That poor boy. My heart went out to him as he looked more and more freaked out as time went on. Then he fainted.

I waited for the pandemonium to move away a little from the unconscious civilian, then dashed out from my hiding spot to pick him up along with what he had been carrying and absconded. I had been running for a little while, when I saw the park up ahead and decided that it was a good place as any to put him down and tend to his injury. I placed him down on a park bench and reached for the tiny medical kit I had started to carry around with me.

I couldn't do anything about his broken glasses, but the cut on his cheek was easy enough to patch up. Actually, I probably should have left him alone, seeing as this boy was Irie Shoichi, but on the other hand, this boy was Irie Shoichi. If I talked to him now, I might be able to convince him to not shoot me with the ten year bazooka in the future and save myself from a whole lot of troublesome situations.

Also, I felt really, really sorry for him.

Spotting a popsicle stand near the playground, I decided to buy two, one for me and one for him, when he woke up. I took the wrapper off and started on it, wrinkling my nose in disappointment when I discovered that it wasn't quite sour enough.

A small groan sounded from beside me, alerting me to the fact that the red-head was waking up. He opened his eyes, and blinked blearily a few times, before focusing on me.

"What...?"

I smiled to put him at ease, and offered him the other popsicle when he sat up. He took it, after an unsure moment, then unwrapped it and started on it as well. We sat there in silence, eating the cold and sugary snack, while watching elementary school kids screaming and running around in the playground.

Shoichi finished his first, despite starting later, and sat there, clutching the popsicle stick, waiting for me to finish mine. I tossed what was left of mine into the bin beside the bench, and in reply to his quizzical look, shrugged and said, "It didn't taste all that good anyway."

"Oh."

We sat there some more in silence, before Shoichi spoke up hesitantly.

"Um, so..."

"You're welcome. I fixed the cut up as well, by the way."

He touched the bandaid on cheek.

"Ah. T-thanks."

"Don't mention it."

"Um, I'm Irie Shoichi. W-who are you?"

"You remember the half-naked guy with the bloated face earlier?" When he nodded, I pulled the hood of my hoodie down and continued. "That, was my brother. See the resemblance?" I pointed to my own face.

At this, he froze up, and looked at me warily. I laughed.

"Don't worry, I'm not going to strip and blow up or pull an illegal weapon out of nowhere."

The future fake Funeral Wreath waved his hands frantically in front of his face, babbling something something about not thinking that, even though he clearly had been. I laughed again at his flustered state, and after a minute, he joined in as well.

After we had gotten over our laughter, we began chatting normally. He wasn't a bad conversationalist, if a bit prone to stumbling over his words, although when we somehow reached the topic of science and robotics, his back straightened, and he began talking confidently as if he knew anything and everything about it.

"-so when science science science robots science science science circuits science science science programming science science science-"

Needless to say, I was more than a little lost. It must have showed on my face, because he stopped suddenly and flushed in embarrassment.

"S-sorry, I just..."

"Really like science?"

"Science covers a lot of other topics as well, but yeah, I do."

He flushed again as I chuckled.

"Well, it's been lovely talking to you, but it's getting late."

"Huh? Oh, sorry."

"It's fine. But before I leave, can you do me a favour?"

"What do you want me to do?"

"If you ever get your hands on a purple bazooka, don't shoot me, okay?" I laughed.

Thinking it was a joke, he replied, "Sure. But what about everyone else?"

"Everyone else is fair game."

We laughed again, and I took my leave.

That should do it.

"Ah, I forgot to give the box back to that onii-san!"

Irie Shoichi slumped back onto the park bench and ran his hand down his face, groaning. He had gotten so caught up in talking with the brunet boy that he had completely forgotten his original objective. He looked at the wooden box with the strange 'Bovino' marking beside him, and wondered what on earth he was going to do with it.

Shoichi sighed. There was no way in hell he was going back to that madhouse. Looked like the only option was to bring it home and hide it somewhere. He sighed again, and lifted the accursed object up.

Wha- Was it really this heavy before?!

Confused, he opened the container. There was another box inside. He opened that one as well, and discovered several - more than several - riceballs.

Did Onii-san leave them here?

Looking closer, he saw a note tucked into the side of the box. It had one word, 'Enjoy!'. He blinked at it, shrugged, and picked up one of the riceballs to take a bite.

People on the sidewalk stopped and blinked in shock as a boy with a face as red as his hair rushed to the fountain in the middle of the park and started gulping the water down as fast as he could.

Omake - I wanted to put this in, but I couldn't find the right place, so here's the first ever omake.

"How do you deal with all the madness that goes on in your house?" Shoichi asked in awe, after he realized I lived in the same house as those 'nutcases'.

I tilted my head, mulling his question over, and shrugged.

"Well, I guess, I don't?"

"What do you mean?"

"Most of the time, I'm out of the house anyways, and when I'm in the house, I just pretend I'm both blind and deaf."

I sparkle-smiled at him, and he sweatdropped.

"Y-you're amazing, onii-san."

I stopped sparkling and stared at him in slight surprise. Seeing it, Shoichi hurried to explain.

"Um, you never actually t-told me your name, so I just... Do you not like it?"

I started smiling again, except this time it was more borderline smirking than an actual smile.

"No, no, I was just surprised for a second is all. Call me that to your heart's content. I'm always willing to accept another sibling."

"U-um, thanks?"

As we continued talking, I mentally cackled in glee.

Ohohoho~ This could be fun.

Ah... I did it again. The crossdressing/mistaken gender thing. Eh. I'm not too happy about how I wrote Shoichi, but what's done is done.

Thanks for reading. Hope you enjoyed. Tell me if there's anything you particularly want to see.

Review?

Disclaimer: I googled the owner of KHR. What showed up wasn't my name. So there you have it. I don't own 'Katekyō Hitman Reborn!'.