(no subject)
Title: Citizen Soldier
Characters: Colonello, Lal Mirch, Reborn, Sasagawa Ryohei
Summary: There are only so many times things can backfire before you get at least one right.
Pairings: Colonello/Ryohei with a large dash of Colonello/Lal
Disclaimer: The world of Katekyo Hitman Reborn! belongs to Amano Akira.
A/N: Another belated Christmas gift. This one for rai_kai_lai. It ... turned out longer than I thought it would. It's the back-story's fault. It wasn't supposed to be there orginally. This was supposed to be crack, which it is - but only at the very end. *FAIL*
It was at boot camp that he first warranted the name Backfire Colonello. His group had been running the training course at the time and Colonello had tried to be the wise guy, boasting that he could do this kind of thing with his eyes closed. It ended with the rest of his group blindfolding him later that night and forcing him onto the field to do exactly that. Everything had been fine, too, until he had reached the barbed wire portion of the course. It went without saying that he wound up with a few more nicks and cuts this time around. The next time had been during his time under Lal Mirch as her subordinate. It had been his first mission and it hadn’t exactly been a pretty one.
They had been ordered to infiltrate a submarine that had been patrolling too close and too frequently in their territory. It could have been by-passed, if the submarine had been a registered one, had shown up in their database, but it hadn’t and they never took chances when it came to a possible hostile. It was likely this particular submarine was just a scout, but that still hadn’t meant anything to them. They had been given the orders and they had to carry those orders without question. To do otherwise was to betray the organization, and to betray the organization was as good as a death sentence. Colonello hadn’t had a problem setting up the bombs; that had been the easy part. It was what came after that which had left them stunned, everyone and not just Colonello.
The C4 had gone off before its designated time. They had made sure to synchronize all the timers - it had made no sense at the time, none at all. There had went their plans for a simultaneous boom. The engine room was the first to go, followed abruptly by the control center. Colonello had barely had time get out of there, the sub already half-way filled with water, making for an awkward get-away if ever there was one. He had made it out of alive, which couldn’t be said for two other men in his squad, two good men who had volunteered to help the ‘new kid’ out. They had lost their lives for him, for a simple mistake he should have caught. It was bad enough he punished himself every day for it, every day that he was alive and they weren’t, but Lal had taken to reminding him at any chance. She had always been the harsh type, enforcing disciple with an iron-first, but her anger this time was for a completely unprofessional reason and he couldn’t call her on it, too afraid to draw attention to what everyone already knew. During that fiasco, she had lost more than just another comrade; she had lost someone she could have spent the rest of her life with.
Seeing her crying the day after the news had been delivered, when it had finally sunk in, it had been more than he could bear. He had promised himself he would never let her cry again, not because of him. He wouldn’t let his screw-ups cost others their happiness, not any more. So he trained, harder and more vigorously than he had ever trained before. His personal array of weapons quickly expanded now that he was taking what he did seriously, focused, determined, and serious for once in his life. Being a part of this was no longer a game, something to do to pass the time. No, that person was a part of the past now. The new Colonello wouldn’t allow for childish mistakes to be made, not even the smallest of ones.
It wasn’t until a year later that Lal finally called him on his ridiculous training methods, shouting that he was insane and she wanted to know what he was doing. He had yelled back, just as loud, that he was doing this for her. She had seemed surprise, her usual callous expression contorting into something more genuine and real. The look was gone as soon as it had come, though, and he was soundly slapped upside the head. “Get a grip, cadet, or I’ll have you demoted!” He had only laughed and asked, “To what? I’m at the bottom of the totem pole, hey!” Her response was a frigid glare and a declaration of, “Stupid. You’re a fucking … Maggot! Go get some sleep, dumbass! He faked a low growl at the insults, but stomped off anyway to go do what he was told. Lal had long ago earned his respect; now he needed to earn her’s. Following orders seemed to be a good a start as any.
More years passed them by, one after another, and still nothing had changed. He had been promoted - twice - but apparently that counted for next to nothing in Lal Mirch’s book. Undeterred, he continued to be the best he could be. Not for him, not for the Frogmen, not even for his country. No, he did this for the people of that country because they were what counted. He fought for the people who could not fight. He lived for the people who could not live. He mourned for every life he had to take that could have otherwise been saved. His job may have required emotional control, but that didn’t stop him for feeling. He knew what it felt like to be in pain. He could remember many nights spent in the medical wards waiting to be deemed healthy enough to be returned to active duty. He had fought many battles, lost a few along the way, but always came out stronger than before.
The day Lal received a letter in the mail, though, with no post-mark or return address, his world came crashing down around him all at once. She had become secretive, hiding things, but he could pretty much guess what that letter said and it made his blood run cold. Reborn, a close friend of her’s that he had met awhile back, had gotten one remarkably similar to that very letter - and Reborn had had no qualms about teasing him about it, how he was apparently the best hitman in the world and Colonello was a far-cry from where he should have been. It had stung at the time, but he had always taken Reborn’s taunts in stride. This, though, was something he had no control over. It was up to Lal if that letter was accepted or not. He could not tell her to stay, not for his own selfish reasons.
This all changed the moment he found out about the down-side to the letter’s proposal. To gain the immortality the senders had promised, there apparently was a high price to pay. Knowing this, he couldn’t sit idly by and watch her do something this irreversibly, something that would cost her the happiness he wanted so badly for her to have. He followed her, night after night, keeping tabs on her because they wouldn’t have her. She had been through so much, seen too much blood-shed already, she needed a get-away that this life wouldn’t give her. He would be able to give her a real life if all those worked out, he would trade places with her and make amends for the past he could never correct.
D-Day arrived quicker than he had first assumed. He was rattled with nerves as he followed them from a distance, too shook up about what he was about to. Sacrificing himself for someone else, he didn’t know if he could do it. It was stupid, feeling this way, like he was helpless. But this, there was no mistake - this was the right thing to do. He assured himself every step of the way that he needed to do this, for Lal’s sake. This could not, would not, be another back-fire. No matter how it turned out, he would not let this be the biggest mistake of his life. Because that was what he had learned throughout all these years of being forcing-fed training; he had learned to make the most out of any given situation, even when things looked bleak and at their worst. His efforts would not be wasted ones tonight, he was positive.
“Either stop following us or show yourself.” The smug voice belonged to none other than Reborn, which had Colonello stifling a sigh from his hiding spot along the cliff’s edge. It was a given someone would notice him, these people weren’t asked for no good reason to become a part of the famed Arcobalenco. They were elitist, each in their own special way - but of course it had to be Reborn that caught on. He weighed his options. On one hand, he could admit that yes, he had been following them for well over a quarter of the past hour. And on the other, he could walk away, none the wiser. Well, it was no contest really. He stepped out from the alcove that had hidden him from view and quirked an eyebrow at Reborn in challenge.
“Got something to say to me, hey?” Reborn smirked that unnerving calm smirk that had always rubbed him the wrong way. Apparently the hitman found putting him on edge more entertaining than answering his question. He was use to it and so ignored it, turning to Lal and giving her a large, beaming grin - one he hadn’t shown her in years. And you, hey! Shouldn’t you be sleeping? He had teased, trying to make the tense atmosphere lighter. The rest of the potential Arcobalenco were already giving him odd looks, wondering who he was while others pointed their weapon of choice at him, ready to kill if need be. He swallowed thickly and half-considered making a run for it while he still had the chance. All Reborn had to do was tell them he was of no importance and there would be no tomorrow for him. There would be no chance for to save Lal … Remembering why he was here, his half-hearted thoughts of running dimmed, the flight and fight sensation turning away from the tempting flight and settling into the resolution of fight. He would stay. He had something to prove.
Colonello waited in silence for the weapons to be either lowered or used, holding his ground despite the disapproving looks cast his way. Lal recovered from her shock from seeing him here of all places and shouted, for them all to hear, “For God’s sake, lower your weapons! He’s no damn threat! Can’t you see he doesn’t even have a weapon?” She paused for a minute to send him a scolding gaze in reprimand of that, but he could only smirk, subtly tapping on his belt - as if to point out that even if she couldn’t see what was there, he still had a few tricks up his sleeve. Never leave home unprepared was his motto. She rolled her eyes and went on. “This guy is just an idiot subordinate. Ignore him.”
Usually he didn’t let comments like that slide, not when they came from Lal, but today was an exception because that comment had saved him. The five that had seen him as a threat stowed away their unique weapons, some disgruntled that they didn’t get a chance to use them. They began to walk away, but Colonello persistently followed them. No one said anything until they reached the very top of the cliff and Reborn dryly noted the meeting place was empty. Lal told him to shut up in irritation and a few others gave the man scathing looks for pointing the obvious. Colonello smirked as well, but held his tongue. Reborn would have his head if he said what he wanted to say.
They waited for what felt like hours for whatever it was that was supposed to happen. Nothing did. They waited some more and still nothing awe-inspiring happened, making Colonello even more agitated. Waiting had always been the worse part of a mission, but he had mastered his control long ago and kept to it, toughing it out because the wait would be worth it in the end. He wasn’t stupid enough to hide out in plain sight, though, and kept to the shadows of a small tree grove that grew atop this strange cliff. The soil wasn’t one that could bear life, so he couldn’t fathom why there were trees here, but they were well-suited for his needs and he wouldn’t second-guess it.
Minutes continued to blend into hours and still they waited. When it seemed like everyone, not just him, was at the end of their patience - that was when it happened, too fast for the naked-eye to see. There was a flash of light too bright to look at and after it had cleared there stood seven people that made Colonello think angels when in reality they were no more than what he was; they were human, or they had been. Now, though, they were what Colonello had feared Lal would become, they were humans that had given up their souls for the prize of lasting power that would not fade. The one in a dark blue robe approached Lal, the ritual beginning as the others found their matching person. He kept to the shadows as he moved steadily closer, seeing this strange sight through narrowed eyes. Lal’s hand was taken and grasped, placed over an object Colonello could not see from his vantage point - but he knew this was his chance, his only chance, to turn things around.
So he acted, instinct kicking in to protect what was important to him. He grasped Lal’s hand over what he could now see was a pacifier, he tried to pull her away, meaning to trade spots with her. The person beneath that robe, though, was stronger than he had first suspected, holding to Lal as Colonello tried in vain to stop what this was, what this was turn her into. After that, things were mostly a blur. He remembered Lal screaming he was an idiot and the person’s low voice, a man’s voice, criticizing him. Reborn? was his last thought before he welcomed oblivion.
~
Later on, much later on, he had woken up to find that the world looked much bigger than it should have and he was surrounded by babies. These babies were at eye-level with him, however, and that was when it had clicked. He had shrunk, making him one of those babies he was eyeing with distaste. Scrambling to stand, to make himself taller, he almost fell back over as a dizzy spell washed over him, making him sway on the spot. A small hand on his back steadied him. He tensed, unsure of the person’s intentions - whether he would be killed or if this was nothing more than a friendly gesture. “Screw up much, Colonello?” He relaxed as soon as he recognized the condescending tone the person spoke with. Reborn was the only one who could get away with that and not make Colonello feel worse than he already felt.
“I didn’t screw-up, hey! And it’s none of your business.” He pulled away from Reborn’s awkward comforting and went to kneel at the side of a little girl with a burn-mark scarring the right side of her face. He tentatively reached out and cupped her cheek while she slept, eyelashes brushing against pale cheeks and her chest rising and falling in time with each reassuring breath she took. ”She’s going to okay, hey! She is. We both are.” Reborn merely scoffed, making Colonello smirk despite the pain gripping at his heart. He had maimed her. This was his fault. If he had never tried to interfere, she wouldn’t …
“Accept that you screwed-up. How do you think she’s going to feel when she wakes up and finds out you’re just as cursed as she is?” It was something Colonello couldn’t find words to explain, but he didn’t think he had done the wrong thing. If he gave in, conceded that he was wrong, that was the only time his decisions would truly be what everyone said they were - backfires.
“It’s not like that, hey,” Colonello growled instead, retracting his hand from her cheek as if burned and looking over his shoulder to glare at Reborn’s pompous visage. Even as a baby the man still grated on his nerves. “She won’t be alone! You’re alone, aren’t you? You’re alone and bitter and this curse … it’ll consume you, hey. Not her, it won’t have her. Can you say someone cared enough to protect you? None of you, no one but Lal, can say that, hey.”
Reborn scoffed once more in response and Colonello could tell the topic was closed. It was a touchy matter, anyway, and he had strayed into dangerous territory by even saying that much. These seven had sacrifices themselves for a reason; he was belittling that reason for his own selfish, not self-righteous, reasons; just like he had wanted to avoid all along. But he had been honest; this curse would not take Lal. If he could, maybe he would save all of them. There had to be a way to fix things. There just had to be.
“Give up before you get hurt,” was Reborn’s final warning before he had left, leaving him alone to drown in the silence that surrounded him and the guilt that inevitable consumed him.
~
Years later and Colonello refused to consider that one event a backfire because it wasn’t. Things had worked out. Lal may not have followed him, but he had at least been able to give her hope - and that was more than enough. She could live her life the way she wanted to now, already having settled into a cushy job as a CEDEF member that Colonello had mocked her for weeks and weeks later. She deserved a little peace, though, after all they had been through and he didn’t mean any of what he said. He had a front to uphold and that was it. She knew him better than that; she knew when he was joking.
His nature, however, hadn’t allowed him to rest like Lal. He had to keep going, to keep himself active and motivated or the curse would take its hold - and he wasn’t about to let something like that happened. For quite a while he kept up with his old job at COMSUBIN. That was until someone made fun of his height and he had went nuts on the person. His discharges were in order the very next day, strangely enough with an honorable merit and good conduct award that he couldn’t fathom were for. It wasn’t like he was cadet of the year or anything.
Now that he was short a job, a salary, and a free meal, he had to look for a more permanent career. Reborn, being the kind and generous guy he was suggested Mafia Land. Colonello had balked at the idea until the other Arcobalenco mentioned the place was in need of someone with enough training to ‘take out the trash’. Non-figurative speaking, Reborn had insisted. Colonello had been inclined to believe otherwise, and soon enough he was working full-time at the place. Filling the position was easy. It was dealing with the general public that ended up pissing him off. He hadn’t expected the incompetence he would have to put up with, there was heaps of it. He jumped at Reborn’s proposition about ‘home tutoring’, had taken the first chance he could to get off the island-of-el-stupidos. He wasn’t expecting, either, that he would be jumping out of the frying pan and right into the fire when he had accepted that offer. The kid he would be ‘tutoring’ had been the very picture of moronic. Really, Colonello was sure if he looked up the word in the dictionary he would see a smiling photo of Sasagawa Ryohei right next to it.
He may have complained in front of Reborn, though, but it had been a different story after there first time alone, one-on-one. The kid might have given off the image of someone who was mentally impaired, but Colonello was reminded of that saying ‘you can’t judge a book by its cover’ because even if Ryohei was an impaired looking book it was surprising tough on the inside. Colonello hadn’t been expecting the kid to live up his expectation, but Ryohei had and he had never been prouder to call someone his student. For the next few years, Colonello took great pleasure in teaching. He had ended up sharing a lot with his pupil, more than he had thought was sensible, and now he could only hope this wasn’t a backfire in the making.
~
It was right after Ryohei’s graduation that he had decided to take the kid on a camping expedition, saying he needed to be ‘toughened up for the real world. Someone the Sun Guardian in training had interpreted that as ‘extreme training to the max!’ which a little bit of overkill. There was nothing ‘extreme’ about camping, but he didn’t damper that kid’s spirit by pointing that out.
The packing was the first thing on Colonello’s to-do list. Delivering orders from his lounging position on the bed, he expected nothing short of obedience from his pupil, who was actually doing the packing. Colonello had mentioned it was ‘good training’ and Ryohei had enthusiastically said ‘let me’. It was great having a passionate student and a dense one, all in one neat package. Of course, he immediately rethought this as he noticed how haphazardly the boxer was flinging things into the backpacks. Ryohei appeared to think ‘packing’ was code for ‘throw everything into the packs with great force’.
When they finally made it out to the wilderness, hours upon hours later, Ryohei was still full of energy. The kid was a bottomless pit of the stuff. Colonello would have told him to sit down and shut up, but he was trying to be, of all things, nice. He only sighed and instructed his student to do something constructive - like set-up camp for the night, which in retrospect hadn’t been a very bright idea. The tent ended up lop-sided, the firewood was all wrong, and then Ryohei had asked - had the gull to ask - where the bathroom was.
His small face fell against his even smaller hands, exasperated. “It’s all around you, hey!” growled Colonello, remembering belatedly that he was trying for nice and had just failed. Despite the sudden attitude, Ryohei merely laughed loudly and then ‘oooh’ed even louder. Colonello couldn’t classify the kid on a stupidity level, not from 1 to 10 anyway. The Guardian was clearly a 20. Of course, there were other things about the kid that made up for the ‘no brains upstairs’ dilemma. There was his extraordinary to always look on the bright side, to stick with something he enjoyed and loved - his boxing a prime example, and Colonello would admit, the kid had looks going for him as well. At Ryohei’s age, he had been a bit scrawnier and the people had camp had often teased him for it. He admired anyway who could look that good and still kickass. It was a default sort of admiration, but it was admiration all the same.
Poking at the camp-fire with a twig, having gotten the right wood a while ago and lit it, he wondered what was taking the kid so long. He hadn’t heard any yelps or cries for help so he was pretty sure Ryohei hadn’t gotten into any sort of trouble yet, but … He stood from his perch beside the warm fire and walked over to the packs, searching them for a fog-horn and blowing it as soon as it was in his grasp. He smirked when he heard a loud, “COMING, COMING. The next shout, though, left him both confused and curious at the same time. “GOT DISTRACTED BY THIS EXTREME PLANT, MASTER COLONELLO!” It wasn’t often you heard someone got distracted by a plant, but apparently it was possible.
“Bring it back with you,” Colonello had ordered. It couldn’t hurt, he figured, and he wasn’t the type to let his curiosity go without being sated. He, however, could only blink at the odd shrub his student had brought back with him. “You do know that that attracts bears, hey? The only reply he got before a roar ripped through the air was “EXTREME!” Colonello still didn’t see what was so extreme about situation like this. His initial reaction had been along the lines of Oh shit. And that was a far cry from ‘extreme’.
Ordering his student to stand-down, Ryohei reluctantly complying, he let his curse out for the first time in years - heaving a put-out sigh in the process. The only times he had ever allowed himself to be overwhelmed by it, this thing that called itself a curse, had been during risky operations where it had been needed, when he needed to rely on the curse to keep on living and make sure others did the same. The kid was lucky; he would get a chance to see a pro in action. Most of the time his comrades had been too unconscious to watch.
Taking out the bear was the easy part, maybe even a little bit of overkill - but Colonello didn’t believe in taking chances - that only left the aftermath of the curse to deal with. For one, it hurt like a son of a bitch, and secondly, his student was staring out him with an open-mouth, clearly not understanding what was going on.
“You … what did you do with the extreme baby that is Master Colonello?!” Palming at his face for the second time in less than an hour, Colonello wondered what he had done to deserve a great student like this with an IQ level that was in the single digits. Although, this time he would concede that his student had a legit reason for being confused. He wanted badly to say it’s me you idiot, but settled for glaring at the kid for all he was worth as he considered how to explain this in the simplest terms possible. After a few attempts at using big words and lots of hand-motions, he put it in the easiest way imaginable and said - in gorilla speak - “Me. Cursed. You. Normal. And now I’m all grown-up up, hey. Understand?” He couldn’t make it any more condensed than that.
Another loud ‘oooooh’ing resounded in the air as Ryohei walked over to the lump of bear on the ground, crouching down beside it and wondering out-loud, “Do you think it’s fur would make a good punching bag?” A sarcastic reply on the tip of his tongue, Colonello had to resist the urge to say it. Instead, he replied with a weary, “It would if you took out all the organs, hey.” It was a joke, really, but Ryohei found that information too ‘extreme!’ to pass up. To distract his student away from the absurd notion of turning a bear into a punching bag, he stumbled over to Ryohei and dragged him back to the campfire, forcing the kid to have a seat beside him - since he really needed some support, even in a sitting position, but the Sun Guardian didn’t need to know that. He reconsidered distracting his student like this, though, because now the kid was going on and on about this was the coolest thing ever and could he do something like that, too? Poofing into someone else is extreme!
Colonello’s head was pounding, the noise too much, and to get Ryohei to just shut up he did the only rational thing he could think of to do at the time. He kissed him. Right on the lips. A blissful silence was a welcome one after that. Even if Ryohei kept mumbling about wanting to try that extreme training again, getting the ‘extreme’ right for once in Colonello’s opinion.
Characters: Colonello, Lal Mirch, Reborn, Sasagawa Ryohei
Summary: There are only so many times things can backfire before you get at least one right.
Pairings: Colonello/Ryohei with a large dash of Colonello/Lal
Disclaimer: The world of Katekyo Hitman Reborn! belongs to Amano Akira.
A/N: Another belated Christmas gift. This one for rai_kai_lai. It ... turned out longer than I thought it would. It's the back-story's fault. It wasn't supposed to be there orginally. This was supposed to be crack, which it is - but only at the very end. *FAIL*
It was at boot camp that he first warranted the name Backfire Colonello. His group had been running the training course at the time and Colonello had tried to be the wise guy, boasting that he could do this kind of thing with his eyes closed. It ended with the rest of his group blindfolding him later that night and forcing him onto the field to do exactly that. Everything had been fine, too, until he had reached the barbed wire portion of the course. It went without saying that he wound up with a few more nicks and cuts this time around. The next time had been during his time under Lal Mirch as her subordinate. It had been his first mission and it hadn’t exactly been a pretty one.
They had been ordered to infiltrate a submarine that had been patrolling too close and too frequently in their territory. It could have been by-passed, if the submarine had been a registered one, had shown up in their database, but it hadn’t and they never took chances when it came to a possible hostile. It was likely this particular submarine was just a scout, but that still hadn’t meant anything to them. They had been given the orders and they had to carry those orders without question. To do otherwise was to betray the organization, and to betray the organization was as good as a death sentence. Colonello hadn’t had a problem setting up the bombs; that had been the easy part. It was what came after that which had left them stunned, everyone and not just Colonello.
The C4 had gone off before its designated time. They had made sure to synchronize all the timers - it had made no sense at the time, none at all. There had went their plans for a simultaneous boom. The engine room was the first to go, followed abruptly by the control center. Colonello had barely had time get out of there, the sub already half-way filled with water, making for an awkward get-away if ever there was one. He had made it out of alive, which couldn’t be said for two other men in his squad, two good men who had volunteered to help the ‘new kid’ out. They had lost their lives for him, for a simple mistake he should have caught. It was bad enough he punished himself every day for it, every day that he was alive and they weren’t, but Lal had taken to reminding him at any chance. She had always been the harsh type, enforcing disciple with an iron-first, but her anger this time was for a completely unprofessional reason and he couldn’t call her on it, too afraid to draw attention to what everyone already knew. During that fiasco, she had lost more than just another comrade; she had lost someone she could have spent the rest of her life with.
Seeing her crying the day after the news had been delivered, when it had finally sunk in, it had been more than he could bear. He had promised himself he would never let her cry again, not because of him. He wouldn’t let his screw-ups cost others their happiness, not any more. So he trained, harder and more vigorously than he had ever trained before. His personal array of weapons quickly expanded now that he was taking what he did seriously, focused, determined, and serious for once in his life. Being a part of this was no longer a game, something to do to pass the time. No, that person was a part of the past now. The new Colonello wouldn’t allow for childish mistakes to be made, not even the smallest of ones.
It wasn’t until a year later that Lal finally called him on his ridiculous training methods, shouting that he was insane and she wanted to know what he was doing. He had yelled back, just as loud, that he was doing this for her. She had seemed surprise, her usual callous expression contorting into something more genuine and real. The look was gone as soon as it had come, though, and he was soundly slapped upside the head. “Get a grip, cadet, or I’ll have you demoted!” He had only laughed and asked, “To what? I’m at the bottom of the totem pole, hey!” Her response was a frigid glare and a declaration of, “Stupid. You’re a fucking … Maggot! Go get some sleep, dumbass! He faked a low growl at the insults, but stomped off anyway to go do what he was told. Lal had long ago earned his respect; now he needed to earn her’s. Following orders seemed to be a good a start as any.
More years passed them by, one after another, and still nothing had changed. He had been promoted - twice - but apparently that counted for next to nothing in Lal Mirch’s book. Undeterred, he continued to be the best he could be. Not for him, not for the Frogmen, not even for his country. No, he did this for the people of that country because they were what counted. He fought for the people who could not fight. He lived for the people who could not live. He mourned for every life he had to take that could have otherwise been saved. His job may have required emotional control, but that didn’t stop him for feeling. He knew what it felt like to be in pain. He could remember many nights spent in the medical wards waiting to be deemed healthy enough to be returned to active duty. He had fought many battles, lost a few along the way, but always came out stronger than before.
The day Lal received a letter in the mail, though, with no post-mark or return address, his world came crashing down around him all at once. She had become secretive, hiding things, but he could pretty much guess what that letter said and it made his blood run cold. Reborn, a close friend of her’s that he had met awhile back, had gotten one remarkably similar to that very letter - and Reborn had had no qualms about teasing him about it, how he was apparently the best hitman in the world and Colonello was a far-cry from where he should have been. It had stung at the time, but he had always taken Reborn’s taunts in stride. This, though, was something he had no control over. It was up to Lal if that letter was accepted or not. He could not tell her to stay, not for his own selfish reasons.
This all changed the moment he found out about the down-side to the letter’s proposal. To gain the immortality the senders had promised, there apparently was a high price to pay. Knowing this, he couldn’t sit idly by and watch her do something this irreversibly, something that would cost her the happiness he wanted so badly for her to have. He followed her, night after night, keeping tabs on her because they wouldn’t have her. She had been through so much, seen too much blood-shed already, she needed a get-away that this life wouldn’t give her. He would be able to give her a real life if all those worked out, he would trade places with her and make amends for the past he could never correct.
D-Day arrived quicker than he had first assumed. He was rattled with nerves as he followed them from a distance, too shook up about what he was about to. Sacrificing himself for someone else, he didn’t know if he could do it. It was stupid, feeling this way, like he was helpless. But this, there was no mistake - this was the right thing to do. He assured himself every step of the way that he needed to do this, for Lal’s sake. This could not, would not, be another back-fire. No matter how it turned out, he would not let this be the biggest mistake of his life. Because that was what he had learned throughout all these years of being forcing-fed training; he had learned to make the most out of any given situation, even when things looked bleak and at their worst. His efforts would not be wasted ones tonight, he was positive.
“Either stop following us or show yourself.” The smug voice belonged to none other than Reborn, which had Colonello stifling a sigh from his hiding spot along the cliff’s edge. It was a given someone would notice him, these people weren’t asked for no good reason to become a part of the famed Arcobalenco. They were elitist, each in their own special way - but of course it had to be Reborn that caught on. He weighed his options. On one hand, he could admit that yes, he had been following them for well over a quarter of the past hour. And on the other, he could walk away, none the wiser. Well, it was no contest really. He stepped out from the alcove that had hidden him from view and quirked an eyebrow at Reborn in challenge.
“Got something to say to me, hey?” Reborn smirked that unnerving calm smirk that had always rubbed him the wrong way. Apparently the hitman found putting him on edge more entertaining than answering his question. He was use to it and so ignored it, turning to Lal and giving her a large, beaming grin - one he hadn’t shown her in years. And you, hey! Shouldn’t you be sleeping? He had teased, trying to make the tense atmosphere lighter. The rest of the potential Arcobalenco were already giving him odd looks, wondering who he was while others pointed their weapon of choice at him, ready to kill if need be. He swallowed thickly and half-considered making a run for it while he still had the chance. All Reborn had to do was tell them he was of no importance and there would be no tomorrow for him. There would be no chance for to save Lal … Remembering why he was here, his half-hearted thoughts of running dimmed, the flight and fight sensation turning away from the tempting flight and settling into the resolution of fight. He would stay. He had something to prove.
Colonello waited in silence for the weapons to be either lowered or used, holding his ground despite the disapproving looks cast his way. Lal recovered from her shock from seeing him here of all places and shouted, for them all to hear, “For God’s sake, lower your weapons! He’s no damn threat! Can’t you see he doesn’t even have a weapon?” She paused for a minute to send him a scolding gaze in reprimand of that, but he could only smirk, subtly tapping on his belt - as if to point out that even if she couldn’t see what was there, he still had a few tricks up his sleeve. Never leave home unprepared was his motto. She rolled her eyes and went on. “This guy is just an idiot subordinate. Ignore him.”
Usually he didn’t let comments like that slide, not when they came from Lal, but today was an exception because that comment had saved him. The five that had seen him as a threat stowed away their unique weapons, some disgruntled that they didn’t get a chance to use them. They began to walk away, but Colonello persistently followed them. No one said anything until they reached the very top of the cliff and Reborn dryly noted the meeting place was empty. Lal told him to shut up in irritation and a few others gave the man scathing looks for pointing the obvious. Colonello smirked as well, but held his tongue. Reborn would have his head if he said what he wanted to say.
They waited for what felt like hours for whatever it was that was supposed to happen. Nothing did. They waited some more and still nothing awe-inspiring happened, making Colonello even more agitated. Waiting had always been the worse part of a mission, but he had mastered his control long ago and kept to it, toughing it out because the wait would be worth it in the end. He wasn’t stupid enough to hide out in plain sight, though, and kept to the shadows of a small tree grove that grew atop this strange cliff. The soil wasn’t one that could bear life, so he couldn’t fathom why there were trees here, but they were well-suited for his needs and he wouldn’t second-guess it.
Minutes continued to blend into hours and still they waited. When it seemed like everyone, not just him, was at the end of their patience - that was when it happened, too fast for the naked-eye to see. There was a flash of light too bright to look at and after it had cleared there stood seven people that made Colonello think angels when in reality they were no more than what he was; they were human, or they had been. Now, though, they were what Colonello had feared Lal would become, they were humans that had given up their souls for the prize of lasting power that would not fade. The one in a dark blue robe approached Lal, the ritual beginning as the others found their matching person. He kept to the shadows as he moved steadily closer, seeing this strange sight through narrowed eyes. Lal’s hand was taken and grasped, placed over an object Colonello could not see from his vantage point - but he knew this was his chance, his only chance, to turn things around.
So he acted, instinct kicking in to protect what was important to him. He grasped Lal’s hand over what he could now see was a pacifier, he tried to pull her away, meaning to trade spots with her. The person beneath that robe, though, was stronger than he had first suspected, holding to Lal as Colonello tried in vain to stop what this was, what this was turn her into. After that, things were mostly a blur. He remembered Lal screaming he was an idiot and the person’s low voice, a man’s voice, criticizing him. Reborn? was his last thought before he welcomed oblivion.
~
Later on, much later on, he had woken up to find that the world looked much bigger than it should have and he was surrounded by babies. These babies were at eye-level with him, however, and that was when it had clicked. He had shrunk, making him one of those babies he was eyeing with distaste. Scrambling to stand, to make himself taller, he almost fell back over as a dizzy spell washed over him, making him sway on the spot. A small hand on his back steadied him. He tensed, unsure of the person’s intentions - whether he would be killed or if this was nothing more than a friendly gesture. “Screw up much, Colonello?” He relaxed as soon as he recognized the condescending tone the person spoke with. Reborn was the only one who could get away with that and not make Colonello feel worse than he already felt.
“I didn’t screw-up, hey! And it’s none of your business.” He pulled away from Reborn’s awkward comforting and went to kneel at the side of a little girl with a burn-mark scarring the right side of her face. He tentatively reached out and cupped her cheek while she slept, eyelashes brushing against pale cheeks and her chest rising and falling in time with each reassuring breath she took. ”She’s going to okay, hey! She is. We both are.” Reborn merely scoffed, making Colonello smirk despite the pain gripping at his heart. He had maimed her. This was his fault. If he had never tried to interfere, she wouldn’t …
“Accept that you screwed-up. How do you think she’s going to feel when she wakes up and finds out you’re just as cursed as she is?” It was something Colonello couldn’t find words to explain, but he didn’t think he had done the wrong thing. If he gave in, conceded that he was wrong, that was the only time his decisions would truly be what everyone said they were - backfires.
“It’s not like that, hey,” Colonello growled instead, retracting his hand from her cheek as if burned and looking over his shoulder to glare at Reborn’s pompous visage. Even as a baby the man still grated on his nerves. “She won’t be alone! You’re alone, aren’t you? You’re alone and bitter and this curse … it’ll consume you, hey. Not her, it won’t have her. Can you say someone cared enough to protect you? None of you, no one but Lal, can say that, hey.”
Reborn scoffed once more in response and Colonello could tell the topic was closed. It was a touchy matter, anyway, and he had strayed into dangerous territory by even saying that much. These seven had sacrifices themselves for a reason; he was belittling that reason for his own selfish, not self-righteous, reasons; just like he had wanted to avoid all along. But he had been honest; this curse would not take Lal. If he could, maybe he would save all of them. There had to be a way to fix things. There just had to be.
“Give up before you get hurt,” was Reborn’s final warning before he had left, leaving him alone to drown in the silence that surrounded him and the guilt that inevitable consumed him.
~
Years later and Colonello refused to consider that one event a backfire because it wasn’t. Things had worked out. Lal may not have followed him, but he had at least been able to give her hope - and that was more than enough. She could live her life the way she wanted to now, already having settled into a cushy job as a CEDEF member that Colonello had mocked her for weeks and weeks later. She deserved a little peace, though, after all they had been through and he didn’t mean any of what he said. He had a front to uphold and that was it. She knew him better than that; she knew when he was joking.
His nature, however, hadn’t allowed him to rest like Lal. He had to keep going, to keep himself active and motivated or the curse would take its hold - and he wasn’t about to let something like that happened. For quite a while he kept up with his old job at COMSUBIN. That was until someone made fun of his height and he had went nuts on the person. His discharges were in order the very next day, strangely enough with an honorable merit and good conduct award that he couldn’t fathom were for. It wasn’t like he was cadet of the year or anything.
Now that he was short a job, a salary, and a free meal, he had to look for a more permanent career. Reborn, being the kind and generous guy he was suggested Mafia Land. Colonello had balked at the idea until the other Arcobalenco mentioned the place was in need of someone with enough training to ‘take out the trash’. Non-figurative speaking, Reborn had insisted. Colonello had been inclined to believe otherwise, and soon enough he was working full-time at the place. Filling the position was easy. It was dealing with the general public that ended up pissing him off. He hadn’t expected the incompetence he would have to put up with, there was heaps of it. He jumped at Reborn’s proposition about ‘home tutoring’, had taken the first chance he could to get off the island-of-el-stupidos. He wasn’t expecting, either, that he would be jumping out of the frying pan and right into the fire when he had accepted that offer. The kid he would be ‘tutoring’ had been the very picture of moronic. Really, Colonello was sure if he looked up the word in the dictionary he would see a smiling photo of Sasagawa Ryohei right next to it.
He may have complained in front of Reborn, though, but it had been a different story after there first time alone, one-on-one. The kid might have given off the image of someone who was mentally impaired, but Colonello was reminded of that saying ‘you can’t judge a book by its cover’ because even if Ryohei was an impaired looking book it was surprising tough on the inside. Colonello hadn’t been expecting the kid to live up his expectation, but Ryohei had and he had never been prouder to call someone his student. For the next few years, Colonello took great pleasure in teaching. He had ended up sharing a lot with his pupil, more than he had thought was sensible, and now he could only hope this wasn’t a backfire in the making.
~
It was right after Ryohei’s graduation that he had decided to take the kid on a camping expedition, saying he needed to be ‘toughened up for the real world. Someone the Sun Guardian in training had interpreted that as ‘extreme training to the max!’ which a little bit of overkill. There was nothing ‘extreme’ about camping, but he didn’t damper that kid’s spirit by pointing that out.
The packing was the first thing on Colonello’s to-do list. Delivering orders from his lounging position on the bed, he expected nothing short of obedience from his pupil, who was actually doing the packing. Colonello had mentioned it was ‘good training’ and Ryohei had enthusiastically said ‘let me’. It was great having a passionate student and a dense one, all in one neat package. Of course, he immediately rethought this as he noticed how haphazardly the boxer was flinging things into the backpacks. Ryohei appeared to think ‘packing’ was code for ‘throw everything into the packs with great force’.
When they finally made it out to the wilderness, hours upon hours later, Ryohei was still full of energy. The kid was a bottomless pit of the stuff. Colonello would have told him to sit down and shut up, but he was trying to be, of all things, nice. He only sighed and instructed his student to do something constructive - like set-up camp for the night, which in retrospect hadn’t been a very bright idea. The tent ended up lop-sided, the firewood was all wrong, and then Ryohei had asked - had the gull to ask - where the bathroom was.
His small face fell against his even smaller hands, exasperated. “It’s all around you, hey!” growled Colonello, remembering belatedly that he was trying for nice and had just failed. Despite the sudden attitude, Ryohei merely laughed loudly and then ‘oooh’ed even louder. Colonello couldn’t classify the kid on a stupidity level, not from 1 to 10 anyway. The Guardian was clearly a 20. Of course, there were other things about the kid that made up for the ‘no brains upstairs’ dilemma. There was his extraordinary to always look on the bright side, to stick with something he enjoyed and loved - his boxing a prime example, and Colonello would admit, the kid had looks going for him as well. At Ryohei’s age, he had been a bit scrawnier and the people had camp had often teased him for it. He admired anyway who could look that good and still kickass. It was a default sort of admiration, but it was admiration all the same.
Poking at the camp-fire with a twig, having gotten the right wood a while ago and lit it, he wondered what was taking the kid so long. He hadn’t heard any yelps or cries for help so he was pretty sure Ryohei hadn’t gotten into any sort of trouble yet, but … He stood from his perch beside the warm fire and walked over to the packs, searching them for a fog-horn and blowing it as soon as it was in his grasp. He smirked when he heard a loud, “COMING, COMING. The next shout, though, left him both confused and curious at the same time. “GOT DISTRACTED BY THIS EXTREME PLANT, MASTER COLONELLO!” It wasn’t often you heard someone got distracted by a plant, but apparently it was possible.
“Bring it back with you,” Colonello had ordered. It couldn’t hurt, he figured, and he wasn’t the type to let his curiosity go without being sated. He, however, could only blink at the odd shrub his student had brought back with him. “You do know that that attracts bears, hey? The only reply he got before a roar ripped through the air was “EXTREME!” Colonello still didn’t see what was so extreme about situation like this. His initial reaction had been along the lines of Oh shit. And that was a far cry from ‘extreme’.
Ordering his student to stand-down, Ryohei reluctantly complying, he let his curse out for the first time in years - heaving a put-out sigh in the process. The only times he had ever allowed himself to be overwhelmed by it, this thing that called itself a curse, had been during risky operations where it had been needed, when he needed to rely on the curse to keep on living and make sure others did the same. The kid was lucky; he would get a chance to see a pro in action. Most of the time his comrades had been too unconscious to watch.
Taking out the bear was the easy part, maybe even a little bit of overkill - but Colonello didn’t believe in taking chances - that only left the aftermath of the curse to deal with. For one, it hurt like a son of a bitch, and secondly, his student was staring out him with an open-mouth, clearly not understanding what was going on.
“You … what did you do with the extreme baby that is Master Colonello?!” Palming at his face for the second time in less than an hour, Colonello wondered what he had done to deserve a great student like this with an IQ level that was in the single digits. Although, this time he would concede that his student had a legit reason for being confused. He wanted badly to say it’s me you idiot, but settled for glaring at the kid for all he was worth as he considered how to explain this in the simplest terms possible. After a few attempts at using big words and lots of hand-motions, he put it in the easiest way imaginable and said - in gorilla speak - “Me. Cursed. You. Normal. And now I’m all grown-up up, hey. Understand?” He couldn’t make it any more condensed than that.
Another loud ‘oooooh’ing resounded in the air as Ryohei walked over to the lump of bear on the ground, crouching down beside it and wondering out-loud, “Do you think it’s fur would make a good punching bag?” A sarcastic reply on the tip of his tongue, Colonello had to resist the urge to say it. Instead, he replied with a weary, “It would if you took out all the organs, hey.” It was a joke, really, but Ryohei found that information too ‘extreme!’ to pass up. To distract his student away from the absurd notion of turning a bear into a punching bag, he stumbled over to Ryohei and dragged him back to the campfire, forcing the kid to have a seat beside him - since he really needed some support, even in a sitting position, but the Sun Guardian didn’t need to know that. He reconsidered distracting his student like this, though, because now the kid was going on and on about this was the coolest thing ever and could he do something like that, too? Poofing into someone else is extreme!
Colonello’s head was pounding, the noise too much, and to get Ryohei to just shut up he did the only rational thing he could think of to do at the time. He kissed him. Right on the lips. A blissful silence was a welcome one after that. Even if Ryohei kept mumbling about wanting to try that extreme training again, getting the ‘extreme’ right for once in Colonello’s opinion.