[Fic] Windshear [Part 41/?]

[kagayachou]

HELLO WORLD~
I'm having one of those blank moments when staring at a computer screen hurts my eyes because of work work work work and stress so bad my new hairstylist asked because he could somehow tell from working with the hair O_O I didn't really consider it possible before, but will attempt to remedy that with more sleep. Right now.
Enjoy~♥

Windshear Part [41/?]

Authors: kagayachou and evocates
Characters/Pairings: Ryohei, Gokudera, Bianchi, Yamamoto, Hibari. Ryohei/Gokudera. Yamamoto/Hibari.
Rating: PG-13
Words: 5771
Summary: Hibird isn't the only one going 'idiots, idiots, idiots...'

With a nod of acknowledgement towards Bianchi, Ryohei turned back towards Gokudera. "I sure hope you know what you're doing, octopussy," he muttered as he knotted a dark cloth behind his head. Truth be told, he wanted to know what he himself was doing too.

Of course Ryohei was aware that Gokudera could fight. It was the Storm Guardian who taught him how to use his box weapon way back during their first battle with the Millefiore... And they'd fought together many times over the years. They had even been sparing for the whole morning.

Why then did he goad the other man into a fight? Why did he even fall for it?

"Of course I know," Gokudera snapped back, tying the black cloth around his own eyes as he scowled heavily at Ryohei. He was sick of the other man trying to coddle him as if he was a teenager still, or even a child who needed to be protected. Gokudera was a Guardian just like Ryohei - he's the Tenth’s right hand man. He faced danger in the form of rival families pointing their guns at him on a regular basis, far more often than Ryohei himself.

He didn't need to be protected like some damsel in distress, and he's going to damn well make sure that Ryohei realized it.

Shifting the cloth over his eyes, he slid the Vongola Storm ring over his finger and lighting it up. His hands brushed across the sticks of dynamite seated on his belt, familiarizing himself with the distinctly different types and their positions so he wouldn't fumble with them later on.

"Let's go," he gritted out, red flames bursting out from his ring.

Over at the side, Bianchi crossed her arms and leaned back against a tree that had a relatively wide shade. She was close enough to keep an eye on her brother, but far enough from his usual blast radius that she knew she'd be safe.

Silly Hayato. She scoffed at her thoughts. They almost sounded like Reborn's. But honestly, they've both been fighting all day yesterday. Someone had to make sure they didn't go overboard. ...What's gotten into them?

That was a question Ryohei wanted answered as well, because he could feel the fatigue in his shoulders - had been feeling it all morning, and he knew that neither of them had gotten enough rest last night, what with the fighting against Genkishi, against the Gesso - not to mention the many times he used his own flames to heal other people.

But he couldn't seem to rest. And maybe it was unfair of him. He should have left Gokudera alone despite the fact that he wanted to see him. He didn't want to look the man in his angry green eyes, but still!

Ryohei growled in frustration, sun flame flaring from his ring to wrap around his fists.

On his part, Gokudera didn't know why he was so agitated either. Ryohei was simply acting like himself - idiotic, hot-headed, and overreacting to everything without thinking of the words that were coming out of his mouth. Usually Gokudera simply blew up and shouted at him for a few minutes before he resigned himself to the other man's idiocy and made no more fuss about it.

But this time, it was different. Ryohei's remarks had incurred actual anger from him rather than his usual milder annoyance. He was angry at him for trying to protect him, for avoiding his gaze, for... for some many different reasons that he could barely think up right now, much less voice coherently.

So, as usual with him, he let his weapons do the talking.

Lighting his dynamites with his Storm flames, Gokudera lidded his eyes and concentrated on expanding his flames' attributes. Degeneration - to break apart and completely destroy everything that the flames touched. Combined with the destructive power of the dynamites themselves, and their power in spreading the flames, Gokudera knew that he had the power to completely destroy an entire city if he weren't careful.

His eyes snapped open suddenly, even though he knew it would be useless, and he let his weapons fly, heading in the general direction of Ryohei's voice.

But the thing with Gokudera's dynamites was that they made a very telling noise as they flew through the air, and whether Ryohei could see them or not, he couldn't halt their in their path the way Tsuna or Yamamoto could. While Tsuna could literally pinch them out with his fingers, and freeze the fire before it spread, and Yamamoto could slow the dynamites down so much that it was as though time stopped, Ryohei's flame worked differently.

Activation - it boosted strength and speeded things up. With a great cry and a burst of sun flames, Ryohei punched a clear path through the dynamites. Wherever his flame met Gokudera's dynamites, they exploded. The important thing was, they didn't do it anywhere near him.

He ran towards Gokudera through the tunnel of their flames, ignoring the blasts that seemed to surround him.

Growling to himself, Gokudera knew that his attack had failed - the rapid-sounding explosions going off had told him that Ryohei had managed to dodge all of the dynamites by using his own flames. And, by the sounds of the rushing air, he was coming towards him.

Gokudera's fist clenched at his side as he ran towards the left, whipping out even more dynamites from his pockets. He lit only one this time, throwing it a little to the right of where he thought Ryohei will be before lighting another and throwing it in the same spot. The first one would act as a decoy and a lure, while the second was to be the true attack.

Smiling grimly, Gokudera's Storm flames flared even brighter on his ring.

Ryohei stumbled; he thought it'd be safe to move forward when the first dynamite exploded in front of him, but then another stick hit his feet. He barely had time to reach down, to shield himself when it went off. By now, most of their fighting clothes were made of a special flame resistant material, but that didn't save them from the heat. Ryohei let out a hiss as he dropped down, quickly smothering the storm flame that clung to his leg with his own as he rolled to the side.

Winning was simple: the fight would be over the moment he got close enough to disable Gokudera. The hard part was pinning him down. While blindfolded. With decoy explosions and actual attacks all over the place.

Suck it up, Ryohei. You asked for this.

He listened with extreme concentration for the hiss of fuses being lit and sprang into action when he relocated Gokudera once more.

But Gokudera knew most of his tricks by now - ten years of fighting against and beside Ryohei had accustomed him to the other man's style. Ryohei fought at close-range - he couldn't do much but defend unless he was close enough to Gokudera to touch him. And Gokudera had no intentions of letting him do that.

Gritting his teeth, his eyes flickered from beneath the blindfold as he tried to listen to Ryohei's footsteps. His hearing had sharpened by now to compensate for the lack of his sight in this dangerous situation. He could tell that Ryohei was closing in, and he immediately backed up, moving towards the right as he tried to make sure that he wasn't being driven against the wall.

Goddamnit. He only realized now how much he depended on his sight when he fought - without his eyes, it was incredibly difficult to aim properly. But like hell was he going to give up just because of that - he had promised to show Ryohei exactly what he was capable of, and he wasn't going to back down from it.

He should still have a few of his rocket bombs left.

Gokudera drew them out of his pocket and lit them quickly, sending them out to Ryohei with a flick of his wrist. He could barely tell where he was throwing them, but it was all right. They would surround him enough to take him out, in any case.

Ryohei cursed as he heard those rocket bombs zooming towards him. They were so close. He actually wasn't sure if he could move out of the way in time, but doubt was no use. Quickly, he bent his knees, sun flame rushing through his legs as he kicked off the ground. It was nothing as elegant as Hibari somersaulting through the air, but just about as extreme, if not more so.

He really is a kangaroo, Bianchi thought as she followed the jump behind her goggles. While it was true that no one was about to faint at the sight of her face - since her silly Hayato couldn't see it at the moment - those boys were still kicking up a dust storm. In fact, if Ryohei hadn't launched himself so high, she wouldn't have been able to actually see the moment when- Oh, of all places!

The Vongola Sun guardian yelped when he collided into the Storm guardian and they went down like great sacks of potatoes.

"You fucking-" Gokudera cut himself off mid-sentence when he felt Ryohei's arms wrap around his chest, pulling him close and shielding him from bodily slamming against the dirt of the training grounds. He gasped, breath knocked out of him still as his head spun from the impact. But quickly enough, he regained his senses and reached up, whipping off the blindfold and turning around, digging his fingers into Ryohei's shoulders.

"What the fuck, lawn head?! What is it with you and your fixation with protecting me?!" he yelled in the other man's face. "How many fucking times do I have to tell you that I don't need to be protected?"

"I was trying to get close to you," Ryohei yelled back. "Not land on you!" His ears were ringing so his voice didn't sound as loud, and more importantly, the shoulder that he landed on was going numb fast. Rolling aside, he turned his back towards Gokudera, scowling as he reached up for his own blindfold. But then he stopped himself and refocused his attention to his shoulder.

Knowing that it wouldn't have been as painful if he'd seen where he was going, he clamped his mouth shut and chewed on the inside of his cheek; it was his big mouth that got them started after all.

Gokudera snarled again, reaching out and ripping Ryohei's blindfold off. He then curled his fingers and gripped onto the other man's biceps hard, nearly shaking him - but he wasn't so cruel to force Ryohei to look at him, not when he had gone through the effort to ask his sister to wear those goggles.

"Well, that worked very well, didn't it?" he said, sarcasm dripping off every syllable. "So much that we're miles apart now.

"Dumbass."

"Feh," At first, Ryohei winced, blinking a few times before his eyes readjusted to the light. He looked at Gokudera without thinking, swallowed, and then looked a little lower instead, sucking in a deep breath through his teeth before letting it out all at once.

It was ridiculous, thinking about a dead, faceless, green-eyed enemy- no, a human being juxtaposed over the one in front of him, who had actually survived a battle with Belphegor before - flayed to itty bitty pieces by the demonic little psychopath. Standing in a pool of his victim's...

Everything?

And I healed him. Ryohei shivered, his eyes glazing over as he asked himself why. 'Cause he's Varia. So he's Vongola. So we're...

For a moment, Ryohei looked sick. He made to brush Gokudera's hand away and stand, gruffly explaining, "I need a bath." He grimaced. "Shower," he immediately amended, already planning to scrub all that blood and guck off of his body all over again if it was the last thing he'd do.

"Oy," Gokudera reached out and grabbed hold of Ryohei's sleeve. He stood quickly, striding forward until he was right in front of the other man. "Stay still and listen to me."

Then his grip shifted as he grabbed hold of Ryohei's collar, pulling him down and forcing him to look into Gokudera's green, green eyes. He was planning to be polite; to be considerate; to let Ryohei get over this on his own - but he couldn't. It frustrated him so much that Ryohei couldn't look him in the eye anymore. It was just so uncharacteristic of the other man that Gokudera could feel cold creeping down his spine at the thought of it.

"How long are you going to keep running away?" he growled softly under his breath, his words so angry that they were almost intelligible. "How long are you going to let a dead person and that bastard Belphegor control you like this?"

He pulled Ryohei up slightly before releasing his hands, letting go of the collar and letting the other man drop back down on the heel of his feet. "Stop being so weak, damnit. You're stronger than this, you dumbass lawn head."

Off to the side, Bianchi was reading the situation completely out of context. As the smoke cleared, the men went from yelling to just talking - a miracle in itself. And as she watched Ryohei move away, she could only make out snippets of sharp words from Gokudera as he tugged the man back.

Stay? Listen? Ryohei, uncharacteristically, looked ready to bolt.

Her baby brother was chasing after Kyoko's brother? It couldn't be right - unless insulting the man in the same breath was Gokudera's way of taking initiative... Or could it? Bianchi narrowed her eyes as she studied them closely.

She knew she had a very strong bias towards the power of love, but those two certainly did not share her beliefs. And unless it was Gokudera who'd recently taken to stalking him, Ryohei looked a little too disturbed with-

Oh. Her eyes widened as she recalled her brother's earlier request - that she put her goggles back on. Not for me, but...

For Sasagawa Ryohei's sake, perhaps.

Bianchi narrowed her eyes, crossing her arms as she moved forward, trying to hear more of the conversation so she could tell what was going on. Right now nothing made much sense, but that was really just par for course when it came to her little brother - he often did things for reasons that she could not understand.

And the Vongola Sun guardian was a whole other matter entirely.

Ryohei, when Gokudera dragged him down, had squeezed his eyes shut. But the words wounded his pride. He wasn't so weak. When it all began, he was considered the weakest of all the guardians, true, but he wasn't anymore - at least he'd like to think he wasn't - but Gokudera was right. What Belphegor did affected him so much, not because he suffered physical pain, but because it was simply traumatizing for him.

He was part of the mafia. He knew, sometimes, it was kill or be killed. But to be able to laugh about it and actually enjoy it to such a level of macabre was something Ryohei could not do. He couldn't even begin to rationalize whether it was right to save Belphegor from bleeding to death in a pool of someone else's- someone else.

When he realized that he was standing in it as well, he wanted to throw up.

Mouth drawing into a thin line, Ryohei reached out until he found Gokudera's arms and then his shoulders. He took a deep breath and opened his eyes, pushing himself to look at the other man and see his green eyes, see his face, instead of Belphegor holding up an eyeball to his own flame's light.

Gokudera found himself suddenly held captive by Ryohei's arms - the grip on his shoulders was tight enough to bruise, but he didn't protest, completely caught in the sudden intensity of Ryohei's gaze. He blinked slightly, tearing his eyes away and hooding his green eyes for a moment before lifting them again, staring down at Ryohei.

"What is wrong with you now, lawn head?" he asked, but there was no anger, much less venom, in his voice.

Gokudera was feeling a little strange; almost lightheaded and his breath caught in his throat.

"You're right to the extreme, octopus head. I'm going to stop being a dumbass about this and stop running away," Ryohei stated, loud and clear enough so that even Bianchi heard every single word.

"If I stare into those eyes of yours to the extreme, that urge to go away has to go away eventually!"

Gokudera snorted immediately, almost as if by reflex, before he pulled himself together and stepped back out of Ryohei's embrace, shaking his hands off his shoulders. He crossed his arms and looked away, lips pressing into a thin line.

"Now I really want you to go away, you bastard..." he muttered under his breath.

It was about then when Bianchi decided that she'd seen enough. Seemed to her like the fight was over, for now. With a sappy, hopeful little grin on her face, she walked off quietly to find Reborn... No wait, Kyoko.

***

The shishi-odori tapped slowly and softly, the sounds of wood against stone breaking the silence that hung over Hibari's personal gardens periodically. Water rushed quietly through the man-made streams.

Hibari sat with Yamamoto under one of the pagodas in the gardens, a tea set placed neatly on the table. He was whisking the tea in the stone bowl, making clockwise circles as he prepared the tea for Yamamoto. They had moved Hibari's gardens from the Vongola's when Hibari tired of the numerous herbivores that insisted on invading their private space when they were there.

Here, in this garden, no one would dare to make an extraneous noise when Hibari wanted silence and serenity.

He poured the tea from the bowl into a teacup when he finished whisking, placing the cup right in front of Yamamoto.

It wasn't a formal tea ceremony. Nonetheless, Yamamoto accepted the small cup of tea with a serious expression and raised it in a gesture of respect towards his host. Then, he turned the cup around and took a sip.

"Well brewed," he said. and as his eyes met Hibari's, he allowed himself a small, wry smile. Yamamoto never really paid attention to tea making himself. Even when he made ocha-zuke - especially when he made ocha-zuke - the green powder was just dumped in a cup or kettle first and hot water was poured in. And then the whole thing would be left to sit until everything else was prepared. End of story.

But for some reason, it mattered to Hibari, and that made a difference. The tea tasted fresh and strong and flavourful, a far cry from the tea Yamamoto sometimes made for himself. "I like it," he simply said as he finished the tea and returned the bow to Hibari.

Hibari gave him a small smile in return, as if to say 'of course'. He had tasted Yamamoto's version of 'tea' before - the man had practically nursed and fed him throughout the time when he had just woken up from both of his comas, after all - and that weak concoction didn't even deserve to be dignified with the word.

He lifted his own bowl and took a soft sip of it, placing it back down onto the table as he exhaled. Picking up the kettle, he poured more boiling water into Yamamoto's bowl, adding the dried tea leaves and whisking it again.

Then, he lifted his eyes to meet Yamamoto's again, a dark look coming into them before he lowered his lids. "What is it that you wanted just now, Yamamoto Takeshi?"

Yamamoto tilted his head and blinked at Hibari. The thing that put Hibari off before was an innocent question: how did you learn how to fight? Thinking back to the time when he first heard about Hibari, Yamamoto recalled - even then, it was grape vine gossip about a demon boy who could bring grown men to their knees, with sticks or whatever he got his tiny, little hands on. And no one knew where he came from.

It was as though Hibari Kyouya had been born a fighter. He must have had an interesting childhood even before he came to... Yamamoto sighed.

"I was just thinking... Namimori is a good place, isn't it?"

"Don't lie to me," Hibari snapped out sharply, eyes narrowed as he placed his cup down on the table with a hard clink on its porcelain source. His knuckles were white, stark against his skin as he glared at Yamamoto.

It wasn't the fact that Yamamoto was prying that maddened him so much - he knew perfectly well that it was precisely because of that part of Yamamoto's nature that he was sitting here, having tea, rather than being buried after dying from Byakuran's disease.

He hadn't forgotten that Yamamoto was the one who had found the antidote for him.

But what truly got him so angry right now was the fact that Yamamoto was still dwelling upon Hibari's past even after Hibari told him to stop; that he was curious about something so unimportant. The present was all that mattered - Hibari didn't dwell on the past unless it was to count grudges, and those were erased from his memories the moment he had gotten his vengeance from the perpetrators.

Or so he would like to think.

But Yamamoto had stopped prying for the time being. Rather, he was reminiscing. "I'm not lying," he simply answered. "I remember there were some yakuza gangs running about, big kids bullying little kids, but you made it safer when you came," he grinned. "And I'm glad you came, or we'd never have met either."

"Now you're being ridiculous and sentimental," Hibari felt his anger slowly ebbing away at the answer - he knew that Yamamoto was telling the truth. For now, at least. He shook his head again, lifting his sleeve and picking up the cup of tea and draining it.

"That's not something you'll bite me for though, right?" Yamamoto laughingly picked up his own cup again, drowning out the questions that were on the tip of his tongue with the offered tea.

He didn't even know where to begin, about Hibari's past. Kusakabe knew Hibari best; the man has stood by Hibari’s side for as long as what seemed like forever. While it was possible that Kusakabe might know a little more about Hibari, it also meant that he was all the more loyal - if Hibari didn't want to talk about his past, Kusakabe wouldn't talk.

Reborn brought Dino to Hibari later on to train him, but teachers didn't really need to know about their student's past either - would he have looked into it on his own?

It wasn't something as worrisome as Hibari's illness though... was it?

"Only if you start annoying me again," Hibari replied, watching Yamamoto from below his eyelids. The other man was planning something, that much was obvious despite the smile on his lips and the carefree nature of his movements.

"I've already warned you - don't even try to find out. There's no use in such things."

"I wouldn't even know where to start," Yamamoto admitted, brushing it off with a shrug. "But I do want to learn more about you in other ways... Like your favourite food, or colour- Things that make you happy!"

"Hamburgers," Hibari answered, voice in a perfect monotone. "Wagashi and tea. Tempura don. Katsudon. Black. Red. Gold." Like his disciplinary committee armband, Yamamoto thought. After a moment, Hibari started whisking the tea again, lifting his eyes up to meet Yamamoto's, a smirk curving up his lips. "When you keep quiet."

Yamamoto laughed. "Curry, hotpot, tamagoyaki, onigiri, ootoro," he fired off. "White. Blue." With a bright little grin, he continued, "Gold, and lots more," lowering his voice as he continued. "And you... talking to me."

"I didn't ask for yours," Hibari pointed out flatly, but there was the smallest of smiles on his lips, as if Yamamoto's answers had amused him greatly. It was something entirely new to him - no one had spoken like this to him before. No one had dared - they feared him too much to even think about bantering.

"But it's only fair," Yamamoto responded easily. That Hibari was willing to answer his questions in the first place made him smile, especially when he could just as likely been shut down with another 'stop prying.'

"Your concept of fairness is absolutely ridiculous," Hibari pointed out, sounding almost bored as he sipped on his tea, watching the other man with piercing eyes.

"Maybe to you," Yamamoto shrugged. Knowing about things that they both liked might seem trivial and therefore ridiculous to Hibari, he chuckled. "It matters to me though... I've never thought about making hamburgers before!"

Hibari raised an eyebrow at that, a smug little smirk coming over his lips as he placed the cup back onto the saucer, leaning forward so he was closer to Yamamoto. "Oh? Have you just appointed yourself as my personal cook?"

"Boy~friend," Yamamoto corrected with a winning little nod. "Or would you prefer something else?" He shifted over, closer, subconsciously.

"Lover?"

Hibari jerked his head to the side, snorting under his breath as he crossed his arms. "Neither," he stated flatly. "Stop crowding me."

"Hahaha," Yamamoto straightened accommodatingly, mirth in his eyes. "How exactly am I crowding you?"

As if on automatic, Hibari's eyes narrowed as he snapped back to face Yamamoto. But there was no hostility in that gaze - only a mild annoyance that was barely enough to be noted. "You're far too close."

Yamamoto blinked, and then glanced deliberately down at the tea set and the tray of snacks between them before smirking and looking back towards Hibari. "But you make good tea," he purred. "Moving further away might spoil it."

"If you're looking for an excuse, Yamamoto Takeshi," Hibari called him out on it immediately, tone bone dry as he looked wryly at the other man. "Then start thinking of better ones."

With a chuckle, he asked, "But do I really need an excuse?" He liked Hibari. He liked him a whole lot. It certainly wasn't an excuse for anything and he wasn't afraid to let him know anymore. "We've been closer." Physically, he privately conceded. But otherwise...?

Hibari couldn't deny that. His eyes hooded as he turned away again, arms folding within his yukata. Accidentally, one sleeve slipped off his shoulder, exposing scarred, pale skin but Hibari didn't bother to lift it back up, his gaze turning to fix upon Yamamoto's again.

"We have," he shrugged. "It has nothing to do with this."

Yamamoto moved after a pause, up and around the food and drink to kneel beside Hibari, and pull that sleeve gently back into its original place. His fingers lingered upon the collar though, as he eyed the scars and then the bruise that he'd made earlier.

"Nothing?" He peered into Hibari's eyes, calm but curious. "This isn't a thing you would have allowed a few months back. How can... whatever we have be nothing?"

There was silence for some time as Hibari considered the question, turning it over and over in his head and pressing his lips into a line. As much as he hated to admit it, the truth was that he was trapped - he couldn't dismiss Yamamoto's words and say that what he had with the other man was 'nothing', because it meant that Hibari would let anyone mark him like this, which was obviously absolutely rubbish.

Yet Hibari's pride wouldn't let him admit that Yamamoto quite possibly meant something to him.

Turning his head away, he waved a hand and shook his head. "Shut up."

Yamamoto smiled impishly. For some odd reason, he found Hibari's response, his refusal to answer, incredibly cute. And encouraging. Enough for him to catch Hibari's hand by the wrist, and draw it to his own lips for a simple kiss.

Hibari glared at him immediately, pulling his hand back and reaching out to bunch the front of Yamamoto's shirt, dragging him forward. "What the hell was that for? I'm not a woman, Yamamoto Takeshi."

The look Yamamoto gave him was slightly incredulous and genuinely lost. "Kissing the inside of your wrist is treating you like a woman?"

Narrowing his eyes into slits, the killing intent in the air spiked as Hibari leaned forward. "Yes," he pronounced, sounding completely sure, his tone broaching no arguments.

Silence. Yamamoto stared for a quiet moment, blinking several times before he could bite his lip to keep from laughing out loud. "Interesting," he managed, curling a hand over Hibari's, just stroking it lightly as he somehow explained, "I've never heard anything like that before, but I definitely didn't do it to make you feel like a woman."

"It's just that..." He shrugged, forcefully editing 'cute' or 'adorable' or anything of the like out of his vocabulary at the same time, because the killing intent was ever so tempting a challenge, but he didn't think he was up for another fight just yet. Besides, there was something else he needed to clarify first.

"...I like you. I did that because I like you. That's all." Momentarily, his hand stilled. A tint of anxiousness crept into his eyes, but his concern was directed towards Hibari rather than himself.

"Did it feel bad?"

Slowly, Hibari pulled his hand out of Yamamoto's grasp, his eyes still narrowed and suspicious and he looked at the man. He knew that Yamamoto meant it when he said that he 'liked' Hibari, because as frivolous and idiotic and ridiculous as the other man could be at times, Hibari knew that he wasn't the type to say what he didn't mean or play with words. If he was, Hibari wouldn't even have let him as close as he was now.

Although he knew that, he was still confused. A crease appeared between his brows, the hand that had been in Yamamoto's grasp curling into a fist before he tilted his head back to fix him with a piercing gaze.

"Why?"

Bemused, Yamamoto smiled back, simply answering, "Well, because... if it feels bad, then I won't do it again." He wondered to himself whether Hibari was actually asking why he liked him in the first place, but first, "Did it?"

Hibari shrugged, folding his arms back into his yukata and lidding his eyes to look at the teacup. "It doesn't matter. Don't do it again."

Yamamoto blinked, brows creasing faintly. "Ah..." He pushed it out of his head with a bright smiling nod, "Okay."

He studied Hibari for a moment, then followed his gaze down to the tea cup as if it could tell him what was going through Hibari's head.

"... Hey. What are you thinking about?"

Almost immediately, Hibari's head snapped up as he glared at Yamamoto again. His hand clenched at his side, must short of closing over the handles of the tonfa in his sleeves.

"You're asking too many questions."

To be perfectly honest, he didn't know what he was thinking about either. Yamamoto was confusing him, sending all his thoughts into a whirl when it had all been so simple before. Before, when all Hibari knew was that Yamamoto was an herbivore just like the rest of them, albeit with teeth but teeth he had never bothered to use properly. Now...

Now... Hibari had absolutely no idea, and his anger spiked at that. He hated not knowing; hated that uncertainty that clouded when it should have been completely clear.

"Ah..." Yamamoto ducked back with a light laugh and held his hands up in obvious surrender. "Your turn then. Is there anything you want to ask? Ask me anything."

Hibari lifted his eyebrows at him before snorting, turning away with a shake of his head, "I don't need to. Whatever I want to know about you, Yamamoto Takeshi, I can find out from your actions and words." He tipped his head back, fierce eyes capturing Yamamoto's gaze. "Nothing else matters."

Yamamoto didn't seem too surprised with the answer. Rather, he smiled as he stared back, understanding in his eyes despite the fact that he did not agree. "Well, the offer stands," he finally said.

"I won't take it," Hibari stated flatly, lifting a sleeve as he picked up the kettle before it started screaming shrilly. He poured the hot water into the pot, letting it steep with the tea leaves. He was perfectly aware of Yamamoto's opinions - his words simply told Yamamoto that he wouldn't ever change his mind.

"Ah... Okay," Yamamoto chuckled, and slid around to Hibari's back, wrapping his arms about the older man's waist. "I'm going to hug you for as long as I can," he said, simply because he wanted to.

It was nice, just holding Hibari, to know that he was right there instead of running around, going after the man who had caused them over a decade's worth of trouble. He sighed softly, content for once to remain inactive for a while, to finally rest.

When Hibird's singing came through the window, Yamamoto only smiled a little wider as he recognized the song, and joined in, "Namimori no~ dainaku shounaku nami ga ii~"

The peace lasted for approximately five seconds before Hibari sat up, pulling away and pressing the end of a tonfa against Yamamoto's throat.

With a laugh, Yamamoto asked, "Time's up?"

Or it could have been his singing, he supposed. He thought he remembered the lyrics, but he might have been butchering the-

"Stop ruining the school song with your off-tune singing," Hibari said crossly, but he didn't remove the tonfa from Yamamoto's throat, nor did he press it even closer. He only remained in that position for some time, feeling Yamamoto breathe from the trembling of the skin of his throat.

He couldn't move.

Yamamoto breathed shallowly with that tonfa shoved against his throat, caught between the urge to back up and the urge to pull Hibari closer anyway - counter intuitive, he knew, but... "So I can hug you anyway if I stop?"

"No," Hibari snapped out immediately. "Let go."

Yamamoto's fingers twitched, but they only seemed to tighten over the silk of Hibari's yukata.

In answer, Hibari nonchalantly pressed the tonfa even closer.

And Hibird's lyrics turned into, "idiots, idiots, idiots," once more, earning a warning glance from Hibari and a bright, amused laugh from Yamamoto as he fell back.

Back: Part 40
Next: TBC