Author's Notice: I don't know what I'm doing right now. I'm supposed to be uploading "The Woodbender", but there's something up with this writer's block. I hope I can get through this.

Anyways, I don't know if I wrote this in the summary, but this story is going to somewhat follow the canon storyline. Besides, I can guess some of you understand what the Guardians are like, personality wise, right? Haha, Tsuna's not going to be weak like this. He's going to receive training once the shock of becoming a boss is over in the next two chapters.

Disclaimer: I do not own Katekyo Hitman Reborn.

Chapter Three: Transition to the Present

"Okaa-san, are you okay?" He rushed down the stairs to the kitchen once he heard sniffling and cries from the only other person that lives with him.

He tripped on his own right foot while he tried to land on the last step. However, he was able slide through the kitchen entrance, and stopped in front of his beautiful mother, who was rubbing away the salty tears with the back of her hand.

Carefully, he sat on his knees, and gently touched his mother's knee with one of his chubby hands. He repeated his question once more and watched his mother lifted her head and gave an uneasy smile. Her long brown curls covered half of her slender face and her eyes were red from what he guessed was sobbing.

He continued to stare at her face, watching the smile disappear, and let the tension disappear from his body.

A larger, more delicate hand than his own touched his left shoulder. His mother bent forward, where she easily hugged him around the waist, and rested her chin on his other shoulder.

He felt a shiver down his spine when his mother exhaled softly near his ear, his feet shifting slightly to not agitate her. It was useless though as he could feel his body tense once more when he heard her breathing hitch in an uneasy pattern.

He removed himself from his mother and stared directly into the same eyes that looked exactly as his own, finally seeing the worry, anger, and apprehension.

"What happened?" He asked, unsure of what was going on with his only precious person.

He allowed his mother to place her head on his soft, fluffy hair. The only time his mother did that was when something was stressing her out, making her feel clingy to anyone. She was unable to respond calmly when a dire situation occurred and needed her mind to be distracted from the mess.

It took a few minutes for him to receive an answer, but as he listened to his mother's mournful voice; he wanted her to stop.

"Tsuna's acting just like his father. I feel happy that you're just as caring and-" His mother stopped talking. Her breath hitched one more time.

He couldn't lean his head back with his mother's face on the top of his, yet he knew that she was wearing such a melancholic expression.

He can imagine the firm lips that wouldn't smile, unfocused eyes that told everyone she wasn't in this world anymore.

But no, she's trying to protect herself. He consoled himself, knowing it's the only way that he wouldn't become mental either.

She was only coping.

He used his opposable thumbs to rub smooth circles around his mother's hand and waited in silence for her to calm down.

The weight on his head lessened and he finally looked up to where his mother gave a false smile. She looked off into the distance and eventually her face smoothed into a blank expression. That was another symptom that he knew was a "coping" technique.

He felt a surge of anger rush through his tiny body. He wanted to smack, hit, beat the person who made his dear mother cry just like the awesome robot in his favorite television show.

Yet, he knew there's another person that can make his most precious person feel better in an instant, and it was his papa.

'Papa's a strong person.' He thought, while he stood up, and wavered when he felt an itchy sensation in his calves. He ignored it and let go of his kaa-san's hands in order to get her attention by jumping up and down repeatedly.

'Papa's better than Roboto-san. He hugs okaa-san and she laughs so much.'

He patted her lap softly and got her attention. She gave a curious gaze with her eyes dull and empty. He tightened his hands into fists and stood determinedly. "Papa is coming home soon. So, don't worry too much Okaa-san!"

Then as if he activated a trigger, the tears started to form in his mother's eyes, and dropped to the ground.

He panicked and waved his hands around like there was a chaotic fire instead of his mom tearing up, and started to lean on his mother's chest to wipe away the tears.

"I'm really sorry; did papa hurt you or something?" He questioned and started to imagine his brave and courageous father with an evil smile and black cape.

'It's impossible. Papa would never do that to okaa-san.'

Papa was one of the most amazing people on the Earth; he could do anything. He was like a superhero.

He was always saving his okaa-san and him from danger. He can still remember the time when his father rescued him from that raving Chihuahua a few months ago.

He was playing with his red ball while his okaa-san was with his papa and a strange old man in the living room.

Then, he left his ball in the middle of the backyard, while he went to get some juice for a few minutes. But when he came back, he saw the Chihuahua chewing on his favorite ball, and started to bark at him. Even though he asked for it back kindly, it kept barking and growling with its beady eyes.

The rest of the dangerous memory disappeared in his mind and the only thing that he could remember after the panic were strong arms holding him. It belonged to his father, who started to bounce him up and down.

The sun was shining brightly; his papa smiled widely that ceased his crying and he grinned back.

He returned back to reality as his mother stood up from the chair and moved towards the sink. He walked by her side and waited for an answer.

He didn't have to wait as long as before.

She bent down to look directly at his eyes and she clutched his shoulders in a vice grip. Tsuna winced a little and his mother stopped, but nonetheless Tsuna could still see his okaa-san was deadly serious.

"Tsu-kun…" His mother said his name.

"Hai?" He waited for the reply.

His okaa-san sighed and brushed back his hair with a gentle touch. "It seems that Papa's going to be a little late coming home. He said that he's going to keep his promise later."

He stopped listening after he heard the words of 'papa' and 'late' together and tried to understand what the two meant together. His papa definitely promised him that he wouldn't be late anymore.

So many times he was rejected along with his mother. They were left behind with only a confident grin and tough posture from their only reliant figure. Now, his papa didn't only break his mother's heart, but tore his apart.

He moved himself away from his mother. He took a step back with wide eyes.

He didn't want to throw a childish tantrum that would upset his mother even more than what she's already dealing with, and tried to stop the little pauses that made his throat feel swollen. So, he gave a weak smile his mother would buy.

She ignored him while she dealt with her momentary disappointment and grief. Nodding along with her words, he turned around to exit the kitchen, and was about to leave to do something distracting; he thought of something that could give him a bit of hope for a few more days.

"Okaa-san, when is he coming home?" He asked and then he heard nothing else.

"Well Tsu-kun, it's going to be hard for me to tell because Papa wants to go on all these adventures for us." He turned around and saw his mother going off into her own world again with her brown eyes glazed. Her arms were by her side while she stood there in front of the sink with a dazed expression.

Using his chubby legs, he walked towards his mother and grabbed her right arm with both of his small hands. And though it took a bit of effort on his part, he was successful of leading his precious mother outside of the kitchen and into the living room, where a creamy-colored couch was placed at the back of the room.

Tightly gripping on one of her sleeve while the other was still holding her slender pale hand, he continued to lead her to the piece of furniture, and softly pushed her to the soft cushions. Then, he let her lie down and counted down from thirty.

She closed her eyes, and drifted off until he could see her chest move up and down calmly.

'Papa,' he thought as he got out of the kitchen and went up the stairs to his room. He was sure that his mother was going to be alright for a few hours and opened the door with a tuna sign.

'Papa's gonna come back for me and kaa-san.' He stubbornly thought and walked to a little desk that had multiple drawers. He opened one of them with slight difficulty. He heard a slight creak from the friction of the wood and metal. Moving some of the useless drawings that he made, he searched through the drawer.

CRASH

"Kaa-san!" Tsuna screamed out, looking around the room for his mother. But, he wasn't in his house.

He stared at the row of clean beds that were separated by white curtains. The rest of the room was colored white, including the floor, and he turned his head to the right to find a wooden desk placed in the corner.

"You're awake now?" He heard the squeaky voice that he only knew it belonged to the persistent devil-in-disguise, Reborn.

He switched the direction so he can stare at the suit-clad infant, who was standing on a wooden stool with an irritating smirk he kept seeing. The infant was holding the same ruler that Tsuna was smacked with and gave a yelp when the utensil transformed to a green chameleon with a bright glow.

The reptile flicked its tongue to lick Tsuna's cheek and climbed up Reborn's sleeve and jumped on his shoulder. The toddler gave a small smile that Tsuna saw as he petted the chameleon's head with a single finger.

However, he didn't care about the cute display and pointed an accusing finger at Reborn. "What are you doing here? How did you enter in the school in the first place?"

Reborn smirked, hopping from the stool to the bed and listed off each of his answers. "I'm here to help you Dame-Tsuna and I have secret passages hidden in the entire school."

Tsuna had a shocked expression, his mouth wide open, and he brought down his finger. "B-but, what about Hibari-san? Doesn't he know that a baby slipped through his gates and now-?"

"Shut up Dame-Tsuna, you're ruining the peace." Reborn muttered as he covered his tiny hand onto Tsuna's mouth and the teenager did nothing, but gave a glare at him. A few minutes passed; the silence stretched before Reborn released his grasp on Tsuna's lips. However once he let go, Tsuna continued to rant on.

"I had it with you! I don't know why you started to scam my mother into this con-act of yours and I don't know how a baby like you can talk. But, I'm not going to follow or listen to you just because you said so!" His voice rose higher and higher until Tsuna could only hear himself in the entire room.

When he stopped to take a deep breath, he saw that Reborn was staring at him with a gaze that said he should continue talking. However, that was only what Tsuna's intuition felt as he decided to go against his gut's feeling and stayed quiet.

"Sawada-san, if you're healthy enough to scream out non-sense in my office, then I'd suggest that you should leave my infirmary." Tsuna heard a strict voice right next to the exit and saw it was the school's nurse. She crossed her arms and wore a strict frown to make a point as she walked across the room to give a more potent glare.

"Sawada-san?"

"O-oh hai sensei, sorry about that," Tsuna apologized.

He removed himself from the covers and found his standard student slippers that were placed underneath the bed. He gave a wince once he felt the soreness return and bowed to the nurse in politeness. The woman seemed to ignore his greeting as she ripped the blankets and bed covers from where he lied down.

"Nasty little gaki," Tsuna heard her whisper under her breath and he visibly flinched at the insult. Shuffling his feet, he gave another hasty bow and left the room, knowing that the baby was right behind him.

Opening the door and closing it behind him, he let out a visible sigh and felt a light slap to his cheek. Automatically putting a hand on where he got smacked, he looked down and found that Reborn was giving an uncharacteristic frown at him.

He found himself becoming annoyed at the expression and asked with a grouchy tone, "What?"

The infant was silent and continued to stare until Tsuna felt like he was being analyzed. "What Reborn?"

He took awhile to answer and only replied to his question. "You should get some lunch Dame-Tsuna; otherwise how can I teach you to become Decimo of Vongola?"

Reborn walked to the stairway, where it would lead to the roof of the school building.

Tsuna began to open his mouth to give a protest on listening to a one-foot sized human, but was interrupted by a smooth voice.

"Is that you Tsuna?"

The teenager turned around and found it was Yamamoto-san, who was with two girls that he recognized: Sasagawa Kyoko and the new transfer student, Dokuro Chrome.

He gave a glance at the purple-haired girl and politely bowed to her. As he raised his head, he noticed that the girl returned the greeting, and took it as an unusual occurrence.

'She doesn't know about my nickname yet.' Tsuna thought, turning his attention to his crush since his first day in this wretched school.

He couldn't get the confidence to speak out a 'hello'. He was enraptured by her gentle beauty. Her amber eyes stared at him warmly just like an angel from heaven and her posture would be as confident as a popular student can be.

But without the arrogance, she was kind to everybody and can make anyone to be her friend with a blink of her eyelash. Yet, Tsuna knew that he can never be her friend- or even boyfriend- since he doesn't have a chance like the other boys in their school.

"Tsuna, do you want to have lunch with us?" The brown eyed teenager snapped out of his gazing and returned his attention to the baseball player. He was holding out an orange-colored bento and had a wide smile that was cheery and sunny.

He gave a mental sneer at the offer. 'It's nothing but a trick… they even got the transfer student and Kyoko-chan to get involved.'

Tsuna ignored Yamamoto's voice, giving a timid refusal and turned around to the end of the corridor.

He was about to take a step when he felt a hand on his shoulder and turned around to make a protest, when he saw it was the transfer student.

Her violet hair was tied up in an unusual pineapple style with one of her amethyst eyes covered by a skull eye-patch. She let down her hand when Tsuna stared at her with a kin of wonder and caution as she opened the flap of her bag.

'What could it be?' Tsuna thought, taking a step back, but stopped once the transfer student brought her stare towards him. She extended her arms and Tsuna looked down to see it was a bento that was wrapped with an orange cloth.

"Bos- Tsunayoshi-san," She said his name and pushed the bento in Tsuna's hands.

"Please have a nice meal." Hearing her soft voice, he almost dropped the lunch box to the ground when he felt something moist on his right cheek. Looking at the corner of his eyes, he saw that Chrome was kissing him with her eyes closed, and clumsily fell backwards.

"H-hai," he answered as he brought his free hand to his cheek, discreetly checking if Kyoko was watching them. And she was, but was staring with somewhat a joyful look on her face.

Yamamoto-san was holding the rejected bento in his hand with a death grip, and he looked somewhat wistful and jealous.

Rapidly shaking his head in dismay, Tsuna collected himself and held the lunch box as he continued to walk up the stairs with confusing thoughts.

He reached the final step of the stairwell and opened the doors of the roof top. Beams of sunlight brought warmth to his body.

He lied on the floor and listened to the sounds of chatter from the students down below. He placed the bento near him and watched as the clouds moved on peacefully and the breeze brought peace within him. Tsuna smiled, closing his eyes and thought back to the meeting five minutes prior.

Yamamoto's always there coincidentally to where he's around ever since that incident with Mochida-sempai. Tsuna frowned at the realization and asked, "What does he want?"

"What do you think that he wants Dame-Tsuna?" A squeaky voice rang in his ears and Tsuna shouted in fright. He sat up quickly and saw it was only his "home-tutor" sitting on the top of the wired fence.

"Can you stop popping out of nowhere like that?" Tsuna clutched his chest and started to breathe in deeply to stop the blood racing.

Reborn ignored the question as he jumped down and on Tsuna's lap as he continued to talk. "Can't you see when he asks you if you're alright or hurt?"

Tsuna scoffed, remembering that happy smile plastered on the baseball player's face. "He's going to be like all the others. I bet you it was only a prank for the rest of the student body to talk and laugh about later."

Reborn softly frowned at the pessimistic behavior and pursued on. "Dame-Tsuna, his intentions were good. Can't you see that he wants to be a good friend to you?"

'And how would you know?' Tsuna thought as he stared at the wide onyx eyes that belonged to the infant.

"I would know because you can see the honesty shining brightly in his actions." Reborn retorted as he jumped off and cocked his pistol at him. Tsuna shrieked and covered himself for protection. He moved his knees inside and covered his face with thin arms.

"HOW DID YOU KNOW WHAT I WAS THINKING?" Tsuna asked, peeking from a gap that was made from his hands. He used his knees to move himself backwards from each step that the intimidating infant made and felt his back against the rusty fence.

"Because I can read minds," Reborn smirked and then suddenly shot a bullet to the right as a twirling tonfa was headed towards Tsuna. The fourteen-year-old yelled in fright as the perpetrator arrived to the scene as it was the one and only: Hibari Kyoya.

He fainted and collapsed on the floor, never noticing that a faint frown was on the prefect's face.

"Why did you do that Arcobaleno?" Hibari asked.

He retrieved his tonfa and kicked Tsuna's body at least three meters away from the rusted fence.

Reborn raised an eyebrow, seeing the hidden intention of protecting the brunette from possible accidents and walked towards his unconscious student. He sat right next to Tsuna as he let his pistol transform back to Leon and watched Hibari inspect the slight dent on his tonfa.

"It was for Dame-Tsuna's protection. Did you need anything Kyoya?" Reborn replied back.

Hibari furrowed his eyebrows and turned to the staircase. Reborn smiled at the concern that the cloud guardian was giving to his student.

'But, this isn't going to work if we keep stalling on Tsuna' training. We have to tell him sooner or later. But first,' Reborn thought and raised a tiny hand.

He listened to the sound of the footsteps stop and waited for the guardian's attention. Once he heard the slight huff that only professional assassins can hear, Reborn spoke with a serious voice that was contrasting for a baby's.

"Gokudera and Lambo will be coming to Japan in two weeks. By that time, I want you to get all the information on where Mukuro is, and you can possibly get that through Chrome."

He could just imagine the perfect change his almost relaxed posture against the entrance door to a rigid stance. Reborn heard an affirmative 'hn' and waited till the fifteen year old walked down the stairs and to his office.

The infant turned around and looked at the unconscious Tsuna and asked himself, "How will this ever work out?"

"Mukuro-sama," a soft willow voice spoke out in the blank canvas of his mind and he imagined himself reappearing in front of his favorite toy.

He waited for his body and clothes to re-materialize as he spread out his hand in front of him. Then as if he knew what happened, Rokudo Mukuro closed his hands and a sharp trident appeared in his closed fist.

"Yes my dear Chrome?" His velvet-like voice spoke out in the dark space and listened patiently to the hesitance in his toy's voice.

"When are you coming here?" Her question makes him smile, taking note that the girl is still dependable on him, even though she could match with one of the other Vongola guardians with her own strength.

"Don't worry my dear Chrome. You shouldn't worry about me just yet." He reassured her, feeling a positive vibe in his chest and smirked. He knew for so long, his words can comfort the girl and her fears about anything.

There was a minute of silence before the female mist guardian began to fidget. He continued to look around, disdained at the bleak appearance of his old hideout.

"Hmm, my lovely Chrome?" He asked.

He gathered himself and then waited for the blank canvas to be painted with an explosion of colors. Soon, the white walls began to shift and swirl, colors blending with the white, and lines started to form shapes.

"Are you okay Mukuro-sama?"

He looked around seeing the canvas was finally turned to the same room it was before ten years ago. He smelled the dusty scent of the abandoned amusement park and laughed as he partially listened to Ken screaming his name in endearment.

"I'm perfectly fine."