Thrill of the pursuit
Death Games
Submitted for the 2009 SMASH! Animanga Convention and won the Action/Adventure category by sheer luck. It was later added into my Minibang entry with accompanying art by the very talented artists, anothermiyaw and akaru_hana
So what do you do when your past insists on catching up with you?
Gokudera runs right smack into the thick of it, except not really. It is not home he goes back to. He is not the prodigal son so he redefines family with Vongola and makes it a personal mission to take it for his own.
He is not even fifteen when he leaves the land of his birth.
His red-eye flight touches down at Narita airport and Gokudera finally admits that there really is no going back now. Silver hair and green eyes make him stick out like a sore thumb but he stares them down, every one who dares give him one wrong look.
He has no idea how he makes it through customs with dynamite in nearly every crevice of his being but he is thankful for the little things. A Vongola henchman meets him at the airport and the house is too big for him. Namimori is too hot but Gokudera sleeps fitfully in his new school uniform and a thumb on his trusty lighter.
*
Their first encounter is not what he envisioned and Reborn is less than impressed. It has been a while since he doubted his instinct but something in those green eyes stops him, something like desperation but on hindsight, he should have known better.
Desperation is no substitute for inspiration but a desperate dog will leap over any wall and Gokudera proves him right (on bended knees, before a boy too small for the Vongola name). Reborn chooses the half Italian because even if he is acrobaleno, he is human and there exists, in the deepest, most forgotten part of that cursed body, memories and some semblance of knowing how to pity small animals. With a nod of his head, he can give broken children a semblance of redemption. So he does; whether it is a bout of shrewdness or nostalgia, he is not sure but regardless, Gokudera is initiated into the new Vongola Decimo’s entourage.
Just like the Ninth did for him.
Right hand man, he lies, watching Gokudera’s eyes light up for the first time.
It is surprisingly easy to make a man go off course with just an empty title, Reborn thinks. After all, admiration and pride are the easiest emotions to manipulate.
But the plans of mice and men often go awry.
Reborn never truly expects Gokudera to rise up to the challenge. He never really understands that acceptance of a Japanese boy is all it takes to overwrite all rejections.
*
“Hey, you like maths and science right?”
Gokudera gives him a look that says something like go bother lawn head or something. It flies over the baseball idiot’s head and Yamamoto’s smile grows.
Gokudera trusts numbers, fixed variables and certainty in the controlled flight of his dynamites. The science of mathematics and the art of chemistry are his elements, calculated trajectories and reaction in combustions. Liking is an understatement.
“Do you know? Mathematicians and scientists are prone to schizophre--”
“Like every other drug addict and chain smoker,” Gokudera deadpans.
He has heard this line of argument too many times. Yamamoto has a look of pleasant surprise, as if his task is made easier now. Annoyed, he lights up another cigarette but Yamamoto does nothing to stop him. Waiting infuriates him the most.
“You’re all of the above you know?”
Gokudera blows a puff of smoke in Yamamoto’s direction. The taller man no longer coughs at the smoke, merely cutting a hand through to fan it away.
“Look who’s talking? I’m not the one playing make believe mafia games here.”
The taller man is quiet and Gokudera cannot resist a chance to guilt trip.
“Someone had to test the composition of that heroin in your pocket you know?”
*
Gokudera is nearly twenty five when he starts believing that happiness is like the sky, so near yet so far, always there but always out of reach.
It is his birthday when he loses something precious again.
This time, it is the boy he pledges his life to.
The brilliant evening sky fades into a bloody mess, covering his world in dusk.
It is almost like somebody pulled the plug and the floodgates are suddenly open, tipping chaos into his world. It reminds him of a hazy afternoon, waiting for happiness that will never come. This time, he is twenty years older and a hardened criminal but there is no difference in death, just the value of life lost and quiet suffering.
The half Italian takes over Vongola’s operations as they wait on the accession of the Eleventh. The number rolls off his tongue like the first Japanese word he learned a decade ago, awkward. There isn’t a ring to it but it is duty and he does it impeccably. Right hand man, he says every time someone (Yamamoto) challenges his decisions. He overlooks the fact that he can only be a right hand if the body exists and denies every request to give Vongola Decimo a proper burial, finally relenting in a handsome coffin in a secluded part of the forest.
It is another morning after that Gokudera remembers something a Chinese mobster said, all smiling eyes and old school wisdom.
“It is better to lose something precious to avoid a disaster.”
And in one quick movement, the tiny mobster cut off his son’s ear as an apology for misleading the Vongola crime famiglia. Tsuna is horrified but that is the end of it.
But Gokudera cannot tell if adverting any disaster is worth losing Vongola Decimo.
And worse, the negotiations with the Hong Kong triads fall apart like a house of cards. Gokudera tells everyone who would listen that they got it off easy but in reality, he knows Vongola Decimo is simply too kind, too good for this world. For even in death, the brunette remains a decent man trapped in an indecent time.
*
There is a territory war even before the dust settles over Vongola Decimo’s coffin and the famiglia is operating on a skeleton of guardians. Hibari washed his hands off everything Vongola the same moment Sawada Tsunayoshi stopped breathing and Mukuro is not to be trusted (even if Chrome brings the coffin Easter lilies everyday). Gokudera picks up the slack and prepares to go into the fray personally.
Yamamoto and Ryohei hold down their forts just fine while the Lambo-Ipin tag team perform surprisingly well. Gokudera’s area is the only one ablaze.
The enemy's C4 bomb goes off earlier than predicted and it blows a hole too near where Gokudera is hidden. Yamamoto is the only one who comes back for him but the half Italian only curses and calls him names. Suicide plan foiled.
“Is it too much to ask for a quiet death, asshole?”
“Nothing is quiet when you’re around Gok--”
A bullet whizzes by and they are nearly caught in the crossfire. There is a maniacal laugh in the distance and it grates at Gokudera’s non-existent patience.
“Sniper, two o’clock,” he whispers, willing the stabbing pain on his calf to stop.
Yamamoto nods, eyes wide and alert as he loads the last magazine of his Beretta.
“So what’s your plan?”
If he had been facing Yamamoto, Gokudera would have dared him to ask a second time but back-to-back, the half Italian pretends to concentrate on tearing his jacket apart as makeshift first aid. There is no way in hell a right hand man like himself will admit that all his plans have gone bust and he is just waiting to die, not to Yamamoto. So after the longest pause, he repeats the obvious, “Sniper, two o’clock.”
“So the plan is to wait?”
Gokudera does not answer. He refuses to give Yamamoto the satisfaction of being right. Because indeed, the best option available now is to wait. Any further rashness on his part will only result in bloodshed they cannot afford. Gokudera winces inwardly as he applies pressure on the bleeding calf. He should have known better.
*
It is a beautiful day to die. His standard prayer is a leftover from his broken childhood and the only shred of pseudo morality he has.
Adjusting his scope, the sniper cannot suppress his glee. Piece of cake, he mocks, this is a job he can do in his sleep.
It is like a game, cat and mouse, Tom and Jer-- He stops in his thoughts. Tom is the smart cat right?
But from the corner of the scope, there is a flash of familiar silver and all thoughts are lost. It does not matter. Any cat that catches mice is a good cat, oh yes.
His prey is moving (he cannot stay away) and a delighted cackle escapes unchecked. There is a quick shift and a smallest pressure on the trigger but it is enough.
Game over.
*
Except things never really work out as planned. Another bullet bites the dust.
It would have been an easy hit, if Gokudera had been alone. But the Vongola crime famiglia operates like a network, always in a team.
So that we will never walk alone, Gokudera-kun.
Not that the sniper knew.
Gokudera Hayato had always been a lucky bastard.
*
Hidden behind a wall of crates, they are a seamless unit of Vongola efficiency. Gokudera wonders if this comforting presence is exactly what Vongola Decimo had intended when he made Yamamoto play back up for every mission.
“The worst that could happen is we all die,” Gokudera mutters wryly, tying the torn jacket sleeve round his bleeding leg. He is going to need a new wardrobe after--
“Nobody is going to die here Gokudera.”
“Tell it to the guy at your feet, stupid.”
Gokudera sneers, spitting out a bloody molar and wiping the bruised edge of his lips with the back of his hand. It is hopeless, he thinks. His forces decimated, a bullet in his calf and a baseball idiot who is better at close-range attacks than a rain of fire.
He tries to stand but fails miserably. Yamamoto is there before he hits the ground.
"Stand back," Yamamoto says. His gaze has the quality of steel and for a second Gokudera seriously considers leaving it in his hands. But the moment is fleeting and he nearly socks the rain guardian for treating him like a girl.
"You're in no condition to fight."
Gokudera proves him wrong by standing, barely.
“I report to one man and you are not him.”
“That man is dead.”
Gokudera gives him the finger. “I’m his right hand man.”
Yamamoto sighs at the mantra he knows too well before bringing his Beretta between Gokudera’ eyes. Stand down. There is an degree of surprise in greenest eyes but in a flash, it is gone and Gokudera’s Glock is in his face. Yamamoto does not recognize the trace of a smile on the half Italian’s lips but the grip on his gun tightens. He will later realise it is desperation coupled with insanity of a man who has lost everything he holds dear.
by akaru_hana
“Russian roulette?”
Yamamoto cannot believe his ears or Gokudera’s cheek. There is no time for this, he wants to say but Gokudera unhinges the safety of the Glock, all shades of seriousness.
“Tsuna is dead.”
“Fuck you.”
“He is dead and you think he wants you to take his place in his fight?”
Gokudera answers with a glare. Yamamoto’s finger steadies on the trigger.
“Don’t disgrace Tsuna further, Gokudera.”
It is the last thing Gokudera hears (along with the loudest crack of bullets crossing). The Beretta shifts and his vision fade out into a dark splotch of rusty crimson.
*
The Vongola’s renewed power in their territories, albeit weakened and fragmented, comes at the price of Gokudera’s sense of hearing. Aftershock, the doctor assures whatever that is left of that headless famiglia. It will come back to him in a month. And Gokudera swears never to forgive Yamamoto.
“Did you get the fucker?” It is the first thing he asks Yamamoto after recovery and it is then that Gokudera admits that there is nothing to forgive.
“Headshot.”
“Show-off.”
“I brought you sunflowers.”
“Fuck off.”
Yamamoto’s laugh is exactly like Gokudera remembers - an overdose of undiluted good-natured idiocy that is so carefree it feels like a luxury they cannot afford but Yamamoto does not stop laughing and Gokudera wishes he was deaf again.
*
Yamamoto leaves a note in the other’s office while he is still confined to bed-arrest. He figured that the piece of information would only enrage the half Italian and the rain guardian really wants to remain in Gokudera’s good graces.
It is a neon yellow post-it, written in his typical broad scrawl.
To be exact, it was between his eyes.
He is the same sniper who caused your mother’s death.
It’s not a kill-steal if I didn’t know.
Don’t burst your stitches.
Okay? :D
by anothermiyaw
*
It had been an exceptionally long day but he trudges up like always, heavy feet and lined features. One hand stuffed in a pocket and the other round the briefcase holding his tools of trade. Halfway up the slope, Chrome’s Easter lilies line a trail leading to that dark oak coffin he knows so well. It makes Gokudera question his long-time grudge against Kokuyo as he sets some of them aside. It feels like forever but Gokudera cannot forget (even if he forgives Mukuro’s one time treachery). The pungent aroma is sickeningly sweet and his fingers itch for a light but Vongola Decimo would never have approved so he leaves them be. It is quiet in the clearing. There is no other being in his presence and Gokudera lets himself come undone.
The place is farthest from escape (denial) but he cannot stop coming. It is not reprieve he desires, not in a place filled with ghosts and he thinks maybe this is not devotion but it is not love, not when it is not returned. So perhaps it is like a habit, a good one.
And old habits die hard, like sinners and their last prayers but Gokudera is not a god-fearing man. But when the coffin comes alive from within, he wonders if it is divine intervention or maybe there really is a God and the half Italian finds that his hands still remember the fading heat of a dying body. Except this time it is different.
Sawada Tsunayoshi is alive.
Gokudera learns then, that it does not take much to reduce a grown man into tears and that his heart is not equipped to keep time with the speed of sound.
What happens next is a given.
Submitted for the 2009 SMASH! Animanga Convention and won the Action/Adventure category by sheer luck. It was later added into my Minibang entry with accompanying art by the very talented artists, anothermiyaw and akaru_hana
So what do you do when your past insists on catching up with you?
Gokudera runs right smack into the thick of it, except not really. It is not home he goes back to. He is not the prodigal son so he redefines family with Vongola and makes it a personal mission to take it for his own.
He is not even fifteen when he leaves the land of his birth.
His red-eye flight touches down at Narita airport and Gokudera finally admits that there really is no going back now. Silver hair and green eyes make him stick out like a sore thumb but he stares them down, every one who dares give him one wrong look.
He has no idea how he makes it through customs with dynamite in nearly every crevice of his being but he is thankful for the little things. A Vongola henchman meets him at the airport and the house is too big for him. Namimori is too hot but Gokudera sleeps fitfully in his new school uniform and a thumb on his trusty lighter.
*
Their first encounter is not what he envisioned and Reborn is less than impressed. It has been a while since he doubted his instinct but something in those green eyes stops him, something like desperation but on hindsight, he should have known better.
Desperation is no substitute for inspiration but a desperate dog will leap over any wall and Gokudera proves him right (on bended knees, before a boy too small for the Vongola name). Reborn chooses the half Italian because even if he is acrobaleno, he is human and there exists, in the deepest, most forgotten part of that cursed body, memories and some semblance of knowing how to pity small animals. With a nod of his head, he can give broken children a semblance of redemption. So he does; whether it is a bout of shrewdness or nostalgia, he is not sure but regardless, Gokudera is initiated into the new Vongola Decimo’s entourage.
Just like the Ninth did for him.
Right hand man, he lies, watching Gokudera’s eyes light up for the first time.
It is surprisingly easy to make a man go off course with just an empty title, Reborn thinks. After all, admiration and pride are the easiest emotions to manipulate.
But the plans of mice and men often go awry.
Reborn never truly expects Gokudera to rise up to the challenge. He never really understands that acceptance of a Japanese boy is all it takes to overwrite all rejections.
*
“Hey, you like maths and science right?”
Gokudera gives him a look that says something like go bother lawn head or something. It flies over the baseball idiot’s head and Yamamoto’s smile grows.
Gokudera trusts numbers, fixed variables and certainty in the controlled flight of his dynamites. The science of mathematics and the art of chemistry are his elements, calculated trajectories and reaction in combustions. Liking is an understatement.
“Do you know? Mathematicians and scientists are prone to schizophre--”
“Like every other drug addict and chain smoker,” Gokudera deadpans.
He has heard this line of argument too many times. Yamamoto has a look of pleasant surprise, as if his task is made easier now. Annoyed, he lights up another cigarette but Yamamoto does nothing to stop him. Waiting infuriates him the most.
“You’re all of the above you know?”
Gokudera blows a puff of smoke in Yamamoto’s direction. The taller man no longer coughs at the smoke, merely cutting a hand through to fan it away.
“Look who’s talking? I’m not the one playing make believe mafia games here.”
The taller man is quiet and Gokudera cannot resist a chance to guilt trip.
“Someone had to test the composition of that heroin in your pocket you know?”
*
Gokudera is nearly twenty five when he starts believing that happiness is like the sky, so near yet so far, always there but always out of reach.
It is his birthday when he loses something precious again.
This time, it is the boy he pledges his life to.
The brilliant evening sky fades into a bloody mess, covering his world in dusk.
It is almost like somebody pulled the plug and the floodgates are suddenly open, tipping chaos into his world. It reminds him of a hazy afternoon, waiting for happiness that will never come. This time, he is twenty years older and a hardened criminal but there is no difference in death, just the value of life lost and quiet suffering.
The half Italian takes over Vongola’s operations as they wait on the accession of the Eleventh. The number rolls off his tongue like the first Japanese word he learned a decade ago, awkward. There isn’t a ring to it but it is duty and he does it impeccably. Right hand man, he says every time someone (Yamamoto) challenges his decisions. He overlooks the fact that he can only be a right hand if the body exists and denies every request to give Vongola Decimo a proper burial, finally relenting in a handsome coffin in a secluded part of the forest.
It is another morning after that Gokudera remembers something a Chinese mobster said, all smiling eyes and old school wisdom.
“It is better to lose something precious to avoid a disaster.”
And in one quick movement, the tiny mobster cut off his son’s ear as an apology for misleading the Vongola crime famiglia. Tsuna is horrified but that is the end of it.
But Gokudera cannot tell if adverting any disaster is worth losing Vongola Decimo.
And worse, the negotiations with the Hong Kong triads fall apart like a house of cards. Gokudera tells everyone who would listen that they got it off easy but in reality, he knows Vongola Decimo is simply too kind, too good for this world. For even in death, the brunette remains a decent man trapped in an indecent time.
*
There is a territory war even before the dust settles over Vongola Decimo’s coffin and the famiglia is operating on a skeleton of guardians. Hibari washed his hands off everything Vongola the same moment Sawada Tsunayoshi stopped breathing and Mukuro is not to be trusted (even if Chrome brings the coffin Easter lilies everyday). Gokudera picks up the slack and prepares to go into the fray personally.
Yamamoto and Ryohei hold down their forts just fine while the Lambo-Ipin tag team perform surprisingly well. Gokudera’s area is the only one ablaze.
The enemy's C4 bomb goes off earlier than predicted and it blows a hole too near where Gokudera is hidden. Yamamoto is the only one who comes back for him but the half Italian only curses and calls him names. Suicide plan foiled.
“Is it too much to ask for a quiet death, asshole?”
“Nothing is quiet when you’re around Gok--”
A bullet whizzes by and they are nearly caught in the crossfire. There is a maniacal laugh in the distance and it grates at Gokudera’s non-existent patience.
“Sniper, two o’clock,” he whispers, willing the stabbing pain on his calf to stop.
Yamamoto nods, eyes wide and alert as he loads the last magazine of his Beretta.
“So what’s your plan?”
If he had been facing Yamamoto, Gokudera would have dared him to ask a second time but back-to-back, the half Italian pretends to concentrate on tearing his jacket apart as makeshift first aid. There is no way in hell a right hand man like himself will admit that all his plans have gone bust and he is just waiting to die, not to Yamamoto. So after the longest pause, he repeats the obvious, “Sniper, two o’clock.”
“So the plan is to wait?”
Gokudera does not answer. He refuses to give Yamamoto the satisfaction of being right. Because indeed, the best option available now is to wait. Any further rashness on his part will only result in bloodshed they cannot afford. Gokudera winces inwardly as he applies pressure on the bleeding calf. He should have known better.
*
It is a beautiful day to die. His standard prayer is a leftover from his broken childhood and the only shred of pseudo morality he has.
Adjusting his scope, the sniper cannot suppress his glee. Piece of cake, he mocks, this is a job he can do in his sleep.
It is like a game, cat and mouse, Tom and Jer-- He stops in his thoughts. Tom is the smart cat right?
But from the corner of the scope, there is a flash of familiar silver and all thoughts are lost. It does not matter. Any cat that catches mice is a good cat, oh yes.
His prey is moving (he cannot stay away) and a delighted cackle escapes unchecked. There is a quick shift and a smallest pressure on the trigger but it is enough.
Game over.
*
Except things never really work out as planned. Another bullet bites the dust.
It would have been an easy hit, if Gokudera had been alone. But the Vongola crime famiglia operates like a network, always in a team.
So that we will never walk alone, Gokudera-kun.
Not that the sniper knew.
Gokudera Hayato had always been a lucky bastard.
*
Hidden behind a wall of crates, they are a seamless unit of Vongola efficiency. Gokudera wonders if this comforting presence is exactly what Vongola Decimo had intended when he made Yamamoto play back up for every mission.
“The worst that could happen is we all die,” Gokudera mutters wryly, tying the torn jacket sleeve round his bleeding leg. He is going to need a new wardrobe after--
“Nobody is going to die here Gokudera.”
“Tell it to the guy at your feet, stupid.”
Gokudera sneers, spitting out a bloody molar and wiping the bruised edge of his lips with the back of his hand. It is hopeless, he thinks. His forces decimated, a bullet in his calf and a baseball idiot who is better at close-range attacks than a rain of fire.
He tries to stand but fails miserably. Yamamoto is there before he hits the ground.
"Stand back," Yamamoto says. His gaze has the quality of steel and for a second Gokudera seriously considers leaving it in his hands. But the moment is fleeting and he nearly socks the rain guardian for treating him like a girl.
"You're in no condition to fight."
Gokudera proves him wrong by standing, barely.
“I report to one man and you are not him.”
“That man is dead.”
Gokudera gives him the finger. “I’m his right hand man.”
Yamamoto sighs at the mantra he knows too well before bringing his Beretta between Gokudera’ eyes. Stand down. There is an degree of surprise in greenest eyes but in a flash, it is gone and Gokudera’s Glock is in his face. Yamamoto does not recognize the trace of a smile on the half Italian’s lips but the grip on his gun tightens. He will later realise it is desperation coupled with insanity of a man who has lost everything he holds dear.
by akaru_hana
“Russian roulette?”
Yamamoto cannot believe his ears or Gokudera’s cheek. There is no time for this, he wants to say but Gokudera unhinges the safety of the Glock, all shades of seriousness.
“Tsuna is dead.”
“Fuck you.”
“He is dead and you think he wants you to take his place in his fight?”
Gokudera answers with a glare. Yamamoto’s finger steadies on the trigger.
“Don’t disgrace Tsuna further, Gokudera.”
It is the last thing Gokudera hears (along with the loudest crack of bullets crossing). The Beretta shifts and his vision fade out into a dark splotch of rusty crimson.
*
The Vongola’s renewed power in their territories, albeit weakened and fragmented, comes at the price of Gokudera’s sense of hearing. Aftershock, the doctor assures whatever that is left of that headless famiglia. It will come back to him in a month. And Gokudera swears never to forgive Yamamoto.
“Did you get the fucker?” It is the first thing he asks Yamamoto after recovery and it is then that Gokudera admits that there is nothing to forgive.
“Headshot.”
“Show-off.”
“I brought you sunflowers.”
“Fuck off.”
Yamamoto’s laugh is exactly like Gokudera remembers - an overdose of undiluted good-natured idiocy that is so carefree it feels like a luxury they cannot afford but Yamamoto does not stop laughing and Gokudera wishes he was deaf again.
*
Yamamoto leaves a note in the other’s office while he is still confined to bed-arrest. He figured that the piece of information would only enrage the half Italian and the rain guardian really wants to remain in Gokudera’s good graces.
It is a neon yellow post-it, written in his typical broad scrawl.
To be exact, it was between his eyes.
He is the same sniper who caused your mother’s death.
It’s not a kill-steal if I didn’t know.
Don’t burst your stitches.
Okay? :D
by anothermiyaw
*
It had been an exceptionally long day but he trudges up like always, heavy feet and lined features. One hand stuffed in a pocket and the other round the briefcase holding his tools of trade. Halfway up the slope, Chrome’s Easter lilies line a trail leading to that dark oak coffin he knows so well. It makes Gokudera question his long-time grudge against Kokuyo as he sets some of them aside. It feels like forever but Gokudera cannot forget (even if he forgives Mukuro’s one time treachery). The pungent aroma is sickeningly sweet and his fingers itch for a light but Vongola Decimo would never have approved so he leaves them be. It is quiet in the clearing. There is no other being in his presence and Gokudera lets himself come undone.
The place is farthest from escape (denial) but he cannot stop coming. It is not reprieve he desires, not in a place filled with ghosts and he thinks maybe this is not devotion but it is not love, not when it is not returned. So perhaps it is like a habit, a good one.
And old habits die hard, like sinners and their last prayers but Gokudera is not a god-fearing man. But when the coffin comes alive from within, he wonders if it is divine intervention or maybe there really is a God and the half Italian finds that his hands still remember the fading heat of a dying body. Except this time it is different.
Sawada Tsunayoshi is alive.
Gokudera learns then, that it does not take much to reduce a grown man into tears and that his heart is not equipped to keep time with the speed of sound.
What happens next is a given.