interlude in tsuna sharp.
An update on the laptop situation: I guess even 24-hour support people need to go home for the holidays so I'll be remaining in stasis for the foreseeable future. Um, since the current work PC is only slightly younger than I am, I'd really appreciate links to your posts and recs. My friends page doesn't bear thinking about. ^^; Speaking of, welcome to floresca!
thelovemafia, it's a bit belated but I tried my best so now we have Irie Shouichi and Tsuna as friends/allies/reluctant men working together, and Spanner thrown into the mix as well. I hope you like it!
AU of 219 onwards. What if they don't believe Shouichi? In which Tsuna and company go underground to regroup and bring their 'hostage' with them.
It was oatmeal three days ago, the brand printed in tidy block letters underneath a request for organic coffee. Today it’s all-natural honey, recycled paper and a packet of ballpoint pens. Grocery shopping for Irie Shouichi is harrowing and thankless; he’ll rummage through your plastic bags with both arms and an afterthought: “Do you want to come in?”
It’s unfair how words spoken easily to Yamamoto flee in the face of Shouichi’s intense scrutiny, the unknown relative come to board and measure you against the yardstick of their own children. “No thanks,” Tsuna smiles, ducking his head because when he’s nervous his sliding eyes give him away. He steps back as Shouichi shrugs. The door swing shut. Too many sunless hours have bleached his skin white as bone and Tsuna’s palms are sweating when he slips the key in the lock.
He envies Shouichi’s poise, the unoffended way he takes his meals, cross-legged on the floor with a crate turned makeshift desk, and his unnerving tolerance of Gokudera’s morning investigations, the surprised shape of his body, cut-off yawn and socks with dead elastic that sit loosely around his ankles.
It leaves Tsuna with a bad taste in his mouth. Of course, Shouichi is wholly unconcerned, lounging in his baggy tee, whiling the days alone in a room they converted from Reborn’s old weapon bunker. He fixes their coffeemaker, doesn’t complain unless they bring him skim instead of soy and manages to provoke Tsuna into feeling guilty and uncouth without doing very much at all.
“He’s suspicious,” Gokudera repeats, with the same certainty he has in all things, even if he happens to be wrong, and Spanner looks up curiously from the end of the table.
“Right,” says Tsuna.
-
He’s scratching his scalp and sleepwalking towards hot chocolate when he trips over the microwave. This close, he can tell it’s Spanner waving a hand in greeting, flicking on a torch to reveal a patch of hallway. The unreliable light beacons Shouichi’s room and bits of circuitboard flash green and silver like Christmas tinsel.
“What are you-” he begins, but catches sight of Spanner’s lazy scrawl and little squashed diagrams made familiar in an underground prison. He eyes the crack under the door, the assortment of tiny cables scattered around Spanner’s boots, and counts it a blessing that Gokudera sleeps like the dead.
Spanner swills the lollipop in his mouth but otherwise doesn’t move, waiting.
“Come on,” Tsuna mumbles, headache gathering, and Spanner raps twice on the door in cheerful goodbye before trailing him into the kitchen.
-
“You are in so much trouble,” he mutters, spooning more Milo into his mug, but it’s hard to summon enough ire to dim the mechanic’s laidback affability. He’s sitting backwards in his favoured chair, all long limbs and artless guile, stirring the remains of his tea.
“He’s my friend, you know,” he says, and the sloping angle of his brow means he’s serious, or semi-serious, which Tsuna’s learned is usually as good as it gets with Spanner.
“Do you trust him?” he sighs, looking down into the steam. His eyes ache. It’s too late, or too early, and even in a quiet moment without spectators he’s not seeing with any more clarity. Sometimes, when his mind’s descended into a dozy jungle, he thinks about consulting himself, the older, deader version, but he can’t even imagine the frame of his face. Would he look like Dad?
“Do you?” Spanner blinks, and Tsuna surfaces, colder and no closer to the answers.
He clutches his cup, remembering the way Reborn topped off all drinks with whiskey, and Spanner’s unsuccessful attempts to repair the silent hologram he left behind.
-
“We’re running out of wholegrain,” Tsuna offers, and adjusts the hand propping up his head so he’s speaking half into his fingers. Shouichi tilts to stare at him, nails wedged around the top of a tiny, stubborn screw. Peace offering. Something to relieve the boredom. The little Mosca with back ripped out whirs innocently and lights up.
Irie Shouichi, former captain of White Spell’s 2nd Rose Squad and ex- A-rank member of Millefiore, pushes up his glasses with an impatient gesture. Tsuna has to keep reminding himself because there are fingerprints smeared over his lenses and dubious stains on his shirt and with that ruffled hair it’s hard to imagine him as anything but the boy who swept all categories except Spanner’s in the biannual GLASS robotics competition.
Gokudera is not-standing-guard outside the door like he promised, scuffing his walking shoes with the rhythm of his anxiety. Tsuna can hear him rattling cigarettes inside their box. A soft curse as duty overtakes instinct; his footsteps fade away.
Tsuna takes a breath, and maybe he’s been obvious all along because Shouichi tenses around his screwdriver, shoulders rigid and perfectly aligned.
“Tell me about Byakuran,” he says quietly, and winces when Shouichi’s eyes flinch behind their frames.
Spanner does it too, a noticeable sideways twitch, and it doesn’t help Tsuna’s already ominous impression of an enemy he hasn’t seen, whose influence seems to be of mythical proportions and everywhere at once. He hopes involuntary bodily responses are only technician for, ‘I’d really prefer not to be talking about this,’ but he’s doubtful, and meanwhile Byakuran strikes his dreams like an indolent snake.
-
The first time Shouichi presses a hand to his stomach and doubles over, Tsuna’s panicked and dragging Spanner in by the sleeve, babbling ‘help’ and ‘hurry’ and ‘don’t worry, Gokudera’ and basically neglecting everything anyone’s ever told him about staying calm in an emergency.
When he returns to his senses, Spanner has Shouichi sitting down, patting his back and making vaguely sympathetic noises and turning towards Tsuna with an admonishing look. “You have to stop him when he starts turning grey,” Spanner is saying, but Tsuna’s busy being distracted by the wistful expression on Shouichi’s face.
Ever since he met Reborn, he has trouble remembering what it feels like to be lonely. Even in the rare hours by himself, he’s warm and full, like falling asleep beneath a kotatsu after a good meal. So passing notes like schoolkids, the dogged way Spanner pulls apart their appliances and relates stories of he and Shouichi’s youth over chai, it’s all a roundabout, Spanner-styled plea.
Tsuna sighs and locks them in together, heads out to do damage control.
-
Lal Mirch breaks her glass when she’s well enough to join them at breakfast and Shouichi and Spanner amble in side by side arguing over the merits of magnetic flux. She pins him with a Look and Tsuna would apologise but he’s fumbled enough excuses this week and isn’t getting any better at giving them.
Shouichi brushes past Kusakabe and sticks his head in the fridge. Gokudera glances at him helplessly like he’s being torn in three directions. Yamamoto laughs.
And Tsuna - Tsuna watches them all, crunching his wheat-flour toast.
thelovemafia, it's a bit belated but I tried my best so now we have Irie Shouichi and Tsuna as friends/allies/reluctant men working together, and Spanner thrown into the mix as well. I hope you like it!
AU of 219 onwards. What if they don't believe Shouichi? In which Tsuna and company go underground to regroup and bring their 'hostage' with them.
It was oatmeal three days ago, the brand printed in tidy block letters underneath a request for organic coffee. Today it’s all-natural honey, recycled paper and a packet of ballpoint pens. Grocery shopping for Irie Shouichi is harrowing and thankless; he’ll rummage through your plastic bags with both arms and an afterthought: “Do you want to come in?”
It’s unfair how words spoken easily to Yamamoto flee in the face of Shouichi’s intense scrutiny, the unknown relative come to board and measure you against the yardstick of their own children. “No thanks,” Tsuna smiles, ducking his head because when he’s nervous his sliding eyes give him away. He steps back as Shouichi shrugs. The door swing shut. Too many sunless hours have bleached his skin white as bone and Tsuna’s palms are sweating when he slips the key in the lock.
He envies Shouichi’s poise, the unoffended way he takes his meals, cross-legged on the floor with a crate turned makeshift desk, and his unnerving tolerance of Gokudera’s morning investigations, the surprised shape of his body, cut-off yawn and socks with dead elastic that sit loosely around his ankles.
It leaves Tsuna with a bad taste in his mouth. Of course, Shouichi is wholly unconcerned, lounging in his baggy tee, whiling the days alone in a room they converted from Reborn’s old weapon bunker. He fixes their coffeemaker, doesn’t complain unless they bring him skim instead of soy and manages to provoke Tsuna into feeling guilty and uncouth without doing very much at all.
“He’s suspicious,” Gokudera repeats, with the same certainty he has in all things, even if he happens to be wrong, and Spanner looks up curiously from the end of the table.
“Right,” says Tsuna.
-
He’s scratching his scalp and sleepwalking towards hot chocolate when he trips over the microwave. This close, he can tell it’s Spanner waving a hand in greeting, flicking on a torch to reveal a patch of hallway. The unreliable light beacons Shouichi’s room and bits of circuitboard flash green and silver like Christmas tinsel.
“What are you-” he begins, but catches sight of Spanner’s lazy scrawl and little squashed diagrams made familiar in an underground prison. He eyes the crack under the door, the assortment of tiny cables scattered around Spanner’s boots, and counts it a blessing that Gokudera sleeps like the dead.
Spanner swills the lollipop in his mouth but otherwise doesn’t move, waiting.
“Come on,” Tsuna mumbles, headache gathering, and Spanner raps twice on the door in cheerful goodbye before trailing him into the kitchen.
-
“You are in so much trouble,” he mutters, spooning more Milo into his mug, but it’s hard to summon enough ire to dim the mechanic’s laidback affability. He’s sitting backwards in his favoured chair, all long limbs and artless guile, stirring the remains of his tea.
“He’s my friend, you know,” he says, and the sloping angle of his brow means he’s serious, or semi-serious, which Tsuna’s learned is usually as good as it gets with Spanner.
“Do you trust him?” he sighs, looking down into the steam. His eyes ache. It’s too late, or too early, and even in a quiet moment without spectators he’s not seeing with any more clarity. Sometimes, when his mind’s descended into a dozy jungle, he thinks about consulting himself, the older, deader version, but he can’t even imagine the frame of his face. Would he look like Dad?
“Do you?” Spanner blinks, and Tsuna surfaces, colder and no closer to the answers.
He clutches his cup, remembering the way Reborn topped off all drinks with whiskey, and Spanner’s unsuccessful attempts to repair the silent hologram he left behind.
-
“We’re running out of wholegrain,” Tsuna offers, and adjusts the hand propping up his head so he’s speaking half into his fingers. Shouichi tilts to stare at him, nails wedged around the top of a tiny, stubborn screw. Peace offering. Something to relieve the boredom. The little Mosca with back ripped out whirs innocently and lights up.
Irie Shouichi, former captain of White Spell’s 2nd Rose Squad and ex- A-rank member of Millefiore, pushes up his glasses with an impatient gesture. Tsuna has to keep reminding himself because there are fingerprints smeared over his lenses and dubious stains on his shirt and with that ruffled hair it’s hard to imagine him as anything but the boy who swept all categories except Spanner’s in the biannual GLASS robotics competition.
Gokudera is not-standing-guard outside the door like he promised, scuffing his walking shoes with the rhythm of his anxiety. Tsuna can hear him rattling cigarettes inside their box. A soft curse as duty overtakes instinct; his footsteps fade away.
Tsuna takes a breath, and maybe he’s been obvious all along because Shouichi tenses around his screwdriver, shoulders rigid and perfectly aligned.
“Tell me about Byakuran,” he says quietly, and winces when Shouichi’s eyes flinch behind their frames.
Spanner does it too, a noticeable sideways twitch, and it doesn’t help Tsuna’s already ominous impression of an enemy he hasn’t seen, whose influence seems to be of mythical proportions and everywhere at once. He hopes involuntary bodily responses are only technician for, ‘I’d really prefer not to be talking about this,’ but he’s doubtful, and meanwhile Byakuran strikes his dreams like an indolent snake.
-
The first time Shouichi presses a hand to his stomach and doubles over, Tsuna’s panicked and dragging Spanner in by the sleeve, babbling ‘help’ and ‘hurry’ and ‘don’t worry, Gokudera’ and basically neglecting everything anyone’s ever told him about staying calm in an emergency.
When he returns to his senses, Spanner has Shouichi sitting down, patting his back and making vaguely sympathetic noises and turning towards Tsuna with an admonishing look. “You have to stop him when he starts turning grey,” Spanner is saying, but Tsuna’s busy being distracted by the wistful expression on Shouichi’s face.
Ever since he met Reborn, he has trouble remembering what it feels like to be lonely. Even in the rare hours by himself, he’s warm and full, like falling asleep beneath a kotatsu after a good meal. So passing notes like schoolkids, the dogged way Spanner pulls apart their appliances and relates stories of he and Shouichi’s youth over chai, it’s all a roundabout, Spanner-styled plea.
Tsuna sighs and locks them in together, heads out to do damage control.
-
Lal Mirch breaks her glass when she’s well enough to join them at breakfast and Shouichi and Spanner amble in side by side arguing over the merits of magnetic flux. She pins him with a Look and Tsuna would apologise but he’s fumbled enough excuses this week and isn’t getting any better at giving them.
Shouichi brushes past Kusakabe and sticks his head in the fridge. Gokudera glances at him helplessly like he’s being torn in three directions. Yamamoto laughs.
And Tsuna - Tsuna watches them all, crunching his wheat-flour toast.