Searching for Sawada Tsunayoshi

The Unexpected Guests

Hello.

This story is a prequel to Where Rainbows End. It is more or less a supplementary read to this story. You don't need to read it to understand this story. Besides, each chapter there's as long as fuck.

If you intend to read about Tsuna and his other guardians within the first chapters, I suggest you to stop reading. Really. This is not their story. I don't want to mislead you into thinking that this is some fanfic bait, even though it partly is (with Giotto's appearance and his guardians). This is more of something else.

It intends to reconstruct KHR. I don't want it to be anvilicious in its approach though. I hope it doesn't rub you that way. But yes, it intends to criticize how the work crashed and burned, salvage the good left in it, and try to see it in a different, better light that still rings true.

In other words, this is an ambitious story four years in the making. I hope that the time I spent just to piece this puzzle together earned its worth. I wrote this fic for the people who think KHR deserved better. This is for the people who believe KHR needed a conclusive ending.

Most importantly, this is for the people who never did get over Reborn.

So here you go. Let's search for Tsuna together.

Chapter 1: The Unexpected Guests

Tsuyoshi Yamamoto, eighteen yet already weary from the world, was rarely a smooth talker and easily gives in to spokes of nostalgia. That was why in Renatotwo hours into his shift as the novice bartender, it was sensible by his standards to nearly drop the Cinderella he was serving to one pretty Cervello lady when he sees Basil from the first time in four years since graduation.

But that time, Basil was unrecognizable. His unkempt long hair then was severely cut into a tight near-bob that showcased both his pale blue eyes, who had the same look of near-airy amiability as he laughed along with his companions. There was a different air around him this time, as to he often kept his hands nestled in the front pocket of his grey knit sweater and walked with much confidence and ease within his circle of friends. They did not look like Renato's typical customers, he mused. For one, they were quite young, with the eldest-a white-haired man with a smile like a thousand suns- whose face bore the age of someone in his late twenties. Tsuyoshi then recalls of a time he met his auntie, whose face screamed twenty when she was already forty years old and corrects himself. He should ask him later if he was older than he looks, how he kept his face like that. Or if he didn't have an ailing mother to take care of.

Later, Basil will tell him that Byakuran was twenty-five that time and he could be none the wiser. And he had no family except his circle of adopted friends.

During that time, Tsuyoshi could not stop looking at Basil and the others as the other customers made way for them, seemingly in awe of his presence and his multicolored-hair gang. He could not describe them better, as they all look like punk wannabees. Or hipsters. He must be getting old. Even the Cervello, already looking like high class socialites, bowed to them with reverence, most especially to the white-haired man. Tsuyoshi could not put a finger to who the hell that boy near the rear was but he felt like he knew him.

The way Basil called out his name made him remember how he called out Giotto's five years later when he and Lavina- his ex-crush and still the hottest woman he ever met- stepped inside in broad daylight (as he was preparing to leave because of his second job) to search for their best friend they haven't seen in nine years.

"Tsuyoshi-san?"

He could only wrap his finger around the oddity he felt taking place when Basil pointed his finger at him and he was nearly beside himself for seemingly forgetting who he was talking to.