Chapter 53:

And do all you can

Wow, so many of you signed up for the KHR Secret Santa! Thank you guys, and keep those requests coming in. It's going to be such fun.

Spaniards no longer have accents because you now know they are Spanish and I don't know how to write with a Spanish accent.

"Oi, why is that brat walking around? Shouldn't he be in the basement or something?" asks one man, watching as their bait walked freely around their kitchen with a glass of strawberry milk in his hands.

"But this Chico is just too cute to lock up." Gushes a woman with long brown hair.

"Basement? Why would I be there?" asks Tsunayoshi, looking at the man with huge brown eyes. Well, the brat was kind of cute, he had to admit.

The man sighs whilst running a hand down his face. "You're bait kid. That means you're attracting the fake Arco Iris here. They won't come and get you if you're not here." He glares at the woman to get his point across, but she just waves her fan and ignores him.

"Arco Iris? Don't you mean the Arcobaleno?" The man sighs and nods. "Well if they are coming then I'll just wait here for them." The man looked at the boy with wide eyes. "Are you friends with them?" Tsunayoshi asks.

"No." The man growls. "We're going to kill them." That's better, now the brat was shaking in fear, his bangs hiding his (most likely crying) eyes.

The woman pats Tsunayoshi's head gently. "You didn't have to tell him that, poor Chico."

"I'll never get you. What happened to the heartless woman that joined us four years ago?" The man asks, staring at the woman strangely.

"Mou~ I'm a woman you know, I'm allowed to gush over Chicos, especially when he's this adorab- Huh?" She looks down and finds her hand limply swinging by her side. The next thing she knows, she's being whacked on the head by her own fan. "Hey! Chic-" She didn't get to finish her sentence as she was slapped across the face with the fan.

She makes a grab for Tsunayoshi with her only working arm but he ducks with amazing speed and runs across the kitchen. The man laughs at his partner, being defeated by a brat. "Haha, you were saying? Ain't so adorable now is he?" But he should have been watching Tsunayoshi more closely, for suddenly he's hit in the back of the knees by a frying pan. He drops to the floor.

Tsunayoshi looks around for another weapon Luce-style. She could turn anything into a weapon. He runs to a cupboard and opens it before chucking out everything he finds in there. The cheese grater, the colander, mixing bowls, scales, half of an electric whisk, everything gets thrown towards the pair. As the man comes at him, arms raised against the flurry of kitchen utensils, Tsunayoshi grabs one of the heavy weights for the olden styled scales and drops it on the man's foot. He grunts before shouting out a few 'naughty' words.

On reflex trained by Luce of all people, he slaps the man's wrist. "No naughty words!"

He then does something he vaguely remembers Lussuria doing and kicks the man's knee cap. It lands mainly due to the fact that his target was hopping on that leg and as such had lowered manoeuvrability. Taking a few steps backwards, Tsunayoshi kicks the rolling pin by accident so he picks it up and holds it in a position he remembers seeing Tsuyoshi holding a bamboo stick in before. What had the restaurant owner done next? Oh yeah, raised it above his head and swung downwards.

So Tsunayoshi quickly raises the rolling pin into the air above his head, only to smack the woman who had been sneaking up behind him. "Ah, I'm sorry Miss." Quickly apologises Tsunayoshi before running over towards the sink. He grabs the bottle of washing up liquid and squeezes the bottle in the direction of the woman. A bright blue liquid jets out and covers the woman.

"You got my dress dirty! It was designer!" she growls.

"But you're going to kill the Arcobaleno. I won't let you do that." Tsunayoshi retorts, giving them a downright icy glare. This makes the pair stop for a second. The man was the best phantom assassin in Spain and even some of his colleagues didn't have heart stopping glares like that. But then again, you had to consider who the brat had been brought up by. He was certainly interesting. "You can't kill them. Killing is naughty!" Tsunayoshi wouldn't be able to handle it of one of them disappeared. "You're just naughty people who are jealous of the Arcobaleno."

And that's when the door opens.

Lal stomps down the stairs towards the basements with Colonnello following behind her, tugging her arm backwards.

"Lal, don't go in there, kora! You know how Verde gets when he's like this. You might die!" Colonnello pleads, trying his best to pull her in the opposite direction. Lal growls before turning around and pulling on Colonnello, causing him to trip. She adds to his decent down the stairs with a kick to his rear end. Colonnello rolls down the stairs, crashes through the door to the Laboratory of the World's Best Scientist, before coming to a sudden halt against a metal table. Colonnello remained curled up, waiting for Verde's wrath at being disturbed. But nothing comes so he carefully peeks up. Verde is sat at his computer typing away frantically.

The screens infront of him flash and beep before Verde stops and pushes himself away from the keyboard. Lal walks past Colonnello, giving him a kick for his stupidity. Before she met Verde she would have told off and slapped into oblivion anyone who had said they were scared of a scientist. Now that she did know the scientist, she would just nod and agree with anyone who made that claim.

"Rosa-sinensis." Verde says, still staring at the screen.

"What about roses?" asks Lal, coming up to see what was on the screen. "Apart from in a few gardens there are no roses on Mafia Row."

"Rosa, not rose." Verde states emotionlessly before turning around and picking up the red stained shoe. "The stain on here is not Tsunayoshi's blood. I've checked the DNA and it's not a match. The blood isn't even human. On this shoe is a mixture of Bull's blood and the Rosa-sinensis, more commonly known as the Spanish Lady Hibiscus. The Bull's blood belongs to a special species of Bulls specifically cross-bred for the Bull run at Pamplona. The flower too comes from that particular area of Spain. That's as far as I can pinpoint his location. They used real blood to fool us into thinking they had harmed Tsunayoshi. The flower must be a clue to finding them."

Lal nods before taking out her cell phone and calling Reborn. She tells him the information Verde had found before hanging up. "Reborn said it's useful in narrowing down the kidnapper candidates."

A gun shot fills the air. "I will kill any slackers without mercy." Reborn growls, before the team of people before him get back to work in a fear filled they were Mafioso, but this was Reborn they were dealing with, the Mafia's best hitman. He could aim, shoot and kill all in under a second. Plus the Arcobaleno were on edge at the moment due to the loss of their child. No one wanted to mess with them at the moment.

Luce comes over and presses an espresso into his hand. "Calm down Reborn, they are working as fast as they can. People who are pushed beyond their limits make mistakes." She soothes, trying to make him calm down. She may be slightly immune to Reborn's killer aura, having lived with it on a daily basis, but normal Mafioso were not, poor darlings.

"Then they aren't trying with their Dying Will." Reborn retorts before taking a sip of the strong black coffee.

"Reborn." says one Mafioso, coming to stand up near them. "With the information Verde gave us, we are able to eliminate 21 Famiglia candidates from our list. That leaves us with 3." Pamplona was an area in Northern Spain. It wasn't big enough to have more than three Mafia Families in the surrounding areas.

"Hand me the list then idiot." Growls Reborn. Luce sighs before whacking Reborn with the mouse of a nearby computer.

"Reborn, what did I just say? I used to be a Boss, I know these things." As such, she gently takes the list from the man before Reborn can violently snatch it. "Geez, who put a bee in your bonnet?"

"In case you've forgotten Luce, Tsunayoshi has been kidnapped." Reborn reminds, eyes flashing in anger.

Although he wasn't expecting the pitying look Luce gave him. "Then you must be doubting yourself Reborn. If you believe that Tsunayoshi cannot defend himself long enough for us to find him then you should remember all the training not only you but the others have given him. Have a little faith Reborn. And stop expecting the worst." Before Reborn can snarkily retort back she flips open her phone and makes a call. "Hello, Frankie, it's Luce. I've got some names here for your contact to have a look at…"

Black.

That was all Tsunayoshi could see. Was he dreaming? Was it that his eyes were closed? Ouch. No they were open alright. So why couldn't he see anything?

Tsunayoshi shivered. It was cold where he was. His throat hurt, his tongue was dry and his stomach gnawed hungrily at him. And he had a headache worse than taking a ten tonne Leon-Hammer to the head. He didn't know how long he had been here. But something tells him it's the next day's afternoon. Had they knocked him out for that long? He didn't remember much after spraying washing up liquid at this woman and the door opening. He did remember losing the following fight though.

It was dark in here. The dark was scary. He didn't know what was out there in the dark. All of the others had drilled the importance of knowing everything about your surroundings into him, and not knowing terrified him. He hadn't been this scared since he had entered Bermuda's house in the dark for the first time.

"Hello, is anyone there?" He shouts. Not getting an answer, he attempts to move and get up. But something holds him back. Tugging on them he hears a rattling sound. He knew that sound; it was the sound that Skull and Bermuda's chains made. And there was something cold around his wrists. Wait, these cold bracelets were attached to chains, and those chains were attached to… a wall?

He was trapped?

No, he couldn't be. That wasn't possible! He had to go back and check that Viper had made it home safely. He wanted to go back! He didn't want to wait for the Arcobaleno here if someone was going to kill them instead. They weren't the Arcobaleno's friends at all!

He tugs desperately on the chains. "Reborn!" Someone had to be able to hear him. He had to let them know he was here. "Colonnello! Fon!" Both were strong, they could get rid of these chains. "Bermuda! Skull!" They had chains themselves, they should know how to get these off him. "V-Viper! Verde!" C'mon someone, anyone. "Lal!" Where was everyone? He was all alone and he didn't like it! "Luce? Mamma Luce!" Please, he wanted to go home.

"Hey, it's going to be alright." Says a voice in the darkness. Tsunayoshi jumps and scrambles away from the voice until the chains pull taught. "The Arcobaleno will come and save you. You believe in them right?" He thinks he recognises that voice. "Damn this cell, why are they never nicely lit?" Something chinks before a tiny flame appears. Tsunayoshi looks away from the light since it hurts his eyes. But he eventually gets used to it and turns to identify the phantom voice.

"Are you who I think you are?" Tsunayoshi asks, peering at the man before him.

"I am." The not-stranger agrees. "But how do you know that?" he asks suspiciously.

"A picture." Tsunayoshi replies before tapping his head. The stranger nods, committing this piece of information to memory.

"How are you feeling, anywhere hurt?" The adult asks in a concerned voice.

"I am a little hungry." Tsunayoshi admits. That was an understatement though. He hadn't gotten around to lunch yesterday before these naughty men had taken him away, which meant he had gone a whole day without food. For a child like him that was the same as a whole week without food.

The adult chuckles. "That's all your worried about? But then again that was the exact same thing I said last time I was captured." There is a rummaging sound and the flame flickers with the movement. "Good thing I came prepared." The next thing Tsunayoshi knows some green grapes are presented to him. "They'll ease your throat before I give you some proper stuff. Can't have you starving now."

After Tsunayoshi has eaten, the man comes closer and lifts up Tsunayoshi's arm. "I can't remove these for you or else they'll know someone came in here. Nor am I allowed to help you escape. But what I can do is fix your injuries for you." Tsunayoshi nods, wondering why the man can't help him escape. He has a feeling that he shouldn't ask though, so he doesn't. "Tell me if anything hurts when I press on it." Tsunayoshi nods.

After a little examination, the man sighs. "Its not the worst damage I've ever seen before. You'll live. I'll stop these cuts from bleeding though, but otherwise there isn't much else that needs fixing." He reaches into his coat pocket before pulling out a canister and spraying it onto Tsunayoshi's wounds. The little boy hisses in pain but doesn't move. "Where I come from we call these Invisible Plasters. It's like an ordinary plaster in the way it stops things entering the cuts and stops the bleeding, but no one can see it."

There is a beeping sound along with a flash of light from what looks to be a watch. "Uh-oh." The beeps decrease in number, almost like a countdown "Goodbye, little one. Stay Strong."

There is one final beep.

"Um, what was that?" asks Tsunayoshi, but no reply is forthcoming. And then the light blinks out, rendering him back into total darkness.

All facts that Verde came up with are generally false for once. However I couldn't find a flower that only grows in Spain, so I had to make it up. There really is a flower called the Spanish Lady and that is it's latin name, and it does grow in Spain, but I think it grows in other places too. I do not know whether the Bulls in the Pamplona run are bred specifically for the event or not either.

Hope you all liked Tsunayoshi's point of view. See you next time!

Phantom Hitman 1412

First Published 15 November 2012