[hitman reborn]: titanic crossover asdfghjakldha
Shiiiiiit, it’s not Valentine’s Day anymore, is it. O-Oh well! Hope you guys had a good one, more chocolates than flowers, because you can’t eat flowers, can you? Or they wouldn’t taste as good anyway.
askldhalf I feel a lot like Squalo right now UUUUOOOIII! I don’t know why. I’m really tired, and there is no reason for me to be yelling HEEEEYYY YOU BRAAAAAATS at the top of my lungs. But, uh. Yeah. I’MMA SHAAAAAARK!
Which, of course, segues naturally into a Titanic/Reborn crossover. Idea spawned by
arisuesei. I am but a tool. DDD8 The word document is named "TITANIC X-OVER WHY GOD WHY” on my desktop, just so you know, Dhieta. Just so you know. :| And dude, someone explain to me why Dino makes me angst in long convoluted sentences asdfghjkl
AUUUUUGH I can’t write anything anymore. And this is only part one akhdsaldalj In my defense, Titanic was a fucking long movie. A fucking long movie that I haven’t seen in a decade, OH WELLLLLL.
But I am going upstate to visit Mom this weekend for belated Lunar New Year’s stuff, will be leaving right after classes tomorrow (today), which is perfect, because I can DROP THIS LIKE A BOMB and run run run away.
Click at your own peril, FLIIIIIIIST!
Dino is going to run away.
He’s got it all planned out, see, and this is how things are going to go down.
The whole world’s been talking about this new ship. An Olympic-class luxury ocean liner. Biggest in the history of big things. Top speed twenty-three knots, which Dino assumes - as he has no idea what a knot is - is really fast. It is 269 meters long, weighs 52310 tons, has a capacity of 3547 passengers, and- the numbers go on. Dino turns the page with a little difficulty, black smudges on the pads of his fingers (he was never good with newspapers, such unwieldy things; he was always knocking people’s hats off at outdoor cafés).
This ship, this tremendous steel leviathan (“tremendous” is redundant in relation to “leviathan,” Dino knows, but it has a nice ring, so he’ll let it go if you will) is called the RMS Titanic, and it is going to set sail on her maiden voyage on April 12th, first picking up passengers in England, then in France, then finally setting course for New York City.
Right. Right, he’s read all this weeks before, countless times, and according to his plan, he is going to board this Titanic, whatever the cost, and sail to America.
And in order to do that, he has to first get from Italy to Southampton, England. He can speak English well enough, though he thinks it is a bland, boring tongue compared to la lingua italiana, and their hands are strangely limp when they talk, but nothing can be done about that. He suspects, however, that he will starve quite a bit while he is there, because it is common knowledge throughout Europe that the food in England is notoriously bad, though the English adamantly deny it even as they pick over-fried fish and soggy potato slivers from pockets of greasy newspapers. He entertains the thought of stopping by Sicily to grab a couple dozen pizzas for his journey, but they’d probably spoil, or he’d be mugged for them by hungry English children, and also he doesn’t want to be mistaken for a delivery boy.
(He could always go to Cherbourg, France instead, which is closer, and where the food is much better, but he doesn’t know a bit of French - despises the language, actually - and besides, being Italian, he has an innate dislike for the French that not even he can rid himself of. Also, most of the passengers in Cherbourg were to be first-class, and he didn’t exactly plan to pack his Sunday bests.)
Once he is on board, by whatever means necessary, he will sail to New York, putting an ocean between him and Italy, leaving behind his father and his demon home tutor and all the bad blood that brings him to his knees, hands clasped, for blessed are the-
Yes, Dino thinks as he shoulders his bag and bites into an apple, looks to the early morning sun. Yes, this could work.
He leaves a note in awkward script that says, I love you, papà, and truly he does, and I’m sorry, and truly he is, but I can’t anymore, it takes away so much, and I don’t have anything left in me to give and- the ink blotches before he can finish his sentence, and he sighs, rubs ink clumsily on his cheeks, leaves the note on his father’s desk in a puddle of pale sunshine. He kisses his stained fingers, touches them to the polished armrest of the leather chair where his father’s hand would be.
There, Dino thinks, and he does not feel better at all.
But in March, a month and two weeks after his twenty-second birthday, Dino steps out of the manor, breathes in the dawn air, falls into a rose bush, and runs away from home.
Two floors up, someone watches his stumbling, thorny departure with a smirk, sipping a cup of something hot and very black. “Such a novice, still,” says this someone, running a finger along the rim of his hat. “We’ll have to keep an eye on him, Leon.”
--------
“I hate this place.”
“Now, now, Kyoya.” His mother fusses over his collar and his buttons and his lapels. He swats her hand away, and she clucks at him. “Kyoya,” she says again, scolding. “We will have none of that. You must look presentable for Mr. Rokudo.” She takes a step back to examine him critically. “I don’t understand why you won’t wear the clothes he bought you from Paris.”
“He bought me a dress, Mother.”
“It was a very lovely dress of the very latest fashion. You would’ve looked very pretty in it; all the girls would have been jealous.”
“...”
“I rather liked the hat that went with it, too,” his mother carries on as she tucks his hair behind his ears, immune to the poisonous aura that seeped from him. “So different from the styles in Japan.”
“Feathers,” he scoffs and makes a disdainful gesture with his hands. “Big fluffy feathers that droop all over the place. Distasteful. Like his hair.” The yellow bird on his shoulder chirps its agreement. “When we’re on that ridiculous ship, I’ll throw him overboard,” he says. “And then I’ll bite him to death.”
“You can’t do both, dear,” his mother points out reasonably, brushing at his sleeves and picking at his cuffs.
“Yes I can.” Confident. He gives her his arm to fret over, stares over the top of her head at the opposite wall. There is a painting of flowers, colorful, vibrant, hideous, and decidedly European. He could do better; all he needed was a brush, a scroll, and Mukuro’s blood. “And then I’ll make the captain change course to Japan,” he continues, blinking once as he realizes that Mukuro’s blood was probably some sort of unnatural green, and there was no such thing as a green flower.
“And how do you propose to get from France to Japan, Kyoya? There’s a whole continent in the way.” She releases him at last, satisfied. “Put Hibird back in its cage. Mr. Rokudo will be here soon and I don’t want Hibird trying to peck out his eyes like last time. It gives the impression that you don’t like him.”
“Oh,” he says blandly. He rolls his eyes, and walks over to the open window to let his bird out.
When he turns around, his mother clasps his arms and beams at him. “Well? Aren’t you excited?”
“Maybe he’ll put up a good fight. But I doubt it. He looks like fruit.”
She is persistent. “Haven’t you heard any of the things they’re saying about this ship?”
“It floats,” he says.
She ignores him. “That it’s a palace on the water, the most majestic, most grand, most splendid, and we are going to cross the Atlantic Ocean in it, Kyoya. To territories yet uncharted!”
“A hunk of steel.” He blinks, unimpressed. “And they’ve charted America, Mother.”
“It will be an adventure nonetheless,” she presses. “And you and Mr. Rokudo will be very happy starting a new life together.”
“That-”
“Very happy. I expect grandchildren, Kyoya. At least three: two boys and a girl.”
“How-”
“You took biology in school, Kyoya, you know exactly how.” A knocking sound. “That’s probably him at the door now.” The warning glance she gives him cuts to his very soul and makes the flowers in the painting wilt. “Behave. I mean it.”
He falls back into a plush armchair, crosses his arms and glares resolutely. His mother opens the door, and he has to clench his fists very tightly to resist kicking the ottoman at the doorway, because there stands Mukuro Rokudo in an immaculate suit, his hat dangling carelessly from between his fingers and a smile on his face that made adjectives run away sobbing.
“My dear lady!” he exclaims, and Hibari hates that he does not know whether the bastard is addressing him or his mother. This time, it turns out to be his mother. Good. They exchange pleasantries, and Mukuro’s Japanese is irritatingly flawless, and Hibari hates the thought of anyone with such ridiculous hair speaking his language.
Mukuro steps into the room, glides towards him and calls him “peach blossom” with such sugary affection that Hibari punches his ear when Mukuro bows to kiss his hand.
“Oh, my precious china doll,” Mukuro coos without missing a beat. “So glad to see that you are well! Are you happy to see me?”
“Ecstatic,” he answers, and moves to break Mukuro’s neck.
“What’s that, love? Speak up, would you? I seem to have lost hearing in my left ear. Strange, that.”
His mother giggles by the door, comments on how adorable her grandchildren will be, and leaves to give them some “alone time.”
“Ah - I don’t know if you’ve noticed, dearest, but you are strangling me.” Mukuro gives him a simpering smile and pats him lightly on the shoulder. “I was expecting more of a - a bodily embrace.”
“Sorry,” he says, and tightens his hold.
“Alouette, alouette, my dear alouette, it seems there is a significant lack of oxygen to my brain. Could I entreaty you to do something about that?”
“You’re imagining it.”
“I do believe I am losing consciousness.”
“Don’t worry, it’ll be over soon.”
“Well, then, a kiss before I expire?”
And then a hand is on the back of Hibari’s head, surprisingly strong, bringing him close enough for their lips to meet. Mukuro’s smile is calm for someone who is suffering oxygen deprivation, and so very evil, and Hibari shoves him to the floor, drops a vase on his head, and storms from the room with his coattails streaming behind him.
“Oh, darling, you forgot your hat!”
Half a second later, Hibari opens the door again. Hibird comes twittering in from the window, pecks viciously at Mukuro’s head, and flutters to Hibari’s shoulder.
The door slams shut.
“I’ll see you at dinner!”
--------
After half an hour of steady losses, Dino finds that he is phenomenally bad at card games. Also, he has no poker face. Also, he understands the other card players maybe half the time, and that’s only if they take the cigars out of their mouths. The other half of the time, he’s not even sure if they’re speaking English. One of them had really impractically long hair that was rather obscenely shiny; another one had an unfortunate raccoon-tail-and-feathers-type-deal growing out of his head; and the last seemed not to have eyes behind his fringe of light brown hair (Dino had discreetly edged his seat away from that one).
Sitting around the rickety wooden table with the sea breeze in his hair and the sun in his eyes, Dino squints and asks, warily and slowly, “Could you - could you repeat that? Please?” He makes sure to be polite.
They look at him, and they say something in rapid-fire Cockney-English, probably insulting his intelligence and maybe his hair, or possibly commenting on the turtle eating his sleeve - not that Dino would know, in that case, as he can’t remember the word for “turtle” or “sleeve.”
“Uhm,” Dino says. He feels that he should do something about all the money he’s lost, but they’re not listening to him anymore, bickering amongst themselves and whipping out knives and guns (ah, Dino didn’t bring his) from who knows where.
He frowns at the mess of cards on the table, and starts to feel very hopeless. The Titanic was going to set sail today. In an hour, to be exact. He’s been in Southampton for a week already, has choked down more steak-and-kidney pies than he cares to recount, and until about half an hour ago, has found no way of actually getting on board the stupid ship.
But about half an hour ago, he had wandered to the dockside, forlorn and almost ready to turn around and go back home, when he heard the most eardrum-shattering cry of “Ooooooiii, you fuckin’ cheaterrrrr!”
He had whirled around, alarmed, and had tripped over his own feet and crashed headfirst into a baby carriage.
“Hi,” he said to the big-eyed infant, who grabbed his nose and gurgled delightedly. The infant’s mother shrieked, and Dino reeled backwards and half-hopped, half-pirouetted into a collapsible card table, around which were seated three-
Well.
“Ushishishi, you’re steppin’ on me foot, mate.”
“’Eeeeeeey, wotch where yer goin’!”
“What?” Dino had asked. “Huh?”
“Why d’ya ’ave a fuckin’ turtle, blondie?”
So, working diligently around the language barrier (which was electrified and topped with wicked barbed wire that liked to shoot spikes at random intervals), Dino had come to understand three things: a) Raccoon-tail had a ticket, b) Raccoon-tail was willing give him said ticket if Dino could win against him in poker, and c) Raccoon-tail rigged the game.
But Dino, who had no better options, was willing to give it a try. Several tries, in fact, though each was equally as fruitless as the last. Now, watching Raccoon-tail slam his suitcase against Silver-hair’s head for fun, Dino realizes the futility of it all.
Then suddenly, there is the sound of a large firearm going off. Dino has two seconds to look up, eyes widening, before grabbing Enzio and diving to the side to avoid having his brains dashed out by a large green ball.
“OhmyGodwhat,” Dino says, and then he’s scrabbling backwards to avoid another green ball of destruction. This time, the ball goes right through the wood of the docks - and it had eyes, ohmygoodness - and into the water with an incongruous plop.
There are more shots - a cannon, definitely a cannon, Dino thinks frantically, a cannon with more barrels than any cannon should ever have - and this time, he has to dodge five of them; he wouldn’t have escaped that last one if he hadn’t tripped over a conveniently placed small dog. Around him, women gasp and scream and children stand in stunned silence. The Cockney card players stare at him, their mouths agape and their cigars falling to their laps to burn holes through their trousers.
“Why,” Dino demands of no one in particular as he windmills his arms wildly to keep from falling off the edge of the pier.
A green ball smashes into the table next. Cards go flying everywhere, and there is a shout of “WHAT THE FUUUUUCK?!” followed by an “Ushishishi, fifty-two pick up!”
Dino falls forward on his knees just as another one flies over his head and into the water.
People are running everywhere as more fall out of the sky like huge gumdrops of doom, and Raccoon has Silver by the collar, screaming obscenities into his face as Silver does his best to reason, “Wotcher want me ta do abou’it, eeeeeeh?!”
Passengers are being ushered onto the ship to avoid the certain death. Families with suitcases tug their children frantically towards the boarding ramp. Right, Dino says to himself amidst the chaos and confusion. Okay, he thinks. He shuffles forward on his hands and knees, he’s going to do this, yes he is, just a little closer-
He grabs the ticket from Raccoon’s trouser pocket just as a flaming ball of neon green fire-
Fire, Dino wonders. What.
-hits and burns through the thick rope of the mooring line like it was candy floss.
The RMS Titanic starts to move.
“This,” Dino says, “is fucking insane.”
And then he throws Enzio into his bag, slings it over his shoulder and starts bolting towards the ship. “Why why why why why-”
He scrambles up the ramp, the last of the stragglers, flashes his purloined ticket along with a winning smile to the crewmember, and takes his first step onto the Titanic. They raise the anchor then, and he immediately loses his balance, hasn’t found his sea legs yet, and plows into a gaggle of people clustered on the deck.
“Sorry, sorry,” he mumbles, but they pay him no mind. They’re all watching the shower of green cannonballs completely demolish Southampton’s seaport.
Well, this is tragic, Dino thinks, and he feels a little bit bad.
But then: ceasefire.
From the dock, there comes a terrible, marrow-chilling roar of pure, pure rage. That’s probably Raccoon, Dino muses, guilty, and slinks off to conceal himself in the crowds, ducking to hide his head of conspicuous blonde hair.
“Does this mean you can stay, Boss?” Silver asks with more than a little hope.
Raccoon clubs him over the head with a table leg and shoves him into the water, veins popping in his temple.
“Ushishishishi,” laughs the boy with no eyes. “I’m a prince!” he says, for no reason at all.
--t-to be continued?--
OhmyGodwhut.
Have a good weekend, gaiz. *flees now*
askldhalf I feel a lot like Squalo right now UUUUOOOIII! I don’t know why. I’m really tired, and there is no reason for me to be yelling HEEEEYYY YOU BRAAAAAATS at the top of my lungs. But, uh. Yeah. I’MMA SHAAAAAARK!
Which, of course, segues naturally into a Titanic/Reborn crossover. Idea spawned by
arisuesei. I am but a tool. DDD8 The word document is named "TITANIC X-OVER WHY GOD WHY” on my desktop, just so you know, Dhieta. Just so you know. :| And dude, someone explain to me why Dino makes me angst in long convoluted sentences asdfghjkl
AUUUUUGH I can’t write anything anymore. And this is only part one akhdsaldalj In my defense, Titanic was a fucking long movie. A fucking long movie that I haven’t seen in a decade, OH WELLLLLL.
But I am going upstate to visit Mom this weekend for belated Lunar New Year’s stuff, will be leaving right after classes tomorrow (today), which is perfect, because I can DROP THIS LIKE A BOMB and run run run away.
Click at your own peril, FLIIIIIIIST!
Dino is going to run away.
He’s got it all planned out, see, and this is how things are going to go down.
The whole world’s been talking about this new ship. An Olympic-class luxury ocean liner. Biggest in the history of big things. Top speed twenty-three knots, which Dino assumes - as he has no idea what a knot is - is really fast. It is 269 meters long, weighs 52310 tons, has a capacity of 3547 passengers, and- the numbers go on. Dino turns the page with a little difficulty, black smudges on the pads of his fingers (he was never good with newspapers, such unwieldy things; he was always knocking people’s hats off at outdoor cafés).
This ship, this tremendous steel leviathan (“tremendous” is redundant in relation to “leviathan,” Dino knows, but it has a nice ring, so he’ll let it go if you will) is called the RMS Titanic, and it is going to set sail on her maiden voyage on April 12th, first picking up passengers in England, then in France, then finally setting course for New York City.
Right. Right, he’s read all this weeks before, countless times, and according to his plan, he is going to board this Titanic, whatever the cost, and sail to America.
And in order to do that, he has to first get from Italy to Southampton, England. He can speak English well enough, though he thinks it is a bland, boring tongue compared to la lingua italiana, and their hands are strangely limp when they talk, but nothing can be done about that. He suspects, however, that he will starve quite a bit while he is there, because it is common knowledge throughout Europe that the food in England is notoriously bad, though the English adamantly deny it even as they pick over-fried fish and soggy potato slivers from pockets of greasy newspapers. He entertains the thought of stopping by Sicily to grab a couple dozen pizzas for his journey, but they’d probably spoil, or he’d be mugged for them by hungry English children, and also he doesn’t want to be mistaken for a delivery boy.
(He could always go to Cherbourg, France instead, which is closer, and where the food is much better, but he doesn’t know a bit of French - despises the language, actually - and besides, being Italian, he has an innate dislike for the French that not even he can rid himself of. Also, most of the passengers in Cherbourg were to be first-class, and he didn’t exactly plan to pack his Sunday bests.)
Once he is on board, by whatever means necessary, he will sail to New York, putting an ocean between him and Italy, leaving behind his father and his demon home tutor and all the bad blood that brings him to his knees, hands clasped, for blessed are the-
Yes, Dino thinks as he shoulders his bag and bites into an apple, looks to the early morning sun. Yes, this could work.
He leaves a note in awkward script that says, I love you, papà, and truly he does, and I’m sorry, and truly he is, but I can’t anymore, it takes away so much, and I don’t have anything left in me to give and- the ink blotches before he can finish his sentence, and he sighs, rubs ink clumsily on his cheeks, leaves the note on his father’s desk in a puddle of pale sunshine. He kisses his stained fingers, touches them to the polished armrest of the leather chair where his father’s hand would be.
There, Dino thinks, and he does not feel better at all.
But in March, a month and two weeks after his twenty-second birthday, Dino steps out of the manor, breathes in the dawn air, falls into a rose bush, and runs away from home.
Two floors up, someone watches his stumbling, thorny departure with a smirk, sipping a cup of something hot and very black. “Such a novice, still,” says this someone, running a finger along the rim of his hat. “We’ll have to keep an eye on him, Leon.”
--------
“I hate this place.”
“Now, now, Kyoya.” His mother fusses over his collar and his buttons and his lapels. He swats her hand away, and she clucks at him. “Kyoya,” she says again, scolding. “We will have none of that. You must look presentable for Mr. Rokudo.” She takes a step back to examine him critically. “I don’t understand why you won’t wear the clothes he bought you from Paris.”
“He bought me a dress, Mother.”
“It was a very lovely dress of the very latest fashion. You would’ve looked very pretty in it; all the girls would have been jealous.”
“...”
“I rather liked the hat that went with it, too,” his mother carries on as she tucks his hair behind his ears, immune to the poisonous aura that seeped from him. “So different from the styles in Japan.”
“Feathers,” he scoffs and makes a disdainful gesture with his hands. “Big fluffy feathers that droop all over the place. Distasteful. Like his hair.” The yellow bird on his shoulder chirps its agreement. “When we’re on that ridiculous ship, I’ll throw him overboard,” he says. “And then I’ll bite him to death.”
“You can’t do both, dear,” his mother points out reasonably, brushing at his sleeves and picking at his cuffs.
“Yes I can.” Confident. He gives her his arm to fret over, stares over the top of her head at the opposite wall. There is a painting of flowers, colorful, vibrant, hideous, and decidedly European. He could do better; all he needed was a brush, a scroll, and Mukuro’s blood. “And then I’ll make the captain change course to Japan,” he continues, blinking once as he realizes that Mukuro’s blood was probably some sort of unnatural green, and there was no such thing as a green flower.
“And how do you propose to get from France to Japan, Kyoya? There’s a whole continent in the way.” She releases him at last, satisfied. “Put Hibird back in its cage. Mr. Rokudo will be here soon and I don’t want Hibird trying to peck out his eyes like last time. It gives the impression that you don’t like him.”
“Oh,” he says blandly. He rolls his eyes, and walks over to the open window to let his bird out.
When he turns around, his mother clasps his arms and beams at him. “Well? Aren’t you excited?”
“Maybe he’ll put up a good fight. But I doubt it. He looks like fruit.”
She is persistent. “Haven’t you heard any of the things they’re saying about this ship?”
“It floats,” he says.
She ignores him. “That it’s a palace on the water, the most majestic, most grand, most splendid, and we are going to cross the Atlantic Ocean in it, Kyoya. To territories yet uncharted!”
“A hunk of steel.” He blinks, unimpressed. “And they’ve charted America, Mother.”
“It will be an adventure nonetheless,” she presses. “And you and Mr. Rokudo will be very happy starting a new life together.”
“That-”
“Very happy. I expect grandchildren, Kyoya. At least three: two boys and a girl.”
“How-”
“You took biology in school, Kyoya, you know exactly how.” A knocking sound. “That’s probably him at the door now.” The warning glance she gives him cuts to his very soul and makes the flowers in the painting wilt. “Behave. I mean it.”
He falls back into a plush armchair, crosses his arms and glares resolutely. His mother opens the door, and he has to clench his fists very tightly to resist kicking the ottoman at the doorway, because there stands Mukuro Rokudo in an immaculate suit, his hat dangling carelessly from between his fingers and a smile on his face that made adjectives run away sobbing.
“My dear lady!” he exclaims, and Hibari hates that he does not know whether the bastard is addressing him or his mother. This time, it turns out to be his mother. Good. They exchange pleasantries, and Mukuro’s Japanese is irritatingly flawless, and Hibari hates the thought of anyone with such ridiculous hair speaking his language.
Mukuro steps into the room, glides towards him and calls him “peach blossom” with such sugary affection that Hibari punches his ear when Mukuro bows to kiss his hand.
“Oh, my precious china doll,” Mukuro coos without missing a beat. “So glad to see that you are well! Are you happy to see me?”
“Ecstatic,” he answers, and moves to break Mukuro’s neck.
“What’s that, love? Speak up, would you? I seem to have lost hearing in my left ear. Strange, that.”
His mother giggles by the door, comments on how adorable her grandchildren will be, and leaves to give them some “alone time.”
“Ah - I don’t know if you’ve noticed, dearest, but you are strangling me.” Mukuro gives him a simpering smile and pats him lightly on the shoulder. “I was expecting more of a - a bodily embrace.”
“Sorry,” he says, and tightens his hold.
“Alouette, alouette, my dear alouette, it seems there is a significant lack of oxygen to my brain. Could I entreaty you to do something about that?”
“You’re imagining it.”
“I do believe I am losing consciousness.”
“Don’t worry, it’ll be over soon.”
“Well, then, a kiss before I expire?”
And then a hand is on the back of Hibari’s head, surprisingly strong, bringing him close enough for their lips to meet. Mukuro’s smile is calm for someone who is suffering oxygen deprivation, and so very evil, and Hibari shoves him to the floor, drops a vase on his head, and storms from the room with his coattails streaming behind him.
“Oh, darling, you forgot your hat!”
Half a second later, Hibari opens the door again. Hibird comes twittering in from the window, pecks viciously at Mukuro’s head, and flutters to Hibari’s shoulder.
The door slams shut.
“I’ll see you at dinner!”
--------
After half an hour of steady losses, Dino finds that he is phenomenally bad at card games. Also, he has no poker face. Also, he understands the other card players maybe half the time, and that’s only if they take the cigars out of their mouths. The other half of the time, he’s not even sure if they’re speaking English. One of them had really impractically long hair that was rather obscenely shiny; another one had an unfortunate raccoon-tail-and-feathers-type-deal growing out of his head; and the last seemed not to have eyes behind his fringe of light brown hair (Dino had discreetly edged his seat away from that one).
Sitting around the rickety wooden table with the sea breeze in his hair and the sun in his eyes, Dino squints and asks, warily and slowly, “Could you - could you repeat that? Please?” He makes sure to be polite.
They look at him, and they say something in rapid-fire Cockney-English, probably insulting his intelligence and maybe his hair, or possibly commenting on the turtle eating his sleeve - not that Dino would know, in that case, as he can’t remember the word for “turtle” or “sleeve.”
“Uhm,” Dino says. He feels that he should do something about all the money he’s lost, but they’re not listening to him anymore, bickering amongst themselves and whipping out knives and guns (ah, Dino didn’t bring his) from who knows where.
He frowns at the mess of cards on the table, and starts to feel very hopeless. The Titanic was going to set sail today. In an hour, to be exact. He’s been in Southampton for a week already, has choked down more steak-and-kidney pies than he cares to recount, and until about half an hour ago, has found no way of actually getting on board the stupid ship.
But about half an hour ago, he had wandered to the dockside, forlorn and almost ready to turn around and go back home, when he heard the most eardrum-shattering cry of “Ooooooiii, you fuckin’ cheaterrrrr!”
He had whirled around, alarmed, and had tripped over his own feet and crashed headfirst into a baby carriage.
“Hi,” he said to the big-eyed infant, who grabbed his nose and gurgled delightedly. The infant’s mother shrieked, and Dino reeled backwards and half-hopped, half-pirouetted into a collapsible card table, around which were seated three-
Well.
“Ushishishi, you’re steppin’ on me foot, mate.”
“’Eeeeeeey, wotch where yer goin’!”
“What?” Dino had asked. “Huh?”
“Why d’ya ’ave a fuckin’ turtle, blondie?”
So, working diligently around the language barrier (which was electrified and topped with wicked barbed wire that liked to shoot spikes at random intervals), Dino had come to understand three things: a) Raccoon-tail had a ticket, b) Raccoon-tail was willing give him said ticket if Dino could win against him in poker, and c) Raccoon-tail rigged the game.
But Dino, who had no better options, was willing to give it a try. Several tries, in fact, though each was equally as fruitless as the last. Now, watching Raccoon-tail slam his suitcase against Silver-hair’s head for fun, Dino realizes the futility of it all.
Then suddenly, there is the sound of a large firearm going off. Dino has two seconds to look up, eyes widening, before grabbing Enzio and diving to the side to avoid having his brains dashed out by a large green ball.
“OhmyGodwhat,” Dino says, and then he’s scrabbling backwards to avoid another green ball of destruction. This time, the ball goes right through the wood of the docks - and it had eyes, ohmygoodness - and into the water with an incongruous plop.
There are more shots - a cannon, definitely a cannon, Dino thinks frantically, a cannon with more barrels than any cannon should ever have - and this time, he has to dodge five of them; he wouldn’t have escaped that last one if he hadn’t tripped over a conveniently placed small dog. Around him, women gasp and scream and children stand in stunned silence. The Cockney card players stare at him, their mouths agape and their cigars falling to their laps to burn holes through their trousers.
“Why,” Dino demands of no one in particular as he windmills his arms wildly to keep from falling off the edge of the pier.
A green ball smashes into the table next. Cards go flying everywhere, and there is a shout of “WHAT THE FUUUUUCK?!” followed by an “Ushishishi, fifty-two pick up!”
Dino falls forward on his knees just as another one flies over his head and into the water.
People are running everywhere as more fall out of the sky like huge gumdrops of doom, and Raccoon has Silver by the collar, screaming obscenities into his face as Silver does his best to reason, “Wotcher want me ta do abou’it, eeeeeeh?!”
Passengers are being ushered onto the ship to avoid the certain death. Families with suitcases tug their children frantically towards the boarding ramp. Right, Dino says to himself amidst the chaos and confusion. Okay, he thinks. He shuffles forward on his hands and knees, he’s going to do this, yes he is, just a little closer-
He grabs the ticket from Raccoon’s trouser pocket just as a flaming ball of neon green fire-
Fire, Dino wonders. What.
-hits and burns through the thick rope of the mooring line like it was candy floss.
The RMS Titanic starts to move.
“This,” Dino says, “is fucking insane.”
And then he throws Enzio into his bag, slings it over his shoulder and starts bolting towards the ship. “Why why why why why-”
He scrambles up the ramp, the last of the stragglers, flashes his purloined ticket along with a winning smile to the crewmember, and takes his first step onto the Titanic. They raise the anchor then, and he immediately loses his balance, hasn’t found his sea legs yet, and plows into a gaggle of people clustered on the deck.
“Sorry, sorry,” he mumbles, but they pay him no mind. They’re all watching the shower of green cannonballs completely demolish Southampton’s seaport.
Well, this is tragic, Dino thinks, and he feels a little bit bad.
But then: ceasefire.
From the dock, there comes a terrible, marrow-chilling roar of pure, pure rage. That’s probably Raccoon, Dino muses, guilty, and slinks off to conceal himself in the crowds, ducking to hide his head of conspicuous blonde hair.
“Does this mean you can stay, Boss?” Silver asks with more than a little hope.
Raccoon clubs him over the head with a table leg and shoves him into the water, veins popping in his temple.
“Ushishishishi,” laughs the boy with no eyes. “I’m a prince!” he says, for no reason at all.
--t-to be continued?--
OhmyGodwhut.
Have a good weekend, gaiz. *flees now*