the adviser that she already spoke to that quiet young man who used to patrol around Namimori just like her son told her before he left. She assured the Chief Adviser was nothing was amiss and had her concerns relieved when the man reassured her that the matter was of little import.

She didn't think any further about the matter.

So that weekend, when Sawada Nana kissed her three young charges goodbye and entrusted them to the care of the men who usually picked them up to bring them to the airport, she certainly didn't think anything different about the fact that there were twice as many men accompanying the children now as per the usual arrangement.

She certainly never even once suspected that the simple, sleek-lined black car that idled by waiting for its usual bevy of young passengers had the latest bullet-proof, shatter-proof, anti-tank reinforced shell guaranteed to withstand anything but a direct hit from a jetfighter's rocket. And that in the event that an attack occurred, it would still run without tiles, had a self-sealing gas tank to avoid explosion, an oxygen chamber and a GPS system so advanced she could've kept track of it in real time using any cellphone she had on hand had she been so inclined.

And so with nary a hair out of place or her heart set aflutter with alarm, she sent off the children with a smile and a few last minute reminders to mind their manners and enjoy themselves before betaking herself off to her usual weekend sojourn into the shopping district, looking forward to two whole days of quiet contemplation and relaxation with only herself as company.

However this weekend proved to be quite an aberration from Sawada Nana's usually quiet routine.

This weekend her house proved to be unusually busy. Not that she noticed anything out of place being used to the unusual occurring when it comes to her rather 'extraordinary family'.

She certainly didn't think any differently about the sudden arrival of workmen who claimed to have been sent by her loving husband to reinforce the house's security and to make 'minor' repairs on the house since she and the children spent most time just inside the house. A simple phone call to confirm the story (a task that his son's tutor had emphatically and unequivocally forced her to learn) and she was more than happy to open the doors to the family home. She could only watch in awe as they installed several security cameras and a few complicated looking panels of buttons and switches. The supervisor that came with the work men continued to keep her company and assured her that it was all pretty standard for a home security. Never mind that she remained oblivious to the fact that her house now hosts one of the most state-of-the-art security systems ever created, one that could rival Fort Knox in complexity and scope courtesy of the famiglia's trio of Imagineers.

She certainly didn't mind the sudden procession of guests and friends who found numerous reasons to suddenly drop by and make an appearance. Though she enjoyed the solitude the weekends afforded her, Sawada Nana was an intensely social and nurturing nature and she adored having someone to cook for and fuss over.

She certainly never thought twice about the small flat package that she reminded her eldest charge to bring with him, situated comfortably snug between the pages of one of the most coveted books in all the Mafia World nor did she even have the faintest inkling of the utter chaos it would soon bring to her very doorstep.

With a sunny smile at the sound of the doorbell ringing yet once again, she hurried over and thought only in passing the stories she would share with the children once they were back home.

Narita Airport

The bi-monthly pilgrimage from Namimori to Italy by the Decimo's three wards was an event choreographed to near perfection after three years. The flight plans, airport transfers, baggage detail, car service and security had been ironed out so seamlessly that it's like watching a rocket launch to the moon.

Of course when you consider who is being ferried and who is waiting at the end of the line, it gives you enough motivation and incentive to get the job done and done quite well. Everyone knows exactly what they needed to do, when they needed to do it where it had to be done and who are the ones that need to be involved to get the matter done. Nothing like the looming threat of violence and retaliation from the one source you know for damn sure could deliver ensures that a flight be made as smooth and event-free as possible.

Airport security has grown inured to the ideals and foibles of the moneyed elite. The ground crew had certainly had their share of divas, despots and dilettantes showing their penchant for over the top drama that they've grown pretty immune and desensitized to all but the most bizarre scenes. They have seen far too many strange goings-on to react much to the sight of three school age children, two young boys and a girl ranging between the ages of ten and fourteen, lugging their own travel bags, walking nonchalantly while surrounded by several black suited guards.

They certainly didn't react when they noticed that the eldest of the trio carried a steel attaché case embossed with an elaborate shield and a short chain that was looped around his thin wrist. The ground crew certainly didn't blink twice when the curly haired boy tripped and several orbs that looked suspiciously like grenades tumbled out of his unusual curly hairdo. Toys, they assured themselves, just another rich boy playing soldier. They barely noticed when the sole female member of the day's entourage was rattling of recriminations towards the curly haired boy next to her in what was clearly a foreign language all the while keeping her eyeballs fixed on the book in front of her face.

The ground crews were professionals. Nothing could faze them.

Not even when the young boy suddenly stopped in the middle of the private tarmac where their private jet was idling nearby and pulled an enormous oddly colored bazooka out of his hair, jumped straight into the nozzle and pulled the trigger. They didn't even blink when a thick pink cloud suddenly engulfed everyone and a young man stood clutching the bazooka with no young boy in sight.

They were professionals. They even managed to give their signature jaunty salute once the small jet taxied off the runway and flew off to god knows where. When they went in to fill out the paperwork for just another customer serviced, they all agreed that was just another customer, just another day. No one questions them when they all went to file a week's long vacation before going home.

The Vongola Stronghold, Italy

He watched quietly as the small convoy of vehicles pull into the long driveway and stop right in front of the mansions sweeping stone steps. The middle car, a sleek black town car, had its door opened immediately and a flurry of limbs came tumbling out of the vehicle, arms and legs and lanky bodies all scrambling to be the first to step out, words and conversations flowing like a bubbling brook, eager as puppies to be the one to reach the embrace of the one who patiently waited for them somewhere inside the large mansion, with arms held wide open and a welcoming smile on thin, sweet lips.

"I wanna tell him!"

"...No I want to tell him!"

"Hey, come on, settle down you two..."

"You should tell him about the other thing-!"

"Why should I? You should tell him! He told you no more 'boom!' and that's all you did Lambo!"

"I didn't do anything like that!"

"I-pin, Lambo, now, now..."

"Someone should tell him about those idiot guys who hang around Maman. So someone should tell him—!"

"Tell him what?"

The voice that spoke behind them came so suddenly it was no wonder that the three children found themselves coming to a stop so abruptly that they bumped one after the other, ending up in a pile of tangled limbs, moaning and groaning in a painful heap at the bottom of the mansion's steps.

"IEEE! You! I wasn't talking to you! What are you doing here?"

"Listening as your inanity becomes even worse apparently. And if you still don't understand anything—not that you ever could with you utter absurdity—I happen to live here."

Livid red painted the cheeks of the curly-haired green eyed Lightning Guardian and I-pin and Fuuta had to curve their own urge to groan when the young guardian sputtered and began screaming just like he used to when he was five.

"Absur—!Did you just call me stupid or something?!I'm not telling you anything! Just tell me where's Tsuna-nii!"

"He'll be along shortly. Now, why don't you start at the beginning, you stupid cow and tell me what was it that Dame-Tsuna is supposed to know?"

"It's nothing! And don't call him 'dame'!"

"Nothing? If it was nothing then there shouldn't be anything to tell at all."

"Yes nothing! But not that kind of nothing. It's a something kind of nothing."

A raised eyebrow and a smirk caused the young boy to even be more flustered as he recalled his words and a torrent of babbling explanation tumbled forth, much to the amusement of the taunting one.

"No! That is—!What I mean was—it was nothing! Nothing at all-!"

"Ahh…Is that so?"

"Yes, that it so, you bully. It was nothing. I won't tell you something when it's nothing. So there!"

The young boy finished off his triumphant statement with a loud raspberry and a cheeky grin. The sound of a custom, well-oiled, precision model Beretta 92FS's hammer being pulled back effectively silenced even the most vehement of protestations and prevarications. It certainly silenced everyone within a mile radius of the mansion that day. Even more so when a smooth, slick, oddly sweet sounding voice lazily asked once more:

"Oh really?"