AUTHOR'S NOTES: Happy New Year! It's been awhile hasn't it?
I apologize for the delay in putting this chapter up, it's been slow going, but I think I'm settling back into a groove for it. We'll see how it turns out, but I still have a lot of this story to tell and I think almost six months is a long enough wait. I hope that I will be able to update this on a consistent basis and keep up with my Skip Beat! fic as well. Wish me luck ^_^
Katekyo Hitman Reborn! isn't mine it belong to Akira Amano, I just seem to have a rather long arc of stories to tell in it ^_^ Please bear with me as I get back into this as there may be a couple shaky characterizations (Ryohei & Hibari are almost impossible for me to write T.T ).
Next update should be hitting on January 31st.
Thanks for your patience and taking the time to read (and review if you get a chance) my story!
Also a special shout out to candi711 and PAK for writing reviews and encouraging me. It means a lot to me. I hope you (and anyone else who reads this) won't be disappointed in this update.
See you in 2 weeks :)
Target 04-04: Storm on the Horizon
"Kagami?" Akai repeated. "I don't suppose you're referring a tall kid that plays basketball in a cartoon are you?"
Haru gave her a withering look and the Hanatachi hitman managed a grin. "You look too serious Haru; you're going to get wrinkles like that," Akai's smile faded and she looked considering for a moment. "I haven't heard the name, but I'll check in with my contacts and see if they've heard anything."
Haru glanced at Yamamoto and Chrome and both shook their heads. "I'll send some feelers out over the net and get in touch with Lady Tomi and see if I can find anything," Haru decided.
"I'll see what I can find while you meet with your Famiglia," Akai said. "I also have that map you requested, I'll bring it to your HQ after you're done."
"I thought you were coming," Haru said.
"Change of plans," Akai replied. "I know what you're going to talk about at the meeting so it'll just be old information to me. I think seeing what I can glean about this Kagami is more important. I'll send you a text when I'm on the way and you can let me know where you are."
Haru nodded. "All right," she said.
The Hanatachi hitman vanished at the next corner leaving Haru with Yamamoto and Chrome. "You're going to have to tell us everything," Yamamoto stated quietly. "And you'll have to send a report to Tsuna. This is going to get dangerous fast."
"But…" Haru began.
"We can't defend against what we don't know is coming," Yamamoto pointed out quietly. "When preparing for a game you watch videos of the teams you're going up against to put together an offensive and defensive plan. Every member of the team needs to watch the videos in case they see something the captain doesn't."
Haru's shoulders slumped. "But you're high school students..." she said.
"And so are you, Haru," Chrome stated quietly.
"But I—" Haru began.
"We're Vongola," Yamamoto said.
Haru's eyes flashed up to meet the baseball player's and she saw a shadow of the grimness that characterized Yamamoto when they'd gone ten years into the future. It was then she realized they'd all moved far beyond what they'd been when the whole 'mafia game' started nearly four years ago and they'd already lived two years of the ten year time span between then and the grim future they'd seen. "I wonder how much has changed already?" Haru murmured. "Or if we've changed anything at all...we never saw our future selves to see what they were like..."
Yamamoto placed his hand on her shoulder. "Don't worry about ten years from now yet, Haru. Let's deal with here and now."
"I don't think we're on the same path that led us to that future," Chrome said. "There are so many other things in play now. We're already seeing boxes and they were a recent development in that time and more people seem to be using the Dying Will Flames now."
"Is that a bad thing or a good thing though?" Haru asked.
"We're not going to know until eight years from now when we see where we stand and compare it to what we saw then," Yamamoto said.
Haru nodded slowly and they drew up to Take Sushi and saw Ryohei jogging in place outside jabbing at the air with his wrapped hands. As soon as the Sun Guardian spotted them his voice boomed. "Good evening!"
Haru winced a bit at the volume and shook her head. "Good evening, Sasagawa-san," she greeted him.
"Let's get inside," Yamamoto said and moved to the door that slid open to reveal Tsuyoshi.
There was a grim look on the restaurant owner's face and Yamamoto frowned. "Is something wrong, Pops?" he asked.
He looked over the teenagers for a long moment and stepped aside. "Go to the back room we use for parties there are still customers here. I'll be there momentarily."
The teenagers headed for the indicated room and once they were behind the doors, Haru's phone came out and she composed a message to Lady Tomi requesting information about Kagami if possible and then sent a truncated copy of the letter to the e-mail program that would then send it out to the Vongola information net. Even though Haru was the one who primarily ran the net, most of the agents didn't know the origin of their orders nor where their information wound up—only that it was managed by a high-ranking Vongola member.
Just after she hit send, the door slid open and Tsuyoshi Yamamoto entered the room with a platter of sushi and one of the waitresses had a tray of hot green tea. The tray of tea was put down on the table and the waitress hurried back off to tend ot the main room of the establishment while Tsuyoshi fussed with the platter until the door shut behind her. "Have you heard of an organization called the Hermosillo?" he asked.
Haru's head snapped up. "What about them?" she asked.
"Some men came in claiming to be from there and were trying to extort 'protection' money from me," Tsuyoshi said grimly.
Haru's eyes met Yamamoto's across the table. "Is she really doing something that stupid?" she asked.
"She probably feels like she has an advantage over us," Yamamoto replied. "She's nothing if not an opportunist."
"Explain this to me," Tsuyoshi commanded.
The teenagers hesitated and the restaurant owner sighed. "I don't know how Takeshi got tangled up with the Vongola, but I'm not unobservant," he said. "I know that the 'mafia game' he once mentioned isn't a game anymore. Don't tell me stories of sumo wrestling matches and shooting stars. I've gathered enough tidbits together to piece things together, but I need full disclosure now."
The Tenth Generation Vongola Guardians looked over at Haru and, for the first time, she felt the full weight of the Vongola representative mantle settle around her shoulders. She had to make this decision. The Vongola Lightning ring that hung on a silver chain around her neck suddenly felt like a two-ton weight and the metal felt like it was burning into her skin. Irrationally she wanted to stand up and declare that she didn't want anything to do with this anymore and run as fast and far as she could. Her hands clenched and her nails dug into the fleshy part of her palm as her mind raced at a million miles a minute. Her phone lit up with an acknowledgment from Lady Tomi bringing her back to her senses and Haru took a deep breath trying to figure out where to start and how much she needed to disclose.
"The Vongola entrance to the Underground is in my dojo, do you think I'm oblivious, Haru-san?" Tsuyoshi asked a grim smile flickering across his features. "I have said nothing until now because it hasn't seemed important. They're threatening my home now."
"How much time do you have Yamamoto-san?" she asked.
"As much time as you need," Yamamoto's father said and settled down in an empty seat at the table with the young Vongola.
"Tsuyoshi-san knows now?" Akai asked.
The Hanatachi hitman met Haru just before she turned onto the street that led to the building that housed Gokudera's apartment. Yamamoto and Ryohei stayed at the sushi restaurant at Tsuyoshi's insistence to help them put a plan of action together in case the Hermosillo goons came calling since they both lived at the restaurant nowadays. Haru told Yamamoto that she was going straight home, but she was sure the baseball player knew otherwise. She'd talked Chrome into going back to their house after Haru had consulted her phone and found five different messages from Chiharu demanding where she was. Idly she wondered how long she was going to be able to dodge that bullet that was her housemate. "Officially, yes," Haru said. "I think he knew a lot more than he ever told us though."
"He did teach Yamamoto Shigure Soen Ryu," Akai said with a slight smile. "That isn't necessarily something a regular person knows..."
"Which Famiglia or Clan?" Haru asked.
Akai blinked and then shook her head. "No organization in particular, Tsuyoshi Yamamoto worked with almost everyone before he took over the family business from his father a bit over eighteen years ago and retired to start a family."
They reached the apartment and Haru dialed in the security code to get in and the two entered The motion sensor that was installed with some of the higher end tech equipment lit the apartment up as they passed the threshold. "Here's the map you requested," Akai said and presented the piece of paper. "I couldn't find anything on Kagami in the hour or so during your meeting, but I have feelers out to see if I can find anything from the Hanatachi sources."
Haru nodded, took the map with a word of thanks, and opened it on the large table that dominated most of the apartment. There were chairs arranged in groupings along the wall and two computers rested on desks in corners so that whomever was working with Haru at a given time had access to one. The kitchenette remained intact and was stocked with an array of nonperishable food supplies with a rice cooker and a hot water heater that kept water hot for when someone wanted some tea. Opening the refrigerator would reveal bottles of water and cold canned coffee, juice, and tea. If the panel was flipped on the blank wall leading to the door of what used to be the bedroom it would be dominated by another series of maps. The bedroom, Haru had converted to her office with a futon folded into the closet for the nights when she had to stay overnight for some reason.
Haru's eyes traced the borders on the new map and Akai handed over the brightly colored sticky notes Haru used to make notations. Haru picked up one of the pens from the container of writing implements and began to write things down in quick, neat handwriting that was a far cry from the loops and flourishes she'd used in the notes she penned to Tsuna while in the midst of her infatuation with him. A colorful array of highlighter marks started to take over the map as she marked each territory and then added in tabs of colored paper with a number kanji and a katakana that she filled in on the paper she was working with.
Haru's phone rang while she was at work and Akai picked it up to answer it at Haru's gesture. "This is Miura's phone," she said.
There was a long silence as the dark-haired woman listened to whomever was on the other end of the line. "Do your best to sidetrack her Chrome. We should be able to get what Haru wants done finished in the next hour or so," Akai said.
There was another pause. "We'll do our best."
Akai hung up and Haru looked at her as she made a final notation.
"It appears that Chiharu is wanting your company and is throwing a fit that you aren't home yet," Akai replied. "She's threatening to come find you."
Haru sighed. "I don't understand it," she said. "Chiharu..."
"Strikes me as a girl who's lived in a lonely world that wants someone to call her best friend," Akai stated. "However, she doesn't know how to interact very well on personal levels and so she winds up coming across as a petulant child."
"Intuition or information?" Haru asked.
"Both," Akai smiled.
"Who is she?" Haru asked.
Akai shook her head and gave Haru an apologetic look. "I can't," she said softly.
The brunette held Akai's brown eyes for a long time before she finally dropped her gaze. "Here's what I have so far," Haru said changing the topic.
Akai looked over what Haru compiled and then added in her own notations from what she'd gathered independently of Haru. Haru made more notes and then nodded. "I have enough to send an initial report to Judaime. We'll have to come back and see what else we can glean from these maps for me to give him a more detailed report and a few hours ought to at least get us some information from the networks."
"Chiharu isn't going to let you out of her sight tomorrow if she can help it," Akai murmured.
Haru wrinkled her nose. "I know. I'll figure it out," she said.
The girls finished their work and Haru flipped the blank panel to reveal the maps and pinned the new one to the board with the rest of them then flipped the panel to reveal the blank wall again. She ducked into the office to do something while Akai waited. They'd agreed Haru's office would be the one place Akai didn't go while she was in the HQ so that Haru could keep sensitive information that was Vongola eyes only somewhere that Akai couldn't claim to accidentally have found. Admittedly, Akai had gone into the office on a couple of occasions—she was one of the information gatherers for the Hanatachi—but she hadn't found anything, which meant Haru was either getting really good at hiding what she needed to or she had the information somewhere else Akai couldn't get to.
Haru emerged a few minutes later and the girls gathered their things and made sure everything else was put away. They exited the apartment and started down the staircase. "I'll walk you home then I have some work to take care of," Akai said.
"I can get myself home," Haru assured her.
"You could, but I won't let you," Akai said. "Even if you're only a representative and no one really knows you yet, you need to have some form of protection around you. Think about it. How often was Tsuna completely alone while he was here?"
"I'm not Decimo though," Haru frowned.
"No, you're not, but if something were to happen to you, there would be nasty consequences," Akai said.
Haru decided not to argue further with her friend and the two continued to Haru's house.
They turned onto one of the streets in the shopping arcade and Akai shoved Haru back as two men came flying out the shattered door of one of the businesses. They were followed by a dark-haired man with bloodied tonfas glinting in the streetlight. "Hibari-san!"
The head of the Disciplinary Committee didn't even spare her a glance and continued to pummel the men. "Akai..." Haru said helplessly.
"He's yours, do something about it," Akai said.
Haru activated her lightning ring and charged the white spikes that she extracted from her bag and flung them in front of the Vongola Cloud Guardian. Lightning crackled over the ground and Hibari's attention immediately focused on her. "Get out of the way, herbivore, I'll bite you to death."
Haru somehow managed to keep her expression calm as she watched Hibari Kyoya bring his tonfas to bear. Haru saw impending death barreling down on her and took a deep breath. "What exactly do you think you're going to accomplish with this?" she questioned.
There was a crash as his tonfas connected with concrete where she'd been standing before Akai hauled her out of the way.
Hibari scowled at the two girls who were now between him and his intended prey. Haru drew herself up and spoke to the Cloud Guardian, proud of her level tone despite the quaking in her limbs. "Wouldn't it be easier to follow this directly to the source?" she said.
That caught Hibari's attention and his tonfas lowered for the moment. "Speak."
"Someone is manipulating these people," Haru said nudging one of the still forms with the toe of her shoe.
"Who?" Hibari demanded.
"I don't know yet, I'm working on it," Haru said honestly, "but if you kill all of these guys, you permanently silencing any information that they may have."
Hibari snorted. "You bleat like a sheep, herbivore, stay out of my way. Do you have a better way?"
"Yes," Haru bit out.
"Prove it," Hibari growled. "Let's see what works best. Your method or mine."
With that he whirled around and stalked away, his jacket flapping in the wind that started picking up.
"One would suggest you find other ways of trying to corral him, Haru," Akai bit out. "He would kill you without a thought."
"I know."