"Why do you always look so sad?" Tsuna tilted his head curiously at the child.

It had been two months since his accepting that the mass of roots beneath his pillow was a boy in his dreams, one that drew from his unconscious energy to grow.

The boy looked from the night sky to Tsuna with an uncaring grin and insulted eyes. "I'm not sad."

"You look sad."

"Why does your mother hate you?"

An awkward silence.

Tsuna was the first to look away, his throat squeezing shut on him. "I-I'm sorry… I guess you don't want to talk about it…" He knew he didn't.

The boy stared down at his hands, appearing miffed despite his smile. "They threw me away."

"Huh?" Tsuna looked back at the boy.

"Your friend told you that lotus flowers only live for six years; I'm different – I've lived six lives."

"Hiiiee?" Tsuna was startled, staring owlishly at the boy.

"Instead of dying, we're reborn. It's a lot like how flowers on this planet go into hibernation. I've already lived six lives, so they threw me away instead of cultivating me again."

This planet, as if he was an alien…

"I-If they threw you away, how did you end up here…?"

"Don't sound so scared." The child spat. "I didn't do anything bad! They're the ones who treated me like I was worthless! Life after life, they treated me like I was a monster!"

It was the first time the child had… well, acted like a child. Though Tsuna was a little curious about whom 'they' were.

"H-hey, who are… 'they'?"

The child looked at him as if he were an idiot. "My genus. Where I am from, your genus is responsible for cultivating you; but my genus has hated me for centuries, and so they ignored their duties when I wilted."

Tsuna guessed that his genus was the same as a family. "I'm sorry…" He stared at the bed. "That was… so cruel of them. You should never turn your back on your family – err, genus."

The child blinked at him, caught by surprise perhaps. "… They never sang for me, either."

"Huh?"

"Your world has bedtime stories; where I'm from, we were sung to sleep." The child closed his eyes. "No one liked to sing for me …"

"I'm not a great singer." Tsuna admitted. "But I could read some stories aloud to you." He rubbed the back of his neck sheepishly. "It's the best I can do."

The child stared at him.

"Hey, that's right!" Tsuna blinked as he realized something. "If you've lived before, doesn't that mean you already have a name?" It was kind of weird that he had gone two months without asking… Then again, the child was a plant.

The child nodded after a small hesitation.

"What is it?"

"… Mukuro… Mukuro Rokudo."

He smiled sweetly for him. "Hi, Mukuro! My name is Tsuna." He outstretched his hand towards Mukuro. "It's nice to meet you."

Slowly, the boy wound his hand into his and let him shake it. His smile lost, just slightly, its perverse edge. "Likewise."

~ : : : ~

"Hey, Tsuna!" Yamamoto had his head tilted curiously, reading the title of the book Tsuna had his nose in. "Since when did you read for leisure?"

"Idiot!" Gokudera barked. "Even Tenth can appreciate a good book every once in a while! Unlike some people." He glared pointedly at the baseball player.

"Hah hah! Sorry, but I'd rather get stuck on clean-up duty than read something of my own free will." He admitted shamelessly. "Ah, but why fairytales, Tsuna?"

The brunette was dragged out of the fantasy world he had encased himself in to look up at them both. "Uuhh…" He couldn't tell them that he had promised a plant that he would read stories to him. "Just… reliving my childhood?"

"You read fairytales when you were a kid?" Yamamoto scratched his chin, trying to remember this; after all, he and Tsuna went way back...

"Yeah, I did." That was actually true. "I read a lot of stories when I was kid, because I didn't have any friends. So I'd just get out a story and I'd stay away from everyone else. I wrote a few stories too…" He paused; now that he thought about it, he couldn't remember for the life of him what he had done with those stories. "My teachers said I was really good at it."

"Hah hah! I didn't know that!" Yamamoto ruffled Tsuna's hair. "Maybe you should write a book! I'd like to read it!"

"Bastard!" Gokudera hit Yamamoto's shoulder. "Don't touch the Tenth so familiarly!" He turned happy-puppy-dog eyes onto Tsuna. "If you ever do write a book, let me be the first to read it, please!"

"U-uh, sure, Gokudera…"

"Mah mah, but I wanna read it first…"

"Too bad! Tenth said I could read it first!"

"Hiiiee! Don't fight you two!"

~ : : : ~

"And they lived happily ever after… the end." Tsuna clasped the book of collected Japanese storiesshut, pleased with himself as well as slightly awed.

Mukuro had his head in his lap, not quite sleeping but very close to doing so. He peeked his eyes open with the end of the story and looked up at Tsuna. "Another one."

Tsuna rubbed the back of his head sheepishly. "Sorry, but that was the last story of the book."

"Can you read it again?"

He laughed. "Uh, sure!" He flipped back to the beginning of the story.

Mukuro sighed and pushed his face against his belly. "I lied."

"Huh?"

"When I said I did nothing bad… I lied."

Something cold and hard settled in Tsuna's heart; not only because of how solemn and honest Mukuro sounded, but because of how the child burrowed closer to him – holding on with all his strength in case he tried to shove him away, his intuition told him.

Without knowing why, he knew he wouldn't ask what that something bad was.

Hesitantly, he brushed his hand through Mukuro's hair. The child froze and eyed him with his scarlet orb. His hair felt like flower petals… "Will you do anything bad here? With me? Will you hurt me or the people I love?"

A moment went by and then Mukuro looked at him with hard eyes. "If I think they're going to hurt me..." His eyes sidled away. "Yes."

Tsuna appreciated him for not lying – though he was slightly worried. "If they try to hurt you, they'll have to go through me, first." He met Mukuro's shocked gaze. "I don't know what you did that was so bad, but this is a different place and a different time; you can start over here, and I won't hate you for your past. But if you hurt any of my friends… I won't be able to look at you the same way again."

Mukuro stared at him with eyes full of unnamable emotions.

"Now… do you want me to read you more fairy tales?"

"Yes."

"Okay…" He flipped back to the beginning, the story labeled 'The magic Teakettle'. "There was once a priest who was very fond of drinking tea…"