Tag: spanner

The Green Knight, Part 4 (2015-05-10)

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The taxi which is not a taxi takes them to a tailor shop on Savile Row. The shop turns out to be a front, or rather, a cover to a secret underground tunnel which has a bullet train. She’s impressed by how unnecessarily deep the dressing room elevator goes–considering how ludicrous the Vongola mansion and the Foundation’s Namimori base are, that’s really saying something.

The bullet train brings them to what she can only describe as a giant garage filled with not only a multitude of cars, but several planes, and possibly boats. She lets the awe show on her face, spots in her peripheral vision that Galahad is smirking with good-natured pride beside her.

The Secchione Sezione specialize primarily in personal defense, gadgets more than vehicles, inventions that utilize Flames for an individual’s needs. Except for the occasional trips back to Namimori, most of the famiglia stay in Italy (vice versa for Kyouya-senpai); the aberrations to that rule are the Mist guardians (and Joshima and Kakimoto) and herself. Unsurprising, due to the shared nature of their missions.

The point, though, is that it’s not feasible to have a car, much less a plane, run on Flames. Vongola makes do with buying top of the line vehicles from whichever company Spanner disdains the least, then tweaking it slightly. They don’t have a need for a fleet of vehicles, she knows, but damn if the Kingsman garage isn’t impressive.

“Lucky for you, we ain’t late this time,” Galahad says, guiding her down a hallway, thankfully without any encroachment into her personal space.

She startles when she realizes that Arthur disappeared during her brief distraction by the garage. She hadn’t noticed at all.

Galahad politely does not comment on that, merely continues his own line of thought, “For me, my proposer ended up leavin’ a lot to chance, so of fucking course I was the last one in.”

“Proposer?”

“Well, yeah. Each of the current knights propose a candidate to get tested. We’re a little short on knights, though…”

Which means more spots to fill, but less recruits to choose from. The quality of knights would arguably decrease, at the very least they would be inexperienced. It’s a potential weakness, but if she learned nothing else from her teenaged years it’s that experience doesn’t always mean strength.

The lack of knights seems like a sore point, not one she should ask after. Not that she would need to, it’s obvious why so many agents would need to be replaced in such a short time. While Valentine’s Day triggered mindless aggression in most of the human population, for those whose wave energy had already been activated into Flames (which was most, if not all, of Vongola) it had just switched on their Dying Will Mode. Vongola Mansion spent their time intermittently experiencing extreme focus for no apparent reason–productivity for that day had been a record all time high. (Tsunayoshi-kun had finished enough paperwork to finally see the wood of his desk and actually burst into tears)

“Who is my proposer?” She asks instead, scolding herself for getting lost in her own thoughts.

“Technically, that would be me,” Merlin says, “Though Galahad was the one to think of it; a fine idea don’t you think, Azusa-san?”

Said knight flushes slightly at the praise.

She nods, she’s certainly grateful–because the alternative was to face abject boredom. That would be crass to admit, though, so instead she responds with, “Yes, Tempesta was honored to receive the invitation…”

So it’s a bit of an exaggeration for Hayato-kun. While not honored, he did see it as a good opportunity and was glad that she had agreed to it. As they measured her abilities through the trials, she could see what a Kingsman recruit went through to become a knight.

She herself would be a test in response.

~

A/N: Okay… so, because I’m terribly cliche, I’m thinking of calling this series The Green Knight and having the Kingsman position in question be for Gawain. Because… Lightning flames are greeeeeeeen. And she’s definitely not going to be a Kingsman agent so… mreh?

Ugh, I’m sorry this was greatly uninspired over all.

Continuation of this post. Will now tag everything in this series as The Green Knight. I apologize in advance for dirtying the tag, actual Arthurian fans 😦

The Green Knight, Part 2 (2015-05-06)

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In the three days counting down before she’s due in the United Kingdom, her friends begin crawling out of the woodwork. They want to speak to her, give her tips, give her more gadgets, get in some last minute sparring. Tsunayoshi-kun earnestly assures her that she doesn’t have to go, but he appreciates her willingness in improving alliance relations. Kyoko ever so politely requests a full-blown medical before she goes, monitoring her health with her newest legion of Vongola medics. The Secchione Sezione (“R&D! Italian isn’t even your native language!”), once they’ve let go of their grudge, ply her with the newest version of contact lenses, armor, and a less bulky container to store Yuzuru.

Even Kyouya-senpai deigns to visit the Vongola mansion and demand a fight before jetting back to Namimori. Truth be told, she would have preferred to see her fiancé one last time instead, but her and Tetsuya’s engagement has always been one of distance and enduring love. She handles her disappointment with grace.

Ryohei, perhaps getting back at all the times she’s teased him about dating Hana, sends Tetsuya several pictures of her pouting. He sends back a short video of him blowing a kiss–or at least he tries to, his pompadour makes selfies difficult–nonetheless it makes her laugh.

The evening before her flight she asks Spanner, regarding the contact lenses, “How strong is the video feed?”

Haru despairs of her insistence on brown lenses (“Why not green, to match your Flames?”), comprehending but not agreeing with why she would cover her pale grey eyes with such a normal color. Shouichi-kun still tends to develop stomach cramps if she hangs around for too long–a remnant from a mission for which he was her handler that neither of them will comment on. So Spanner, apathetic to the core, is the one that gets to field her questions.

“Pretty strong,” He answers noncommittally, before guessing where she’s trying to go with her question, “We have a few relays set up around Europe, so as long as they don’t whisk you away to a different continent we should be able to receive it here. And, as long as you’re powering it with Flames it’ll last you for months.”

The length of the Kingsman trials… provided she gets to the final round, of course.

“We’ll set your feed up on one of the 24-hour monitors,” He continues, his blasé tone contradicting his words.  

It’s a huge relief; something she didn’t really know she was worried about until he said it. She’s a little touched, too. Vongola only has three 24-hour monitors, manned constantly by rotating teams of handlers and on-call reinforcements. One of them is devoted solely to Tsunayoshi-kun (which used to get him flustered but, by this point, he’s become desensitized to his lack of privacy). The other two’s usage depends on what missions are out there, the more vital or dangerous ones taking precedence. The Kingsman trials are practically a training exercise with their allies, so she’s a little embarrassed that she had any concerns. Much less concerns so overt that her family are pulling out all the stops to reassure her.

“Thanks,” She says honestly, any doubts and hesitation gone. She’s a guardian of the Vongola Famiglia–and her family has her back.

~

A/N: HOW HAVE I STILL NOT GOTTEN TO THE RIGHT COUNTRY YET, MUCH LESS THE ACTUAL TESTS. OH MY GOD.

This is a direct continuation of this post (which is, in and of itself, a distant sequel to this post).

The Green Knight, Part 1 (2015-05-05)

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The thing about being a mafia assassin is that, once said mafia famiglia stops being a crime organization and starts being a vigilante group, the need for assassinations decreases significantly. She isn’t exactly out of a job, because technically she’s a Guardian, not just any run-of-the-mill assassin (though it could be argued that any assassin isn’t run-of-the-mill, much less one from Vongola, much less one of the Decimo’s guardians), but she does end up having a lot more free time on her hands.

It’s gotten to the point where even the Secchione Sezione (“We are R&D!”) are getting sick of her hanging around and offering to test out their latest and greatest gadgets. She’s also careful not to push too much of her luck with the Foundation. Though the members remain rather fond of her, Kyouya-senpai is still disdainful of any crowding.

She sighs gustily, sprawled out on Hayato-kun’s office sofa which is positioned so perfectly in sunbeam. Uri who, unsurprisingly, tolerates her more than he does his master, is similarly sprawled over the back of the sofa. Yuzuru, her own box weapon familiar, is coiled up in his smaller form on her stomach. At the ensuing silence, she sighs again. The figure at the desk twitches but says nothing.

“Don’t make me do it again,” She warns lazily, fingers tracing along Yuzuru’s smooth, scaly body. He reciprocates by flicking his tongue  along her wrist in a friendly manner.

“Tch, just because you don’t have any work doesn’t mean the rest of us are similarly blessed,” Hayato-kun half-heartedly grumbles, typing continuously.

“Surely there must be something I can do? I’m beginning to become superfluous. You’re going to have an excess of bored Lightning natureds if this keeps up,” She thinks about Lambo-kun who, though much better than he was seven years ago when they first met, is still a force of mayhem. While she’s not quite at that level, she’ll admit to having some destructive tendencies of her own.

Whether he’s thinking the same thing or not, it makes Hayato-kun pause, shudder, and finally look in her direction, “Haru and Spanner are being productive,” Technically, Haru and Spanner are both dual natured Lightning and Storm. But she gets what he’s trying to say.

“But they’ve always been part of Secchione Sezione–”

“–They prefer to be called R&D–”

“And plus, I’ve already been by to see if they’d like my help. And they just turned me away,” She sighs once more, lolling her head around the sofa. It’s a very nice sofa.

“Well if you’re that bored…” Hayato-kun begins, turning back to his screen and sending a file to her contact lenses. As computers, the contact lenses have minimal memory, more suited to operating the aiming system and relaying video feed to the Vongola network. But within the vicinity of said network, it can be used to share small files for convenience. Or out of laziness.

“The Kingsman?” She wouldn’t say their meeting with the Kingsman was a disaster, necessarily. It had certainly gone better than what she had either hoped or expected. But she was sure they were at the level of civility and courtesy rather than beginning to swap favors. Even though the file–more a missive, really, from the one they called Merlin–is entirely in English, her fourth language of fluency, she thinks she gets the gist of it, “Why do they want one of us to take their tests? Surely they know Vongola is going to take priority over anything from them,”

“It makes sense,” Hayato-kun argues with a shrug, “They don’t actually want us to be one of their agents, they want to see what our abilities are. Seeing how far a member of Vongola, Guardian or not, can get through their tests gives them a good approximation of our relative strength.”

It’s when Hayato-kun talks like this, frankly and freely, that makes her realize how much all of them have grown. Six years ago he would have been crowing about how any Vongola member would breeze through such a test; as if being part of Vongola, being part of Tsunayoshi-kun’s famiglia, somehow made a person invincible by proxy. And while the Hayato-kun of six years ago (then still Gokudera-kun) had been willing to speak of his own personal insecurities to her, he would have rather cut out his own tongue than say anything negative of Tsunayoshi-kun (then still Sawada-kun) or his inheritance.

“Ah, is that so?” She demurs, briefly, “What were you thinking of doing with the…” She pauses, unsure of how to phrase it, “… invite?”

“To be honest, I was going to refuse it. I considered sending one of the more combat focused of Shamal’s subordinates–”

“–Kyoko’s minions–”

“But better to not send anyone than give a poor showing. Or worse, reveal Flames to them. The alliance we have with them is still precarious, we don’t want to give them more than we need to,” He continues, disregarding her interjection.

“It’s for several months though, why not send Mukuro or Chrome? They haven’t been as active recently either,”

Hayato-kun looks at her flatly, almost edging towards disbelief, “Because the alliance we have with them is still precarious,” he repeats, “And we do actually want them to trust us.”

Considering how the Mist guardians’ missions usually end up… yeah. She sees his point.

“Does that mean you trust me?” She smiles teasingly.

“I trust you not to fuck up,” He bites back, though a hint of a blush creeps along his face, “And you’re bored. Prendere due piccioni con una fava,”

“If you say so,” She agrees mildly. Which only causes him to blush more.

“I’ll send a confirmation and have the details sent to you. Now get out of my office!”

Oh, Hayato-kun, still so easily flustered. But she decides not to push him, because he did just give her a reprieve from boredom. So she leaves, gently draping Yuzuru over one shoulder, from which he settles himself around her neck with familiarity. For his sake, she tries not have too much bounce in her step; but she can’t help it–she’s excited.

~

A/N: BECAUSE THIS WOULDN’T LEAVE MY HEAD AND IT WAS BUGGING ME AND I WOULD LIKE TO DO SOMETHING ELSE THAT ISN’T SO PAINFULLY DERIVATIVE. AND I DIDN’T EVEN GET TO THE ACTUAL PARTS THAT WERE BUGGING ME. So… I guess expect future installments of this. This post is itself kind of a continuation to this post.

For context: POV character is my OC Lightning Guardian, Tetsuki Kaiza from Trailblazers, a KHR fic I’m maybe not actually writing. She’s a year older than Tsuna/Gokudera/Yamamoto/etc, the same age as Ryohei, and a year younger than Hibari.

Also, “Secchione Sezione” means Nerd Department/Section. The two words sound remarkably similar to me–though I don’t actually speak Italian–so I thought it’d be a teasing/informal way to call Vongola’s R&D. And “Prendere due piccioni con una fava” means “To catch two pigeons with one fava bean,” which is basically the Italian equivalent of “Kill two birds with one stone.”