(no subject)
done for kittyling as part of khr_exchange
hope you like it and happy holidays! ♥
Title: Nocturne
Rating: M
Pairing: 8059
The rain beats against the window in tandem with his heartbeat, steady and rhythmic, loud. The soft roll of thunder purrs in the distance, a building crescendo like the rumbling from the belly of a giant cat before it cracks, sharp and sudden like a whip. Lightning follows and flashes briefly and blindingly bright across the black sky. He feels almost calm as he watches the storm, its ring glittering silver on his middle finger.
It has been a while since it stormed like that, he realizes, leaning slightly against the window. His warm breath frosts the cold glass and he reaches out a hand to press against the silhouette of raindrops. He watches them carve their tracks on the glass silently, almost appreciatively, one ear cocked to the sound of Chopin on the stereo.
He moves his hand to trace the grooves of the other ring on the fourth finger of his hand absently, memorizing the pits and dips of the heavy silver. Finally feeling agitated with the canned sound of piano from the stereo, he tears his gaze from the window and redirects it to the baby grand sitting polished and black not five paces from him.
“An anniversary present,” Yamamoto had said. “And to keep you company when I'm away. I want you to be reminded of me when you play. So play for me, Hayato. Play me Chopin.”
“Che, what do baseball idiots know of good music anyways?” Gokudera replied but obligingly sat at the piano, felt its silent black and white keys beneath his fingers, felt the powerful cacophony of sound waiting to erupt from its orifices. Moving to a will and rhythm of their own, his fingers moved, flying across the ivory, flying home as Chopin's first nocturne resounded and filled the hollow room with its symphony.
As the last notes of the piece drifted into nothing, he felt strong arms slide around him and a sharp chin coming to rest at the junction between clavicle and neck. He squirmed slightly, uncomfortable, damn sharp chin, but Yamamoto would not budge. Instead, the arms pulled him tighter against a broad chest, fingers drawing lazy circles against his abdomen.
“Beautiful,” Yamamoto told him.
“Of course it was,” Gokudera snapped. “It was Chopin's masterpiece.”
A soft golden gaze and smile later, he felt the soft press of lips against his neck. Gokudera felt the goose flesh rising along his skin and the shudder that ran down his spine was barely restrained. He was still self-conscious of their intimacy, even after all these years.
Ten years; had it really been ten years? They'd been together, survived together for that long?
He attempted to struggle free at the other's chuckle but the embrace held fast and hot breath heated the conch of his blushing ear,
“I didn't mean Chopin, Hayato,” Yamamoto murmured, lips burning hot against his skin. They moved away as hands turned his shoulders gently, forcing Gokudera to face him.
Yamamoto smiled softly and moved a few paces back, away from him and Gokudera suddenly found himself missing his warmth. He suppressed the urge to reach out for him as the Rain Guardian simply smiled, reminding the other of their youth, of the carefree smile long gone from their halcyon years, and Yamamoto Takeshi kept on smiling as he moved to kneel down on one knee.
He sits at the piano and barely lifts his arm to grab the stereo remote, shuts off the music and sits staring at the sheet music before him.
Chopin's “Nocturne in G Minor” stares back, almost mockingly, sanguinely reminiscent of everything, painfully acute, its notes taunting, challenging him; “play me Chopin, Hayato.” His hands refuse to budge from his sides. He feels painfully empty and the tears are reluctant to flow. “Play me Chopin.”
Gokudera always jetted to the exotic European cities to meet with Yamamoto after his missions whenever Tsuna could spare him. He would fly over to stay with him during long missions and Tsuna, smiling, with his blessing, would tell them to take a week off, spend some time in Rome, shop in Milan, go wine-tasting in Sicily.
Whenever they were in Siena, they would stay with the Bucking Horse. Dino Cavallone was always gracious and welcoming and occasionally, they would see their own Cloud Guardian in the halls of el Palazzo di Cavallone. Yamamoto would always smile and greet him loudly but Hibari Kyouya never was a very social person and more often than not, he would simply ignore them as he passed.
“I'll bite you to death if you say anything of this to the other herbivores,” he once told them calmly as he exited Dino's private quarters. That was the most interaction they got from Hibari Kyouya for the year.
Somehow, the numerous rendezvous in Italy felt that much more romantic, dangerous, and just plain frivolous. As much as Gokudera attempted to claim he only went to “make sure the stupid moron was still alive,” he found himself enjoying the trips back to his motherland. It felt much more welcoming in Yamamoto's arms to walk the streets of the country that had once rejected him as a child. He finally felt like he was really coming home.
On one such trip, Yamamoto took Gokudera to Rome. “The city of love,” he said.
“The city of love is Paris, you moron.”
“Haha, that's okay. We'll make this our city of love.”
“Che, why do I even put up with you?” he asked as he brought his arms up around Yamamoto's neck. Gokudera always felt less inhibited in Italy and often showed more affection than he did back in Japan. He pressed their lips together softly, sweetly, lovingly and the smile he got from Yamamoto after he pulled away was enough to set his heart beating frantically like a trapped bird against his ribcage.
Stupid heart, why so erratic even after ten years?
It is painful for him to press his fingertips against the black and white ivory keys again. He feels as though he has just eaten a batch of his sister's poisonous cookies, the ones she fed him as a child to get him to play. He feels nauseous as he sits on the bench, his back hunching over the keyboard.
He can still hear the rumble of thunder outside and the staccato patter of rain. Soon, he also hears the melodious first notes of Chopin's masterpiece and he is surprised when he looks down to see his own fingers moving across black and white, following the timeless notes of “Nocturne.”
It had been ten years since Yamamoto confessed to Gokudera in the cold, late at night, in the darkness with the snowflakes and stars as their witnesses. It had been that long ago since Yamamoto dug up the courage to tell Gokudera how much he meant to him and that he was his precious person.
Their past scrapes with mortality had taught the optimistic, childish, seemingly oblivious, astute, “ha ha, what a fun game!” Yamamoto that they just might run out of time in the next moment, second, minute, hour, day. That they might lose the mafia game and die.
Those same escapes from the clutches of death and injury taught the angry, fuck-the-world, self-loathing, vulnerable, “I'm going to blow you the fuck up” Gokudera the courage to accept that there could be someone who would be precious to him and thought him to be their precious person in return.
It had been ten years since they'd shared the first of their many other firsts. They were fifteen and awkward, and the first time Yamamoto tried to kiss Gokudera, it had earned him a punch in the gut.
“What the fuck are you doing, you stupid baseball freak?” Gokudera demanded. He realized what the other was trying to do when he bumped their foreheads together painfully, and he sighed and took Yamamoto's face between his hands. “....You're doing it wrong.” And he showed him how to kiss properly.
Gokudera often reflected with vague embarrassment on their first time. He often felt the urge to shove it out of his memory and could not fathom why so many people commemorated their first times. His first was awkward, uncomfortable, and painful; embarrassing.
Yamamoto had tried to be gentle but their angular teenage limbs got in the way and they ended up elbowing each other more than anything else. They were sixteen, young and eager, and they would have much more practice but even Gokudera knew then, grudgingly and in pain, that it was the start of something wonderful.
He was sixteen and in love for the first time, having just realized this would be the person he'd want to spend the rest of his life with.
Ten years later, Gokudera finally found the courage to tell Yamamoto exactly that when they exchanged rings in an old cathedral in Florence in front of the rest of la Famiglia. The old church felt like living art as they breathed the ancient air and gazed up in awe of the rainbow rose window and saints praying piously on the walls. Neither of them were religious but it felt right to do it in a church, in Italy, surrounded by Family.
As the last notes of the nocturne reverberate and fade into silence, his vision swims before him. The black and white keys blur into a puddle of grey and he suddenly realizes there are tears when a drop falls onto his hand.
He lifts the shaking hand to swipe angrily at the display of emotion and winces when he feels the hard, cold knock of metal against his cheek. He moves the hand in front of him and stares blankly at the two rings on that hand, one next to the other.
The Storm ring - his own ring - sits on his middle finger, bearing his loyalty and devotion to the Family. The other ring - the ring of Rain, his ring - sits on his fourth finger, displaying his loyalty and devotion to his precious person.
The scrape of cold, smooth metal was almost unbearable against Gokudera's heated skin. The burning hot trail of kisses that followed had him arching off the bed as his fingers grasped at the sheets below him. He gasped as a wet tongue found his nipple, pressing, licking, scraping teeth; enough sensation to make him cry out.
He pulled Yamamoto's face up to his own and pressed their mouths together, Yamamoto's tongue immediately finding the accommodating opening of his lips as they kissed.
Yamamoto pulled away first, something deeply sad and profound in his gaze, something inexplicable and all Gokudera knew was that he wanted to kiss it away; take the jaded look he gained from his father's death from his eyes.
He leaned up to kiss the jagged scar on Yamamoto's chin, the once gaping slash he had helped sew up after that one precarious mission in Tuscany. The knife Yamamoto had barely been able to block, coming up and slashing his face. A knife meant for Gokudera's heart.
He felt Yamamoto's breath fanning hot against his chest as expert fingertips found him and entered. Gokudera felt himself arching up again as kisses and soft caresses worked to distract him from the probing pain. He felt a sudden sharp pang of loss when the fingers were removed.
Yamamoto pressed his lips against his neck again and he whispered, “I love you, Gokudera Hayato,” as he pushed in and it was enough to make him scream.
There was a sense of underlying desperation to their lethargic thrusts, moving together like they'd done many times past.
Yamamoto was leaving in the morning to complete a heavy black folder mission, something the Boss specifically needed his best assassin for; the best friend who had turned killer who killed for him, for them, to protect the Family; he who gave his soul, his body, his heart to protect all of them.
And Gokudera - Gokudera felt a sense of finality to their movements, something heavy weighing his person as they completed each other, a strong ominous foreboding. Sad golden eyes found his own equally jaded green - there had been too much blood over the years, too much pain. How long would they still be able to do this with anything resembling sanity intact? - and he knew this might very well be the last time he'd see Yamamoto alive smiling his little smile. The silly, stupid, vapid smile that once made him want to break the idiot's face.
He pulled Yamamoto's face down to his own again, smiled back at the smile that Yamamoto used to smile as a teenager, one he hadn't seen for almost a year - not since Yamamoto Senior - and whispered back, “I love you, too, idiot.”
The heavy bang of his fist clashing against the ivory keys jolts him slightly. He stares emptily at the piano before him, his vision no longer blurred with tears but instead clouded red with anger.
He is angry at the world, at everything, at him, at maybe even the Boss for giving him that black folder. He is angry at himself for never having said all the important things he should've said, the things he should've done, the songs he should've played.
“Play me Chopin, Hayato.”
Gokudera had to be restrained by five of his subordinates plus Sasagawa Ryohei to prevent him from entering the abandoned building.
Eyes wild, hair tousled, and straining desperately against the many arms holding him back, Gokudera bit back a scream of frustration as Tsuna approached. The Boss was apprehensive and looked upon Gokudera sadly before he had the subordinates and Sun Guardian release him.
“Gokudera,” he began, as he watched his right hand man slump to the ground. Gokudera immediately picked himself up at the call of his name and stared desperately at his Boss, his best friend, eyes pleading.
Tsuna faltered and had nothing more to say other than a quiet, “I'm so sorry, Gokudera.”
He brushed past his Boss for the first time and ran into the building. This time, no one reached out to stop him as he entered and he ran blindly though the maze of corridors covered with rotting carpet, reeking of death and mold. His feet led him, as though by instinct, as though guided, to the second floor, to what was once a meeting room, now drenched in red.
Yamamoto was a scarlet visceral painting splashed across the canvas of the marble floors. The red was stark against the white walls, his entrails a grotesque stroke against the backdrop of the black granite table. Gokudera was shaking as he stared at Yamamoto's blank eyes staring back at him, the head perched on the table space in front of a chair, one to the left of the center throne.
When the other Guardians rushed into the room, Gokudera found himself screaming, unable to stop as sobs wracked his body, hands trembling, bloody, brushing matted hair from the cold forehead of the severed head. Not Takeshi, no no no no no! You fucking idiot! No! Please....
Hibari Kyouya calmly clipped Gokudera in the back of the head with a steel tonfa as Ryohei caught the unconscious Storm Guardian and carried him out of the room. Even the sadistic Mukuro Rokudo was quiet and somber as the pieces of the Rain Guardian were collected by his own subordinates. The only sound in the red room was the soft padding of moving feet and the creak of leather as Mukuro bent to pick up a band of silver - the ring of Rain.
He makes futile attempts at calming himself as he sits on the piano bench, still staring blankly at the keys and at his hands. He sees them red - stained forever with the blood of ghosts. These hands will never be clean; and he runs a finger over his ring, almost feels the tears building up behind his eyelids again and he swallows thickly.
He rips the ring from his finger, still scrutinizing it as the door opens and his Boss, the reason he's alive, the reason he's dead enters, sheepish, sad, grieving.
A hand comes to rest on his shoulder, almost hesitantly as though the Boss knows that he blames him, even if only slightly, deep down, and his gaze is apologetic, filled with so much regret; and he feels like crying all over again. Instead, he takes a deep breath and makes a weak attempt at a smile, waves away questions of his well-bring and picks himself up when the Boss tells him it's time to go. He places the ring of Rain on top of the piano and walks out with Tsuna to bury the dead.
As they walk out to the car, he lights a cigarette and pulls out his cellphone. The car begins to move and a quick speed dial later, Gokudera Hayato watches the apartment with the piano and the ring he once shared with one Yamamoto Takeshi erupt into flames and burn, burying that part of their past in a rain of nitroglycerin.
The sky opens up above them and the torrential downpour continues as the eye of the tempest stares down at the fragments of what was once a whole.
hope you like it and happy holidays! ♥
Title: Nocturne
Rating: M
Pairing: 8059
The rain beats against the window in tandem with his heartbeat, steady and rhythmic, loud. The soft roll of thunder purrs in the distance, a building crescendo like the rumbling from the belly of a giant cat before it cracks, sharp and sudden like a whip. Lightning follows and flashes briefly and blindingly bright across the black sky. He feels almost calm as he watches the storm, its ring glittering silver on his middle finger.
It has been a while since it stormed like that, he realizes, leaning slightly against the window. His warm breath frosts the cold glass and he reaches out a hand to press against the silhouette of raindrops. He watches them carve their tracks on the glass silently, almost appreciatively, one ear cocked to the sound of Chopin on the stereo.
He moves his hand to trace the grooves of the other ring on the fourth finger of his hand absently, memorizing the pits and dips of the heavy silver. Finally feeling agitated with the canned sound of piano from the stereo, he tears his gaze from the window and redirects it to the baby grand sitting polished and black not five paces from him.
“An anniversary present,” Yamamoto had said. “And to keep you company when I'm away. I want you to be reminded of me when you play. So play for me, Hayato. Play me Chopin.”
“Che, what do baseball idiots know of good music anyways?” Gokudera replied but obligingly sat at the piano, felt its silent black and white keys beneath his fingers, felt the powerful cacophony of sound waiting to erupt from its orifices. Moving to a will and rhythm of their own, his fingers moved, flying across the ivory, flying home as Chopin's first nocturne resounded and filled the hollow room with its symphony.
As the last notes of the piece drifted into nothing, he felt strong arms slide around him and a sharp chin coming to rest at the junction between clavicle and neck. He squirmed slightly, uncomfortable, damn sharp chin, but Yamamoto would not budge. Instead, the arms pulled him tighter against a broad chest, fingers drawing lazy circles against his abdomen.
“Beautiful,” Yamamoto told him.
“Of course it was,” Gokudera snapped. “It was Chopin's masterpiece.”
A soft golden gaze and smile later, he felt the soft press of lips against his neck. Gokudera felt the goose flesh rising along his skin and the shudder that ran down his spine was barely restrained. He was still self-conscious of their intimacy, even after all these years.
Ten years; had it really been ten years? They'd been together, survived together for that long?
He attempted to struggle free at the other's chuckle but the embrace held fast and hot breath heated the conch of his blushing ear,
“I didn't mean Chopin, Hayato,” Yamamoto murmured, lips burning hot against his skin. They moved away as hands turned his shoulders gently, forcing Gokudera to face him.
Yamamoto smiled softly and moved a few paces back, away from him and Gokudera suddenly found himself missing his warmth. He suppressed the urge to reach out for him as the Rain Guardian simply smiled, reminding the other of their youth, of the carefree smile long gone from their halcyon years, and Yamamoto Takeshi kept on smiling as he moved to kneel down on one knee.
He sits at the piano and barely lifts his arm to grab the stereo remote, shuts off the music and sits staring at the sheet music before him.
Chopin's “Nocturne in G Minor” stares back, almost mockingly, sanguinely reminiscent of everything, painfully acute, its notes taunting, challenging him; “play me Chopin, Hayato.” His hands refuse to budge from his sides. He feels painfully empty and the tears are reluctant to flow. “Play me Chopin.”
Gokudera always jetted to the exotic European cities to meet with Yamamoto after his missions whenever Tsuna could spare him. He would fly over to stay with him during long missions and Tsuna, smiling, with his blessing, would tell them to take a week off, spend some time in Rome, shop in Milan, go wine-tasting in Sicily.
Whenever they were in Siena, they would stay with the Bucking Horse. Dino Cavallone was always gracious and welcoming and occasionally, they would see their own Cloud Guardian in the halls of el Palazzo di Cavallone. Yamamoto would always smile and greet him loudly but Hibari Kyouya never was a very social person and more often than not, he would simply ignore them as he passed.
“I'll bite you to death if you say anything of this to the other herbivores,” he once told them calmly as he exited Dino's private quarters. That was the most interaction they got from Hibari Kyouya for the year.
Somehow, the numerous rendezvous in Italy felt that much more romantic, dangerous, and just plain frivolous. As much as Gokudera attempted to claim he only went to “make sure the stupid moron was still alive,” he found himself enjoying the trips back to his motherland. It felt much more welcoming in Yamamoto's arms to walk the streets of the country that had once rejected him as a child. He finally felt like he was really coming home.
On one such trip, Yamamoto took Gokudera to Rome. “The city of love,” he said.
“The city of love is Paris, you moron.”
“Haha, that's okay. We'll make this our city of love.”
“Che, why do I even put up with you?” he asked as he brought his arms up around Yamamoto's neck. Gokudera always felt less inhibited in Italy and often showed more affection than he did back in Japan. He pressed their lips together softly, sweetly, lovingly and the smile he got from Yamamoto after he pulled away was enough to set his heart beating frantically like a trapped bird against his ribcage.
Stupid heart, why so erratic even after ten years?
It is painful for him to press his fingertips against the black and white ivory keys again. He feels as though he has just eaten a batch of his sister's poisonous cookies, the ones she fed him as a child to get him to play. He feels nauseous as he sits on the bench, his back hunching over the keyboard.
He can still hear the rumble of thunder outside and the staccato patter of rain. Soon, he also hears the melodious first notes of Chopin's masterpiece and he is surprised when he looks down to see his own fingers moving across black and white, following the timeless notes of “Nocturne.”
It had been ten years since Yamamoto confessed to Gokudera in the cold, late at night, in the darkness with the snowflakes and stars as their witnesses. It had been that long ago since Yamamoto dug up the courage to tell Gokudera how much he meant to him and that he was his precious person.
Their past scrapes with mortality had taught the optimistic, childish, seemingly oblivious, astute, “ha ha, what a fun game!” Yamamoto that they just might run out of time in the next moment, second, minute, hour, day. That they might lose the mafia game and die.
Those same escapes from the clutches of death and injury taught the angry, fuck-the-world, self-loathing, vulnerable, “I'm going to blow you the fuck up” Gokudera the courage to accept that there could be someone who would be precious to him and thought him to be their precious person in return.
It had been ten years since they'd shared the first of their many other firsts. They were fifteen and awkward, and the first time Yamamoto tried to kiss Gokudera, it had earned him a punch in the gut.
“What the fuck are you doing, you stupid baseball freak?” Gokudera demanded. He realized what the other was trying to do when he bumped their foreheads together painfully, and he sighed and took Yamamoto's face between his hands. “....You're doing it wrong.” And he showed him how to kiss properly.
Gokudera often reflected with vague embarrassment on their first time. He often felt the urge to shove it out of his memory and could not fathom why so many people commemorated their first times. His first was awkward, uncomfortable, and painful; embarrassing.
Yamamoto had tried to be gentle but their angular teenage limbs got in the way and they ended up elbowing each other more than anything else. They were sixteen, young and eager, and they would have much more practice but even Gokudera knew then, grudgingly and in pain, that it was the start of something wonderful.
He was sixteen and in love for the first time, having just realized this would be the person he'd want to spend the rest of his life with.
Ten years later, Gokudera finally found the courage to tell Yamamoto exactly that when they exchanged rings in an old cathedral in Florence in front of the rest of la Famiglia. The old church felt like living art as they breathed the ancient air and gazed up in awe of the rainbow rose window and saints praying piously on the walls. Neither of them were religious but it felt right to do it in a church, in Italy, surrounded by Family.
As the last notes of the nocturne reverberate and fade into silence, his vision swims before him. The black and white keys blur into a puddle of grey and he suddenly realizes there are tears when a drop falls onto his hand.
He lifts the shaking hand to swipe angrily at the display of emotion and winces when he feels the hard, cold knock of metal against his cheek. He moves the hand in front of him and stares blankly at the two rings on that hand, one next to the other.
The Storm ring - his own ring - sits on his middle finger, bearing his loyalty and devotion to the Family. The other ring - the ring of Rain, his ring - sits on his fourth finger, displaying his loyalty and devotion to his precious person.
The scrape of cold, smooth metal was almost unbearable against Gokudera's heated skin. The burning hot trail of kisses that followed had him arching off the bed as his fingers grasped at the sheets below him. He gasped as a wet tongue found his nipple, pressing, licking, scraping teeth; enough sensation to make him cry out.
He pulled Yamamoto's face up to his own and pressed their mouths together, Yamamoto's tongue immediately finding the accommodating opening of his lips as they kissed.
Yamamoto pulled away first, something deeply sad and profound in his gaze, something inexplicable and all Gokudera knew was that he wanted to kiss it away; take the jaded look he gained from his father's death from his eyes.
He leaned up to kiss the jagged scar on Yamamoto's chin, the once gaping slash he had helped sew up after that one precarious mission in Tuscany. The knife Yamamoto had barely been able to block, coming up and slashing his face. A knife meant for Gokudera's heart.
He felt Yamamoto's breath fanning hot against his chest as expert fingertips found him and entered. Gokudera felt himself arching up again as kisses and soft caresses worked to distract him from the probing pain. He felt a sudden sharp pang of loss when the fingers were removed.
Yamamoto pressed his lips against his neck again and he whispered, “I love you, Gokudera Hayato,” as he pushed in and it was enough to make him scream.
There was a sense of underlying desperation to their lethargic thrusts, moving together like they'd done many times past.
Yamamoto was leaving in the morning to complete a heavy black folder mission, something the Boss specifically needed his best assassin for; the best friend who had turned killer who killed for him, for them, to protect the Family; he who gave his soul, his body, his heart to protect all of them.
And Gokudera - Gokudera felt a sense of finality to their movements, something heavy weighing his person as they completed each other, a strong ominous foreboding. Sad golden eyes found his own equally jaded green - there had been too much blood over the years, too much pain. How long would they still be able to do this with anything resembling sanity intact? - and he knew this might very well be the last time he'd see Yamamoto alive smiling his little smile. The silly, stupid, vapid smile that once made him want to break the idiot's face.
He pulled Yamamoto's face down to his own again, smiled back at the smile that Yamamoto used to smile as a teenager, one he hadn't seen for almost a year - not since Yamamoto Senior - and whispered back, “I love you, too, idiot.”
The heavy bang of his fist clashing against the ivory keys jolts him slightly. He stares emptily at the piano before him, his vision no longer blurred with tears but instead clouded red with anger.
He is angry at the world, at everything, at him, at maybe even the Boss for giving him that black folder. He is angry at himself for never having said all the important things he should've said, the things he should've done, the songs he should've played.
“Play me Chopin, Hayato.”
Gokudera had to be restrained by five of his subordinates plus Sasagawa Ryohei to prevent him from entering the abandoned building.
Eyes wild, hair tousled, and straining desperately against the many arms holding him back, Gokudera bit back a scream of frustration as Tsuna approached. The Boss was apprehensive and looked upon Gokudera sadly before he had the subordinates and Sun Guardian release him.
“Gokudera,” he began, as he watched his right hand man slump to the ground. Gokudera immediately picked himself up at the call of his name and stared desperately at his Boss, his best friend, eyes pleading.
Tsuna faltered and had nothing more to say other than a quiet, “I'm so sorry, Gokudera.”
He brushed past his Boss for the first time and ran into the building. This time, no one reached out to stop him as he entered and he ran blindly though the maze of corridors covered with rotting carpet, reeking of death and mold. His feet led him, as though by instinct, as though guided, to the second floor, to what was once a meeting room, now drenched in red.
Yamamoto was a scarlet visceral painting splashed across the canvas of the marble floors. The red was stark against the white walls, his entrails a grotesque stroke against the backdrop of the black granite table. Gokudera was shaking as he stared at Yamamoto's blank eyes staring back at him, the head perched on the table space in front of a chair, one to the left of the center throne.
When the other Guardians rushed into the room, Gokudera found himself screaming, unable to stop as sobs wracked his body, hands trembling, bloody, brushing matted hair from the cold forehead of the severed head. Not Takeshi, no no no no no! You fucking idiot! No! Please....
Hibari Kyouya calmly clipped Gokudera in the back of the head with a steel tonfa as Ryohei caught the unconscious Storm Guardian and carried him out of the room. Even the sadistic Mukuro Rokudo was quiet and somber as the pieces of the Rain Guardian were collected by his own subordinates. The only sound in the red room was the soft padding of moving feet and the creak of leather as Mukuro bent to pick up a band of silver - the ring of Rain.
He makes futile attempts at calming himself as he sits on the piano bench, still staring blankly at the keys and at his hands. He sees them red - stained forever with the blood of ghosts. These hands will never be clean; and he runs a finger over his ring, almost feels the tears building up behind his eyelids again and he swallows thickly.
He rips the ring from his finger, still scrutinizing it as the door opens and his Boss, the reason he's alive, the reason he's dead enters, sheepish, sad, grieving.
A hand comes to rest on his shoulder, almost hesitantly as though the Boss knows that he blames him, even if only slightly, deep down, and his gaze is apologetic, filled with so much regret; and he feels like crying all over again. Instead, he takes a deep breath and makes a weak attempt at a smile, waves away questions of his well-bring and picks himself up when the Boss tells him it's time to go. He places the ring of Rain on top of the piano and walks out with Tsuna to bury the dead.
As they walk out to the car, he lights a cigarette and pulls out his cellphone. The car begins to move and a quick speed dial later, Gokudera Hayato watches the apartment with the piano and the ring he once shared with one Yamamoto Takeshi erupt into flames and burn, burying that part of their past in a rain of nitroglycerin.
The sky opens up above them and the torrential downpour continues as the eye of the tempest stares down at the fragments of what was once a whole.