Archive of Our Own

Autumn had always belonged to Hibari Kyoya.

It was the season in which Namimori became quieter without truly becoming still, when summer’s humid violence finally loosened its grip and the trees along the roads began surrendering their leaves one by one.

The air sharpened. The skies turned pale and endless. People walked faster in the mornings, hands tucked inside their sleeves, while the wind carried the dry scrape of leaves across pavement Hibari had spent half his life protecting as though the town itself were another living creature under his jurisdiction.

It was also the season in which Hibari Akito had been born.

For that reason alone, autumn had become something else entirely.

Tsunayoshi sometimes thought Hibari knew the exact date the first maple leaf had turned red that year. He had never asked, though.

There were certain things about Hibari Kyoya that became less mysterious after years of loving him, but there were others Tsunayoshi had eventually learned not to disturb simply because he was curious.

Hibari Kyoya did not celebrate sentiment.

He collected it privately.

That was different.

Seven years after Akito's birth, Tsunayoshi still occasionally caught him standing by the enormous windows of their private residence in Namimori whenever autumn returned, watching their son running beneath the maple trees in the garden with an expression so still that most people would have mistaken it for indifference.

Tsunayoshi knew better.

Especially because Hibari's eyes always followed Akito. Always.

Akito had inherited almost everything visible from his father.

The same black hair that refused to lie completely flat no matter how carefully Tsunayoshi combed it in the morning. The same pale skin. The same sharp little nose. Even his eyes had Hibari's shape, narrow at the corners in a way that made strangers stare twice whenever Akito happened to look serious.

But the irises were Tsunayoshi's. Bright orange-brown when sunlight caught them. Warm, somehow soft.

The combination was strange enough that Reborn had stared at the infant for several seconds after his birth before announcing, with absolutely no sympathy for Tsunayoshi's exhaustion, that apparently God had decided one Hibari face had not been enough punishment for the world.

Hibari had tried to bite him to death inside the hospital room.

Akito, unfortunately for anyone hoping the resemblance would continue into personality, was nothing like his father.

He was timid. Painfully timid, sometimes.

At seven years old he still hid behind Tsunayoshi when unfamiliar adults addressed him too loudly. He disliked large gatherings (unlike Hibari it was not because he wanted to murder everyone present) because crowds overwhelmed him. Noise frightened him. He was slow to warm to people and very quick to return to Tsunayoshi's side when he was uncertain.

He loved holding Tsunayoshi's hand.

He loved sitting pressed against Tsunayoshi's hip when they ate.

He loved climbing into Tsunayoshi's lap with a book and quietly turning the pages while Tsunayoshi worked.

And whenever they entered unfamiliar places, Akito's little fingers invariably found the hem of Tsunayoshi's jacket.

Papa was safety.

Papa was home.

This had resulted in more than one person making the unfortunate mistake of assuming Akito preferred Tsunayoshi to his father.

Tsunayoshi knew this was not true. Akito simply loved them differently. With Tsunayoshi, his affection was easy, with Hibari it was reverent.

The first time Hibari had called him little lion, Akito had been three years old and crying because he had fallen from the low stone wall bordering the koi pond.

It had not been a serious fall. There had barely even been blood.

That was irrelevant to a three-year-old.

Akito had been sitting on the grass with his knees drawn up, tears rolling silently down his cheeks while Tsunayoshi hurried toward him from the veranda.

Hibari had reached him first, he crouched.

Akito's tiny face had crumpled harder when he saw him. "Dad."

"You fell."

A tragic understatement.

Akito nodded miserably. Hibari examined his scraped palm.  

Tsunayoshi had expected him to say something completely unhelpful like stop crying.

Instead Hibari wiped the blood away with his thumb and said, "A little lion doesn't lose to a wall."

Akito stopped crying. Not immediately, there had been one final watery hiccup. Then his enormous orange eyes lifted toward his father.

"Lion?"

Hibari's mouth had moved almost imperceptibly. "Little lion."

Akito had stared at him as though Hibari had personally placed the moon in the sky. For weeks afterward he had informed everyone who would listen that Dad said he was a lion.

Even now, four years later, the nickname remained one of Akito's most precious possessions.

And sometimes Tsunayoshi heard Hibari use it when he thought nobody else was listening.

“Wake up, little lion.”

“Your shoes.”

“Don't run there, little lion.”

“Come here.”

Occasionally, when Akito fell asleep against his shoulder, Hibari would brush the boy's black fringe away from his forehead and murmur it so quietly even Tsunayoshi was not certain he had heard correctly.

“My little lion.”

They had built something strange together.

A home inside an organization known across half the criminal world for violence. A marriage constructed between two men who, as teenagers, could barely speak for five minutes without either Tsunayoshi panicking or Hibari threatening grievous bodily harm.

A child born between bloodlines that had already frightened enough people separately.

It should not have worked. Perhaps that was why Tsunayoshi treasured its ordinary moments so desperately.

There was a time during their breakfast when Akito insisting he could button his own coat only to misalign every button.

Hibari silently fixing them.

Tsunayoshi finding children's books beside Hibari's reports.

Three pairs of shoes at the entrance.

A small cup beside two larger ones in the bathroom.

Akito sleeping between them after nightmares despite Hibari's repeated declaration that there was no reason for him to be afraid of imaginary creatures.

Tiny things. Just ridiculous things. Ordinary things for some people. Things Tsunayoshi had once believed people like them did not get to have.

But Tsunayoshi was still grateful that he got to experience these little things in his life. A place he could call home. A person he could call love. And a son he could call his treasure.

Then, on a cold afternoon in late October, someone took their son.

And for eleven hours, Hibari Akito disappeared from the world.

It happened quickly.

That was the part Tsunayoshi would hate most afterward.

There had been no dramatic warning, no suspicious vehicle parked across the road for days, no threatening message, no intercepted intelligence suggesting someone intended to strike directly at the Vongola Decimo's family.

Akito had been at the private learning center he attended three mornings a week with six other children belonging to families vetted more thoroughly than some governments.

The security detail was Vongola.

The route was randomized.

The building itself was protected.

At twelve forty-seven in the afternoon, Tsunayoshi received a message informing him Akito had finished early because one of his instructors was ill.

At twelve fifty-two, the escort vehicle departed.

At one fourteen, it crossed the eastern bridge.

At one seventeen, every tracking signal disappeared simultaneously.

At one twenty-six, Gokudera entered Tsunayoshi's office without knocking. He did not have to speak, one glance at his face was enough.

Tsunayoshi stood so abruptly his chair struck the wall behind him. "Hayato-kun."

"Tenth..."

There were moments in which the title still sounded like devotion.

There were moments in which it sounded like an apology.

This was the latter.

Tsunayoshi's hands went cold. "Where is Akito?"

"We lost contact with the escort nine minutes ago."

For one absurd second, Tsunayoshi only stared. His mind rejected the sentence.

Lost contact. That could mean anything; malfunction, a tunnel, equipment failure, or Akito complaining because his snack had fallen onto the car floor.

Anything.

Then Gokudera continued. "The vehicle isn't responding. The emergency beacon was disabled."

"Where?" Something in Tsunayoshi's chest dropped.

"East sector. Yamamoto is already moving."

"Kyoya-san?"

Gokudera's silence answered.

Tsunayoshi shut his eyes. Of course someone had already told Hibari.

When Tsunayoshi opened them again, the warmth people associated with Sawada Tsunayoshi had disappeared so completely that Gokudera instinctively straightened.

"Lock every route out of Namimori."

"Already done."

"Airports."

"Under surveillance."

"Private airfields."

"Five teams moving now."

"Ports."

"Blocked."

Tsunayoshi reached for his coat. "Anyone crossing the city border without authorization gets stopped. I don't care who they belong to."

"Yes."

"Contact CEDEF. Every informant. Every allied Family. I want facial recognition running through every public and private camera from twelve thirty onward. Traffic cameras, residential cameras, shops, stations. Everything."

"Understood."

"If someone refuses access—"

"I'll handle it."

Tsunayoshi looked at him, Gokudera swallowed. There was fear in his face, but not a fear of Tsunayoshi.

Fear for Akito.

Gokudera had been one of the first people allowed to hold him after his birth, he had nearly cried when Tsunayoshi asked. Then denied crying for seven consecutive years.

"Find my son." Tsunayoshi said.

Gokudera's expression broke for half a second.

"We will, Tenth."

They found the escort vehicle at one thirty-eight.

Tsunayoshi reached it less than six minutes later.

The road had already been emptied. Three black Vongola vehicles blocked each direction, men positioned through the trees while technicians worked around the abandoned sedan. The driver's door stood open, glass covered the asphalt. And there was blood on the steering wheel.

Tsunayoshi stopped walking, his lungs forgot how to work.

Not Akito's. Please. Not Akito's.

"Tsuna."

Yamamoto appeared beside him. He looked older than he usually did, not physically, but something in his face had hardened.

"The driver's alive," he said immediately. "So is the second guard."

Tsunayoshi forced his voice to work. "Akito?"

Yamamoto's jaw tightened. "Gone."

The word entered cleanly. It still tore something apart.

Tsunayoshi crossed the remaining distance to the car. There was Akito's little backpack on the back seat, dark blue with a small lion keychain dangling from the zipper.

Hibari had bought it without telling anyone where it came from. Akito had carried it everywhere since.

Tsunayoshi reached inside and picked it up. The bag was still warm from the car's heating system. His hand began to shake.

Papa?

For one terrible instant he could hear Akito saying it. Soft voice, tiny fingers around his sleeve.

Papa.

Tsunayoshi bent his head. He could not fall apart. Not yet, not now.

"How?" he asked.

Yamamoto glanced toward one of the investigators. "Road maintenance truck forced them to slow down. EMP weapon took the electronics. Professional team. Six, maybe eight attackers."

"The cameras?"

"Looped for four minutes."

"Four."

"Exactly."

Someone had planned this. Someone had studied Akito's schedule, the escort formation, Vongola security protocols, the city's surveillance grid. Someone had known exactly how long they needed.

Tsunayoshi closed his fingers around the backpack strap. "Who knew the route?"

"Less than twenty people."

"Bring me every name."

"Tsuna—"

"Every name, Yamamoto."

Tsunayoshi rarely called him by that name anymore, usually referring to him as Takeshi instead. But this time, there was no hesitation in his voice.

Tsunayoshi was serious. Anyone could see how much he was struggling to keep himself together, to stop himself from breaking down or lashing out at anyone, because all he wanted was to find his son.

Yamamoto watched him for a moment. Then nodded, "Yeah."

A sound cracked through the trees. Not gunfire, but something heavier—concrete. Several people turned, Tsunayoshi already knew.

Hibari stood near the maintenance barrier fifty meters away.

Or what remained of it.

The reinforced concrete block beside him had been split almost completely through.

Nobody approached. Nobody was stupid enough.

His tonfa were already in his hands. He wore his long black coat over his shoulders, dark hair shifting in the cold wind. There was no visible panic in his face.

That frightened Tsunayoshi more than rage would have.

Hibari's violence had always been easy to understand when it was loud.

This was something else.

Stillness pulled too tight.

Tsunayoshi walked toward him. "Kyoya-san."

Hibari looked at him. For the first time since arriving, something moved behind his eyes.

"Where is he?" His voice was sharp and icy.

Tsunayoshi hated himself for having no answer. "We're searching."

"That's not what I asked." Hibari's grip tightened around the tonfa.

"I know."

"Where is Akito?" Where is my son? That was all Tsunayoshi heard.

The voice as desperate as he was. They shared the same fear, the same panic, the same pain of having their child taken away from them.

"I don't know." The admission nearly broke Tsunayoshi's voice.

Hibari turned away, his tonfa struck the barrier again. The remaining section exploded into rubble. Men twenty meters away flinched.

"Hibari!" Gokudera barked from behind them. "Destroying the scene isn't going to—"

Tsunayoshi raised one hand. Gokudera stopped immediately.

Hibari’s shoulders were rigid.

Tsunayoshi stepped closer. "Kyoya-san."

Nothing.

"Look at me."

Hibari did. His face had gone pale, not the ordinary paleness of his complexion. Wrong. Bloodless.

"I told him this morning not to forget his scarf," Tsunayoshi whispered. Hibari's eyes sharpened. "He forgot it anyway."

Tsunayoshi's mouth trembled. "I put it in his bag."

Hibari looked toward the abandoned vehicle.

"He asked whether you'd be home tonight." A pause. Tsunayoshi swallowed. "I told him yes."

Something in Hibari's expression fractured, so small nobody else would have seen. Tsunayoshi did.

Hibari looked at the trees, then at the road, then at the bloodstained car.

"I'll kill them."

It was not a threat. It was a statement of future fact.

Tsunayoshi normally would have said something. Not because he possessed illusions about morality in their world, but because somebody had to remain the boundary around Hibari Kyoya when his instincts decided violence was easier than thought.

Today he simply said, "Find Akito first."

Hibari looked at him again.

Tsunayoshi stepped closer until their shoulders nearly touched. "Then we'll decide what happens to everyone responsible."

It was perhaps the most terrifying answer Sawada Tsunayoshi had ever given him.

Hibari's eyes went dark.

"Good."

By three in the afternoon, the Vongola network across Japan had stopped functioning like a criminal organization and started functioning like a government under invasion.

Within minutes, checkpoints had been set up along every route out of Namimori. Private security feeds were seized and redirected, while helicopters circled the outskirts of the town, turning the entire area into a tightly controlled search zone.

CEDEF agents searched warehouses, abandoned buildings, underground structures and Family-owned property extending for more than a hundred kilometers.

Every known enemy of the Vongola received a visit.

Some cooperated the moment they were asked. Others needed a little more persuasion before they decided to share what they knew.

Hibari handled several personally.

Tsunayoshi did not ask how.

At four thirteen, a minor syndicate leader in Yokohama insisted he knew nothing.

At four twenty-two, he remembered the name of an information broker who had been asking questions about the Decimo's domestic security.

At four forty-one, the broker was found trying to leave Japan through a private marina.

He knew about the surveillance purchase, but he did not know who purchased it.

At five seventeen, Irie Shouichi reconstructed two minutes of the corrupted traffic feed. A gray maintenance truck with no license plate.

At five thirty-three, the truck was located burning behind an abandoned factory. Empty.

At six, the temperature dropped.

At six fourteen, Tsunayoshi realized he was still holding Akito's backpack.

He had carried it all the way from the roadside to the Vongola operations center without even noticing.

Nobody said a word about it. Not Gokudera. Not Yamamoto. They had been by Tsunayoshi’s side the entire time, but neither of them dared to mention it. They knew bringing attention to it would only make everything worse.

Not even Reborn, who arrived shortly after sunset and quietly took control of an intelligence station without wasting a single sentence on reassurance nobody could guarantee.

Tsunayoshi sat at the center table, surrounded by a wall of screens displaying maps, phone records, photographs, names, and possible routes.

After a while, everything began to blur together. Every piece of information, every lead, every possibility merged into one endless stream of desperation.

He called people he had not spoken to in years. He collected debts he had once sworn never to use. He offered money, threatened alliances, and opened Vongola databases that were normally kept beyond the reach of even their closest allies.

And yet, none of it mattered.

Every hour that passed felt like another piece of him was being drained away.

Akito hated the dark. Tsunayoshi knew that.

He knew how his son needed the small lamp beside his bed because complete darkness made him imagine shadows moving in the corners of the room. He knew how Akito was shy around strangers, how he would cry quietly instead of making a sound, how, when he was truly frightened, words would sometimes fail him completely.

Was he calling for Papa?

Was he calling for Dad?

Was he hurt?

Was he cold?

Was he hungry?

Tsunayoshi's fingers tightened around the fabric of the backpack, gripping it as if it was the only thing keeping him together.

Stop.

He couldn't let his mind go there. He couldn't imagine every possibility, every fear, every moment his son might be suffering.

He needed information.

That was the only thing that mattered.

He needed—

A hand closed around his wrist.

Tsunayoshi looked up. Hibari stood beside him, silent as ever. There was blood on one of his cuffs.

"You're bleeding." Tsunayoshi said automatically.

"No." Tsunayoshi's eyes remained fixed on the stain. Hibari followed his gaze before answering. "Not mine."

Of course it wasn’t his. Tsunayoshi almost laughed. The sound never made it past his throat.

Instead, his expression cracked. Only slightly, but enough.

Hibari's grip shifted, moving from his wrist to his hand. It was such a small, private gesture that Gokudera, standing across the room, immediately turned his gaze away.

Tsunayoshi's voice came out barely above a whisper. "It's been five hours."

Hibari said nothing.

"What if he's scared?"

"He is."

The certainty in his answer hurt more than uncertainty ever could. Tsunayoshi closed his eyes.

"Kyoya-san."

"He'll wait."

Tsunayoshi opened his eyes again. Hibari's voice remained calm, unwavering.

"Akito will wait for us."

"He's only seven."

"He's ours."

Two simple words. Not a claim. Not arrogance. Hibari simply believed it.

Akito was theirs. Therefore, he would endure.

Therefore, they would reach him.

Therefore, the world had no other acceptable outcome.

Tsunayoshi lowered his forehead against Hibari's shoulder for a brief moment.

Nobody in the room reacted. Nobody dared to.

"I should have gone with him today."

"No."

"I knew his instructor was sick."

"You didn't."

"I could have—"

"Tsunayoshi." The tone cut through him. Hibari bent just enough that only Tsunayoshi could hear. "The people who took him are responsible."

Tsunayoshi's eyes burned.

"Not you."

It was almost ridiculous. Hibari Kyoya, offering comfort like an order. Perhaps that was why it worked.

Tsunayoshi inhaled slowly. Then straightened. "Any update from Kusakabe?"

"Three properties remaining."

"And your Foundation?"

"Searching."

Tsunayoshi nodded.

Hibari did not release his hand immediately. For three additional seconds, their fingers remained locked beneath the edge of the table where few could see.

Then Hibari stepped away.

The room resumed breathing.

At seven twenty-six, they found the traitor.

Not inside the Vongola, but inside the contracted education service.

An administrator had sold attendance schedules months earlier through what he believed was a legitimate corporate data broker.

He did not know Akito specifically.

That fact did not save him from Hibari. It barely saved him from Gokudera.

Tsunayoshi watched the interrogation through a remote feed.

The administrator broke down quickly. He cried, pleaded, and eventually gave them an encrypted contact address.

Shouichi traced it through fourteen separate relays.

But by the time they reached the endpoint, it had already been abandoned.

Another dead end.

Another wall standing between them and Akito.

At eight sixteen, Hibari shattered a desk.

At eight thirty, Tsunayoshi stopped him before he could leave to interrogate the man again.

"He's told us everything."

Tsunayoshi sighed. He knew there was nothing else to take from him. They had already gone through every piece of information the administrator had. Every name. Every contact. Every transaction.

There was nothing left.

And yet, it still wasn't enough.

"He sold Akito."

"He sold information."

"Same thing."

"Kyoya-san."

"I'll kill him right now."

"Later."

Hibari stared at him, Tsunayoshi stared back.

For a moment, Yamamoto looked dangerously close to laughing—or perhaps breaking down—at the sheer absurdity of the word. Later.

Gokudera, however, looked completely unfazed. As if this was the most reasonable conversation happening in the entire building.

Tsunayoshi rubbed both hands over his face. He had not eaten since morning, neither had Hibari.

Someone had placed a cup of coffee beside him two hours ago. It had gone cold.

He stared at it briefly before looking away.

Even something as simple as drinking coffee felt impossible now. His body was exhausted, his mind was running in circles, but none of that mattered. Not when every second they spent searching was another second Akito was alone.

"We need another lead," Tsunayoshi whispered.

The words sounded almost empty. They had searched every route. Contacted everyone. Used every resource available to them.

And still, his son was nowhere to be found.

Hibari's hand tightened slightly around his. Not enough for anyone else to notice, just enough for Tsunayoshi to remember that he was not the only one waiting for Akito to come home.

"There's something we're missing." Reborn spoke from the opposite end of the table.

Everyone looked up. "What?"

"The kidnappers were prepared for Vongola."

Tsunayoshi frowned. "Obviously."

"No." Reborn tapped a map. "Prepared specifically for Vongola response patterns. They knew your lockdown would begin within fifteen minutes. They knew which systems you'd access first. That's why every first-layer clue was designed to pull you outward."

Gokudera leaned closer. "Outward."

"Roads. Ports. Airports. Warehouses outside Namimori."

Tsunayoshi's stomach tightened.

Reborn looked directly at him. "They wanted you searching far away."

The room fell into a quiet.

Then, Hibari moved first. "They're still here."

"So we were looking in the wrong direction." Yamamoto cursed under his breath.

Tsunayoshi was already on his feet. "Search Namimori again."

"We already—"

"Again."

The word left no room for argument. Gokudera was already reaching for his phone.

"Every building," Tsunayoshi ordered.

Every street. Every corner. Every place they might have missed.

They had been looking for the wrong thing.

They had been chasing the trail left behind.

But if Reborn was right, then Akito was never taken far away. He was still somewhere in Namimori. Somewhere close, somewhere waiting for them to find him.

"Not just registered properties," Tsunayoshi said. "Utility records. Closed facilities. Construction sites. Underground spaces. Anything with power consumption inconsistent with occupancy."

Shouichi's voice came through the speaker. "Give me ten minutes."

"Five."

"I'll do my best."

Hibari was already heading for the door.

Tsunayoshi caught his sleeve. "Where?"

"Namimori."

"That's a city, Kyoya-san."

"I know."

"You can't search it alone."

Hibari looked down at Tsunayoshi's hand, then at his face. "I can."

"That wasn't what I said."

For several seconds neither moved.

Then Hibari turned toward Kusakabe. "Divide the Foundation."

Kusakabe bowed immediately. "Yes, Kyo-san."

It was the closest thing to compromise Tsunayoshi was getting.

He released him.

Before Hibari reached the door, Tsunayoshi called him.

"Kyoya-san."

Hibari paused.

"Bring him home."

He did not turn around.

"I will."

Elsewhere in Namimori, Akito woke up inside the darkness.

He did not know how much time had passed. His head hurt, and something rough pressed against his cheek. It took him a moment to realize it was concrete beneath him. When he tried to move his fingers, a sharp pain shot through them too.

For several seconds, his mind remained blank. He could not remember where he was or how he had ended up there.

Then the memories slowly returned.

The car stopping. The sudden loud sound. Mr. Sato turning around and shouting. Someone pulling the door open. A hand grabbing him. A cloth pressed over his mouth.

He remembered fighting back. He remembered kicking as hard as he could. He remembered Papa telling him never to go with strangers, and Dad teaching him what to do if someone grabbed him from behind.

Hit the throat, he had tried. He really had tried.

But the man only laughed.

And then everything went dark.

Akito's lower lip trembled.

"Papa?"

Nothing answered him. His own voice sounded small in the darkness.

Slowly, Akito pushed himself upright, though the movement made the room spin around him. He squeezed his eyes shut for a moment, waiting for the dizziness to pass before whispering again.

"Dad?"

Still nothing.

When he looked around, he noticed a thin line of light slipping from beneath a door several meters away.

Akito stared at it. His chest hurt whenever he breathed, and the fear that had been sitting quietly inside him began to grow heavier.

He wanted Papa.

Not later. Now.

He wanted Papa's arms around him. He wanted to hear Papa's voice telling him that everything would be okay. Papa always knelt down whenever Akito cried, making sure they were at the same height, making sure Akito never felt small or alone.

Papa never told him that he was not allowed to be scared.

Papa always said being afraid was okay, as long as Akito remembered that he was never alone.

But right now, in this cold and unfamiliar place, Akito was alone.

His breath hitched.

"No." He wrapped both arms around himself, holding on tightly as if he could make himself feel safe again.

Dad said little lions did not lose.

The memory appeared so vividly that Akito could almost see him.

His dad standing in the garden, his black coat moving gently with the wind as he looked down at him.

Little lion.

Akito sniffed, wiping his face with trembling hands. "I'm a lion."

The door opened, and Akito immediately froze. A man stepped inside, someone he did not recognize, wearing dark clothes with a mask covering the lower half of his face.

For a moment, Akito could only stare at him, his small body going completely still as the fear he had been trying to hold back slowly returned. He did not know the man's name, and he could not see his face clearly, but he remembered enough.

The same voice, the hands, the way they had taken him away from the only place he felt safe.

The man closed the door behind him, leaving only a thin line of light from the hallway before the darkness swallowed the room again.

"Awake?"

Akito pressed himself against the wall, his fingers tightening around the fabric of his clothes as he tried to make himself smaller.

He wanted to call for Papa. He wanted to call for Dad.

But his voice refused to come out.

The man walked closer. "Boss wants another picture."

Akito's breathing grew faster.

He knew what a picture meant.

They had taken them before. They had made him sit in a chair while he tried not to cry. One man had held his chin when he turned away. Another had said something about needing proof.

Akito never understood what they needed proof of.

He only knew one thing.

Papa would hate this.

"Come on." The man reached for him.

"Don't!" Akito scrambled backward.

"Kid."

"Don't touch me."

The man's hand closed around his arm.

Akito screamed. It was not loud. It came out broken, frightened, and desperate. "Papa!"

"Stop fighting." The man pulled him upright.

"Dad!"

And then something inside Akito awakened.

It was a feeling he could not understand; warmth that spread through his chest, growing stronger with every heartbeat. It was not born from fear, but from the desperate desire to survive, to return home, to see Papa and Dad again.

His heart pounded.

Orange light flickered around him.

Akito stared at it in confusion. He did not know what it was, he did not know why it appeared.

But somehow, his body understood.

The man's grip loosened.

"What the—"

Suddenly, everything became clear.

The rough texture of the floor beneath his feet. The rhythm of the man's heartbeat. The faint movements outside the door.

Six.

No.

Nine.

He could hear nine people. Someone raised a weapon, Akito knew it without seeing it.

He did not understand how he knew. He only knew.

His fear was still there, buried somewhere deep inside him, but it no longer controlled him. It felt distant now, like something that belonged to another child.

Because Akito was no longer thinking about being afraid. He was thinking about going home. His body moved before his mind could understand what was happening.

The orange light surrounding him grew brighter, spilling across the room as the man stumbled backward in shock. Akito did not think. He did not plan. His body simply reacted, guided by something older and stronger than fear.

Suddenly, Akito could notice everything—the footsteps, the breathing, every movement around him. And without knowing how, Akito knew exactly what to do.

When it was over, the room fell silent.

The orange glow slowly faded.

Akito stood there, trembling, his small hands curled tightly at his sides.

He did not remember falling. He did not remember what happened afterward.

The last thing he remembered was wanting to go home.

Rokudo Mukuro had not intended to become involved.

This was important.

If anyone asked—and Sawada Tsunayoshi absolutely would ask once the emotional catastrophe ended—Mukuro intended to establish that he had been pursuing an entirely unrelated matter concerning an ambitious broker attempting to acquire Mist-class illusion technology.

The fact that the broker had connections to the group currently hiding Sawada Tsunayoshi's kidnapped child was unfortunate.

Coincidental.

Nothing more.

Mukuro particularly did not appreciate Chrome suggesting otherwise.

He disliked Hibari Akito.

This, too, was important.

Not the child himself, perhaps.

It was difficult to genuinely hate someone who still pronounced Mukuro's name incorrectly half the time and once offered him a strawberry because Tsunayoshi had insisted sharing was polite.

But Akito represented something Mukuro found personally offensive.

Proof.

That was what the child was.

Living, breathing proof that Sawada Tsunayoshi had chosen Hibari Kyoya and continued choosing him.

Proof that whatever ridiculous, persistent, impossible affection Mukuro had once cultivated toward Tsunayoshi had lost in the most spectacular way imaginable.

Not merely lost. It had produced competition in miniature.

Akito had Hibari's face.

It was insulting.

(The first time Mukuro had seen the infant, he had stared into the crib and said, "How unfortunate."

Tsunayoshi, exhausted and glowing with happiness in a way Mukuro still resented remembering, had smacked his arm.

"Don't say that about my baby."

Mukuro had looked down at the tiny sleeping creature.

Black hair. Small fist beside his face, then the infant had opened orange eyes.

Tsunayoshi's eyes.

Mukuro's irritation had somehow worsened.)

Seven years had not improved matters.

Akito liked hiding behind Tsunayoshi whenever Mukuro approached.

Excellent instincts. Mukuro approved of that.

Akito also adored Hibari.

Unforgivable.

Nevertheless, when Mukuro entered the abandoned underground facility beneath an old industrial block and found thirteen adults dead, two critically injured and one seven-year-old child unconscious in the middle of them, the first thought that entered his mind was not satisfaction.

It was; Tsunawaga is going to break.

The thought struck so violently that Mukuro stopped smiling.

Akito lay curled on the concrete.

Small. Too small.

There was dried blood beneath his nose. His clothing was torn at one sleeve. An orange flame flickered weakly across his forehead before vanishing.

Mukuro looked around.

The room was destroyed. Not merely damaged, but destroyed.

A metal door had been torn partially from its hinges.

One wall was cratered.

A rifle lay in two pieces several meters apart.

Bodies were scattered in patterns Mukuro recognized immediately as combat rather than execution.

Fast combat.

Brutal.

Instinctive.

One man had been thrown hard enough into concrete to fracture it. Another had died with his weapon still holstered.

"What an unbearable creature." He crouched beside him, looking over the small figure lying unconscious. "Surely not..."

Akito did not move.

Mukuro reached out and pressed two fingers against his neck, checking his pulse.

Alive.

Fast. Too fast.

But alive.

For reasons Mukuro would deny even under torture, a small sense of relief loosened something unpleasant in his chest.

He let out a quiet breath.

"You troublesome little skylark."

He carefully lifted Akito. The boy weighed almost nothing, seven years old, unconscious, still warm.

Akito's head fell against Mukuro's shoulder.

Mukuro went rigid.

This was unacceptable. He had not agreed to this kind of tenderness.

Then Akito made a small sound. Barely a whisper, not enough to mean he was awake.

"Papa."

Mukuro's expression changed. The amusement vanished completely.

"Kufufu," He murmured, though there was no laughter behind it. "Let’s bring you back to your Papa."

One of the critically injured men nearby moved, Mukuro's attention shifted toward him. The man's hand trembled as it reached for the gun lying nearby.

Mukuro's eye flashed red. The man screamed.

"That," Mukuro said softly, adjusting Akito more securely against his chest, "was a very poor decision."

At eleven forty-eight that night, Tsunayoshi stood inside the Namimori operations room, trying not to think about the possibility that his son might already be dead.

Nobody had said it. Nobody would.

But probability existed even when people refused to give it words. And after nearly eleven hours, that possibility had begun to linger in the back of everyone's minds, even if no one dared to acknowledge it aloud.

Nearly eleven hours.

For a kidnapped child, eleven hours was an eternity.

Tsunayoshi's body had started betraying him. His hands would not stop shaking, his head ached constantly, and his heartbeat felt irregular beneath his chest. Every new notification made him jerk toward the nearest screen, desperately searching for something different, something that would finally bring good news.

But every report saying negative scraped another piece from inside him.

No sign.

No sign.

No sign.

He wondered if this was what dying felt like. When death happened slowly enough for the body to remain alive while everything meaningful inside it was being removed piece by piece.

Across the room, Hibari stood over a table with Gokudera and Yamamoto. Three of the strongest men Tsunayoshi knew.

And all three looked exhausted.

Hibari looked murderous.

There was dirt across the hem of his coat from searching abandoned tunnels personally. One knuckle was split. His hair had become disordered.

Tsunayoshi could count on one hand the number of times in fifteen years he had seen Hibari Kyoya visibly disheveled by circumstance.

Akito's disappearance had done it in half a day.

"If they're underground, thermal won't help," Yamamoto was saying.

"We've checked the old evacuation tunnels," Gokudera replied. "There are forty-three decommissioned utility routes—"

"Search them."

Gokudera paused. "We are."

"Faster." The sharpness in Hibari's voice made the tension in the room grow heavier.

"Do you think we're fucking sightseeing?" Gokudera snapped.

Hibari's eyes lifted. The two stared at each other for a moment, neither willing to back down. Gokudera's hand twitched toward his explosives.

Yamamoto closed his eyes briefly.

"Yamamoto Takeshi."

"I'm thinking."

"I'm going to kill him."

"No, you blood-thirst freak!"

"He wastes oxygen."

"Not tonight. Do it later."

Usually, Tsunayoshi would have intervened before things escalated. He would have sighed, told them to stop, and somehow managed to keep the two of them from turning the operations room into another battlefield.

Tonight, however, he lacked the energy. He only watched them, too exhausted to do anything except keep searching.

Then the outer security door opened.

Nobody reacted immediately. Agents had been moving in and out for hours, bringing reports, updates, and information that never seemed enough. Another person entering the room was nothing unusual anymore.

But then the second door opened, followed by a pair of slow, unhurried footsteps.

Something about the pace made Tsunayoshi lift his head.

Yamamoto was the first to turn. Whatever he saw made his expression change instantly. Gokudera noticed and followed his gaze, and then Hibari looked over as well.

The room slowly fell silent.

Mukuro stood in the doorway, his clothes covered in dust and stained with blood. But Tsunayoshi barely noticed any of that, because there was something else in Mukuro's arms.

For a moment, his mind refused to understand what he was seeing.

Black hair. A small hand resting limply against Mukuro's coat. The familiar green coat and orange scarf that Tsunayoshi had seen countless times before.

His breath caught.

"Akito!" The name left him as nothing more than a silent breath.

For one second, nobody moved. It felt impossible, like the world had stopped just to prove that he was not imagining it.

Hibari moved before anyone else could.

Tsunayoshi had seen him cross distances faster than ordinary eyes could follow, but this was different. This was not speed born from fighting.

This was desperation.

One moment Mukuro was holding Akito. The next, Hibari was already there.

"Give him to me."

Surprisingly, Mukuro did not make a single joke. He only adjusted his hold carefully before handing the child over.

Hibari's arms immediately closed around Akito.

And something changed in him. It was not obvious Hibari did not cry. He did not break down.

But after eleven hours of holding himself together through nothing but anger and determination, something finally loosened.

His shoulders lowered slightly. The murderous tension that had kept every part of his body rigid disappeared, leaving behind something far more vulnerable.

He looked down at Akito.

His son's face rested against his chest. Unconscious. Bruised.

Alive.

Hibari's fingers moved to the side of his neck, searching for the pulse.

There it was.

His eyes closed just once. For less than a second.

Tsunayoshi reached them before he even realized he had moved.

"Akito."

His hands hovered uselessly in front of him. He wanted to reach out, to take his son back into his arms, but his body hesitated.

He was afraid to touch him.

Afraid that the moment his fingers made contact, the image in front of him would disappear. Afraid that this was nothing more than a cruel illusion created by his exhausted mind.

No, Mukuro would never—

"He's alive," Mukuro said.

The words broke something inside him.

Tsunayoshi made a broken sound as his hand finally moved, his fingers trembling as they touched Akito's cheek.

Warm. He was warm.

His knees nearly gave out.

"Akito."

Before he could fall, Hibari's free hand caught his waist and steadied him. Tsunayoshi grabbed the front of Hibari's coat, holding onto him as if he needed something real to keep himself standing.

"Oh God." His vision blurred. "Oh God, Kyoya-san."

Hibari pulled him closer without shifting Akito from his arms, carefully keeping their son safe between them.

Tsunayoshi pressed one hand over his mouth, trying to hold back the sob that had been trapped inside him for hours.

For eleven hours, he had refused to cry.

He had forced himself to keep moving, keep searching, keep believing that Akito was still waiting for them somewhere.

But now that his son was finally in front of him, alive and breathing, his body made the decision for him.

Tears spilled so quickly that he could barely see.

"My baby."

Akito did not wake. The realization made panic immediately return.

"Why isn't he awake?"

Mukuro's expression sharpened slightly. "Exhaustion. Possibly shock. I would recommend having your excessively expensive medical staff confirm it rather than expecting me to suddenly become a pediatrician."

That sounded more like Mukuro.

Good.

Good.

If Mukuro was still being irritating, then maybe the world was finally starting to return to normal.

Tsunayoshi wiped at his face, still unable to take his eyes away from Akito.

Gokudera was the first to break the silence. "Where did you find him?"

"Old industrial district. Beneath the Shimizu processing site."

"We checked that." Gokudera's expression immediately changed.

Mukuro glanced at him. "You checked the visible basement. There is another structure beneath it."

Yamamoto was already reaching for his phone. "Send teams."

"Bring bags." Mukuro looked at him.

Yamamoto paused. "Bags?"

Mukuro's expression remained unreadable.

"For the bodies."

Silence spread through the room.

Tsunayoshi's eyes immediately returned to Akito, his arms still wrapped around Hibari's coat as if letting go would make this moment disappear.

Hibari's gaze sharpened. "What happened?"

Mukuro's mouth curved. It was not his usual smile, something darker rested behind it.

"Your son happened."

Hibari stared at him. Mukuro inclined his head slightly toward Akito.

"I arrived after the interesting part."

"What does that mean?" Gokudera demanded.

Mukuro looked at them. "It means," he said, "that thirteen of the people responsible for taking him were dead before I entered the building."

Yamamoto stopped moving.

Gokudera's eyes widened.

Tsunayoshi looked from Mukuro to Akito, unable to process what he had just heard. "No way."

"Kufufu." Mukuro's expression shifted slightly, though there was no amusement behind it. "That was approximately my reaction."

Hibari's hand tightened around his son's back. "Explain."

Mukuro studied Akito. "I found him unconscious in what was left of the holding room. There were traces of Sky Flame everywhere. Strong ones."

Tsunayoshi went cold. "Sky… Flame?"

"Yes."

For a moment, Tsunayoshi could only stare at Mukuro, as if his mind was refusing to accept the words. "But he can't ignite."

"Apparently nobody informed him."

"Mukuro."

For once, Mukuro did not prolong the explanation with one of his usual remarks. His expression remained unusually serious.

"Hyper Dying Will Mode."

The room went completely silent. Even Reborn, who had been standing near the rear wall, sharpened his gaze.

Tsunayoshi stared at him. "That's impossible."

"Clearly not."

"He's only seven!"

"I am aware."

"He doesn't even know what Dying Will Mode is."

"Which is precisely why I said it appears to have happened without his conscious understanding."

Tsunayoshi looked down at his son. Akito's small hand was curled tightly into Hibari's lapel, even while unconscious, still clinging to him as if some part of him knew he was finally safe.

"Did he—" The words caught in Tsunayoshi's throat. "Did Akito kill them?"

Mukuro's gaze shifted briefly toward him.

For once, he did not answer immediately. There was something unexpectedly gentle in the pause before he spoke.

"He survived them."

Tsunayoshi closed his eyes. That was not an answer, but it was enough.

Hibari did not look horrified. He looked stunned. A subtle distinction that only people who knew him well would notice.

His gaze moved over Akito's face—the bruise along his temple, the dried blood on his skin, and finally his small hands resting against him.

"The injuries on the bodies," Mukuro continued, "suggest tremendous physical acceleration and impact force. One of them was thrown through reinforced glass. Another had his firearm crushed before he fired."

Gokudera looked at Hibari. Then at Tsunayoshi.

Then back at Akito. "At seven?"

Mukuro gave him a look. "Your Decimo was hardly a model of ordinary developmental milestones himself."

"I wasn't killing trained adults at seven," Tsunayoshi said weakly.

"No. You merely descended from the most absurd bloodline in organized crime and eventually developed the ability to level buildings with your forehead. My apologies for the distinction."

"Mukuro."

"Kufufu."

Hibari finally spoke. "Thirteen."

Mukuro looked at him.

"Dead." Hibari's expression did not change. "Alone."

"As far as I could determine."

Hibari went quiet.

Mukuro tilted his head slightly, studying the expression on his face. "You look surprised."

"He is seven."

"And you were born without a normal understanding of human strength yourself."

Gokudera coughed suspiciously at that. Yamamoto looked up at the ceiling, wisely deciding not to involve himself.

Hibari's eyes narrowed dangerously. Mukuro smiled. There it was, almost normal.

The tension in the room eased by the smalest amount, enough to remind them that they were still themselves despite everything that had happened.

Then Mukuro looked at Akito again.

"But yes. The combination is unpleasantly impressive."

Tsunayoshi frowned. "Combination?"

Mukuro's smile sharpened.

"Sawada Tsunayoshi and Hibari Kyoya." He let the words settle for a moment. "A terrifying genetic decision."

Under normal circumstances, Tsunayoshi would have immediately objected to his son being described as a genetic decision. He would have argued, complained, and probably reminded Mukuro that Akito was a person, not some experiment.

Tonight, however, he only looked down at his son and felt his eyes burn again.

Because Akito was here.

Alive.

Medical personnel arrived at a run moments later.

The instant they approached, Hibari's entire body changed. Predatory.

The first doctor stopped three steps away. "Hibari-sama, we need to examine—"

"No."

Tsunayoshi stared. "Kyoya-san."

"No."

"They need to check him."

"They can check him here."

The doctor looked helpless, clearly unsure how to argue with someone who looked ready to fight a medical team over access to his own child.

Tsunayoshi wiped the remaining tears from his face. "Kyoya-san, Akito might have internal injuries."

Hibari's jaw tightened. "He doesn't leave."

"Then we go with him."

A pause followed. Hibari looked at Tsunayoshi.

Tsunayoshi gently touched Akito's hair. "Both of us."

That solved it.

Hibari turned toward the medical team. "Move."

Everyone moved immediately.

As Tsunayoshi followed, he stopped beside Mukuro.

Mukuro looked at him.

For a moment, neither of them said anything. There were too many years between them, too many complicated things left unsaid, and too many words Tsunayoshi knew Mukuro would immediately turn into jokes if given the chance.

So instead, Tsunayoshi simply reached out and grabbed his sleeve.

Mukuro froze.

"Thank you."

The smile disappeared from Mukuro's face.

Tsunayoshi's voice still broke when he continued. "Thank you for bringing my son back."

Mukuro looked toward Hibari's retreating figure. Akito was still held tightly against his chest.

Something old and bitter moved behind Mukuro's mismatched eyes.

"Kufufu." He looked back at Tsunayoshi. "I still dislike him."

Tsunayoshi laughed quietly through his tears. "I know."

"He has the skylark's face."

"I know."

"Very unfortunate."

"Mukuro."

"But..." His gaze softened. Barely. "You would have been unbearable if he died."

Tsunayoshi stopped smiling.

Mukuro's expression did too. "I had no desire to watch you become that."

For all the things Mukuro could have said, that was perhaps the closest he would ever come to admitting the truth.

Tsunayoshi squeezed his sleeve once before letting go.

Mukuro glanced down at the place his hand had been.

"Go," he said.

Tsunayoshi went.

Akito had a concussion, two cracked ribs, bruising across his left arm, minor dehydration, and several small cuts scattered across his body.

Nothing that should kill him. Nothing that should leave permanent physical damage.

The doctors repeated this three times.

Tsunayoshi made them repeat it a fourth.

Then a fifth.

He needed to hear it again. And again. He needed the words to settle in his mind until he could believe them—that Akito was safe, that his son was still here, that the worst possibility he had been forcing himself not to imagine had not happened.

Hibari did not ask them to repeat anything.

He simply stood beside the medical bed, his eyes fixed on Akito with the expression of a man memorizing every single word in case he needed to personally evaluate the competence of every physician present afterward.

Akito remained unconscious.

And despite every explanation they had been given, that still frightened Tsunayoshi.

"His body underwent extreme stress," the doctor explained carefully. "If Mukuro-sama's description is accurate, the flame activation alone would have exhausted an adult who hadn't trained for it. For a child—"

Tsunayoshi's fingers tightened around the bedrail. "When will he wake up?"

"Most likely within several hours."

"Most likely?"

The doctor's expression faltered.

Hibari looked at him. The doctor immediately paled even more.

"We expect him to wake," he corrected quickly. "There are no signs of intracranial bleeding. His scans are reassuring. His neurological responses are normal."

Tsunayoshi nodded slowly. "Thank you."

The doctor almost visibly sagged with relief.

They moved Akito to a secure private room inside the Vongola medical wing afterward.

Nobody suggested separating him from his parents.

They valued life.

And nobody in the Vongola was willing to test how far two terrified parents would go to keep their child within reach.

Tsunayoshi sat on the left side of the bed.

Hibari sat on the right.

Hours passed, yet neither of them moved. Neither of them left.

At two in the morning, Gokudera arrived with food. Tsunayoshi managed to eat three bites, mostly because Gokudera looked ready to physically force him if he refused.

Hibari ate nothing.

At two forty, Yamamoto arrived with preliminary information from the underground site, but Tsunayoshi only told him it could wait.

There was nothing more important than the child sleeping in front of them.

At three eleven, Reborn entered the room, looked at Akito's sleeping face, and quietly adjusted the blanket by two centimeters before immediately pretending he had done nothing of the sort.

At three thirty, everyone finally left.

The room once again became quiet.

Tsunayoshi rested his cheek against his folded arms beside Akito, too afraid to move too far away even for a moment.

Hibari remained upright in his chair, still watching. Always watching.

"Kyoya-san."

"Hn."

"You should sleep."

"No."

"You've been awake since this morning."

"So have you."

"I'll sleep if you sleep."

"No."

Tsunayoshi managed a faint smile despite himself. "That's not how negotiating works."

"I wasn't negotiating." Of course he wasn't.

Tsunayoshi looked back at Akito.

The room was dim, illuminated only by the small light above the sink and the quiet glow of the monitors beside the bed.

Asleep, Akito looked even younger. Their baby.

The sharp resemblance to Hibari softened when he relaxed. His mouth was slightly open, and his lashes rested quietly against his cheeks.

Seven years old.

Seven.

Tsunayoshi reached out and gently touched his fingers. "I'm scared to close my eyes."

Hibari looked at him.

"What if I wake up and—"

"No."

Tsunayoshi swallowed. "I know it's irrational."

"No."

"But I keep thinking—"

"Tsunayoshi." Hibari reached across the narrow bed and covered Tsunayoshi's hand with his own. "He is here."

Tsunayoshi's eyes burned. "I know."

"Alive."

"I know."

"With us."

Tsunayoshi nodded.

Hibari's thumb moved once across his knuckles. It was such a small gesture. Barely anything. And somehow it was enough to break through everything Tsunayoshi had been holding together.

Tsunayoshi lowered his head and gently kissed Akito's little hand before looking back at Hibari.

"I'm sorry."

Hibari's eyes sharpened immediately. "For what?"

"I couldn't find him."

The answer that neither of them said remained between them.

Neither could I.

But Tsunayoshi continued before Kyoya could respond.

"I'm his Papa. I'm Vongola Decimo. I have satellites and intelligence networks and thousands of people who would tear apart countries if I asked, and I couldn't find my own son."

Hibari watched him silently. "Rokudo Mukuro found him."

"That's not the point."

"It is."

Tsunayoshi shook his head. "No, Kyoya-san, I—"

"You think being his father means nothing can reach him."

Tsunayoshi stopped.

Hibari's gaze lowered to Akito. "I thought that too."

The admission was so quiet that Tsunayoshi almost missed it.

Hibari continued after a brief pause. "I knew someone would eventually try."

Of course he did.

They had discussed it before Akito was born. They had discussed it after. They revisited security protocols every year because they both understood the reality of their world.

Children of powerful mafia families were leverage.

Hibari despised that reality so much that, once, he had suggested eliminating every possible threat before they could ever reach their child.

Tsunayoshi had informed him that genocide was not a reasonable parenting strategy.

Hibari had disagreed.

"I believed they would fail," Hibari said. His fingers curled slightly around Akito's blanket. "Because he is mine."

Tsunayoshi looked at him. Hibari's mouth tightened.

"Arrogant." There was something almost self-directed in the word.

"Kyoya-san—"

"I should have taught him more."

"He's seven."

"He was helpless."

"No." Tsunayoshi straightened slightly. "He was seven. He is a kid."

Hibari looked at him.

"Don't do that." Tsunayoshi said.

"Do what?"

"Don't turn this into a failure because you didn't train our preschooler to survive an assassination squad."

"He survived."

"Apparently by entering a state he didn't understand and killing thirteen people." Tsunayoshi's voice cracked.

Hibari became silent.

Because beneath the relief, beneath the fact that Akito was alive and breathing between them, there was still something neither of them had allowed themselves to face.

Fear.

The horror of what could have happened.

Now that Akito was safe enough for Tsunayoshi's mind to move beyond the single thought of alive, everything else finally began to surface.

"He doesn't know, Kyoya-san." Tsunayoshi looked down at their sleeping son. "He doesn't know what he did."

"He doesn't need to."

"What happens when he remembers?"

"If he remembers."

"What if he does?"

Hibari said nothing. The silence that followed was enough of an answer.

Tsunayoshi rubbed his eyes, trying to hold himself together. "He cries when he accidentally steps on insects."

That was true.

Akito had once cried for twenty minutes after accidentally crushing a beetle beneath his shoe. Tsunayoshi had buried it with him in the garden afterward, treating the small funeral with the same seriousness Akito had given it.

Hibari had watched the entire thing from six meters away, wearing an expression that suggested he questioned every decision that had somehow led him to that moment in his life.

"He'll think he's bad." The words hurt more than Tsunayoshi expected. "Our Akito will think he's bad."

Hibari's expression changed. Tsunayoshi leaned closer to the bed, looking at their son. "He isn't bad."

"No."

"He was just scared."

"Yes."

"He survived."

Hibari's gaze sharpened. The same words Mukuro had used.

Tsunayoshi closed his eyes, "He survived."

Hibari repeated it slowly, as if he was placing the words somewhere permanent in his mind. "He survived."

Tsunayoshi opened his eyes again. They looked at each other across their son's sleeping body.

"Then that's what we tell him."

Hibari nodded once.

Tsunayoshi stared at him for a long moment. There was dried blood near Hibari's cuff, dirt along his collar, and a shallow cut beneath his jaw.

He reached across Akito and gently touched it, Hibari did not move away.

"You scared me today too."

Hibari frowned.

"You looked like you were going to destroy Namimori."

"I considered it."

Despite everything, Tsunayoshi laughed.

Weak. Exhausted. Real.

"That's your hometown."

"I would rebuild it."

"Of course you would."

Hibari caught his wrist before he could withdraw his hand.

Tsunayoshi's breath stopped.

Years together had never made Hibari demonstrative in the conventional sense. He did not fill rooms with declarations. He did not say I love you casually, frequently, or automatically.

But he held Tsunayoshi's wrist.

He brought his hand to his mouth and pressed a kiss against the center of his palm.

Tsunayoshi's expression softened. "Kyoya-san."

Hibari's gaze remained on him. "I thought he was dead."

The words were so unexpected that Tsunayoshi forgot how to breathe.

No metaphor. No distance. Just the truth.

Hibari looked back at Akito. "For several hours." His voice remained steady. "I kept thinking we would find a body."

Tsunayoshi's vision blurred instantly. "Don't."

"I thought about you seeing him."

"Kyoya-san."

"I thought about carrying him home."

"Stop." Tsunayoshi stood so quickly that the chair scraped against the floor. He moved around the bed before Hibari had time to react, wrapping both arms around him.

For one second, Hibari remained rigid. Then his arms closed around Tsunayoshi. Hard.

Tsunayoshi buried his face against his neck. "I thought it too," he whispered.

Hibari's grip tightened.

"I kept seeing it." Tsunayoshi's shoulders shook. "I kept thinking someone would call and say they found him, and he was cold, and I'd have to—"

His voice disappeared. Hibari pulled him closer.

"Tsunayoshi."

"I couldn't breathe."

"I know."

"I don't think I could survive it."

Hibari's hand moved into his hair. "You would."

"I don't want to find out."

"You won't."

"You can't promise that."

"I just did."

Tsunayoshi laughed wetly against his neck. "You're impossible."

"Hn."

They remained like that for a while.

Two of the most dangerous men in the criminal world holding onto each other in a dark hospital room, not because of a battle they had won or an enemy they had defeated, but because their child was breathing only three feet away.

Eventually, Tsunayoshi lifted his head.

Hibari's face was close. Too close for distance to exist between them. Tsunayoshi reached up and touched his cheek.

"I love you."

Hibari's eyes lowered for a moment before returning to his. "I know."

Tsunayoshi almost smiled. He knew Hibari loves him.

Then, slowly, Hibari kissed him. Not urgently, not passionately. There was no hunger in it. No desperation.

Only relief.

His lips pressed against Tsunayoshi's as if he was confirming that something solid still existed in this world. Something he could return to.

Home.

Tsunayoshi kissed him back.

When they separated, Hibari rested his forehead briefly against Tsunayoshi's.

"Tsunayoshi."

"Hm?"

"I love you."

Tsunayoshi froze. Hibari rarely said it first. Almost never.

Perhaps fear had stripped away the unnecessary restraint they both carried. Perhaps after almost losing their son, there were some things that no longer felt worth keeping unsaid.

Tsunayoshi's eyes filled again. "Kyoya-san."

"Don't cry."

"That's your fault!"

"You've cried enough."

"You just told me you love me after our son was kidnapped for eleven hours. What did you think would happen?"

Hibari considered the question.

Tsunayoshi laughed again when he realized there was, apparently, no answer coming. Then he leaned forward and kissed the corner of his mouth.

Behind them, the monitor continued its steady rhythm.

Akito slept.

Alive.

Alive.

Alive.

And for the first time since afternoon, Tsunayoshi finally believed that morning would actually come.

Akito woke at eight seventeen.

Tsunayoshi was asleep with his head resting beside him on the mattress, exhaustion finally claiming him after an entire night of refusing to leave.

Hibari was awake. He noticed the slightest change in Akito's breathing before the boy even opened his eyes.

His fingers twitched first. Then his brow tightened slightly as if he was trying to wake from a dream he did not understand.

Slowly, orange eyes appeared beneath heavy lashes.

Confusion. Pain. Fear.

Hibari stood immediately. "Akito."

Akito's gaze snapped toward him. For several seconds, he only stared, still caught between sleep and reality.

Then his lower lip trembled. "Dad?"

"I'm here." Hibari bent down without hesitation.

Akito looked around the unfamiliar room, and the moment he realized he was somewhere he did not recognize, fear returned to his face. His breathing became quicker.

"Papa?"

Hibari placed one hand carefully against the back of his head. "Here." He reached out and touched Tsunayoshi's shoulder. "Tsunayoshi."

Tsunayoshi woke as if someone had fired a gun.

"What—Akito?" He was upright so quickly he nearly hit the bedrail.

Then Akito saw him. And everything in the child's expression collapsed at once.

"Papa…"

Tsunayoshi made a sound somewhere between a laugh and a sob. "Oh, baby."

He carefully climbed onto the edge of the bed, moving slowly because he remembered the injuries and the wires attached to Akito.

But Akito did not care about any of that, he reached for him despite the IV.

Tsunayoshi gathered him close, mindful of his ribs, and the moment he was in his father's arms, Akito finally broke. He began crying, not screaming. Akito rarely screamed.

Instead, he sobbed against Tsunayoshi's chest, small broken sounds leaving him as Tsunayoshi held the back of his head and whispered that he was there.

"I'm here."

"Papa."

"I'm right here."

"I wanted you."

"I know."

"I called you."

Tsunayoshi's face crumpled. "I know, sweetheart."

"You didn't come."

The words destroyed him.

Hibari's eyes closed briefly.

Because there was no answer to that. No explanation that could make those hours disappear. No reason that would change the fact that, in the moment Akito had been afraid, they had not been there.

Tsunayoshi rocked him carefully, one hand supporting his back while avoiding his injuries. "I'm sorry."

Akito cried harder.

"I'm so sorry. Papa was looking for you. Dad was looking for you. Everyone was looking for you."

"I was scared."

"I know."

"There were bad people."

"I know."

Akito's fingers twisted tightly into Tsunayoshi's shirt, holding onto him as if he was afraid that letting go would make everything disappear again.

Tsunayoshi kissed his hair again and again. "You're safe now."

Akito shook his head weakly. "Papa—"

"You're safe."

"Dad?"

Hibari had remained beside them the entire time. Akito reached one hand toward him without letting go of Tsunayoshi, Hibari took it immediately.

"Dad."

"Hn."

Akito cried harder. Hibari's thumb moved slowly across his knuckles.

"You took too long."

Silence filled the room and Tsunayoshi's heart cracked.

Hibari did not defend himself. He did not explain the impossible distances, the hidden facilities, or the people who had spent hours keeping them away from their son.

He simply lowered his head over Akito's small hand.

"Yes."

Akito sniffed. "I waited."

"I know."

"Dad said lions wait."

Hibari went completely still, Tsunayoshi looked at him. Akito's wet orange eyes searched his father's face.

"I was a lion."

For the first time, Tsunayoshi saw Hibari Kyoya come dangerously close to crying. It lasted only for a brief moment, a small shine in his eyes that disappeared almost immediately.

Hibari leaned forward and pressed his mouth against Akito's forehead.

"My little lion."

Akito made a small, wounded sound at that, reaching for him as well.

Hibari looked at Tsunayoshi.

Tsunayoshi understood without needing him to say anything.

Carefully, they shifted positions. Hibari sat on the bed, and Tsunayoshi guided Akito between them, making sure not to disturb any of the injuries the doctors had treated.

Their son ended up half in Tsunayoshi's lap and half resting against Hibari's chest, as though he could not decide where he wanted to be and had no intention of choosing.

Neither of them complained.

For several minutes, nobody spoke. Akito cried until exhaustion slowly overtook him. His small hand remained closed around Hibari's finger, while the other stayed tangled in Tsunayoshi's shirt.

Even asleep, he refused to let either of them go.

Eventually, Tsunayoshi spoke softly.

"Does anything hurt?"

Akito nodded.

"Where?"

"My chest."

Tsunayoshi gently touched his hair.

"The doctors fixed you up. You just have to be careful for a little while, okay?"

"Home?" Akito murmured.

"Soon."

"Today?"

"We'll see what the doctor says."

Akito frowned. "I want home."

"We'll go home." Hibari answered immediately.

Tsunayoshi looked at him. "Kyoya-san."

"We're going home."

"The doctor—"

"Will agree."

Somewhere in the building, a physician probably experienced a sudden and unexplained sense of dread.

Akito's eyes drifted closed again. Tsunayoshi thought he had fallen asleep,then Akito opened them again.

"Papa."

"Yes?"

His fingers tightened slightly around Tsunayoshi's shirt.

"I did something bad."

Tsunayoshi's blood ran cold. Hibari went completely still.

"What do you mean?" Tsunayoshi asked.

Akito looked frightened. This fear was different from before.

It was not the fear of strangers. It was fear of himself.

"I don't know."

Tsunayoshi immediately softened, his hand moving to stroke Akito's cheek. "That's okay."

"There was fire."

Hibari and Tsunayoshi exchanged a glance.

Akito touched his forehead. "Here."

Tsunayoshi nodded slowly. "Okay."

"It was hot."

"Okay."

"Then everyone fell down."

His voice grew smaller with every word. Tsunayoshi felt his chest tighten.

"I don't remember."

"You don't have to remember right now."

Akito hesitated. Then he asked the question they had both been afraid of. "Are they dead?"

There was no safe lie. Not in their world. Not when Akito would eventually remember.

Tsunayoshi looked at Hibari.

Hibari’s face remain unreadable. Then Tsunayoshi looked back to his son. "Some of them are."

Akito stared at him, tears slowly filled his eyes again. "I killed them?"

Tsunayoshi placed both hands around his face, making sure Akito looked at him.

"Listen to me." Akito sniffed. "You were scared. They took you away from us. They hurt you."

"But—"

"You did what your body knew how to do because it was trying to keep you alive."

Akito started crying again. "I'm bad."

"No." Tsunayoshi's answer came so quickly that it almost startled even himself. "No, you are not, Akito."

"But Papa says hurting people is wrong."

The words struck harder than Tsunayoshi expected.

Oh.

God.

Parenting inside the mafia had always been a minefield of contradictions.

Hibari solved it in the most Hibari manner possible. "They were hurting you."

Akito looked at him.

Hibari's gaze remained steady. "You stopped them."

"They died."

"Yes."

"Dad."

"You survived."

Akito's mouth trembled. Hibari leaned closer. "You are not bad."

Akito stared at him.

"You hear me?"

A tiny nod, then Akito swallowed. "Yes."

"You are not bad."

"I'm not bad."

Hibari touched his hair gently. "You are my little lion."

And that was enough to make Akito cry all over again.

This time, he threw both arms around Hibari's neck. Tsunayoshi watched as his husband's face disappeared against their son's hair. Hibari's hand spread carefully across Akito's back, protective and mindful of his injured ribs.

Those were the same hands that had broken bones without hesitation the day before.

The same hands that could make enemies fear him.

Yet now they held a seven-year-old as if he had been made from something irreplaceable.

Perhaps he had.

To Hibari, he certainly had.

Tsunayoshi leaned closer, unable to stay outside that small circle between them. Akito immediately reached blindly for him too. Within seconds, the three of them were tangled together again.

"Papa."

"Yes?"

"Dad."

"Hn."

"Don't go."

Tsunayoshi kissed his temple. "We aren't going anywhere."

Akito sniffed. "Promise?"

Tsunayoshi looked at Hibari.

Hibari answered.

"Promise."

The doctor did, in fact, object to Akito going home.

For approximately four minutes. Then Hibari entered the discussion.

The objections became recommendations.

By noon, Akito was discharged under strict instructions: complete rest, careful observation, limited physical activity, medication, and immediate return if any neurological symptoms appeared.

Tsunayoshi listened carefully to every word, Hibari listened more carefully than anyone expected.

He asked about everything the doctors might have overlooked: how long Akito's ribs would take to heal, which signs could indicate internal bleeding, how often they needed to wake him during the first night, and which medications should never be combined.

Tsunayoshi watched him from beside the bed.

There were things people misunderstood about Hibari Kyoya because he had never cared enough to correct them.

One of them was the belief that indifference and silence were the same thing.

They were not.

Hibari noticed everything that belonged to him; Namimori, his Foundation, Tsunayoshi, Akito.

Especially Akito.

When Akito had been an infant, Kyoya had memorized the temperature settings in every room without anyone asking him to.

He knew which formula Akito tolerated best, which brand of diapers irritated his skin, and which lullaby Tsunayoshi hummed when Akito had colic.

He knew Akito disliked peas unless they were mixed with pumpkin, although he insisted dietary preferences were nothing more than herbivore nonsense.

He knew exactly how tightly to fasten the straps on Akito's car seat.

He knew Akito's pediatrician's direct number.

He knew every teacher.

Every escort.

Every emergency contact.

He knew all of it.

He simply never announced that he did.

Now, carrying Akito through the corridor because their son refused to walk despite being perfectly capable of it, Hibari looked terrifying enough that the entire medical wing cleared a path.

Akito did not care. His cheek rested against Dad's shoulder. One hand clutched the front of Hibari's shirt, his eyes were half closed.

Tsunayoshi walked beside them carrying the discharge bag.

"Comfortable?" he asked.

Akito nodded.

"Does Dad make a good taxi?"

A tiny smile appeared on Akito’s face.

Hibari looked at Tsunayoshi. "Don't teach him nonsense."

"Too late."

Akito whispered, "Dad taxi."

Tsunayoshi covered his mouth.

Hibari stared at his son. Akito's smile widened cautiously.

"Little lion."

Akito buried his face against Hibari's shoulder.

Tsunayoshi laughed.

It felt miraculous.

Their house had changed while they were gone.

Security had doubled—no, tripled.

Foundation members stood at every external access point, while Vongola personnel occupied surveillance stations throughout the property. Every entrance, every corridor, every possible blind spot had been reinforced.

Hibari noticed immediately, his expression darkened.

Tsunayoshi reached out and touched his arm. "Temporary."

"No."

Tsunayoshi sighed. "We're not firing security because you're angry they failed."

"They failed."

"Some of them weren't even on duty."

"They belong to the same structure."

"Kyoya-san."

Hibari's gaze remained cold. "We change the structure."

"Yes."

That stopped him. Tsunayoshi looked at him seriously.

"We change it. We improve it. We review every person with access to Akito's schedule. But we don't turn his home into a prison."

Hibari said nothing, his gaze shifted toward Akito.

Their son was standing between them now, one small hand gripping Tsunayoshi's coat. He had been quietly listening to the exchange, watching the adults around him with a seriousness that did not belong on a five-year-old's face.

Too quietly.

Tsunayoshi lowered his voice. "He needs normal."

Hibari understood immediately.

His eyes moved toward the armed personnel visible beyond the hallway. Then he looked back down, Akito was looking up at him.

After a moment, Hibari held out his hand.

Akito took it without hesitation.

"Home," Hibari said.

Akito glanced around the house, then he nodded.

"Home."

That evening, nobody came inside except the people Akito asked for.

It was a small thing but after everything that had happened, nobody dared to ignore what Akito needed.

Gokudera arrived first.

He brought three absurdly expensive toys and immediately pretended they were nothing special.

"These aren't because you got kidnapped," he informed Akito sternly. "I already had them."

Tsunayoshi looked at the enormous model train box sitting beside him. "Hayato-kun."

"What?"

"You already had this?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

"I plan ahead."

"For what?"

Gokudera ignored him.

Akito sat on the sofa with a blanket wrapped around his shoulders, carefully looking through the toys in front of him.

"Thank you, Uncle Hayato."

Gokudera's entire expression softened instantly. "You're welcome."

Tsunayoshi smiled.

Gokudera had spent years trying to teach Akito to call him Uncle Gokudera. Akito had decided that simply Hayato was easier.

Gokudera, somehow, considered this a profound honor.

Yamamoto arrived next with food.

"I figured everybody's going to forget to eat again."

Tsunayoshi hugged him, Yamamoto froze for a moment. Then he laughed softly and hugged him back.

"He's okay now."

Tsunayoshi nodded against his shoulder. "He's okay."

Yamamoto looked past him toward Akito.

The boy was showing Gokudera one of the train pieces, explaining something with a quiet excitement that had been missing from him earlier.

Hibari sat in the armchair beside him. Watching.

Yamamoto's smile faded into something gentler.

"Scared the hell out of us, kid."

Akito looked up. "Sorry."

Every adult in the room reacted immediately.

"No." Tsunayoshi said.

"Absolutely not, kid." Yamamoto added.

Gokudera looked personally offended. "Why are you apologizing?"

The sudden attention made Akito shrink slightly into the blanket around his shoulders.

Hibari's hand settled gently on top of his head. Everyone went quiet.

Akito looked down at his knees. "Everyone got worried."

Tsunayoshi crouched in front of him. "That wasn't your fault."

"But—"

"The bad people caused it."

Akito thought about that for a moment. "Okay.".

"No apologizing for something someone did to you." Tsunayoshi touched his cheek

Akito nodded.

Hibari's hand remained on Akito's head, resting there with a quiet kind of reassurance that did not need words. Yamamoto smiled at the sight.

"Your Papa's right."

"Hn," Hibari added.

Gokudera stared at him for several seconds, clearly unable to process what he had just witnessed.

"Did you just agree with someone?"

Hibari looked at him. "Leave."

"I've been here twenty minutes!"

"Too long."

"YOU—"

Before Gokudera could continue, a small sound interrupted him.

Akito giggled.

Everyone stopped.

The room went quiet, not because anything was wrong, but because everyone realized what they had just heard.

It was the first full laugh from Akito since he had woken up.

Gokudera's outrage vanished immediately. Yamamoto's smile widened, and Tsunayoshi felt his eyes sting.

He had spent the past days hearing his son's cries, seeing his fear, and watching him struggle to understand what had happened. Hearing him laugh again felt like getting a piece of Akito back.

Hibari looked down at him.

The boy had covered his mouth with his hand, almost as if he was unsure whether laughing was something he was allowed to do.

Hibari gently tapped his forehead."Again."

"What?" Akito blinked at him.

"Laugh."

Tsunayoshi almost died.

Gokudera turned away with suspicious speed, as if refusing to let anyone see his reaction. Yamamoto, meanwhile, looked like he had just witnessed a solar eclipse.

Akito stared at Hibari for a moment longer. Then slowly, a smile appeared on his face.

And he giggled again.

Hibari leaned back in his chair.

Satisfied.

Mukuro came after dark.

Uninvited. Naturally. Just like usual.

He appeared in the sitting room with enough casual arrogance that the Foundation guards outside nearly initiated an international incident trying to decide whether they should stop him or pretend they had not seen anything.

Akito immediately noticed him and instinctively pressed closer to Tsunayoshi's side.

Mukuro noticed.

"Kufufu. Such gratitude."

Tsunayoshi looked up from the children's book resting in his lap. "You could use the door, you know."

"I could."

"But you choose not to."

"Correct."

Before Tsunayoshi could respond, Hibari entered from the hallway. The atmosphere changed instantly.

"Illusionist."

"Skylark."

Tsunayoshi sighed. "Please don't destroy the house tonight."

"No promises." Mukuro said.

Hibari's tonfa appeared almost immediately.

Akito looked up. "Dad."

Hibari stopped.

It was extraordinary. Mukuro noticed it too. His eyebrows lifted slightly. Akito looked between the two adults, his expression becoming more serious.

"No fighting."

For a moment, nobody moved.

Then Hibari put the tonfa away.

Mukuro stared.

Tsunayoshi had to bite the inside of his cheek to stop himself from laughing. The sheer amount of power contained in a timid seven-year-old simply saying Dad was honestly astounding.

Mukuro approached, but the moment he did, Akito stiffened slightly.

Tsunayoshi immediately placed a reassuring hand on his back. "It's okay."

Mukuro stopped several feet away rather than coming any closer. Unexpectedly considerate.

"I came to see whether the tiny skylark survived his dramatic evening."

Akito looked at Tsunayoshi. "He's talking about you."

"I know." Akito looked back at Mukuro. "Thank you."

Mukuro went still.

Even Tsunayoshi paused.

"Papa said you brought me back."

Mukuro's usual smile returned slowly. "Did he?"

Akito nodded. "Thank you, Mukudo."

A vein nearly appeared on Mukuro's forehead. "My name is Mukuro."

"Mukudo."

"Rokudo Mukuro."

"Rokudo Mukudo."

Tsunayoshi finally lost the battle and started laughing. Even Hibari's mouth twitched slightly.

Mukuro looked deeply offended. "I reconsider saving him."

"No, you don't," Tsunayoshi said.

Mukuro's eyes moved toward him, and for a moment that old expression appeared again.

That strange look Tsunayoshi had seen many times before—affection with nowhere comfortable to go. Something that existed, but that Mukuro never seemed willing to acknowledge.

"I suppose not."

Before anyone could say anything else, Akito reached toward the table beside him. A plate of sliced pears sat there, prepared earlier but mostly forgotten. He picked one up carefully, then held it out toward Mukuro.

Tsunayoshi froze.

He knew that gesture. It was exactly the same thing Akito had done years ago with the strawberry.

"Here."

Mukuro looked at the pear in Akito's small hand, clearly unable to understand why he was being offered food.

"Why?"

Akito blinked. "Sharing is polite."

Tsunayoshi immediately covered his face.

Mukuro looked at him. "You continue poisoning this child with kindness."

"I know. Horrible parenting."

Akito did not move. He simply continued holding the pear out, patiently waiting as if there was nothing unusual about offering food to someone who had once terrified half the people in the room.

Eventually, Mukuro sighed and accepted it. "Thank you."

Akito smiled. Mukuro looked away first.

Hibari watched the entire exchange with quiet suspicion, his eyes narrowing slightly as if he was trying to understand how someone as troublesome as Mukuro had managed to earn Akito's trust.

Mukuro ignored him and bit into the pear.

"For what it's worth, little skylark," he said after a moment, "You frightened some extremely unpleasant people yesterday."

The smile disappeared from Akito's face.

Tsunayoshi noticed immediately. So did Mukuro.

The change in his expression was subtle, but his voice shifted. Not softer exactly. Just less sharp.

"They deserved to be frightened."

Akito looked at him quietly. "Papa said I'm not bad."

Mukuro stared at him for a moment before sighing. "Your Papa is irritatingly correct."

"Enough." Hibari's voice cut through the room.

Mukuro glanced at him.

Surprisingly, he listened.

He stayed for less than half an hour after that. Long enough to make sure Akito was comfortable, long enough to pretend he was only there because he had nothing better to do.

Before leaving, he paused beside Tsunayoshi.

Akito had fallen asleep against Hibari on the sofa, completely unaware of the silent conversation happening around him.

The sight was almost absurd.

Hibari Kyoya, feared across international organized crime, sitting completely motionless because a seven-year-old had his cheek pressed to his chest.

Mukuro watched them, his expression became complicated. Tsunayoshi knew better than to comment.

Finally Mukuro said quietly, "You look happy."

Tsunayoshi glanced at him.

"I am."

Mukuro's smile was faint. "Disgusting."

"You saved part of it." Tsunayoshi laughed.

Mukuro's gaze returned to Akito. "Don't make a habit of reminding me."

"I'll remind you forever."

"Then perhaps I should have left him."

"You wouldn't."

Mukuro looked at him, no smile this time. "I wonder."

Tsunayoshi reached out, touched his arm. "Thank you again."

Mukuro's eyes lowered to the contact.

Then he disappeared into mist before Tsunayoshi could embarrass him further.

That night, Akito refused to sleep alone.

Nobody expected otherwise.

After everything that had happened, after hours of fear and uncertainty, no one had the heart to tell him that he should be fine on his own.

So his room changed slightly.

The lights stayed warmer than usual. The door remained open just enough for him to see the hallway outside. And for the first time in several nights, Akito was surrounded by the two people who made him feel safest in the world.

Tsunayoshi changed him into pajamas carefully, making sure not to move too quickly around his injuries. Every movement was gentle, almost overly careful, as if he was afraid that being careless for even a second would somehow hurt him again.

Meanwhile, Hibari stood by the bedroom windows, checking every lock and every possible entrance for the third time.

"Kyoya-san."

No response.

Tsunayoshi glanced over his shoulder while folding Akito's clothes. He already knew that look on Hibari's face. It was the same expression he wore whenever he had decided something needed to be fixed and would not stop until he was satisfied.

"You checked those."

Hibari checked the lock again.

"Twice."

No response.

Tsunayoshi stared at him for a moment before letting out a small sigh.

"Three times now."

Hibari looked toward the balcony door instead, as if that was a completely different matter that still required his attention.

Tsunayoshi put both hands on his hips. "If you dismantle the window frame, Akito is going to think something is wrong with it."

"Something was wrong with our security."

"Not the window."

"It is part of the security."

Tsunayoshi stared, Hibari stared back. For a moment, neither of them said anything.

They both knew what this was really about. It was not the window. It was not the lock. It was the memory of a phone call that never came. The empty hours. The thought that they might not find their son in time.

Hibari was simply turning that fear into something he could fight.

On the bed, Akito watched them quietly. He had been unusually quiet since returning home, still adjusting to the fact that the walls around him were familiar again, that his toys were still there, that Papa and Dad were both within reach.

"Papa."

“Yes?” Tsunayoshi immediately softened and turned toward him.

Akito looked at Hibari, who was still standing by the window with his serious expression. "Dad's mad."

Tsunayoshi's expression softened. "Dad is worried."

Hibari frowned. "I'm not worried."

Tsunayoshi looked at him, so did Akito. Even the stuffed lion on the bed seemed to look at him.

The silence that followed was devastatingly obvious.

Hibari's frown deepened. "Sleep."

Akito, apparently deciding not to argue with that, crawled beneath the blankets. Tsunayoshi watched him settle down, a small smile appearing on his face.

"Excellent emotional communication."

"Hn."

They left Akito's room because the boy had requested their room instead.

Apparently, recovery from kidnapping granted access to every parental bed boundary previously established.

Nobody had the heart to argue with that.

Hibari objected for exactly zero seconds.

Which, according to Tsunayoshi, was perhaps the clearest sign of how serious the situation had been. Normally, Hibari would have complained about unnecessary habits, disrupted routines, or anything that disturbed the order of things.

But this was Akito.

So the rules changed.

Akito settled in the center of their bed, surrounded by familiar warmth and the quiet presence of both his parents. Tsunayoshi lay on one side, while Hibari remained on the other, close enough that Akito could reach either of them without having to ask.

The lights remained on low, leaving the room dim and calm.

Akito held Tsunayoshi's hand tightly.

For ten minutes, he seemed almost asleep. His breathing slowed, his grip loosened slightly, and Tsunayoshi began to think that perhaps the exhaustion had finally won.

Then his eyes opened again.

"Papa?"

"I'm here." The answer came immediately. It always would.

"What if they come back?"

Tsunayoshi's heart clenched. He knew that question was not really about tonight. It was about the room. The darkness. The memory of being taken away.

"They won't."

"How do you know?"

Before Tsunayoshi could answer, Hibari spoke. "Because I am here."

Akito looked toward him.

Hibari lay on his side, one arm beneath his head, his expression perfectly serious as if he was stating a simple fact rather than offering comfort.

"They would have to pass me."

Akito considered this carefully. "What about Papa?"

"They'd have to pass Papa too." Tsunayoshi smiled faintly.

Akito's eyes widened slightly. Somehow, that seemed to settle the matter. There were perhaps advantages to having two parents who were widely regarded as walking natural disasters.

Akito closed his eyes again. Then opened them once more.

"Dad?"

"Hn."

"Are you strong?"

"Yes."

Tsunayoshi snorted softly. Hibari ignored him.

"Stronger than the bad people?"

"Yes."

"All of them?"

"Yes."

"Stronger than Papa?"

Tsunayoshi immediately became interested.

Hibari's eyes moved toward him. Tsunayoshi raised one eyebrow, clearly waiting for the answer. Akito waited too.

After a moment, Hibari said, "Different."

Tsunayoshi smiled victoriously. "Very diplomatic, Kyoya-san."

"Sleep."

Akito giggled. Then immediately winced because of his ribs.

Tsunayoshi sat up at once. "Does it hurt?"

"A little."

"Okay. Don't laugh."

"Papa." Akito looked confused.

"Yes?"

"That's hard."

Tsunayoshi blinked.

Beside him, Hibari's mouth twitched. "He's right."

Tsunayoshi stared at him. "Did you just make a joke?"

"No."

"You did."

"No."

"Kyoya-san."

"Sleep, Tsunayoshi."

Akito giggled again. Then he immediately covered his chest. "Ow."

"See?" Hibari said.

Tsunayoshi narrowed his eyes. "Now you're encouraging him."

Eventually, after a few more quiet moments and several reminders to rest, Akito's breathing finally evened out.

He slept between them.

Safe.

Tsunayoshi remained awake.

So did Hibari.

The house had finally gone quiet. After everything that had happened, the silence no longer felt empty. It felt fragile, like something they were both afraid to disturb.

Their son's small body lay between them beneath the blankets.

One hand had loosened from Tsunayoshi's, the other rested near Hibari's wrist. Even asleep, Akito still seemed to need the reassurance that both of them were there.

Tsunayoshi watched his face.

The same face that had frightened him hours ago because it was too pale, too still. The same face that had made him think of every possible future he never wanted to see.

Now, it was only his son's face again.

After several minutes Hibari murmured, "Sleep."

"I can't."

"He is here."

"I know."

"You need rest."

"So do you."

Hibari ignored that.

Tsunayoshi looked across Akito at him, studying the familiar expression that had changed so little over the years and yet somehow revealed everything to him.

"Kyoya-san."

"Hn."

"Do you ever think about when he was born?"

Hibari's eyes narrowed slightly. "Why?"

"Autumn."

That was explanation enough, Tsunayoshi smiled faintly. "You looked terrified."

"I wasn't."

"You were."

"No."

"You held him like someone handed you an unexploded bomb."

"He was small."

"He was a newborn."

"Too small."

Tsunayoshi's expression softened. There it was. Hibari had been frightened, not of the baby but of how fragile something could be while already mattering so much.

Akito had been less than ten minutes old when the nurse placed him in Hibari's arms.

Hiabri had stared down at him for what felt like forever.

Tsunayoshi, exhausted in the bed, had watched his entire future rearrange itself inside that silence.

He remembered thinking that this was the moment everything had changed. Not because they had gained another responsibility. But because suddenly, there was someone in the world whose happiness mattered as much as their own.

Then Akito opened his eyes.

Orange.

Hibari looked at Tsunayoshi. The expression on his face had been impossible to describe.

Shock.

Possession.

Wonder.

Fear.

Love so immediate it offended his understanding of himself.

"He's ours," Tsunayoshi had whispered.

Hibari looked down again. "Ours."

Seven years later, lying in the dark with that same child bruised but breathing between them, Tsunayoshi felt the memory cut straight through him.

The fear was different now.

Back then, they had been afraid because they were meeting their son for the first time.

Tonight, they were afraid because they had almost lost him.

"I thought we lost him."

Hibari's gaze moved to Akito. "We didn't."

"What Mukuro said."

"Hn."

"About him being strong."

Hibari said nothing.

Tsunayoshi continued. "You're proud."

A pause.

"Yes."

Tsunayoshi almost smiled. "Even though it scares you."

“Yes.” Hibari looked at him.

That admission mattered.

Because Hibari Kyoya could face enemies without hesitation. He could stand against impossible odds without fear.

But his own son's future was something far more difficult to protect.

Tsunayoshi reached across Akito, Hibari met him halfway. Their fingers linked over the blanket.

"I don't want his strength to become something people want from him."

"It won't."

"Vongola will notice."

"I know."

"The old men will have opinions."

"I'll kill them."

Tsunayoshi sighed. "That's not always the solution."

"It is efficient."

"Kyoya-san."

"They don't touch him."

The words were flat. Absolute. Tsunayoshi looked at him, looking at how Hibari's eyes were cold now.

Not toward Akito.

Never toward Akito.

They were cold toward an imagined future where anyone tried to take away his son's choice.

"He chooses," Hibari said. "When he is older."

Tsunayoshi's expression softened. "Right."

"If he wants Vongola, he chooses Vongola."

"Yes."

"If he wants Namimori, he chooses Namimori."

Tsunayoshi smiled. "Of course you'd include Namimori."

"If he wants nothing, he chooses nothing."

Tsunayoshi's eyes burned. "Yes."

Hibari's thumb moved across Tsunayoshi's fingers. "No one decides for him."

That was the heart of it.

Perhaps because Hibari had spent his entire life refusing chains.

Perhaps because Tsunayoshi had inherited a throne before he had understood what inheritance meant.

Both of them knew what it meant to have a path chosen for them before they were old enough to choose it themselves. They knew what it felt like to carry expectations that were never asked for, to become something because the world demanded it rather than because they wanted it.

Their son would not be born into obligation simply because he had power.

Not if they had anything to say about it.

Tsunayoshi squeezed Hibari's hand. "I love you."

"Hn."

"That's not the correct response."

"I said it yesterday."

Tsunayoshi stared. For a moment, he genuinely had no answer. Hibari closed his eyes, completely satisfied with his own reasoning.

Tsunayoshi had to bite his lip not to laugh loudly enough to wake Akito. "You have a daily limit?"

"Yes."

"One?"

"Less."

"Kyoya-san."

Hibari opened one eye. Tsunayoshi smiled at him, unable to hide his amusement.

Something warm passed through Hibari's expression. It was brief. Almost impossible for anyone else to notice. But Tsunayoshi had spent years learning every version of him.

"I love you, Tsunayoshi."

The smile disappeared beneath emotion. Tsunayoshi blinked rapidly.

"You're cheating."

"How?"

"You knew I'd cry."

"Herbivore."

"You're married to this herbivore."

"Hn."

"By choice."

Hibari's eyes settled on him. "Yes."

One word with no hesitation. Tsunayoshi felt it all the way down.

Anyone else could have said the same thing and it would have been nothing more than a confession.

From Hibari, it was a promise.

A single word carrying the weight of years they had spent choosing each other.

Between them, Akito shifted.  Both men stopped immediately.

Akito mumbled something incoherent in his sleep before relaxing again. Then his fingers moved, searching blindly until they found Hibari's hand.

He held one of Dad's fingers in his sleep.

Hibari looked down.

Tsunayoshi watched his face. This was the version of Hibari almost nobody saw.

Not gentler, exactly.

Gentleness implied the absence of sharp edges.

Hibari never lost his.

This was something fiercer.

Devotion without spectacle.

He would burn cities before allowing harm to reach the two people in this bed.

He would also wake at three in the morning to find a missing stuffed lion because Akito could not sleep without it.

He would threaten international syndicates.

He would cut apples into slices because Akito disliked biting them whole.

He would destroy men with his tonfa.

He would remember Tsunayoshi's preferred tea temperature.

Contradictory only to people who had never understood him.

Tsunayoshi understood. He had always understood.

He loved the sharp edges.

He loved the quiet gestures hidden behind them.

He loved all of it.

The nightmares started at two thirty-seven.

Akito screamed. He didn't cry. He screamed, loud and hard.

The sound ripped through the silence of the room so suddenly that Tsunayoshi woke before he was even fully aware of where he was. His son's small body jerked upright between them, caught somewhere between sleep and memory.

"No!"

"Akito." Tsunayoshi reached for him immediately, trying to wake him by gently patting his son's cheeks.

"Don't touch me!"

The reaction froze him, so did Hibari.

Akito wasn't awake. Not truly. His eyes were open, but they weren't seeing the room around him. His breathing came in desperate gasps, his body still trapped somewhere else.

"No, Papa. Papa!!"

"I'm here." Tsunayoshi forced himself to stay calm. He kept his hands visible, making sure Akito could see that he wasn't a threat. "Akito. Papa's here."

"No!"

"Look at me."

Akito scrambled backward instinctively. Pain shot through his ribs, he instantly cried out. That was what finally brought him back, his eyes focused slowly.

Tsunayoshi saw the exact second recognition returned.

"Papa." The sound nearly broke Tsunayoshi all over again.

He tried not to let his expression show how much seeing Akito like that hurt him. "Yes, baby?"

Akito launched himself forward, and Tsunayoshi caught him carefully, immediately adjusting his hold so he wouldn't hurt his ribs.

"They came back." Akito sobbed against him.

"No, baby. They weren't—"

"They came back!"

"It was a dream." Tsunayoshi held him tighter, his hand moving slowly through Akito's hair. "You're home with us."

But Akito was still trembling violently, his fingers gripping Tsunayoshi's shirt. "No, I saw—"

"A dream." Tsunayoshi repeated it gently, not trying to force him to forget, only reminding him where he was. "You're home with us."

Akito's breathing remained uneven. Then, Hibari moved closer, the moment Akito noticed him, his hand reached out.

"Dad."

"I'm here."

"They came back."

Hibari touched his face carefully. "No one is here."

Akito's eyes moved around the dark room, searching for something that wasn't there. Hibari reached over and turned on the bedside lamp. Warm light filled the space, chasing away the shadows.

"Look."

Akito looked. The curtains, the wardrobe, the chair, his papa cardigan, his dad coat. Home. He was at home with his parents.

"No one's here," Hibari reassured him.

Akito swallowed. "Dad checked?"

Tsunayoshi's heart broke and healed at the same time. Because even now, even after everything, Akito still believed that if Dad checked, then he would be safe.

Hibari answered with complete seriousness. "Three times."

Tsunayoshi almost laughed despite himself. Apparently, three inspections by Hibari Kyoya constituted sufficient proof of safety.

Akito nodded slowly. And little by little, he relaxed.

Tsunayoshi brushed the sweat-damp hair away from his forehead. "Do you want water?"

Akito shook his head.

"Do you want to talk about it?"

Another shake.

"Okay."

Tsunayoshi hummed softly, accepting the answer without pushing.

For a while, nobody spoke.

Then Akito whispered, "Sing."

Tsunayoshi blinked. "You want Papa to sing?"

Akito nodded.

Hibari looked at him, and Tsunayoshi immediately narrowed his eyes. "Don't."

"I said nothing."

"Your face did." It was almost a tease.

Hibari simply answered, "Hn."

Akito sniffed. "Papa sings good."

"See?" Tsunayoshi pointed at him.

Hibari looked away. "He's injured. He doesn't know what he said."

"Kyoya-san!" Tsunayoshi gasped.

Akito giggled weakly. Then immediately winced because of his ribs.

Tsunayoshi sighed. "Okay. No laughing."

He settled back against the pillows with Akito tucked carefully against his chest. Hibari lay beside them, close enough that Akito could feel his presence even without looking.

Tsunayoshi began humming. It was the old melody he had sung when Akito was a baby and refused to sleep at two in the morning. His voice was not exceptional, Hibari had never said it was.

But Akito loved it.

Slowly, the child's trembling eased. His breathing became calmer, his eyelids grew heavier, and the fear that had pulled him from sleep finally began to fade.

Tsunayoshi continued.

At some point, Hibari's hand came to rest on Akito's back.

At some point, Tsunayoshi leaned his head against Hibari's shoulder.

They remained that way until Akito slept again.

This time, without screaming.

Recovery changed the house.

For the first week, Akito rarely let Tsunayoshi out of sight.

If Tsunayoshi walked into another room, Akito followed.

If Tsunayoshi needed to take a call, Akito sat nearby.

If Tsunayoshi showered, Akito waited outside the bathroom with a book.

Tsunayoshi allowed it.

The therapist they brought in—one who understood children raised within mafia environments without treating that phrase as an ethical paradox—told them routine mattered, safety mattered, and forcing independence too quickly would only teach Akito that comfort could disappear when he needed it.

Hibari absorbed the advice without comment, then rearranged half his schedule.

Tsunayoshi discovered this accidentally.

"You're not going to Tokyo?"

"No."

"But the Foundation meeting—"

"Tetsu handled it."

"Kyoya-san, you haven't attended in person all week."

Hibari looked toward the garden. Akito was sitting beneath a tree playing alone, but within sight of the veranda.

"I'm here."

Tsunayoshi watched his husband quietly. Hibari had not taken his eyes off their son even once, his entire focus fixed on the small figure sleeping between them.

There was something dangerous in the way he watched, like he was already prepared to move, to strike, to destroy anyone who dared come close with the intention of hurting their son again.

The protectiveness was there. Tsunayoshi could feel it.

Hibari frowned, "What?"

"Nothing."

"You're making that face."

"What face?"

"Herbivore face." Hibari almost growled.

"That is not a face."

"It is."

Tsunayoshi stepped closer, he put both hands against Hibari's coat. "You're staying for him."

Hibari's gaze shifted away.

Hibari was a honest man. The difficult part was never feeling something. It was admitting it with words.

Tsunayoshi understood that. He had learned that Hibari's silence was not emptiness, and his lack of words was never the absence of emotion. Hibari simply showed what he felt differently.

Tsunayoshi smiled. "Kyoya-san."

"He is unstable."

"He's recovering."

"Same thing."

Tsunayoshi rose onto his toes and kissed him. The gesture was simple, almost impulsive. A quiet reminder after a night filled with fear that they were still here, still together, still able to have moments like this.

Hibari went still. For a second, he looked almost surprised, as if he had not expected affection to be given so freely despite everything that had happened.

Then one hand settled automatically around Tsunayoshi's waist.

It was instinctive. Familiar. The same way he reached for Akito without thinking.

When Tsunayoshi pulled back, Hibari looked annoyed. Mostly because he had enjoyed it. Tsunayoshi knew that expression well enough by now. The slight narrowing of his eyes, the quiet refusal to admit something he had already revealed.

"I love you."

"Hn."

Tsunayoshi stared at him. "Daily limit again?"

"Yes."

"You're ridiculous."

Hibari simply looked away, completely unapologetic.

Then Hibari looked toward Akito again. Their son had stopped playing, the small movements of his hands had gone still as he watched them quietly from where he sat.

Tsunayoshi followed Hibari's gaze and noticed it too.

For a moment, he wondered what Akito was thinking.

Then Akito smiled. A small, peaceful smile. Just like that, he returned to whatever he was doing, completely satisfied with what he had seen.

Tsunayoshi's chest warmed. "He likes when we're affectionate."

"He shouldn't watch."

Tsunayoshi looked at him. "He saw his parents kissed."

"Exactly."

Tsunayoshi laughed softly. "What do you think he's going to learn? That his parents love each other?"

Hibari did not answer. Tsunayoshi studied him, already familiar with the silence that usually meant Hibari was thinking more than he wanted to say.

Then, softer, Hibari said, "That's a good thing."

Hibari looked at him, Tsunayoshi's smile faded into something more tender. "He should know."

Hibari said nothing, his grip around Tsunayoshi's waist tightened slightly. "He knows."

"I want him to grow up never doubting what home looks like." Tsunayoshi leaned against him.

The words stayed between them.

Because that was what they had both wanted from the beginning: for Akito to grow up knowing that home was never defined by power, legacy, or the weight of a name he had inherited before he could understand it.

Home was the place he could always return to, where he would never have to question whether he was wanted, protected, and loved.

Hibari's gaze returned to their son.

Outside, autumn sunlight filtered gently through the branches overhead, casting soft shadows across the garden.

Akito sat among the fallen leaves with his toys scattered around him, completely absorbed in whatever small world he had created for himself.

The bruise at his temple had turned yellow-green.

Healing.

A reminder of what had happened, but also proof that he had made it through.

"He won't." Hibari said.

Tsunayoshi looked at him.

There was no hesitation in his voice. No uncertainty.

Hibari's eyes remained on Akito, watching their son laugh quietly as if the world had not tried to take his happiness away. "He'll know."

And Tsunayoshi understood what he meant.

Akito would know what home was.

He would know what it meant to be loved.

He would know that no matter how strong he became, no matter what power he carried, he would always be their child first.

Almost four weeks after the kidnapping, Akito asked Hibari to teach him how to fight.

Tsunayoshi nearly dropped his tea. For a brief second, it felt like his heart stopped beating.

"What?"

They had been having a normal breakfast. A quiet morning that, after everything that had happen, still felt like something precious they had to protect.

Which was why none of them expected Akito to suddenly drop a request like that.

"I want Dad to teach me how to fight."

Tsunayoshi froze. Even Hibari looked up from his coffee.

That alone was enough to show how unexpected the request was.

Hibari Kyoya—the man who had spent most of his life fighting, the infamous bloodthirsty demon who had ruled Namimori since middle school with his iron tonfa—was genuinely surprised by his own son's request.

Tsunayoshi carefully placed his cup down.

"Akito." The boy looked at him. Tsunayoshi kept his voice neutral, even though his mind was already racing. "Why do you want to learn?"

Akito looked down at the table.

And there it was, the reason hidden beneath the request.

Fear.

"I don't want them to take me again."

Tsunayoshi's chest tightened.

Beside him, Hibari watched their son in silence. He had already placed his coffee cup down, his full attention now on Akito.

"If I'm strong like Dad, I can stop them."

Tsunayoshi opened his mouth, but Hibari spoke first.

"No."

Akito's face fell slightly. Tsunayoshi looked at Hibari in surprise.

“Why?” Akito whispered.

Hibari set down his cup completely. "Being strong doesn't mean no one can hurt you."

Akito stared at him, and Tsunayoshi did too.

Hibari's gaze remained fixed on his son. "You were already strong."

"But they took me."

"Yes."

"So I wasn't strong."

"No." Hibari leaned back slightly. "Strength isn't never losing."

Akito's little brow furrowed as he tried to understand. "Then what?"

Hibari seemed to pause, as if trying to translate a philosophy built through decades of violence into words that a seven-year-old could understand.

"You were scared."

Akito nodded.

"You waited."

Another nod.

"You fought when you had to."

Akito looked uncomfortable, like he still wasn't sure whether that was something he should be proud of.

Hibari continued before he could retreat into that thought. "You came home."

Akito's eyes widened slightly.

"You are strong."

The boy stared down at his toast.

Tsunayoshi felt something painful and proud move through him. His husband was not trying to comfort their son with empty words. He was not simply telling Akito that he was strong because that was what a parent was supposed to say.

Hibari Kyoya had never been someone who offered meaningless reassurance. He had always judged people by their strength. He respected those who could stand on their own, those who could endure and survive.

And yet, in Hibari's eyes (the eyes of the strongest man Vongola had ever known) his son was already strong.

Akito was brave. Akito had endured. And Hibari was proud of him.

Tsunayoshi knew how much that meant.

Because for someone like Hibari, who had always measured the world through strength, seeing courage in someone so small was not a simple thing.

Then Hibari added, "I'll teach you when you're healed."

"Kyoya-san." Tsunayoshi immediately turned toward him.

Hibari looked at him. "Reasonably."

"Define reasonably." Tsunayoshi narrowed his eyes.

"No weapons."

"Good."

"For now."

Tsunayoshi stared at him. He was absolutely against the idea of Akito learning how to fight from such a young age. Completely against it.

He did not want his son to grow up thinking violence was the only way to protect himself.

But he also knew reality. With their family, their world, and the strength Akito had already shown, sooner or later training would become part of his life.

That did not mean Tsunayoshi had to like the idea. "Kyoya-san!"

Akito looked between them, curious. "Can Papa fight?"

“Yes.” Hibari answered before Tsunayoshi could.

Akito looked impressed. It made Tsunayoshi sighed. "Papa would prefer you didn't need to."

"Why?"

Tsunayoshi looked at his son. "Because fighting isn't supposed to be the first answer."

“It is.” Hibari took another sip of coffee.

Tsunayoshi frowned immediately. "Don't teach our son that."

Akito smiled. "Dad likes fighting."

"Unfortunately."

Hibari looked mildly offended.

Akito giggled. Then, after a moment, his expression changed. He looked down at his small hands, turning them over as if thinking about something much bigger than himself.

"Can I be strong and still scared?"

Tsunayoshi's expression softened completely.

There it was. The question he had been waiting for.

Not about power or what Akito had done. The question about whether fear meant he was weak.

Tsunayoshi reached over and covered Akito's small hand with his own. "Yes."

Because that was Tsunayoshi.

Despite all the strength he carried, despite the title he inherited, despite the people who looked to him as their leader, Tsunayoshi had always known fear.

He was scared because things mattered to him. Because people mattered to him. And he had never believed that fear made someone weak.

Akito looked at Hibari. Hibari held his gaze for a moment before nodding once. “Yes."

That seemed to matter more than anything else.

Akito smiled.

"Okay."

The first training session occurred three weeks later.

It was mostly footwork. At least, that was what Tsunayoshi insisted.

Hibari had a different idea.

When Tsunayoshi arrived at the training area that morning, he found two child-sized practice tonfa already placed neatly on the mat.

He stared at them, then he stared at Hibari.

Hibari stared back.

Neither of them moved.

Finally, Tsunayoshi walked over, picked up the tonfa, and removed them from the mat.

Hibari put them back.

Tsunayoshi removed them again.

Hibari put them back again.

This continued for several minutes until Akito, who had been watching the exchange with growing confusion, finally tilted his head. "Is this part of training?"

Tsunayoshi froze, Hibari looked away. From a safe distance, Yamamoto immediately started laughing, he laughed for a full two minutes.

"Takeshi." Tsunayoshi called.

"Sorry," Yamamoto said, although he clearly was not. "It's just... you two are terrifying people, and you're having a silent argument over tiny tonfa."

Tsunayoshi sighed.

Hibari ignored him.

Eventually, they compromised.

No weapons. Yet.

Akito learned stance, balance, how to fall safely, and to protect his head.

Hibari taught him every movement slowly, correcting his posture whenever he leaned too far or shifted his weight incorrectly. There was no impatience in his voice, no expectation that Akito should understand immediately.

He simply repeated the same instructions until Akito could do it on his own.

How to keep his footing.

How to move away from danger.

How to protect himself first.

How to break a wrist grip.

That last part made Tsunayoshi uneasy until Hibari explained it slowly enough that Akito could follow.

Hibari wasn't teaching him how to hurt someone, he was teaching him how to escape.

There was a difference.

"Turn toward the thumb."

Akito tried. Too weak.

Hibari adjusted his hand carefully. "Again."

Akito frowned in concentration, his small brows furrowing as he focused completely.

Turn.

Pull.

His hand slipped free.

For a second, Akito simply stared at his own hand. Then his entire face lit up. "Dad!"

Hibari nodded once. "Again."

Akito repeated it. Faster this time.

"Dad, did you see?"

"I am standing here."

Tsunayoshi laughed from the veranda.

Akito immediately turned toward him, "Papa!"

"I saw!"

"I did it!"

"You did!"

Akito practically glowed.

Hibari watched him quietly, but Tsunayoshi found himself watching Hibari instead.

Because he knew that expression.That quiet, hidden pride Hibari rarely allowed anyone to see. The thing he kept buried beneath his usual indifference, only revealing it to the people who knew exactly where to look.

He would never say it, he didn't need to.

Akito turned back toward him with the same excitement still bright on his face. "Again!"

Hibari held out his hand. "Again."

They continued practicing until Akito's movements gradually became slower and his energy began to disappear. Hibari noticed immediately, and the moment he did, he stopped without hesitation. He never pushed Akito for one more round, never demanded him to continue until exhaustion took over.

Tsunayoshi noticed that too. Because Hibari was strict, but he had never been careless with what belonged to him. He knew when to challenge someone and when to let them rest.

Without warning, Hibari lifted Akito into his arms.

The boy immediately squeaked. "Dad!"

"Finished."

"I can walk."

"You're tired."

"I'm not."

"You are." Hibari continued walking toward the house, completely ignoring the protest.

Akito looked offended. "Papa, I'm not tired."

Tsunayoshi smiled from behind them, already knowing that arguing with Hibari Kyoya was rarely a successful strategy. "Then you can explain that to Dad."

Akito considered the likelihood of winning that argument. He looked at Hibari's completely serious expression, then looked away after a moment and simply rested his head against Hibari's shoulder.

"Okay."

Tsunayoshi laughed.

Hibari's hand rested securely beneath his knees, holding him with effortless certainty.

There was no hesitation in the way he carried him, no awkwardness despite Akito being old enough to insist he could walk on his own. To Hibari, it didn't matter. If Akito was tired, then he would carry him. Simple as that.

"My little lion."

Akito smiled into his shoulder, the exhaustion finally catching up with him as he relaxed completely in his father's arms.

Eventually the investigation finished.

The truth behind the kidnapping was uncovered after days of tracing connections, following financial trails, and dismantling every remaining piece of the organization responsible.

The kidnapping had been orchestrated by a coalition of remnants from three organizations dismantled during Vongola operations over the previous six years.

Revenge.

Leverage.

A plan to force Sawada Tsunayoshi into concessions. They had looked at Akito and seen only a weakness. A way to reach the Vongola Decimo through the one thing he could never afford to lose.

They had expected a frightened child.

They had not expected Hibari Akito.

The remaining leaders did not survive long enough to revise their assumptions. Tsunayoshi did not ask Hibari for details, and Hibari did not volunteer them. They understood each other well enough not to speak about certain things.

There were aspects of the mafia Tsunayoshi accepted without allowing them into his home.

The violence. The decisions. The necessary darkness that came with the position he carried. But that boundary had become more important after Akito.

Their son could inherit their strength. He could inherit their name. But Tsunayoshi refused to let him inherit the ugliness that came with their world before he was old enough to understand it.

The underground site was destroyed.

The compromised systems were replaced, forcing them to rebuild every layer of security from the ground up. New protocols were implemented, routes were altered, and access was restricted until only a select few people remained trusted with information about Akito.

Nobody outside an approved circle received Akito's full schedule anymore.

They had learned what happened when they assumed he was safe.

This time, they would not wait for another mistake to happen before changing everything.

And as promised, the house did not become a prison. Tsunayoshi and Hibari kept their word. The guards became less visible, the weapons disappeared behind walls, and the garden remained a garden—the same place where Akito could play, run, and be a child without constantly being reminded of the danger surrounding him.

The security changed, but the home itself did not. They refused to let fear take away the one place Akito should always feel safe.

Akito returned to lessons gradually. They did not force him to return immediately or pretend that nothing had happened. Everyone understood that healing was not something that could be rushed, especially for a child who had experienced something he should never have had to endure.

The first morning was difficult.

He stood at the front entrance holding Tsunayoshi's hand so tightly his knuckles turned white while the new escort vehicle waited outside. Akito stared at it silently, and Tsunayoshi immediately noticed the hesitation in his son's expression.

Tsunayoshi crouched in front of him, making himself level with Akito's eyes. "You don't have to go today."

Akito looked at him quietly.

"We can try tomorrow."

For a moment, neither of them said anything. Tsunayoshi didn't push. He knew better than that. After everything Akito had been through, the choice mattered. The feeling that he could still decide for himself mattered.

Then Akito glanced toward Hibari.

Hibari stood beside the door, his black coat hanging neatly over his shoulders, completely still as he watched them.

"Is Dad coming?"

Tsunayoshi looked at his husband. Hibari answered simply, "Yes."

Akito blinked.

Tsunayoshi did too. "You are?"

"For today."

Akito's shoulders relaxed. Hibari approached and held out his hand. Their son looked between them, seeing Papa on one side and Dad on the other.

They walked to the car together.

Tsunayoshi sat in the back with Akito while Hibari sat on Akito's other side. The child spent the first five minutes staring through the windshield, quietly watching the road ahead as if convincing himself that this was different.

Slowly, his body relaxed. He leaned against Tsunayoshi's side, and one of his feet touched Hibari's.

Hibari did not move it. He simply let it stay there.

At a red light, Akito whispered, "Dad."

"Hn."

"Little lions go to school?"

Hibari looked down at him. "Yes."

"Even after bad things?"

"Especially after."

Akito considered his answer carefully, as if weighing whether he believed it. Then he nodded.

"Okay."

Tsunayoshi looked out the window before either of them saw him cry.

Autumn moved toward winter.

The leaves slowly disappeared from the trees, and the air became colder with each passing day. The garden that had once been covered in warm colors gradually turned quiet, waiting for the first signs of winter.

Akito healed.

The nightmares became less frequent. The moments when he woke up afraid became fewer, and little by little, he stopped waiting outside the bathroom door whenever Tsunayoshi disappeared from his sight.

Then, eventually, he stopped following Tsunayoshi into every room.

It happened so naturally that Tsunayoshi almost missed it.

One afternoon, he realized Akito had been playing alone in the garden for nearly twenty minutes without looking back to check whether either parent remained within sight.

He was simply playing. Just a child enjoying the afternoon.

It felt like victory. It was the kind of progress Tsunayoshi had been hoping for—not Akito needing them less, but Akito finally carrying that feeling of safety with him even when they weren't right beside him.

The reassurance he once needed from them every moment was slowly becoming something he could hold inside himself.

Tsunayoshi stood by the window watching quietly, a small smile appearing on his face before he even realized it. He had spent weeks counting every sign that Akito was healing, every moment where fear loosened its grip.

And somehow, this simple sight—their son playing beneath the autumn sky—felt like the greatest progress of all.

Hibari entered behind him. "What?"

"Nothing."

"You're staring."

Tsunayoshi smiled slightly. "Maybe I am."

He pointed outside. Akito crouched beneath the maple tree, carefully collecting the last red leaves scattered across the ground.

Hibari followed his gaze and stood beside him. Their shoulders brushed lightly, a familiar closeness neither of them thought about anymore.

Neither spoke for a moment.

They had never needed to fill every silence between them. After years together, some moments were meant to simply be shared.

Then Tsunayoshi smiled. "He was born right around this time."

"Earlier."

Tsunayoshi glanced at him. "Three weeks earlier."

"Still autumn."

Tsunayoshi laughed softly. "I know."

Hibari looked back toward Akito.

The child who had once been carried home unconscious was now sitting beneath the same season he had entered their lives in, completely unaware of how much he had changed them.

Tsunayoshi leaned slightly against Hibari's shoulder.

Hibari did not move away. He never did.

"You remember the exact date," Tsunayoshi said quietly.

"Of course."

Tsunayoshi smiled. Of course he did. Hibari remembered everything that belonged to him.

Their first meeting.

Their first argument.

Their first kiss.

The day Akito was born.

Things he pretended were insignificant, yet somehow never forgot.

Tsunayoshi looked at him fondly. "You're still impossible."

"Hn."

"But I love you anyway."

Hibari's gaze remained on Akito. "I know."

Tsunayoshi smiled because, somehow, that was exactly the answer he expected.

After all these years, he had learned that Hibari's simplest answers often carried the most meaning.

Akito looked toward the house and noticed them standing by the window. The moment he saw them, his face brightened. He raised both hands.

"Papa!"

Tsunayoshi immediately waved back, unable to stop the smile that appeared on his face.

Akito seemed encouraged by the response and shouted even louder. "Dad!"

Hibari raised one hand, barely. It was such a small gesture that most people would have missed it.

Akito did not. The boy looked completely delighted anyway before turning back to his leaves as if that small acknowledgment had been enough to make his entire afternoon better.

Tsunayoshi leaned against Hibari's shoulder, watching their son return to his little world beneath the maple tree. "Seven years."

"Hn."

"You ever regret it?"

Hibari looked at him. Tsunayoshi smiled softly, already knowing he needed to clarify.

Tsunayoshi smiled softly, already knowing he needed to clarify. "Not him," Tsunayoshi said. "Us."

"Why ask a stupid question?" Hibari's eyes narrowed slightly.

Tsunayoshi laughed quietly. "Because sometimes I like hearing the answer."

Hibari looked back toward Akito. "No."

"No regret?"

"No."

The answer came immediately, without hesitation or the need for even a moment of thought.

That was what made Tsunayoshi smile. He had known Hibari for too many years to mistake his silence for uncertainty. When Hibari made a decision, when he believed in something, there was never any doubt behind it.

Tsunayoshi looked outside again, watching Akito carefully place another red leaf into his small collection, completely unaware of the conversation happening between his parents.

Their son was happy. Safe. Growing up surrounded by the things they had fought so hard to protect.

"I don't either."

Hibari's hand found his waist, pulling him slightly closer in the quiet way he always did.

They stood there together, watching their son beneath the autumn sky, surrounded by the life they had built together.

Quietly. Completely. Home.

Akito came running several minutes later with both fists full of leaves.

The excitement on his face was impossible to miss. He had clearly spent time choosing them carefully, treating every leaf as if it carried some important meaning only he understood.

"Papa!"

The door slid open, letting the cold autumn air rush inside.

Tsunayoshi crouched immediately, opening his arms slightly as Akito approached. "What did you find?"

"Red ones."

"I can see that."

Akito held up the largest leaf with both hands, presenting it with complete seriousness. "This is for Papa."

"Thank you." Tsunayoshi accepted it solemnly, as though he had just received something far more valuable than a simple leaf.

Akito smiled, clearly satisfied, before turning toward Hibari. He searched through the remaining leaves carefully, comparing them one by one as if deciding which one suited his father best.

Finally, he found another.

Smaller. Darker.

"This is Dad."

Hibari looked down at the leaf. Akito held it higher, waiting for him to accept it.

"Dad."

Hibari took the leaf from him, he studied it for a moment. Then his eyes shifted toward Tsunayoshi. "Why is mine smaller?"

Tsunayoshi stared. For a moment, he genuinely wondered if he had heard correctly.

Akito froze. The confident expression disappeared immediately as he looked between them, suddenly worried that he had made a mistake.

"I—"

Tsunayoshi started laughing. Hibari's mouth curved, only slightly. It was barely there, but Tsunayoshi noticed.

Akito noticed a second later. His worried expression disappeared when he realized Dad was teasing him. His face brightened.

"Dad joke!"

"No."

"Yes!"

"No."

"Papa!"

Tsunayoshi immediately pointed at Hibari. "He did."

"Traitor." Hibari looked at him.

That only made Tsunayoshi laugh harder.

Akito, encouraged by the fact that both of them were smiling, launched himself at Hibari without hesitation. Hibari caught him instinctively, one arm wrapping securely around his small body.

The movement was so natural that Tsunayoshi almost forgot how different Hibari had once been. The same hands that people feared were now the hands Akito reached for without thinking, the boy wrapped his arms around his neck.

"Dad can joke!"

"Stop saying that."

"Little lion says Dad joke."

Hibari looked at Tsunayoshi over their son's shoulder. Tsunayoshi was nearly crying from laughter.

"Control your child."

"Our child." Tsunayoshi said.

"Your behavior."

"Your face."

Akito gasped dramatically. "Papa said Dad face!"

Hibari looked deeply unimpressed.

Tsunayoshi approached them, still smiling, and wrapped one arm around Akito and the other around Hibari. All three of them were pressed together by the open garden door, with the cold autumn air slipping around them while the warmth of home stayed inside.

Akito rested comfortably between them, still holding onto his collection of leaves like it was the greatest treasure he had found that day.

Tsunayoshi looked at his husband and their son and felt that familiar warmth settle in his chest again.

This was what they had wanted.

Not perfection.

Not a life without danger.

Just this.

A home where Akito could laugh loudly, tease his father, and run through the garden carrying handfuls of leaves because he was simply a child.

Tsunayoshi held onto the moment a little longer than he probably should have.

Akito smelled like grass and soap.

Hibari smelled faintly of cedar and metal.

Home.

The word settled somewhere deep inside him, Tsunayoshi closed his eyes.

A month ago, he had imagined this house without one of them.

He had imagined carrying a tiny body through these halls instead of watching a child run through them. He had imagined a bedroom permanently empty, shoes left at the entrance that nobody would ever wear again, and a cup beside the sink that would become nothing more than a reminder of someone who was no longer there.

He had seen the shape grief might carve through their family.

He had known exactly what it could take from them.

Now Akito squirmed between them because Hibari's coat button was pressing into his cheek.

"Papa."

"Mm?"

"Too tight."

Tsunayoshi immediately loosened his arms. "Sorry."

Akito remained there anyway, clearly having no intention of leaving the warmth between them.

Hibari looked at him, then at Tsunayoshi.

Something in his face softened. It was a subtle change, the kind most people would easily miss. But Tsunayoshi knew Hibari better than anyone. He had always been able to see the feelings hidden beneath the calm expression and sharp words.

After years together, he had learned that Hibari's smallest gestures often carried the most meaning.

His hand moved from Akito's back to Tsunayoshi's neck, his thumb brushing the warm skin beneath his ear. "Tsunayoshi."

"Hm?"

"Close the door."

Tsunayoshi stared at him. "That's what you have to say during a family moment?"

"It's cold."

Akito nodded seriously from between them. "Cold."

Tsunayoshi looked between his husband and his son. Somehow, the two people he loved most in the world could be equally impossible in completely different ways.

He sighed. "Both of you are impossible."

But he closed it anyway.

That evening, they ate together.

Akito talked far more than anyone expected because he had discovered a snail near the garden wall and apparently considered the discovery important enough to deserve a full explanation.

Tsunayoshi listened attentively, asking questions and reacting at all the right moments.

Hibari pretended not to listen.

He also asked three very specific questions about the snail's location.

Tsunayoshi noticed, but he said nothing.

After dinner, Akito insisted on drawing the three of them.

His version of Tsunayoshi had enormous orange hair, despite Tsunayoshi immediately protesting that his hair was not that large.

His version of Hibari had tonfa in both hands.

His version of himself stood between them wearing what appeared to be a cape.

"Why do you have a cape?" Tsunayoshi asked.

"Because I’m a lion."

Tsunayoshi nodded as if this explained everything. "Of course."

"Why are you taller than your Papa?" Hibari studied the picture carefully.

Akito looked down at the page. "Because I'm growing."

Tsunayoshi burst out laughing, Hibari stared at his son. Akito smiled nervously, as if he was suddenly unsure whether that had been the correct answer.

Then Hibari reached out and tapped his head gently. "Good."

Akito beamed.

Later, after his bath, Akito climbed into bed and immediately demanded one story from Tsunayoshi and one from Hibari.

It had become a routine lately. A small thing, but one Tsunayoshi treasured more than he could explain. After everything Akito had gone through, he never complained about being asked to stay a little longer, to read one more story, or to sit beside him until he fell asleep.

Tsunayoshi told him about a rabbit who crossed a mountain to bring medicine home. It was a simple story, gentle and warm, filled with the kind of kindness he wanted Akito to remember.

Then it was Hibari's turn.

Hibari told him about a lion that defeated thirty wolves.

Tsunayoshi slowly turned his head from across the bed. "Thirty?"

"Yes."

"Kyoya-san."

"What."

"This is for a seven-year-old."

"The lion won."

Tsunayoshi stared at him. "That's not what I'm worried about."

Akito, however, looked completely fascinated. His eyes were enormous as he listened to the story. "Did lion bite them to death?"

Tsunayoshi covered his face.

"Some." Hibari answered honestly.

"Kyoya-san."

"What?"

The complete lack of understanding on Hibari's face almost made Tsunayoshi laugh. Almost.

Eventually, the story was modified under protest.

The lion scared the wolves away. Most of them.

Akito accepted this explanation without further questioning, apparently satisfied that the little lion had still won.

His eyes began closing before Hibari even finished the revised version. Tsunayoshi smiled softly and pulled the blanket higher around him.

Hibari reached over and switched off the lamp, leaving only the soft light from outside the room.

"Papa."

Tsunayoshi paused. "Yes?"

"Stay."

The request was quiet, almost sleepy. Tsunayoshi's expression softened immediately.

"For a little." Akito continued. "Dad too."

Hibari, who had already been sitting back, simply sat down again.

They stayed.

One on each side.

Akito's breathing slowly became calmer between them, his small hands resting near the blanket as he fought against sleep.

His eyes fluttered.

"Papa."

"Hm?"

"Love you."

Tsunayoshi's heart squeezed. "I love you too."

Akito turned his head toward the other side.

"Dad."

"Hn."

"Love you."

Silence filled the room. Tsunayoshi looked at Hibari.

His grey eyes looked at Akito. Then he leaned down and pressed a kiss into black hair.

"I love you."

Akito smiled with his eyes closed. "My Dad used his daily limit."

Tsunayoshi stopped breathing. Then he immediately turned away because laughter exploded out of him.

Hibari stared. Akito started giggling beneath the blanket. "Papa said!"

"Tsunayoshi."

"I'm sorry."

"You taught him that."

"I'm sorry."

"You aren't."

"No."

Akito laughed harder beneath the blanket, clearly far too pleased with himself.

Hibari looked at both of them as though reconsidering every life decision that had led him here. Then, without warning, he caught Tsunayoshi by the back of the neck and pulled him close.

Tsunayoshi yelped softly. "What—"

Hibari kissed him. Right there, beside Akito.

Tsunayoshi froze completely. When Hibari released him, his face was hot. Akito's eyes were wide open now, watching them with complete fascination.

Hibari looked at his son. "Two daily limits."

Akito blinked, Tsunayoshi stared.

Then Akito understood. "Two daily limits!"

Hibari stood. "Sleep."

Akito disappeared beneath the blanket, giggling so hard his shoulders shook.

Tsunayoshi followed Hibari into the hallway several minutes later and immediately smacked his arm. "You did that on purpose."

"Yes."

"In front of him!"

Tsunayoshi stopped.

For a moment, he had no answer. Because somehow, coming from Hibari, those simple words carried more weight than any grand declaration ever could.

Hibari kept walking down the hallway as if he had not just said something that would have surprised everyone who knew him.

Tsunayoshi stared at his back for a second before a smile slowly appeared on his face. Then he took two steps to catch up.

"Kyoya-san."

Hibari looked over.

Tsunayoshi smiled. Soft. Hopeless. Completely in love.

He took Hibari's hand, and Hibari allowed their fingers to link together without complaint.

Together, they walked down the hallway, passing the family photographs Hibari claimed not to care about but never permitted the staff to move without his approval, the little scuff on the wall Akito had made with a wooden sword, and the vase filled with the last red maple leaves from the garden.

Their house was not quiet in the way Hibari once preferred.

There were toys in corners and tiny socks that occasionally appeared inside laundry that did not belong there. Someone laughed too loudly, someone cried, and someone asked endless questions throughout breakfast.

There were birthday decorations once a year, nightmares some nights, books left on the floor, medicine stored in the cabinet, three toothbrushes lined up in the bathroom, and three coats waiting by the entrance.

Three lives tangled together so thoroughly that Hibari could no longer separate the idea of himself from the two people occupying the rooms beside his own.

Once, that might have terrified him. Perhaps some part of him still feared it.

Love had given him something even the strongest man could not protect through strength alone. Something that could be taken. Something that could be lost.

For eleven hours, someone had reached into the center of Hibari Kyoya's life and torn his little lion away from him.

He had learned what helplessness tasted like.

Cold.

Violent.

Unacceptable.

He would remember it forever.

So would Tsunayoshi.

So, in pieces, would Akito.

But that was not the only thing they would remember.

They would remember the doorway where Mukuro appeared with a child alive in his arms. They would remember Hibari catching him, Tsunayoshi's hand against Akito's cheek, the feeling of a pulse beneath his fingers, the warmth of his skin, and the desperate words that escaped before anything else.

My baby.

They would remember the hospital morning when Akito looked at them through tear-filled eyes and said,

Papa.

Dad.

You took too long.

I waited.

I was a lion.

They would remember that fear did not erase love, and that strength did not erase fear. They would remember that surviving something terrible did not mean becoming terrible because of it.

And Akito would remember his father's voice for the rest of his life.

My little lion.

Hibari never called him that because he believed his son needed to become fearless, nor because he wanted Akito to become violent. The thirteen bodies left behind had never been proof of what Akito should become, nor had they ever been the reason Hibari was proud of him.

He called Akito his little lion because he had watched a timid child hide behind Tsunayoshi's legs, cry over scraped knees, apologize to insects, cling to his parents, fear strangers, fear darkness, and fear being alone, yet still choose to be brave anyway.

He had once thought strength was measured only by what refused to bend.

Akito taught him something different.

Strength could tremble. It could cry. It could call for Papa and Dad in the middle of the night. It could need someone else to hold its hand and carry it home when walking became too difficult.

And sometimes, after everything, strength was simply waking up the next morning, taking both of its parents' hands, and trying again.

At the end of the hallway, Tsunayoshi stopped walking.

Hibari noticed immediately and looked back at him. "What."

Tsunayoshi reached up and straightened the collar of Hibari's shirt, even though there was nothing wrong with it. He only wanted an excuse to touch him.

"Nothing."

Hibari watched him. "You're staring again."

"I know."

"Why?"

Tsunayoshi smiled softly.

Because after all these years, after everything they had survived, he still found himself falling in love with the same man who stood beside him now. The man who claimed not to care, yet remembered every small detail. The man who rarely spoke his feelings, yet showed them in every action.

Before he could answer, Akito's voice called faintly from his room.

"Papa?"

Both men turned instantly, then Tsunayoshi laughed. "He probably dropped the lion."

"I'll go." Hibari released his hand.

Tsunayoshi watched him walk back toward the bedroom, watching the same man who once preferred solitude now immediately answer when their son called for him.

"Kyoya-san."

Hibari glanced over his shoulder, Tsunayoshi leaned against the wall.

"I love you."

A quiet pause followed as autumn rain began tapping softly against the windows, filling the hallway with a gentle sound that made the house feel even warmer.

From Akito's room came another small call.

"Dad?"

Hibari's eyes shifted toward the sound before returning to Tsunayoshi. There was the smallest curve at the corner of his mouth.

"I know."

Tsunayoshi groaned. "Your daily limit is over again, isn't it?"

"Yes."

Akito called louder.

"Dad!"

Hibari opened the bedroom door. "I'm here, little lion."

And that, Tsunayoshi thought as he followed him inside, was more than enough.

OMAKE

Akito discovered the phrase entirely by accident.

Or, more accurately, Tsunayoshi discovered that Akito had discovered the phrase entirely by accident.

It happened on an otherwise peaceful Sunday afternoon.

The kind Tsunayoshi had learned not to trust.

Akito was sitting on the living-room rug with several wooden blocks, carefully building what he proudly announced was a lion castle. He had spent nearly twenty minutes arranging every piece perfectly, occasionally moving one block a few centimeters because apparently the castle needed to have the correct structure.

Tsunayoshi sat on the sofa nearby, sorting through paperwork he had promised himself he would finish before dinner.

Hibari was by the window.

Reading.

Quiet.

Domestic.

Suspiciously normal.

Which usually meant something was about to happen.

The front door suddenly opened.

"I'm home!" Lambo's voice echoed through the house before the fifteen-year-old even appeared in the living room. "Lambo-sama has arrived!"

Tsunayoshi looked up immediately, already sensing trouble.

"Lambo, be careful—"

Too late.

Lambo turned around while talking, stepped backward without looking, and his heel caught one of the scattered blocks on the floor.

"Huh?" He slipped. He didn't fall completely, but he stumbled directly into Akito's carefully constructed lion castle.

The entire thing collapsed in seconds.

Lambo froze.

Akito froze.

Tsunayoshi slowly lowered the paper in his hand, Hibari stopped turning the page. That alone was enough to make Tsunayoshi nervous.

Akito stared at the destroyed castle.

The little boy did not cry. He simply looked at the fallen blocks with the kind of seriousness usually reserved for important Vongola meetings. His little shoulders went rigid as he slowly picked up one of the fallen blocks.

Then he looked at Lambo. His orange eyes narrowed.

Tsunayoshi immediately recognized that expression.

Oh no.

No, no, no.

Akito lifted his chin, trying his absolute best to copy Hibari's intimidating expression. Unfortunately, he was wearing a shirt with tiny lions on it, which made the attempt significantly less terrifying.

"Herbivore."

Lambo blinked. "Huh?"

Akito stepped forward. "I'll bite you to death."

The room went completely silent.

Tsunayoshi stared at his son.

Hibari lowered his book slightly.

Lambo looked like his soul had temporarily left his body.

"HUH?!"

"Akito!" Tsunayoshi immediately stood up.

Akito pointed at the broken castle, his expression still completely serious. "You destroyed my lion castle."

Lambo looked down at the blocks. Then at Akito, then slowly toward Hibari. "Why does the baby sound like Hibari-nii?"

Tsunayoshi covered his face.

Because unfortunately, Lambo was not wrong.

That posture. The expression. Even the way Akito delivered the threat with absolute certainty, it was terrifyingly familiar.

Hibari looked completely unconcerned. "Effective."

"Kyoya-san." Tsunayoshi immediately turned toward him.

"What."

"Do not encourage our son threatening Lambo."

Lambo immediately pointed at Hibari. "See?! He admits it!"

Akito looked at Hibari, then back at Lambo. "Dad says it works."

"No, no, no," Tsunayoshi said quickly, crouching beside him. "That is not the lesson."

Lambo crossed his arms dramatically. "I’m being attacked by a mini Hibari."

"I am not mini!"

Everyone stopped.

Tsunayoshi slowly looked away because he was trying very hard not to laugh.

At that exact moment, Yamamoto entered the room and immediately understood from everyone's expressions that he had missed something important.

“I’m a lion! A carnivore!”

Yamamoto stunned for a whole minute, then he let out a nervous laugh.

"Sorry," Yamamoto said, although he clearly wasn't. "He really does sound like Hibari."

Akito looked proud. "I'm strong."

"You are strong." Tsunayoshi looked at him and smiled.

Akito smiled back. "But?"

Tsunayoshi sighed because he already knew this conversation would require patience. "But we don't bite people to death because they accidentally break our blocks."

Akito thought about this seriously.

Then he looked at Lambo.

"Sorry, herbivore."

Lambo gasped. "The apology was ruined!"

Tsunayoshi slowly turned toward Hibari, the accusation was immediate.

Hibari, however, had already returned to his book as if he had absolutely nothing to do with the situation unfolding in front of him.

"Kyoya-san."

"Hn."

"Would you like to explain why our son knows what an herbivore is?"

Hibari's eyes remained on the page. "He has ears."

Tsunayoshi stared at him. "That's your defense?"

"It is accurate."

That was exactly the kind of answer Tsunayoshi had expected from him. Hibari had never been someone who apologized for the way he was. He simply existed, and somehow everyone else had to adjust around him.

Unfortunately, that now included their son.

Akito suddenly stood. The serious expression on his face made Tsunayoshi immediately suspicious. He watched as Akito picked up one of his blocks and walked toward him.

"Papa."

"Yes?"

Akito held the block out. "You're not herbivore."

Tsunayoshi paused. That was unexpectedly sweet, his expression softened immediately. "Aw. Thank you, Akito."

"Because you're strong."

Tsunayoshi smiled. "That's very—"

"Dad said you're annoying herbivore but strong."

Tsunayoshi's smile vanished. Hibari turned another page, Tsunayoshi stared at him.

"Kyoya-san."

"Hn."

"Would you perhaps like to contribute to raising your child instead of corrupting him?"

"I am contributing."

"How?"

Akito lifted one finger importantly. "Dad teaches me things."

"Such as?" Tsunayoshi looked down at him.

Akito began counting on his fingers, clearly proud that he had memorized everything.

"Don't crowd."

Tsunayoshi sighed.

"Okay."

"Don't touch Dad's tonfa."

"Very good."

"Don't bother Hibird when he's sleeping."

"Also good."

Tsunayoshi's eyes closed.

There it was. The exact moment where the lesson had gone terribly wrong.

He rubbed both hands down his face, trying to process how a simple afternoon of building blocks had somehow turned into a discussion about whether their five-year-old son should inherit Hibari's method of handling problems.

Lambo, who had been watching the exchange from the other side of the room, slowly looked between Akito and Hibari with a deeply troubled expression.

"Why does the little one sound exactly like Hibari-nii?"

Yamamoto, leaning against the wall with an amused smile, let out a quiet laugh. "I guess he really is his son."

"That's not the comforting answer!" Lambo immediately complained. "I don’t want another Hibari!"

Tsunayoshi glanced at him. "He's not another Hibari."

Lambo looked toward Akito, who was still standing there with the most serious expression a child his age could possibly have.

Then he looked back at Tsunayoshi.

"Are you sure?"

Tsunayoshi opened his mouth. Then closed it again.

Because unfortunately, at that exact moment, Akito was standing with Hibari's expression, using Hibari's words, while wearing a shirt covered in tiny lions.

"Kyoya-san."

This time Hibari finally looked up. "What."

"You cannot teach our son that."

Hibari seemed genuinely confused. "Why."

"Because he's seven." Tsunayoshi stared at him.

"He understands."

"That is the problem."

Lambo, who was still sitting nearby with a few blocks in his hands, slowly looked toward Yamamoto. "Is this normal?" he whispered.

"For them?" Yamamoto watched the exchange with an amused smile. He glanced at Hibari, then at Akito, who was standing there with the same serious expression his father often wore. "Kind of?"

"That is terrifying."

Tsunayoshi chose to ignore them.

Akito climbed onto the sofa beside him and settled against his side, completely unaware that his parents were debating the appropriate level of intimidation for a child his age. To him, it was simply a discussion about what Dad had taught him and what Papa thought was acceptable.

"Papa."

"Hm?"

"Can I bite bad people?"

"No."

Akito looked disappointed. The expression was so sincere that Tsunayoshi almost felt guilty for refusing him. Almost.

Then he remembered exactly why they were having this conversation in the first place. He reconsidered.

"Well, don't literally bite anyone."

Akito tilted his head. "What if they take me?"

The humor disappeared from Tsunayoshi's face for half a second. Just half, but Hibari noticed.

Yamamoto's smile softened too, while Lambo became quiet, the joking expression disappearing from his face. Everyone in the room understood where that question came from.

It was not about biting. It was about the fear that someone could take him away again.

The question had come from somewhere deeper than curiosity. Tsunayoshi's expression softened, and he pulled Akito closer, pressing a kiss to his hair.

"If someone tries to hurt you, you do what Dad and Papa taught you. You get away, you call for help, and you protect yourself if you have to."

Akito thought about it carefully, then nodded. "Okay."

"Good." Tsunayoshi smiled.

Akito looked toward Hibari. "Dad."

"Hn."

"Papa says no bite."

Hibari looked directly at Tsunayoshi.

Tsunayoshi narrowed his eyes in warning.

Yamamoto immediately noticed the exchange and smiled to himself. He had seen that look between them too many times over the years. The silent conversation where Tsunayoshi was asking Hibari to please, just once, cooperate with normal parenting.

Lambo, meanwhile, watched with complete anticipation, as if waiting to see whether Akito would receive permission to become a tiny version of Hibari.

There was a long silence.

For a moment, Tsunayoshi genuinely wondered whether Hibari was going to disagree just to be difficult.

Then Hibari said, "Listen to Papa."

Tsunayoshi blinked, and Akito blinked as well, both of them seemingly surprised by the fact that Hibari had actually listened without arguing.

For a second, nobody in the room knew how to react. Hibari Kyoya agreeing with a parenting decision without adding a condition or making things more complicated was almost as shocking as the original problem.

Then Akito grinned. "Okay!"

Completely satisfied, he jumped off the sofa and returned to his blocks, happily rebuilding his tower as if the most important parenting discussion of the afternoon had just been resolved.

Lambo watched him for a moment before slowly turning toward Yamamoto. "Did he actually listen to Tsuna-nii?"

"Looks like it." Yamamoto smiled, clearly amused by the disbelief in Lambo's voice.

"That's scary too," Lambo muttered.

Tsunayoshi ignored them and watched Akito carefully place each block back into position. For several seconds, everything returned to normal.

A child playing with his toys, his parents watching nearby, and a peaceful afternoon that somehow felt ordinary despite the people involved.

Lambo, who had been sitting nearby while watching Akito rebuild his lion castle, carefully approached a few minutes later to help put the blocks back in place.

Unfortunately, Akito was still keeping an eye on him.

The moment Lambo reached for one of the blocks, Akito placed the toy car back beside the rebuilt tower and pointed one tiny finger at him with the same serious expression he had used earlier.

"Don't do it again."

Lambo froze.

Tsunayoshi couldn't stop the smile that appeared on his face. The seriousness on Akito's expression was far too familiar, especially considering the small child standing there wearing lion-patterned clothes while trying to imitate Hibari.

"Good. Or I'll—"

Tsunayoshi immediately leaned forward. "Akito."

The boy stopped and looked at him, then at Hibari, and finally back at Lambo. A serious internal debate seemed to happen in his mind as he searched for a different solution.

After several seconds, he corrected himself. "Or I'll tell Papa."

Lambo stared. "That was supposed to be less scary?"

"Actually, for you, I think it's more effective." Yamamoto laughed from the side.

"Why is everyone treating this like a normal thing?!" Lambo complained.

Nobody answered him immediately because, unfortunately, nobody in the room could deny that Akito's behavior had started becoming strangely familiar.

Tsunayoshi, however, was more focused on the fact that his son had successfully replaced a threat with asking for help, even if the person he planned to ask for help was arguably the most terrifying person in the house.

He relaxed immediately. "Much better."

Beside him, Hibari made a faint sound that was almost impossible to notice.

Tsunayoshi turned his head slowly. "Are you laughing?"

"No."

"Kyoya-san."

"No."

The denial was so immediate that it somehow made it less believable. Before Tsunayoshi could say anything else, Akito turned around at the exchange and immediately pointed at him.

"Dad laughed!"

"I didn't."

"You did!"

"I didn't."

Lambo looked between them with growing disbelief.

The expression on his face suggested that he had accepted many strange things during his years with the Vongola, but watching Hibari Kyoya argue with a seven-year-old about whether he had laughed was somehow still beyond him.

"He's arguing exactly like you too, Hibari." Yamamoto laughed softly from where he stood.

"Definitely his son." Lambo agree.

Akito seemed to decide that proving Dad had laughed was far more important than rebuilding his tower, so he abandoned the blocks and ran toward Hibari without hesitation.

"Dad laughed!"

Hibari lowered his book just before Akito crashed into his knees, catching him automatically without even looking surprised. It was a movement that had become completely natural over the years, the same hands people feared now moving without hesitation whenever their son reached for him.

Akito climbed into his lap with the absolute confidence of a child who had never once questioned whether he belonged there.

Tsunayoshi watched them from the sofa, his tired smile softening. There were still moments when he remembered the Hibari Kyoya he had first met—the boy who stood alone, who pushed everyone away, who believed relying on others was unnecessary.

And then there was this.

Hibari Kyoya, sitting quietly while his son accused him of laughing, allowing a small child to occupy his lap as if it was the most natural thing in the world.

Somehow, he was still the same person. He had just found two people he would never push away.

Akito poked his cheek. "Dad."

Hibari looked at him.

"I'll bite you to death."

Tsunayoshi made a strangled sound.

"AKITO."

Akito burst into laughter, completely delighted by his own joke. Hibari stared at his son for a long moment, as if trying to decide whether he should be concerned or impressed.

Then the smallest curve appeared at the corner of his mouth.

"My little lion."

Tsunayoshi fell back against the sofa. "Oh, great. Now you're encouraging him."

"Dad likes it." Akito wrapped both arms around Hibari's neck, completely pleased with himself.

"I know," Tsunayoshi said miserably.

Hibari's gaze shifted toward him. "Tsunayoshi."

"What?"

Akito grinned from Hibari's lap, and then father and son looked at him at the exact same time, both wearing that sharp, unreadable expression despite their completely different eye colors.

Tsunayoshi stared back.

A terrible realization slowly settled over him.

There were two of them now.

Two Hibaris.

One full-sized.

One seven years old.

His life was over!

Tsunayoshi sighed, although the tired smile on his face betrayed how much he loved the situation. "I should've seen this coming."

Akito beamed proudly while Hibari looked entirely satisfied with himself.

Lambo, still sitting nearby, watched the three of them and quietly decided that he had absolutely no chance of winning against that family.

And from that day onward, whenever Akito became angry at an inanimate object, an insect, a crooked building block, or occasionally Gokudera for stealing the last strawberry, Tsunayoshi could always be heard somewhere nearby saying the same exhausted sentence.

"Stop copying your dad."

It never worked.

OMAKE 2: Gokudera Hayato's Worst Nightmare

Gokudera Hayato had prepared himself for many things.

He had prepared himself for Akito inheriting Sawada Tsunayoshi's kindness.  That was obvious. The boy had Tsuna's habit of worrying about everyone around him, even when he was the one who needed to be protected.

He had prepared himself for Akito inheriting Tsunayoshi's stubbornness too. That was unavoidable.

After all, the child was raised by the man who would willingly throw himself into danger for someone else without a second thought.

What Gokudera had not prepared himself for was this.

"Herbivore."

Gokudera stopped walking.

The word was so familiar that for a second he thought he had heard the wrong person.

Slowly, he looked down.

Akito stood in front of him with his arms crossed, his tiny face carrying the most serious expression a seven-year-old could possibly make.

A child he had spoiled since birth.

A child who used to run toward him whenever he visited the house, calling his name with the brightest smile.

A child who once cried because Gokudera forgot to bring the strawberry candy he promised.

Now that same child was looking at him like Hibari Kyoya looking at someone who had broken a Namimori rule.

Gokudera stared. "...What did you just call me?"

Akito tilted his head slightly. "Herbivore."

The world stopped.

Somewhere behind them, Yamamoto immediately started laughing.

Gokudera slowly turned toward him. "You find this funny?!"

Yamamoto tried to stop laughing, but the situation was simply too ridiculous. Seeing Gokudera Hayato—the person who could explode enemies without hesitation—completely defeated by a small child using Hibari's vocabulary was something he would probably remember forever.

"Sorry," Yamamoto said, although his expression proved he was not sorry at all. "But it really sounds like him."

"This is not funny!"

"It kind of is."

"It absolutely is not!"

Akito watched the exchange quietly before looking back at Gokudera. Then he pointed at Yamamoto. "Herbivore."

Yamamoto's laughter stopped.

The two older men looked at each other.

For one brief moment, they shared the same realization.

The child had inherited it.

"No," Gokudera whispered. "No, no, no. This is wrong! This is never happen!"

Akito blinked. "Uncle Hayato?"

Gokudera immediately softened.

Because despite everything, that was still Akito. His beloved nephew. The child he had watched grow from a tiny baby into someone who could now somehow intimidate adults.

"Don't call people herbivore."

Akito frowned. "But Dad says it."

Gokudera froze. Of course. Of course it was Hibari's influence. His Tenth would never teach Akito this..

Slowly, very slowly, he turned toward the garden.

Hibari stood there with his usual calm expression, drinking tea as if he had nothing to do with the psychological damage currently happening to Gokudera.

"YOU FUC—" Gokudera stopped himself, years of survival instinct prevented him from shouting. "Hibari!"

Hibari looked at him. "Hn."

"You taught him that?"

"He heard it."

Gokudera stared. "That is worse."

"It is accurate."

"That is exactly the kind of answer I expected from you!"

Hibari remained completely unaffected, which somehow made Gokudera even more frustrated.

Because the worst part was that Akito really did resemble him.

The serious expression.

The quiet confidence.

The way he stood as if the entire world was slightly inconvenient.

Gokudera grabbed his hair. "My beloved nephew..."

"Yes?" Akito looked up.

"You were supposed to inherit Tenth’s kindness."

"I am kind."

Gokudera immediately softened.

Then Akito continued. "I just tell people when they're wrong."

The silence that followed was devastating.

Yamamoto laughed again, Gokudera slowly looked toward him. "Don't."

"I didn't say anything."

Akito sat down on the floor and continued playing with his blocks, completely unaware that he had just emotionally damaged his uncle.

Then one of the blocks fell.

Akito stared at it, his expression changed.

Gokudera immediately pointed. "No. Don’t say anthing."

"I didn't say anything." Akito looked at him.

"You were thinking it."

Akito picked up the block again, completely serious as he inspected the damage before looking back at Gokudera.

"I'll bite you to death."

Gokudera froze.

The pain on his face was genuine.

Not because he was afraid of the threat itself—after everything he had experienced as a member of the Vongola, a five-year-old's threat was hardly dangerous—but because hearing those exact words come from the child he had spoiled since birth felt like a personal betrayal.

"Akito, don't say it."

Akito blinked, genuinely confused.

"But Dad says it."

Gokudera immediately turned toward Hibari.

"I don't care what your dad says!"

Hibari, who had been quietly observing the entire situation, looked over with his usual unreadable expression.

"Who are you?"

The question made Gokudera stop. For a moment, he simply stared at him in disbelief.

"I’m his uncle!" He immediately pointed toward Akito, as if that explanation alone should have been enough. "Your son is already terrifying enough without creating another one!"

Hibari did not look convinced.

Akito, meanwhile, only looked between the two adults with a completely calm expression. "I am strong."

And that was the worst part, because Gokudera couldn't even argue with that.

Akito was strong. But more importantly, he was kind.

Behind all the intimidating expressions and the words he had accidentally inherited from Hibari, he was still the same child Gokudera had watched grow up. The same child who cried when someone got hurt, who shared his snacks without being asked, who always made sure everyone had eaten before worrying about himself, and who once spent twenty minutes apologizing to a beetle because he thought he had frightened it.

That was Akito.

Not a copy of Hibari. Not some terrifying little version of the man standing nearby.

Just Akito.

Gokudera sighed deeply, finally accepting that arguing against a child who had inherited both Tsunayoshi's heart and Hibari's attitude was probably impossible.

"You're still my favorite nephew."

Akito immediately smiled. "Really?"

"Yes."

"Even when I say bite them to death?"

"No biting."

"Okay."

Gokudera finally relaxed. For approximately three seconds. Because then Akito looked up at him with the same serious expression and said,

"I'll tell Papa."

Gokudera froze.

Slowly, he turned toward the doorway.

Tsunayoshi stood there holding a cup of tea, clearly having arrived in the middle of the conversation and now trying to understand why his son, his right-hand man, and his husband looked like they were in the middle of a crisis.

"What happened?"

Gokudera immediately pointed at Akito. "Tenth."

"Yes?"

"Your son is becoming Hibari."

Tsunayoshi looked at Akito, then at Hibari. Then went back at Gokudera. For a moment, he said nothing.

The silence itself was enough to make Gokudera nervous.

"I know." Tsunayoshi sighed.

Gokudera's expression changed instantly. "You accept this?"

Tsunayoshi smiled tiredly, the kind of smile that only someone living with Hibari Kyoya could understand. "I live with two of them."

That answer somehow made everything worse.

Yamamoto, who had been watching the entire scene from the side, laughed. And Hibari looked completely satisfied with himself.

Akito looked proud.

Gokudera Hayato finally realized the truth. His beloved nephew was no longer only Sawada Tsunayoshi's son. He was also Hibari Kyoya's child.

Which meant Akito had inherited Tsuna's kindness, his warmth, and his instinct to protect others while somehow also inheriting Hibari's terrifying ability to make everyone around him nervous.

A tragedy.

A complete tragedy.

When Akito eventually walked over and wrapped his small arms around Gokudera's arm, all of that frustration disappeared immediately.

"Uncle Hayato."

Gokudera softened without even realizing it. "Yeah?"

"You're not herbivore."

His heart melted. Finally, something normal. Something that proved Akito was still Akito.

Then the child continued. "You're annoying herbivore."

The room went silent.

Yamamoto immediately burst into laughter.

Tsunayoshi covered his face. Even Hibari looked away, although Gokudera was almost certain he was hiding amusement.

Gokudera stared at his nephew. His beloved nephew, the child he had loved since the day he was born.

A perfect combination of the two people he respected most.

He sighed. "I blame Hibari."

"Fair." Tsunayoshi nodded immediately.

Hibari looked over.

"Oi." Gokudera pointed at him. "Don't teach him anything else."

Hibari narrowed his eyes. "No."

"Why not?!"

"Because he listens." The answer came immediately.

Hibari was right. Akito listened.

He listened to his father.

He listened to his Papa.

He listened to everyone he trusted.

And somehow, despite the suffering of everyone around him, Gokudera Hayato was still proud.

Because the child was strong.

Kind. Brave. Loved.

Even if he occasionally sounded exactly like Hibari Kyoya.

Which, according to Gokudera Hayato, was a personal tragedy.