Moment In Time

Chapter 69

Chapter 69:Moment

Reborn wants to kick his own ass.

And then he wants to kick Iemitsu's ass followed quickly by the Ninth's ass.

It takes him way too long to realize how touch-starved his student is, how close they came to losing Tsuna, and it isn't even the fact that Tsuna is the only heir to Vongola that pisses him off so much, it's that Reborn had seen how bright and good Tsuna is, has seen him and taught him, and the damn boy was his and they had almost lost him because Iemitsu was a raging idiot and so was the Ninth for going along with the plan to seal Tsuna away from his Flames from a part of his soul, and it's worse because Reborn hadn't seen the issue, hadn't known to fix it and it infuriates him.

It takes so long for Reborn to put it together partially because of all the crap Tsuna had to go through- Mukuro,the Varia, the future-that-wasn't, the Arcobaleno Trials, and then the Vindice and a mess of other things- causing Reborn to focus more on shoving everything he could into Tsuna's brain about fighting and surviving it all instead of the touch issue and partially because even before Reborn has gotten there Tsuna hadn't ever really touched anyone, and all the reports had agreed on that fact so Reborn doesn't put it all together until much later.

Tsuna doesn't touch because for as long as he can remember touch has meant pain and no one had wanted Dame-Tsuna to touch them, and besides that initial moment where Tsuna had touched his guardians or they had touched him and they had Harmonized he didn't really touch them they had to initiate the contact and why hadn't Reborn put it all together?

The moment it clicks in Reborn's head, it's near the beginning of Tsuna's reign and Tsuna had been stressed the entire day, running himself ragged with all the paperwork and the fighting Tsuna has to do- both verbal and physical- because most of the mafia are firmly against Tsuna's goal of purifying the hell out of it and are rebelling and all the work is wearing the Sky out and it's showing, but Tsuna won't stop, can't stop- not really, not when the other Families would take advantage to try and stop the change or see it as weakness.

Hibari is in the room giving a verbal report to his boss when the others all come barreling in.

With all the chaos that seems inevitable when Tsuna and his Guardians enter a room together it's not really a surprise when Gokudera gets knocked forward just as Tsuna is coming around his desk to break up a fight between Lambo and Mukuro and causes a chain reaction that leads to Tsuna getting knocked over along with every single one of his Guardians and ends up on the bottom of a huge dog pile of tangled limbs, and Reborn is amused because he knew Mukuro had used Mist Flames to cause the whole thing to escalate as it did, until it registered why Mukuro had done it.

Because at the bottom of the pile of tangled limbs, with skin on skin contact with all of his Guardians in one way or another, Tsunayoshi has gone nearly boneless as the tension melts away and he relaxes as all of his bonds with his Guardians hum at the same time and the feelings ofwarmsafeMINEpackpridefamilysafeloved flood his stressed minds and body.

And Reborn knows Hibari and Mukuro had known Tsuna needed this even if he had issues with touch thanks to his childhood and had arranged it all with a bit of Mist Flames (because Reborn knows Hibari could have dodged Gokudera when Mukuro caused him to trip but he didn't) and it all suddenly snaps into focus all those little things he had seen but not observed and Reborn is furious with himself for not seeing it sooner.