Cloud AU's

Inverted Clouds Are MOM's

^Reference; Skull losing sight of them on a mission before looking everywhere, even breaking into other mafia Famiglias territory, beating them up before questioning them over where 'Ren-chan', 'Nello', etc. were.

The fact that he referred to Fon as 'his gay son' left for quite the confused side/ back glances to the bemused Storm, who was serenely observing the scene with them whilst they listened to the com. The primo-idiot of their group had forgotten that he not only had a com but that they had previously decided upon a rondevouz-point in advance - both for after the mission was over and in case of lost contact, broken com, an accident, etc.

Skull had, apparently, forgotten it in what could be assumed a sleepy haze and was now running around and wrecking havoc and spreading chaos on what would later be referred to as pure 'Mothers' adrenaline.

...Though, this was part of the reason the Arcobaleno are wary of a tired Skull. He made weird comments that made zero-fucking-sense. Verde was fine, mostly, but Skull?? No-ducking-way. Where the Lightning goes off about some equations and contents of experiments mixing with recipes broken down into chemical elements, Skull would wander around, try to herd them like mother duckling would and even (dare to) venture into false sexist comments for which he got duct taped to the garage wall for hours with Oodako to make sure he didn't hurt himself; their sanity was at risk, not his.
He never got the memo for innuendos and still doesn't understand what kind of things others could draw and make (dirty) interpretations of. Add to that the fact that they have an actual child in their group...

Take last Tuesday's breakfast for example: They had all sat together for breakfast, as insisted upon by Aria, and the moment Skull had tumbled down the stairs a few of them had either began an inner countdown or checked the signs that would indicate how tired the Cloud was. Was it over cautious of them? Maybe, who cares about sanity anyway.
That bitch died somewhere in the alleys making up their mind a long time ago and only few strangers would miss her.
Most of them wanted to keep their own peace (sans Reborn, depending on the hour of day and his caffeine-intake) anyway.

When Skull had finally sat down with his utensils, consisting of a fork and cereal bowl -not quite yet a warning sign as he'd eat like that to spite them with intentional lack of manners, to varying effect- , he looked at them and frowned.

"I have no favorite Child. I have a least favorite though and it's the Youngest." Skull looked at Colonello as he said this while casually reaching for the milk carton situated somewhere between Reborn, Lal, Aria and Verde, but got the coffee instead and poured it into his cereal which he then began to fork up.

Seven year old Uni raised a hand in question, however her mom brushed her own hand over Uni's, quietly prompting her to put it down and return to eating. Seeing the others' nonchalance, and only reaction to this occurrence being that they went to refill the coffee, she had come to the conclusion that this was, in fact, part of the unusual norm.

Skull, after finishing his cereal, had also chugged down the rest of the coffee in his bowl, which was a concerning amount by all means of personal healthcare.

Colonello had looked slightly affronted at Skull's statement, borderline confused which the others mirrored. Wasn't Uni the youngest? Didn't he have the most beef with Reborn? Whom zhe fiddled fuddledy was his child!? And by what standard of the known universe was he speaking right now!?

-and that wasn't even the most embarrassing occurrence, mind.

Sometimes he dragged Verde out of his lab, saying something along the lines of 'his child couldn't become a vampire, immortality was no fun'.
Which was commendable, considering the closet scientist needed his Vitamine D-intake outside of pills and daily social in-person no-screen interaction.

Other times he dragged Fon to bed because he thought the man's face was flushed from a fever - which was just the flush of exertion after training, most times if not a trick of the light with Fon's clothing, they suspect. Fon didn't protest or squirm out of the hold too much, most times like 8/10; Skull wanted to help him, take care of him (as much as he was an independent individual and older than Skull) and he enjoyed the amusing company.

What became common sense among the Arcobaleno was the fact that, compared to what was his Flame stereotype, Skull was unbelievably considerate when he took care of others, even when accounting for his usual helpful nature. He talked softer, his speech changed as - instead of making himself out as the most important part and focus of his sentence - he put others first. Sometimes you weren't even sure if it was him when he went to check up on the 'patients' due to his change in behaviour. He acted like an old man talking with his nieces and nephews or grand-/ kids (did he actually have kids?? No seriously, cause this had to be learned behavior? It would make sense... Somewhere, that logic.)

Reborn had compared it to Nono and Tsuna - that's how he acted with them!!

It was borderline scarring to see him like that. Verde and Lal still scrunched their noses when Skull approached them like that, while Colonello got goosebumps the first time it happened with him. Reborn was mysteriously absent most of the time, if not giving Skull suggestions over what 'illness' or wound someone had. Even the mention of them being anything sub-bar healthy flipped a damn switch! Hence no one mentioned them to Skull--well, unless they really reeaally needed that type of care and could handle the backlash embarrassment/ possible blackmail to live another day.

Said embarrassing situations were like the following example: Skull had gone into Lal's room and went looking for fucking porn magazines, stating that the artillery magazines she had were even worse and that he was very disappointed her room was so unorganized!!
He gave the frown™ he'd learned from Aria and Lal sported both a twitching eye and a murder stare that entire week.

...

He'd even gone and tried to drag Reborn to Tsuna's school back when they were chibis stating 'his rowdy child ("excuse me, what?") couldn't miss out on his education. He could play later'.

No words had been uttered when Skull had opened the door to Tsuna and Enma's classroom in Namimori-chuu's 3-A and apologized for the lateness, his child wasn't quite the morning person.
Then he turned to Reborn, cooed and told him to play nice with the other kids, asking a horrified Tsuna to please watch him while said brunette was also biting down on his lip to suppress a laugh that would surely cost him; even if it's not the first time this happened, Reborn not having been the first Arcobaleno to be brought in and left. That Skull had actually got him though... neither don had expected it. Reborn had waited until he couldn't hear Skull's motor engine anymore before jumping out the window, his eyes twitching and planning any increase in Tsuna's training - such as posture (he'd seen the shaking shoulders and he couldn't let that pass so easily, could he?).

Enma had later, during break, informed Tsuna he had caught Skull sleep-walking in Simon mansion a few times, washing the dishes, cleaning his motorbike and even hanging from a tree like a bat; Shitt P. had reported the last instance numerous times when he'd brought it up. Adelheid even found him sleeping in the sink or cupboard before that.

So, summing up all the accounts, it is a fact that Skull had weird tendencies when he was tired and asleep, and most often needed a babysitter of his own. Although he could be quite useful in that state too: he asked the weirdest things to Verde, the other actually looking into those things and when he ran on that 'mother's adrenaline', a condition now recognized as fatal as it was unique, there was very little one, especially their enemies, could do to stop him.

The Carcassa Famiglia Don had belatedly admitted in a report to Reborn of having made Skull's room baby proof just so he wouldn't get out and blow them up during his tired phase.