To Be A Normal Kid DISCONTINUED REWRITING

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Eighteen: Memories

Tsuna was only ever good at running. He'd run from the Estreno, his fratello and sorellina, his memories. He'd been running from his past for so long that he forgot what it was like to stay in one place. He'd forgotten what it was like to just walk.

"Your classmates should be back late tonight." Mammon said when they'd finished eating. The meal had been very quiet and Tsuna felt as though it was his fault.

"Is that so?" He felt very detached at the moment. It was as if he was....as if he was...He couldn't actually remember. He knew he'd felt this way before, but he couldn't place when.

"Yes," Levi answered, "And Reborn will be back, too."

Tsuna hummed noncommittally. 'Never again,' he remembered swearing to himself once upon a time. 'You trust too easily.' He didn't like this voice. It was harsher than the one that guided him. 'You said you'd die before making that mistake again.' Had he? What mistake?

"He's completely dissociated." Lussaira whispered.

"No emotions," Tsuna found himself muttering in Italian. It was, after all, his first language. "No attachments. No trust."

The others were obviously taken aback by his mutterings. His eyes were cloudy and he wasn't completely with them at the moment.

"This is my fault," Shoichi mumbled, earning himself glares from the assassins sitting at the table with him. "I hit the table and he flinched back. I- he's never done that before!"

It was quiet for a moment before Squallo sighed. He was slow, his every move obvious and within Tsuna's field of vision. If he was even seeing the present. He'd seen flashbacks plenty of times before in a lot of people. The tricky part is pulling someone from one. Not every person can be pulled out the same way. Hell, some people can't even be pulled out by outside forces! "He's experiencing a flashback."

"Either that," Bel added, "or a coping mechanism."

Shoichi was feeling worse by the second.

"He could also be remembering something," Mammon said. They're a Mist, the strongest Mist, so they knew the ins and outs of the human mind better than anyone.

"Regardless," Lussaria was holding a hand to his cheek in worry, "Something triggered him. Pulling him out of his head will be hard without knowing the trigger, but not impossible."

Shoichi gulped. "Either that or we wait for him to wake up on his own.

Xanxus stood up from his seat at the head of the table, directly opposite of Tsuna's seat. "Are you willing to wait that long? We don't know how long he'll be like this."

He was speaking before he knew what he was saying. "That doesn't matter right now!" He knew Xanxus was going to do something rash to pull Tsuna back into reality, but Shoichi knew the risks of doing that. These guys likely knew them, too, but they're assassins. Assassins don't care about things they deem as small risks. He's more human than all of them simply because he hasn't had the humanity trained out of him yet. He'd rather wait for Tsuna to wake up on his own rather than risk something worse happening.

Xanxus knew exactly where the brat's mind had gone. If that's how he wanted to play, then, "Fine." he almost crossed his arms, "We'll do this your way then. We'll wait for him to wake up on his own." He left the room and made himself comfortable under a tree in the courtyard. He was well aware of the risks of both solutions. Both were dangerous in their own rights, but he found that being stuck in your head for too long, reliving things for too long, can be detrimental. He knew this because he's an assassin. If Shoichi wanted to put Tsuna in danger, fine. Let him learn from his mistakes. Hopefully, this won't go too horribly.