Work Text:
Series: Katekyo Hitman Reborn
Characters: TYL!Gokudera/Yamamoto and some TYL!Yamamoto/TYL!Gokudera
Title: In The Past
Rating: PG-13
Words: 2,897
Summary: This is for 
binni . ;D The time TYL!Gokudera is sent to the past and the time he meets the younger Yamamoto. Kind of connected to this, but not entirely... you don't need to read that to understand this.
That much, Gokudera was sure. The empty room he was standing in belonged to the past. The child who was uncontrollably crying was enough proof—the Lambo he knew was much older now, much more refined. This Lambo, clad in cow print pajamas and covered in snot, pointed an offending finger towards Gokudera and was calling him names. His bazooka was beside him. He hadn’t seen that for a while.
Gokudera ignored the toddler and turned around, looking at the small and messy room. He recognized it instantly. It was the Tenth’s—the younger one’s—room.
He pieced it together in his mind. He had been in front of the Tenth’s coffin when the younger version appeared—hit by the bazooka, of course—and even after five minutes had passed, he was still there. That’s when Gokudera confirmed that the bazooka had malfunctioned again. Before he knew it, he had been transported to the past.
His younger self had probably been looking for the Tenth when that annoying toddler hit him with the bazooka. That was the only logical explanation. Gokudera felt a nostalgic smirk curve his lips—he had been so loyal to the Tenth, practically a puppy too eager to please the master. Over the years, that Yamamoto made fun this tendency of his.
Yamamoto—baseball idiot—he hadn’t spoken to him for a while. Just the thought of that person made his stomach knot painfully.
He was just happy he was able to tell the Tenth about Irie Shouichi. That was one thing he had done right.
“Oi, stupid cow.” Gokudera glared at Lambo, and the kid stiffened almost instantly—as if realizing that this wasn’t the Gokudera he normally saw. It was the Gokudera he saw every time he was hit with his own bazooka—the one with a different hairstyle and a taller stature. It wouldn’t be much of a surprise, since Lambo saw him all the time, but didn’t he just hit himself with the bazooka? He never appeared in Tsuna’s old room when he sent himself to the future.
Gokudera felt nostalgic again. ‘Stupid cow’. That was one nickname he hadn’t used for a while.
“Where’s Reborn?” Gokudera asked the toddler.
He should have recognized the change of expressions on Lambo—the way he wiped his snot on the back of his hand in a victorious manner, to be followed that laugh of “Gyahaha!”—then “Why should I tell you!?”
Lambo jumped up and threw his hand grenades, all of which Gokudera simply flicked back with his finger—he had learned, after all. They blew up the room in small explosions, and Lambo, burnt face and all, fell to his knees in loud wails.
Suddenly, the door slammed open and another familiar voice gave a loud yelp. Haru, younger version, stormed in and swept Lambo up to her arms and tried to calm him down. She glared at Gokudera. “What did you do!? Lambo’s just a baby!”
…Why was she even in the Tenth’s house?
Gokudera reminded himself that everyone always turned up in Tsuna’s house, invited or not. The Tenth was very accommodating—even when he didn’t want to.
“Well!?” Haru repeated, shaking an accusing finger at Gokudera’s face. Gokudera didn’t know what to respond—what did he say again ten years ago? Stupid woman? He couldn’t remember. He hadn’t seen Haru for a couple of months now—he hadn’t seen a lot of people these past days. A particular reason was that he isolated himself once Tsuna was gone.
Thankfully, he was saved. Someone stepped into the room. The attention was going to be shifted, obviously—
“Oi, Gokudera! You’re here, too!”
Shit.
Yamamoto was at the door, playing with a baseball in his hands, tossing it back and forth in that annoying habit he still had even when he was in a suit and twenty-five fucking years old. He had that annoying smile on his face, the one Gokudera wanted to punch back into his skull all the time. But that never worked, no matter how many times Gokudera tried.
Shit. Shit. SHIT.
And he said nothing—Gokudera scavenged his pockets, looking for that box of his—he needed something to clench between his teeth—where the fuck was his box? His fingers were twitching, his mind blowing up. Maybe he could jump out the window. It wasn’t that high off the ground.
“You okay?” Yamamoto blinked. “Why are you all dressed up?”
“Hahi!” Haru almost jumped away in surprise. Lambo had finally calmed down, and she used her free hand to suddenly pull Gokudera’s ears, inspecting them. Gokudera gave an annoyed yell, incoherent, but he had nothing else to say.
“…You got piercings!” Yamamoto said in awe as he approached them.
“…A-and a haircut!” Haru said with a wide grin and mild shock.
And Lambo was snickering, knew the truth, but nobody asked him.
Then that’s when all things went bad—when he saw a glimpse of another familiar face by the door. “Hayato,” his sister called out, and he really should have learned not to look towards the direction of that voice. Bianchi stood there, and he fell to his knees in pain, clenching his stomach.
No, no, no.
When he finally looked up again, he realized it was the wrong move—straight into his sister’s face.
“Why are you suddenly taller than me?” Bianchi inquired—that’s when he fainted.
……
There was a soft buzzing—or humming—that Gokudera woke up to, and he shifted to the side, on purpose, to stare at the wall. Yamamoto had heard him, paused in his humming, only to return to it after a while. This had been their unspoken agreement ever since—when Gokudera pretended to be asleep, he was asleep. And Yamamoto respected him, knew that even Gokudera deserved his moments of silence.
Silence. That single word rested heavily on the Italian’s shoulders. He remembered what he left behind, the way Yamamoto implied that he might as well have been born mute.
‘The death of Tsuna is affecting everyone’. Those were the words told to him, and those were the words he ignored. It was a drastic change, one he couldn’t accept.
Yamamoto’s room was as dingy as he remembered it, baseball posters covering almost every inch of the walls, unread school books scattered everywhere—and it smelled like him, like fresh grass and that flavor of gum he always chewed on right before a game and during. Gokudera preferred that smell, hated the cologne that the older Yamamoto always wore.
And Gokudera knew he couldn’t stare at the wall forever, so he finally gave a loud sigh and sat up straight. He forced himself to look at Yamamoto who peered at him from over the sports magazine he was reading.
“Oi, Yamamoto.”
That was the first thing he had told Yamamoto—even thought another version—after weeks of saying nothing at all.
“Mm,” was Yamamoto’s simple reply, accompanied with that huge (annoying) grin of his. “Feeling better?”
Gokudera almost missed this, their almost daily routine in the past: the afternoons where he woke up in Yamamoto’s room after staring Bianchi right in the face, and Yamamoto’s nonchalant greeting. It was nothing like the world he knew by now, the one he had grown accustomed to, where blood was part of everyday, and he wasn’t scared of the violence, and that had scared him—not being scared of death.
“When did you get piercings?” Yamamoto asked curiously.
“Graduation.”
The change in Yamamoto’s expression was almost too brief to notice, but Gokudera saw it anyway. The baseball player on that confused face and said, “That’s funny, Gokudera.”
And there had been a day when Yamamoto finally admitted to Gokudera that he knew from the start that none of this was a game, and he knew none of those were toys, but he liked to think of it that way, because it was much easier to smile than to believe that guns were being shot right in front of him. That children could hold grenades and that Gokudera had killed for the first time at the age of twelve.
“Lambo shot my past self with the bazooka—“
“Bazooka? That toy of his?”
“—I’m a different person—“
“Hmm, you lost me there—“
And it all happened too quickly, that all familiar scowl on Gokudera’s face before he stood up and stomped his way towards Yamamoto, who blinked in confusion even when Gokudera grabbed him by the front of his shirt and slammed him against the wall. The magazine in his hand dropped to the ground, Yamamoto’s expression hardened momentarily, but he said nothing and the frown on his face disappeared instantly, hidden by that huge sheepish smile of his. He ignored the tight, painful grasp of Gokudera and simply looked into his annoyed face as Gokudera spoke to him, their breaths intermingled.
“Don’t fuck with me, Takeshi. You know what I’m talking about.”
Yamamoto opened his mouth to say something, felt and heard Gokudera’s uneven breathing, closed it again because he couldn’t find the words. That’s when he realized that, yes, this Gokudera was much taller than him and even he couldn’t make up some farfetched story about how this could be possible.
It was awkward—they way Gokudera’s grip never relented and the way he suddenly pressed their foreheads together, their lips less than an inch apart but never touching, and Yamamoto couldn’t help it so he leaned forward just a bit, and the kiss was lighter than a feather, and he would have thought that Gokudera hadn’t even noticed it if he hadn’t felt the slight twitch at the corner of his mouth.
“I think your piercings are hot on you.” Yamamoto murmured, because he couldn’t say anything else.
Gokudera blinked and loosened his grip on Yamamoto’s shirt slowly, and backed away, sitting down on the floor in front of Yamamoto, their knees knocking together. He suddenly gave a laugh, and Yamamoto couldn’t tell if it was real, sarcastic, or he was simply just too exasperated. It didn’t matter to the young baseball player. He loved hearing Gokudera’s laugh, so he smiled, genuinely.
Yamamoto listened as Gokudera’s laughing died down. The Italian gave a loud sigh and covered his face with his hand, his shirt cuff drooping down so that Yamamoto saw that he had a lot of new chains and bracelets—sliding down his too-thin wrist and making soft clinking sounds as they did, like always.
His hair was different, shorter, and neater—Yamamoto wondered if he could still tie it to that cute ponytail—and he looked much more tired, as if he had nothing left to lose, and Yamamoto was scared to ask about that, so he didn’t.
Soon, Yamamoto will be sent to the future, and he will find out about Tsuna’s death, and he will be glad he didn’t ask the version of Gokudera who was older and too tired.
Yamamoto found himself speechless once more—he wondered why, because he never found himself at a loss of words, especially in front of Gokudera Hayato and these things just came naturally. Gokudera was looking at him with a silent stare that seemed to pierce him completely, his lips coiled into a frown that was a mixture of confusion and frustration.
Before he knew it, Gokudera had grabbed him by the front of his shirt again, roughly pulled him forward—crashed their lips together, and it was mostly teeth against lips, and Yamamoto remembered it because he was still Gokudera and he hadn’t changed in some aspects. It was the Gokudera who was desperate and frustrated, the Gokudera he knew right after the fight for the Ring of Storm and the time Yamamoto won the Rain Battle, right after they all thought he would die.
It had been so long since they last spoke. And it had been so long since he allowed Yamamoto to touch him, so long since he trailed his fingers over that thick scar on his chin and dug his nails deep into those broad shoulders and whispered “Fuck me, moron,” and Yamamoto always obliged, because he wanted it, too.
Gokudera pushed Yamamoto against the floor, held his shoulder tightly, keeping him in place. It was all so strange and new to Yamamoto, because this person seemed different somehow, but he couldn’t place why, not at the moment. Gokudera’s fingers were cold against Yamamoto’s neck, sliding down to his collarbone and resting around the chain there. Curiously, the Italian took hold of the chain and broke the kiss for a while, looking down at exactly what it was—his eyes widened for a while when he realized it was the chain that Yamamoto used to hold his Vongola ring.
Then Gokudera reminded himself that this wasn’t his Yamamoto—this was just a kid, sitting in his place, and he almost laughed when he saw the pout on the teenager’s face when he pushed away. He flicked Yamamoto and said, “No.”
“…No?”
“No. Shut up.”
Gokudera spoke in senseless ways when he couldn’t think straight, and for someone who was regarded as such a genius, Yamamoto wondered why he always had such a difficult time getting his points across. But Yamamoto understood, knew that Gokudera wanted to stop before it got further.
Yamamoto didn’t ask for a reason, so they just sat in silence for a while. When asked, Gokudera said didn’t he want to eat in the restaurant because he said he was too tired—truth was, he didn’t want to face Yamamoto’s father. Gokudera remembered the time Yamamoto’s father was murdered, regretted the words he told Yamamoto, or the lack thereof.
So Yamamoto ran down and got a plate of sushi, and they ate it in his room. He asked about the future but didn’t ask about the big stuff—he asked when they would start using suits, because it looked cool, and because he always wanted his own. Gokudera told him he would get a closet full of it. He also told him that the cologne he used in the future smelled of feet. Truth was, Gokudera just preferred the smell of bubblegum.
Gokudera liked leaning his forehead against Yamamoto’s shoulder, especially when he thought the other man wouldn’t notice it, like when he was too engrossed in some dumb baseball game on television. But he didn’t like Yamamoto’s cologne, not at all, and hit Yamamoto when he got fed up—go take a shower and take that stench off, he would say—and Yamamoto would laugh and refuse, and though he had no real reason to use the cologne, he still did, day after day, just to annoy him. Gokudera was kind of immature and demanding, even for tiny things like cologne, and Yamamoto liked that at times. It told him he cared.
“Oi, keep away.”
“…But it’s my room.”
Gokudera scowled at him, pushed him away, but Yamamoto always got his way so it ended up with him resting his head on the Italian’s lap. Knowing he probably couldn’t win this one—but, really, when did he ever win against Yamamoto anyway—Gokudera ran his fingers through Yamamoto’s hair, speaking to him in hushed Italian until the young boy fell asleep, his hand grasping Gokudera’s knee protectively, as if that would stop him from leaving.
“Fucking kid…” Gokudera found himself muttering, even though the closeness felt good and natural. The next morning, when Yamamoto woke up, Gokudera was no longer around. There was just a note—‘Hungry. Went to get breakfast. I don’t want damn sushi. Go to school.’
When Yamamoto was sent to the future, he pretended it was the first time he heard of it as a possibility. Gokudera, his Gokudera, asked him about it, but he said he was clueless about the whole thing. He didn’t want to tell Gokudera the truth—because the Gokudera he had met seemed so tired, and he didn’t want to tell Gokudera that he was going to end up like that—and he could change it, probably—so no use in telling, really—
Yamamoto, clad in his suit, ten years older, stood in a field he recognized too well. The buildings around him weren’t broken down, and he wasn’t in the middle of a battle. That was all he needed to realize that he had been sent to the past, and also Gokudera, not fifteen, who was standing in front of him.
“I knew you were going to be stupid enough to be sent here, too.” Gokudera scowled.
“Oh, you’re talking to me again?” Yamamoto grinned and crossed his arms, found the red that spread over Gokudera’s cheeks quite cute.
“Saw you back then. You were an idiot.”
“Same here. He slept in my room.”
Gokudera looked confused. “Who’s he?” And it dawned on him after a few seconds, and he yelled, all red, “You fucking pervert, you hit on my fifteen year old self!?”
“You jealous? Nothing happened.”
And he hit Yamamoto in the face, didn’t even bother to mention that he stayed over in his old room, with the younger Yamamoto—nothing happened either, it didn’t matter. Still, he needed to punch Yamamoto. It just felt right, his own greeting, then he allowed Yamamoto to crush their lips together, Yamamoto’s greeting, and that felt even better.