"Ughhh..." Tsuna let out a long sigh. "No business, huh? Well..."
"And the invisible magic shield, immortal, whatever you have." Xanxus glared at him with pure hatred, clearly furious about this so-called "magic shield."
"Shield?" Tsuna's expression soured. He let out a deep sigh as Xanxus fired another shot at him, as if to confirm what they had just seen. Just like before, the bullets simply hit an invisible barrier and ricocheted. It was a good thing everyone there had quick reflexes, or there would have been some fatalities.
"Did you really have to do that?" Tsuna muttered, pointing at the new holes in the walls. "You're paying for those." He didn't have a single credit card or any money on him, and he certainly didn't want to explain that to Reborn.
"You're covered, brat. Now, talk." Xanxus wanted to know what the hell was going on.
"I can teach you something even worse than that magic shield," Tsuna said, now annoyed. "What I'm offering is quite viable. Do you want to see it?"
"Nothing can be worse than that demon-shield..." Xanxus muttered a few words that no one should have said in front of the creature now before them.
What they were seeing was a shapeless creature made of pure fire. The only thing with a discernible form was its face, which had two large red eyes, black cat-like pupils, and many, many sharp fangs. In fact, now that they were looking at it closely... Yamamoto wanted to laugh, and Gokudera swallowed hard.
"Tsuna, Natsu, I think you can stop now."
"Why?" The figure spoke in a deep voice. "Why should I stop, you unhappy humans? I'm going to kill you all..." It seemed to say the last part slowly and sadistically.
With that, the figure lunged toward Xanxus with its mouth open, as if ready to devour him. It passed by Yamamoto, missing its prey, but it did ignite the baseball player's clothes before launching itself again at incredible speed. What made everyone break out in a cold sweat was that not only the bullets, but everything they threw at it, was bouncing off and burning.
"Stop at once, Tsuna!" But "Tsuna" didn't seem to hear him; he seemed determined to eat Xanxus first.
Nono was about to intervene, though he had no idea how to stop something that repelled everything, when he noticed someone hiding between his legs...
"...If you're here..." The lion cub let out a whimper and ran to hide under a table.
Gokudera and Yamamoto exchanged a glance. That meant Natsu had no part in this. But what the hell were they supposed to do now?
"Any ideas?" Xanxus shouted, ready to blow off the roof and get out of there. He had no idea if the thing could fly, but considering it floated...
Without thinking, Yamamoto went to find Natsu. He was the only one who could give them any idea of what was wrong with Tsuna. Strangely, the cub still whimpered but allowed himself to be picked up and then hid in Yamamoto's arms. Natsu was scared, but he had never attacked anyone before. It didn't make much sense. But if Natsu could feel what Tsuna felt... then Tsuna must have been scared. But what could have possibly scared him? It didn't make any sense.
"Hey, Gokudera, try to grab him by the tail. It's the only thing I can think of to get his attention."
"Are you crazy?! I'll get burned for sure!"
"Just do it. We have to get his attention somehow."
Natsu was ready to attack, but he didn't want to hurt anyone. He was just scared. Maybe Tsuna felt threatened? He couldn't just be annoyed or irritated; that had nothing to do with fear. But if Tsuna felt threatened, what exactly was he feeling threatened by?
"Grrrrrrrrr!" The creature roared and turned its gaze to Gokudera, opening its mouth again and launching itself toward its new prey.
However, it ended up biting Yamamoto's arm, who had stepped between them after entrusting Natsu to Nono. Yamamoto couldn't help but groan. The teeth, even though they were made of fire, were sharp. But just as he suspected, Tsuna didn't really want to hurt anyone. He could have injured him more, but he was simply biting lightly with an expression—if you could call it that—of fury and was, apparently, growling deeply. If the situation wasn't so critical, Yamamoto would have joked about Tsuna acting like a surly cat and asked how he made those non-human grunts.
"Sometimes that guy gets into the brute..." G complained with a grimace, with several people nodding and others just watching.
"He's testing them," Giotto said seriously. "He wouldn't do something like this just because... He's taking advantage of the fact that Nono is here. He's the only one who can stop him if none of them manage to do it themselves."
"By becoming a popsicle?" Tsuna's future self seemed to have serious issues.
"In that state, he would last a maximum of one minute before breaking free," Giotto commented calmly. "The boy is skilled at freezing and thawing."
"...Let me guess..." Asari was going to regret saying this: "You've been stalking him."
"No, boredom does a lot of things. In his case, he developed unique abilities, like that dragon you're seeing."
"You're a stalker, Giotto, admit it, nufufufu..."
Unable to help himself, Giotto gave them "the look." Everyone fell silent, putting an end to the jokes. When Giotto used "the gaze," the best thing to do was shut up, whether they were ghosts or not.
"Ma Ma..." Yamamoto placed his free hand on the creature's nose—or what he thought was its nose—and ignoring how hot it was, he began to stroke it as if trying to calm a small lost animal. "That's enough, don't you think, Tsuna?"
Nothing changed, making Yamamoto break out in a cold sweat. How the hell was he supposed to calm him down? Tsuna was apparently listening, but...
"You'll have to pay for that, you brat."
Apparently, that was not the right thing to say, and Xanxus felt a stinging slap in response. Yes, Tsuna was listening.
"Come on, Tsuna, you've already shown us your little dragon or whatever this is," Yamamoto continued, acknowledging that it was scary—very scary. Everything bounced off it and/or burned. "Could you go back to normal now? You're going to cook me."
Apparently, that last part was what he needed to say because the flames lost their shape and dissipated little by little.
"It worked," Nono said with a tone that meant, I can't believe it, they did it.
"Don't tell me this was a test," Gokudera complained, still scared.
"There are only three ways to stop me while I'm in that state." Tsuna held up a finger. "One is to get tired, which could take several hours." He held up a second finger. "Another is to turn me into an ice cream popsicle like Grandpa did with Xanxus." A third finger went up. "And the last one... well, I think that's what you did: calm me down. I congratulate you. In that state, I'm not reasonable at all; quite the opposite."
The flames were completely gone, revealing Tsuna in his Hyper Dying Will Mode, which then also disappeared.
"...You have to be kidding me." Xanxus complained, getting up from the ground. "Why did you do that, then?"
"Just so you know..." Tsuna looked at his grandfather. "Let go of Natsu, you little cheater." The last part was said with a smile, addressed to the cub who jumped into his arms, still afraid but quite happy. "You weren't supposed to help them." The boy half-scolded the puppy while playing with him. Then he paused. "Right, the magic shield is the friendliest version of this you just saw."
Everyone was stunned, but Tsuna continued his explanation as if nothing had happened:
"X-Dragon came from Natsu's dragon form. Theoretically, it works in the same way, but practically, not so much. In essence, it's a simple envelope of flames, a dense amount of flames, around my body that I mold into a shape... in my case, a dragon. As for the attack reflex, it's due to the density of the flames and a certain mixture I took out of the Zero Ice Punch..." He paused. "Yes, I was very bored."
"Show me..." Tsuna was quite irritated. He couldn't find anything to do, nothing to distract him. He didn't want to go to his room and lock himself in his bubble of depression. "What the hell do I do?!"
The answer came in the form of an angel. No, seriously, it arrived in the form of an angel, literally. Someone had thought it was a good idea to put an ice sculpture of an angel in the garden. And it fell on him—or almost fell on him, rather.
"...Maybe the sun did its thing, or someone wanted me to die in the arms of an angel," he muttered to himself, looking at the now-melted angel on the ground. "...But now I have an idea of what to do."
With the idea in his head, he headed to his personal training room. It must have been full of dust, but it was guaranteed that no one would be there, nor would they hear or see him. Not a thing. Though he didn't know why he cared so much about it; the Christmas festivities would take up almost everyone's attention.
"Explanation of why you become unreasonable?"
"It's just that I only get it right if certain conditions are met." Tsuna pointed to Natsu as a reference. "You've already seen them. Besides, I don't see anything in that state. I just follow the sounds and my Hyper Intuition, so you can imagine..." He grimaced. "That, and that state was made for defense. It doesn't have great power behind it, but it's not easy to get through." He paused. "Anyway, the magic shield, the X-Cloak, is, as I said, the friendliest version of the X-Dragon." He paused again. "That 'barrier' is nothing more than a dense—a very dense—layer of my flames. It's tiring beyond belief, and it has a limit. It's not perfect... in fact, it's more useful the more visible it is, just like the X-Dragon. And to do it, I have to be very concentrated; otherwise, it's useless." He sighed deeply.
"..."
"Yes, I was bored, okay?" Tsuna decided to sit down. He still had to explain. "As for the sun flames..." He paused to think about his words. "Not all the time will there be someone who can heal me, and the situation can get ugly in mere seconds."
"Ughhh..." He tried to stifle the moan as best he could and headed to his room, trying not to leave a trail of blood on the floor.
There was no point in going to the infirmary; there was no one there, and even if there was, they wouldn't want to attend to him because they were afraid of him. No, there was no point in going there. But...
"Ah..." He moaned, unable to help himself, and tried his best to close the door.
But he needed medical attention. He wasn't even sure of the severity of his injuries. Asking someone would be stupid; no one would answer, and most of the staff of the mansion had gone out to repair the damage. Perhaps it was his fault for facing those murderers alone. He deserved it, he admitted. He was nothing more than a monster who deserved death. But... he didn't want to die like this, not in this way at least. With a great sigh, he threw himself into his bed as best he could to avoid pain, not caring about staining everything with blood, because that wasn't important. The important thing now was how he was going to heal his wounds.
He might as well use the first aid kit if there weren't so few things in there. He hadn't bothered to change it, and that was obviously a serious mistake now. He could tear up some suits and use the fabric as a bandage and apply pressure if he had the will to get up and do that, because the clothes he was wearing would only make things worse. In reality, he was ready to fall into unconsciousness. He had neither the will nor the strength to get up, and he was wounded in many areas. He couldn't stay like this; he was bleeding a lot, and even in this state, he knew that was bad.
He could die if he fell asleep like this, just as he could live, wake up in pain and weak. He couldn't say. If he died, they would come back, or so he thought, but not to see his body—that was obvious. What exactly could he do? It was something hypocritical, really. He wanted to die, and he could die from this... and yet he didn't want to die like this. What a hypocrite he was, a naïve man really. But none of this was helping him. He felt that things were starting to move on their own. Well, they said that the Sky Flame could open all the boxes, that it had some properties of the other flames. If the latter was true... Maybe... maybe he could use the healing properties of the Sun Flame if he wanted to? It didn't hurt to try.
"It occurred to me to try one day when I cut myself with a piece of paper—don't laugh—and after a while, it worked. So I kept practicing and practicing." He paused to caress Natsu, who purred softly in his arms. "Honestly, though, I trust Oni-chan more than myself."
"You mean the grass head? You have to be kidding."
"He knows what he's doing, Gokudera-kun. I don't know what I'm doing."
"Ahg..." He bit his lip. Maybe this hadn't been one of his best ideas. But at least it was stopping the bleeding.
Although... how long had he been in this state exactly? It was difficult for him to focus on anything. Everything was moving, and there were even doubles. Maybe he had lost a lot of blood, and none of this made sense anymore. But what could a monster like him know? With another soft moan, he moved a little to try to reach his right leg without producing more pain than necessary, and he still had other areas that were still bleeding. He was probably losing track of time... but... at least... he had... what...
"Ughhh..." Who the hell left the curtains open? The sun was a terrible alarm clock.
The answer was himself; only he could have done it. No one came to this room anymore, not even to clean. With another complaint to himself, he got up to start the day, or rather, deal with it. A sharp pain shot from his leg to his heart, and not only from there, but also from his torso, a thigh, and even an arm. The pain left him gasping for a moment, and then he remembered what had happened the other day. Almost curiously, he moved his injured arm to get a good look. It wasn't quite healed, but it had worked. He just had to finish the job.
"Then there's only one solution to that problem," Timothy interjected before the boys could jump in to contradict Tsuna again. "I'm sure Reborn already has plans for you, boy. He's the Arcobaleno of the Sun after all. Why didn't you tell him that you have problems with that? Maybe it doesn't seem like it, but Reborn is an expert in that area."
"...Wait, you're telling me that Reborn, the best hitman in the world... a murderer... is an expert in the healing area?" Even Xanxus expected anything but what happened next. "Pffff, I already knew that. Reborn is an expert in almost everything, and if he finds an area where he's not an expert, he specializes." The appearance of surprise on Tsuna's face changed drastically to one that said, Don't tell me...
"Then...?"
"I didn't want them to know yet," was the simple answer. "Besides... I don't think there are many..."
"You are the only Sky user, with no apparent second flame, who has used his flames to use the abilities of another flame that he doesn't possess," Gokudera kindly supplied.
Tsuna looked at him with an unfriendly face, and Natsu growled, indicating that perhaps that was a bad choice of words to give him that information.
"Thank you for the tip, Gokudera-kun..." He sighed deeply. "As for activating my Hyper Dying Will Mode without help..." They all leaned in, maybe they could help the Tsuna of this time with this information. "I honestly don't know how it started; it just happened."
Tsuna shrugged at the end, being totally honest, not even bothered or impressed by the "You're joking, aren't you?" faces he was receiving from everyone present. Simply put, Tsuna just continued his life until at a random moment he stopped needing the pills for some reason that didn't make much sense. Maybe Tsuna was lying to them... In fact, he could have been lying to them from the beginning, which was the safest thing to do.
"I didn't have my pills at the time, and I really needed to go into that mode, so maybe you could say that necessity was what happened," Tsuna shrugged, almost bored now. "But it's a lot faster than digging into my pocket, or wherever, for the pill box, taking out the pills I need, and then swallowing." He whistled in appreciation. "It's much less problematic and incredibly faster." Then he clarified: "It's not that it's easier."
Well, they couldn't blame him for lying. He was just taking care of himself, and it would be pretty weird and complicated to explain the whole truth without compromising anything. In fact, they would probably be peppering him with questions if they didn't know he was a Tsuna from the future, because there were so many loopholes and nonsensical things. It was impossible for him to have learned all that in such a short time or not to have been discovered before.
"Any other—HHIIIIIIEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!"
"Tsuna-san!"
Xanxus was the only one who didn't laugh when he saw Tsuna trying not to fall with Natsu in his arms and Haru hugging him from behind. Unfortunately for Tsuna, he failed and ended up on the ground with Haru in a bear hug. Natsu had jumped out of his arms and had taken refuge behind Gokudera, half-crying and half-upset that he had to abandon his master. None of them would say it out loud, but it was a real relief to see Tsuna like this, to hear him scream like that more than anything. It was not only funny but comforting to know that that part of him hadn't been completely lost; you just had to give him a good scare.
"Tsuna-nii!"
"And here go the other two..."
"Wait, I'm missing!" Fuuta complained before joining his brothers.
"Ugh..." was all that could be heard from the poor victim.
From the door, Kyoko and the others could only smile, laugh, and even tease poor Tsuna, who was being crushed by several people. Yamamoto and Gokudera were healed by the boxer, and Tsuna was still trapped. In fact, most of them settled in, and he was still trapped.
"Hey, witch, let Juudaime go! You're going to kill him." Gokudera complained, debating whether he should interfere or not.
"Haru is not a 'Desu witch!'" The girl complained, puffing out her cheeks.
And the fight of the century began there. Tsuna, from the ground, just sighed deeply and then smiled. She had missed these disasters, definitely. For once, he wouldn't complain. How many years had it been since he had seen a large part of his family reunited with him? He didn't want to answer that question, but he knew it had been a few.
"...How strange that Tsuna-kun hasn't complained that we're demolishing the house," Kyoko murmured to herself, a little surprised and remembering that Tsuna was there.
Chrome, who heard her, only smiled slightly and pointed her trident toward a corner of the room, as if she were telling a secret. Kyoko followed the direction indicated... only to see Tsuna sitting on what appeared to be the remains of a couch, smiling enormously and laughing from time to time, watching everything that was occurring like a child receiving a Christmas present. She smiled subconsciously, but that smile fell almost immediately. Had he been like this in the last few hours?
She watched him for several more minutes, seeing how happy he was in the face of the whole mess but not making much noise or interfering, either to cause more chaos or stop it. On any other occasion, she would have just smiled and forgotten about it, but this time she couldn't. Hadn't this Tsuna seen this kind of chaos? No, it couldn't be that; he would be super scared or upset if it were. Maybe he missed this? It sounded better, more in line with what she was seeing, but still...
To miss it, you have to go through a long absence first. If Tsuna missed this, did it mean that he hadn't witnessed this for a while? The boys couldn't stop causing chaos wherever they went; sooner or later, this had to happen. For some reason, the more she thought about this, the more sadness she felt toward this particular Tsuna. An enmity perhaps, many missions perhaps, or perhaps he didn't have much time to see them, or perhaps he was alone for a long time before coming to this time?
She didn't think that in the future they would let work get in the way of their friendship, but what the Yamamoto of the future said made her doubt. Kyoko sighed deeply and looked away for a moment. There was no point in wondering about any of that now. They didn't have enough information to put the puzzle together, and forcing things... It wouldn't turn out well; they had already seen what might happen, after all. Still, though...
"Boys!" Some looked at her; others just gave her a bad look, grunted, or complained, or all at once. "To him!" She pointed to Tsuna, one of the few who was safe, and who stopped smiling at the sudden change of attention.
"C-Guys..." Tsuna whispered fearfully, trying to hide behind the sofa, or the first thing he saw.
Natsu had been the smarter of the two and had returned to his ring when all eyes fell on his poor master as if he were a strip of bacon to be devoured. Tsuna was strong; he would survive whatever everyone was going to do to him, or so Natsu wanted to believe. For his part, Tsuna wasn't sure if he would get out of there alive and was a little upset with Kyoko for selling him to the wolves. If there weren't so many... Tsuna shuddered, and in less than a second, his life passed before his eyes at an alarming rate, followed by the asphyxiating death—all on top of him—and then in a coffin in who knows where.
"Be a good boss and stay still, Tsuna~"
Even if Tsuna had wanted to stand still, he couldn't. He had no time for anything but screaming and groaning as he was crushed, then laughing hysterically from the tickles, pats, slaps, and other friendly, painful acts inflicted upon him. Amidst the laughter were pleas, groans, and even kicks, but that didn't stop anyone from pestering Tsuna. The kicking was more of an instinctive reaction than anything else and was easily solved with a rope. What they didn't know was how long the rope would last; Tsuna was strong, and they weren't being very gentle. The hands were much less worrisome and were easier to capture.
"You'll faint if you keep this up," Nono pointed out with a bit of sympathy as he watched the poor victim turn bluer by the second.
"Oops..." they all thought in unison when the sudden movement, laughter, groans, and pleas ceased.
After some apologies and fighting, Tsuna was accommodated in his bed and freed from the restraints they had placed on him to prevent him from moving or kicking. Some of them were a little embarrassed, others were just satisfied that they had somehow gotten their revenge on the boy, and some were a little worried about how Tsuna was doing and how he would react once he woke up. But none of them could deny that it felt incredibly good to do so much evil to Tsuna, get away with it, and make him laugh and cry so much at the same time.
"It seems that the future of that Tsuna is quite focused on your absence more than anything, don't you think?" Nono muttered to himself, analyzing everything he had seen and not addressing anyone in particular.
Apparently, Tsuna had been alone for a long time if something like this—where he would normally be losing his mind over all the chaos, according to what Reborn had told him—made him so happy. So happy, in fact, that he enjoyed it and let them make as much of a mess as they wanted, not bothering to even open his mouth to say anything, just enjoying the view. From what he had read between the lines when Primo "talked" to him, Tsuna was a fairly kind, polite guy and, depending on his mood, could be sadistic with other people. But he was also very sensitive when it came to himself, because for some reason Primo had been very specific in telling him to be careful what he said in front of him and not to point out any defects... or they would have another "talk." Unable to help himself, Nono shuddered at the memory. He wouldn't get involved in anything that had to do with finding out the "past" of this Tsuna. He would just wait, like the good grandfather he was.
"B-But—"
"Having finished our friendly chat regarding Tsunayoshi, I would like to let you know how pleased I am with your decision..." Cousin smiled kindly, extended his hand, and touched one of the stacks of paper on the desk. "Giving you this gift, I hope you enjoy it."
And just like magic, the pile was transformed into 30 more, each containing approximately 2,000 documents. He felt like he was going to faint, but Primo wasn't done yet.
"And to help you with your hard work, I'll leave this for you too." With another wave of his hand, a pen appeared on top of the desk. "For every document you sign with this pen... I'll let you find out for yourself." He smiled sweetly and said goodbye with: "You have a day to finish, ciao~"
Almost in a trance, Nono slowly sat down, took the pen, and signed a piece of paper... he signed it again, and again, and again... and then moved on to the next document. He signed it only once and waited about a minute... the signature appeared and disappeared faster than the blink of an eye. He looked at the original again; the signature didn't change. Feeling as if he was in hell and about to curl up into a ball and cry, he proceeded to re-sign the second document.
Leaving the horrific memories for a moment, Nono wondered what could have happened to make Tsuna so sensitive about himself. From what he saw today, his family was more involved in all this than it seemed; maybe they were even the reason why he was here and for his strange behavior. No one knew for sure when this Tsuna actually appeared, and it was best to leave it at that. Tsuna didn't know that they knew more than they should, and for some reason, he pretended (or tried) to be the same old Tsuna. It had to be a very good reason if even Primo showed up to "clarify" certain things. He was getting too old for these things, he thought. He wanted to do more, but for various reasons, he could not.
He blinked slowly, feeling silly, as if he had swallowed a bag of candy whole. If he had, he hoped there was some other spare bag; the last thing he wanted at that moment was to hear Lambo cry, even though the boy had a lot of candy, courtesy of his mother. Speaking of sweets, he wanted to eat a good ice cream... one of vanilla, caramel, and cookies! The question was where to get one of those. He could always ask Gokudera, but knowing him, he would surely bring him the entire factory when he only wanted a simple glass.
Well, in any case, the first thing he had to do was get out of bed, although... how had he ended up there in the first place? He couldn't remember anything but laughing and crying nonstop. Next time he'd jump out the window and run in a Fast & Furious style; that was humiliatingly funny, but it was still humiliating. He blinked several times after carefully sitting up. How great, he was in the wonderful white room. How funny... He sighed deeply and almost pouted. Couldn't he dream of another color? So much white made him nervous. He didn't like hospitals, and if this wasn't a hospital, a clinic, or a specialized medical area, then he would go bald.
He looked at his arms, he didn't want to get up and make a mess, well... a bigger disaster than normal, even if it was a dream. Almost lazily and irritatedly, he removed all the cables. What was he, an experiment? He couldn't have more cables unless he was in an alien movie. He couldn't really be sure; he didn't know exactly how many wires a person could have connected, or how many you could play with... He had taken off about 5, plus the tape and gauze... Almost immediately, a sound caught his attention, but when he recognized it, he made a bad face. That irritating sound...
Without thinking twice, he placed his feet on the floor and almost jumped at how cold it was. Carefully, thanks to the extremely cold floor, he got up, letting the wires fall to the floor and staining the bed and floor with small amounts of blood. It was a dream, so it didn't matter; he could make a mess as much as he wanted. Almost pouting, he headed for what he thought was the bathroom, but there were no decent clothes. Well, it was a dream... He could go as an exhibitionist. Maybe there was nothing attractive to see, and the robe he was wearing was very annoying, and he preferred to go naked than to wear it. He was already naked with that on him!
He threw the robe on the bed and checked his head in case he had anything on him. Luckily, he didn't, and then he decided to leave the room. There must have been something entertaining to see in that dream that was not the brilliantly white room. He was about three steps from the door when it burst open, making him blink. Why was there all the fuss?
"Say—uhh..." He shrugged his shoulders and ignored what appeared to be a nurse. He knew she wasn't pretty or anything, ugly even, but she didn't have to be so rude to stare at him so much.
She didn't have time to continue her journey out of the room when someone practically took the nurse away. A few seconds later, he realized that it wasn't one person, but several people.
"Juudaime, I'm glad to see you awake!" He was sure he made a bad face, because Yamamoto just made an apologetic face and helped lift the nurse up. "But, if I may ask..." Ignoring Gokudera, he looked at the other person who was on the floor; she looked like a woman... "What are you doing outside the bed, and naked?" "Oh, it was Bianchi." "Hey, where do you think you're going?"
Without paying them any more attention, he evaded them and went to the door, took the handle, and finished opening it to leave. He placed one foot outside the room when he felt someone grab his arm...
"Ma Ma, are you high on drugs again?" He heard Yamamoto say a bit jokingly, but that didn't matter to him; he felt more and more annoyed. He wanted to get out! "Tsu—"
"Let me," he said as best he could, without turning around.
"I'm sorry, but—Wow!" He felt that he was released and did not miss the opportunity to finish leaving and turn in a random direction.
Wow, he was in the mansion. He didn't know exactly where, but he knew the place well enough to get to a landmark and go from there. And with his Hyper Dying Will Mode, it would be even easier to get wherever he wanted to go. The question was... where did he want to go? It was a dream, so that didn't matter much. Maybe he would wander the halls—
"Tenth—ohhh..." He didn't pay attention to that; he just went on his way. "Do you want me to bring you a suit or something to eat, sir?" He didn't even turn to look at anyone.
He only stopped when he saw something black in front of him. Knowing that it was a person who deliberately got in his way, God only knows where because not even he himself knew, irritated him even more.
"Get out of my way..." he muttered loud enough to be heard. His throat was starting to hurt.
"Chaos, good afternoon, brat." The other person, whom he recognized as Reborn, greeted him. So he was dreaming of things from his own time, huh? "What do you think you're doing naked out there?"
"I said get out of the way." He wrapped his fist in flames and prepared to hit the person in front of him.
"Wow, what's got you so upset, Dame-Tsuna?" Reborn made fun of himself, cutting his fist.
This time he didn't say anything, now much more annoyed, and he felt hurried footsteps and a lot of mumbling and questions. He didn't know who they were talking to and he didn't care; he just wanted to wander. It was his dream; he should be able to do whatever he wanted. Why did they want to stop him from even that?
"X—"
"Don't even think about it—"
"Pulse." He continued as if no one had spoken. The pulse of flames pushed his opponent away, but it also left him seeing double.
Unable to help himself, he leaned against the nearest wall, fearing he would fall and then not be able to get up. If he fell, he would most likely be taken back to that room, and the point of all this was—
"Take a little, you must be thirsty." Someone offered, extending their hand toward him with some fear.
He blinked several times, his gasp slowing, and tried to focus on whatever was in front of him now. After a moment, he managed to stabilize himself and see what was in front of him, something that made him blink in confusion. It was milk, a glass of milk to be precise, and the lady who was holding it out to him was trembling slightly, as if she were afraid of something.
"...I don't want your charity..." He didn't want lies even in a dream; he was sick of them, and he didn't feel well enough to just ignore them. "...If you're afraid, just go away..." He didn't want to deal with—
"Oh no, no, no, no, sir, you are wrong." The lady, who now that he saw her well looked like a servant, hurriedly denied it. "It's just that I'm afraid he's going to faint here, or that he's going to hurt himself more..."
He didn't say anything for a while, just focusing on his breath and meditating on his words. He smiled slightly, and the lady relaxed, but he hadn't smiled about that.
"...In real life, you would already be hiding in some corner..." His throat wasn't being so kind anymore. "...praying that he doesn't find you and kill you..."
He coughed a little after that and made his flames grow as he felt movement behind him. He heard a laugh, a laugh that left him quite surprised. Dream or not, he hadn't heard anyone laugh in the mansion for a long time, at least not in front of him.
"But this is real life, Tenth-sama." The lady smiled sweetly. "And as you can see—"
"Yes, of course..." Maybe he should just shut up and try to leave. "...no one would come to see me even if I was dying..." They would never do it; they hated him. He was a monster. And he was very clear on that. "Go now, you have nothing to do here." He said before coughing and touching his throat again. Yes, he should shut up.
"A dream... you think this is all a dream?" He heard Reborn say closer and closer, and he prepared to use another attack. "You hate hospitals... You don't want to go back to that room, do you?" Apparently, it was a rhetorical question because he didn't expect any answer. "Stop the fuss, no one is going to force you to go back there." Yeah, right. As soon as he half-let his guard down, they would drag him away. "Distrustful, huh?"
"Juudaime—I won't do anything to you, I promise," Gokudera said, raising his hands in surrender and stopping. He didn't take his hand away from his direction; he was focused on him now. "Juudaime..."
"Tsk..." If he attacked again, he would surely see triple or faint. "Gokudera-san... would never... call himself that..." He looked at the other man, who looked as white as Gokudera. "And you... you would never... you would never touch me..." He looked at Reborn. "...You never came... when I called you..." He looked at the others. "And you... they believe that... I'll kill them..." He coughed; he really should shut up. "...What does it matter, it's just... a dream... stupid..." He looked back at Reborn, who looked like he was about to hit someone. "Away..."
"You are not in a position to wander around, even in this 'stupid dream'." He quoted almost bitterly. "If you want to walk or stroll, let it be in this room." Why would everyone look at him? That—"I know it's irritating, Tsunayoshi, but in this dream, you are seriously injured, full of tranquilizers, and you're walking around naked without any care." He blinked several times. It made sense, but it still wasn't a dream, so it didn't really matter. "At least wear this and eat something, whatever you want, although I would suggest something to drink for that throat of yours. And no, no using your flames or running away. If you want something, ask for it. Insult if you feel like it, but let everything you do be in this room..." Reborn smiled slightly. "The dining room is quite large, so I don't think you have any complaints about space, and... since this is a dream, you can say and do whatever you please without any consequences. As I said before, just don't get out of here, do you understand?"
He was about to tell him that he didn't have to obey him or anything, but he thought better of it. At any moment, he could wake up, and he didn't feel like fighting. He just wanted to wander. The limitation thing sucked, but he didn't think he could wander very far in the—
"Juudaime!" He heard screaming, and the next thing he saw was Gokudera's worried face in front of him. He blinked several times, wondering what the hell had happened, and then pouted. "Try not to scare us again like that..." the silver-haired man muttered, laughing a little, probably at his pout.
He didn't answer him; he just looked at Reborn and went back to normal. Apparently, that was all the answer the best hitman in the world needed because he smiled, and the next thing he saw was orange. Oh, it was just underwear... Orange... what the hell? Why wasn't it black?
"Don't be an exquisite brat." With that said, they threw something else in his face.
"Don't you mind us helping you with that?" Yamamoto asked, coming closer as if he expected him to say no or something. "Privacy here—"
"You saw it; I don't bother you or anything." Reborn cut him off, saying between the lines: "What is it?"
He shrugged his shoulders and tried to get up. As he had feared, once he was down, he could not get up. Gokudera just smiled sadly and helped him up for no apparent reason. Well, it was a dream in itself, a very strange one, so why not more crazy things?
"Ready." Orange underwear and a tunic of the same color... It couldn't be more striking, definitely. At least the underwear was boxers.
"Do you want to—uhhhh..."
He heard Reborn laughing, but he didn't care about it; he just wanted to wander after all. The only bad thing was that there were people around, now running from one side to the other. She didn't know why, or at least that's how it was until she saw the table fill with food.
"You can sit down to eat—"
"Do you want something in—"
At this point, he wondered if they didn't understand that he wasn't stopping them. He wasn't hungry or interested in having a conversation. Although he definitely appreciated that apart from the occasional question about eating or drinking, no one had tried to talk to him.
"...Why am I not surprised..." he heard Gokudera say, who even seemed embarrassed for some reason.
Deciding to shut him up, he threw a piece of chicken in the direction of the offender. No one messed with him and his ice cream (too bad there was no chocolate or other candy of that type). Splash!
"...You asked for it, you know how he is with sweets..." Well, there was a table full of food to throw. Splash! "When he feels like it, he craves them..." He ended up wiping his face as best he could.
"Not just sweets."
"But it's the only thing that—well, no, you're right... I'll go get him chocolate, let's just hope he doesn't bounce off the walls later."
Even though the two men ended up making a collage of food, they were smiling for some reason. The servants laughed sometimes and other times they lamented everything they would have to clean, and Reborn... He seemed satisfied for some reason he didn't want to know.
"No comment—"
"You're a narcissistic idiot." Well, he wanted a comment...
"Brat..." Oh, a vein.
"This dream has lasted..." he said to himself. "Where is the Gay Poseidon..."
For some reason, Gokudera and Yamamoto tensed up, but he didn't give them much attention.
"Gay Poseidon?" Reborn seemed almost amused.
"A guy with a trident, purple, all purple and with a medium effeminate tone... what's wrong with them?" He asked the other two, who were trying their best not to laugh.
"Where did you get that, Tsunayoshi?" Reborn's smile said, "I'm going to use this to make someone suffer." And for some strange reason, he had a tape recorder in his hand that appeared, apparently, out of nowhere.
"From another dream I had about a... I think it was about a circus?" Ice cream saves throats.
"A circus? Did it have animals?"
"I had aliens."
Reborn smiled sadistically while the other two paled.
"What kind of aliens?"
"I don't know, I don't remember well... I know there was a clown who smiled like crazy and was scary, an old man with... yes, with a look like she had sucked a lemon, or was she an old woman? A cow with removable horns and... I walked on two legs, and uh... the purple thing with the trident."
"I see..."
"And why do you suffer so much?" It didn't make sense; they looked like they were about to faint for no apparent reason. "You will cease to exist when I wake up." Reborn couldn't do anything to them; he wanted to.
"Uhhhhh..."
He shrugged and yawned; it wasn't his problem.
"We're going to take you to a bed..." What for? Not that he needed to sleep in a bed; in fact... why did he need to sleep in a dream?
"Juu—too late..."
"You move... and... I'll... give..."