When Tsuna arrived downstairs, Lambo was already bouncing around, shouting and cheering about playing in the rain and the new waterproof boots Mama had got him. As soon as he saw Tsuna, he ran over, babbling at an incomprehensible pace about the rain, and snacks and the green plaster with frogs on it that Mama had bought just for him. Apparently he had scratched his arm while chasing I-Pin around the garden. It was a tiny scratch, but Lambo was treating it like it was a battle wound.

Tsuna made admiring noises which seemed to satisfy Lambo, who bounced off again. Tsuna was glad he wasn't upset or scared, but he knew it was because Lambo didn't understand what was happening. If a scratch was enough to demand special attention, Tsuna was terrified at the thought of him taking even a fraction of the damage Ryohei had the night before. He didn't want to force Lambo to fight, especially against such a scary guy. But he had been warned not to let him use the bazooka, and he wasn't allowed to forfeit a match. He just didn't know what to do.

Reborn appeared out of nowhere, as usual, kicking him in the head and breaking him out of his spiral of misery before jumping down to sit at the table, drinking coffee that Mama didn't seem to have a problem with an apparent two-year-old drinking. At Reborn's suggestion, Nana was spending the evening at a spa, getting her hair and nails done, so that Tsuna could have the house to himself, to prepare for the fight. Even his beloved oblivious mother would have noticed something wrong, with Tsuna wound tighter than piano wire. He didn't trust Lambo not to invite her to the match. And oblivious as she was, she wouldn't be able to avoid noticing Lambo coming home injured. Gokudera-kun and Yamamoto would be arriving soon, after making sure that Haru and Kyoko-chan were at the hospital and safely out the way of the fight. Tsuna was glad that his Kaa-san was out of the path of danger as well.

Seeing the Sun match, where Ryohei had been so thoroughly defeated, had been a horrifying wake-up call. Tsuna had known it would be dangerous, but Ryohei had been completely outclassed, and he had spent the whole ten days training with Colonello to prepare! If he had been beaten so easily, what chance did the rest of them have? Yamamoto would be going up against a master swordsman, with only ten days of training under his belt. Gokudera-kun would be fighting someone who Reborn had told him was a genius, and absolutely in love with bloodshed. Mukuro-san was confident about his match, but he had so much at stake, Tsuna was terrified for him, and for his sister. He liked Chrome-chan! She was sweet, and pretty, and kind, and had forgiven Gokudera-kun for throwing dynamite at her. She didn't deserve to be locked up like a criminal.

Tonight was Lambo's turn. His only hope of victory was the Ten-Year Bazooka, but Adult Lambo had already warned him not to let Lambo use it. Without that, Lambo didn't stand a chance, but Reborn had told him forfeits weren't allowed. Lambo didn't have a choice but to fight, and Tsuna didn't see any way he could win. Or even survive.

Reborn glared at him, and Tsuna squealed reflexively. Reborn hit him with the Leon mallet, ignoring Lambo's gleeful laugh at Tsuna's pain.

"Stop thinking like a loser, Dame-Tsuna. You need to have faith in your guardians."

"Lambo is five! I'm not so pathetic that I need to be guarded by a five-year-old, Reborn! Believing that he can beat a trained killer isn't faith; it's insanity."

A knock at the door interrupted the argument, and the next ten minutes were spent in utter chaos, with Gokudera shouting at Lambo, Yamamoto laughing instead of helping, and Tsuna rushing around, catching things that were knocked over and trying to defuse the argument.

It was only as they were headed out the door into the rain, Lambo running ahead and gleefully splashing into every puddle he saw, that Yamamoto asked where Mukuro was.

Tsuna yelped in shock. "I didn't even think of that! He left this afternoon, and I don't know where he went. Will he be watching with us? He said he would be, but I thought he would meet us at the house."

Tsuna still didn't entirely trust Mukuro. He couldn't forget how badly he had hurt Hibari-san, and Ryohei. Despite himself, he was coming to like the older boy, with his sharp sense of humour and surprisingly patient style of teaching, but he didn't like him vanishing before such an important fight. He knew that they were on the side, and Mukuro had more reason than anyone to want them to win, but he couldn't shake the suspicious voice in his head (which sounded a lot like Reborn).

"I apologise for my tardiness, Tsunayoshi-kun," a voice drawled from behind him, making him jump and squeak in shock. "Ken and Chikusa wanted to support Lambo-kun as well. It took longer than we thought it would to find our waterproof jackets."

Ken and Chikusa had skipped Ryohei's battle, so Tsuna hadn't thought they were interested in any match except Mukuro's. But here they were, wrapped up in raincoats, Ken scowling and Chikusa as expressionless as always.

"Thanks for coming," Tsuna said, smiling timidly at the intimidating trio.

"Now the whole team's here, apart from Sasagawa-sempai!" Yamamoto declared cheerfully.

Mukuro just chuckled ominously and followed them up to the roof of the school, Ken and Chikusa trailing after him.

The three of them stood back, away from the group, so Tsuna ignored them as he tried to convince Lambo to take the match seriously. He thought it was a fairground ride! The group cheer made him feel a little better, but he felt his heart in his throat as he watched Lambo-kun skip across the metal bars.

As the match went on, he felt his fury at his father, which had been at a low burn, rekindle. Why didn't he tell Tsuna about Lambo's special ability with lightning? Why didn't he make it clear what Lambo was supposed to do? He had accepted that the man didn't care about him at all a long time ago, but he couldn't believe the man was so careless with the life of an innocent five-year-old.

For a few minutes, he thought there was a chance that Lambo might actually win. The twenty five-year-old Lambo was skilled and obviously experienced and powerful. Levi wasn't taking him seriously, so if he could just get one good attack in, he might be able to win the match!

Then a puff of smoke, and the five-year-old was back. Tsuna couldn't stand watching as he was beaten by the sadistic assassin. He didn't care if it cost them the match, he had to interfere. He had to stop this!

He had barely shifted his weight forward when vines wrapped around him, pinning his arms to his sides and tugging the gloves from his pocket. He could feel their pressure around his chest, and warm air against his neck.

"If you interfere, Tsunayoshi, if you cost me my freedom through your idiocy, then I can guarantee I will not go down alone," Mukuro hissed in his ear as the illusionary vines squeezed him tighter and tighter, until he could hardly breathe.

"I need to save Lambo!" he gasped, refusing to let the child go.

"If you interfere, you will forfeit your ring. If that is counted as forfeiting your match, then any further fighting becomes pointless. The Varia will win. You and your friends will die. And I will ensure that your precious mother and darling Kyoko-chan share that fate."

"No! Mukuro, you can't!"

Tsuna could hear Mukuro laughing in his ear, forming a terrifying harmony with Lambo's screams and whimpers as the assassin toyed with him.

"Why not? You are willing to take everything I love from me. Do you doubt that I am capable of returning the favour? Do not underestimate me, Sawada Tsunayoshi, and do not think for a moment that I follow you out of sentiment. If you cannot serve my goals I have no need of you. So choose. Will you sacrifice your friends and family, for no gain at all?"

"Chrome-chan wouldn't want you to hurt them!"

"My dear Chrome will likely not be sane for long enough to resent me for it. The innocent never last long in Vindicare."

"Stop it, asshole! You're here with us! You can't hurt Nana-san from here, we won't let you!" Gokudera-kun declared angrily. Tsuna couldn't turn his head to look at him, but he felt a rush of gratitude for his support.

"I am here. Ken and Chikusa are not. Did you not notice?" Mukuro laughed in his ear.

There was no explosion of dynamite, no sword cutting through the vines that held him prisoner. His friends must have seen that Ken and Chikusa were gone, and come to the same conclusion Tsuna had. They had no options.

"I'm sorry, Jyuudaime," Gokudera wailed. Tsuna couldn't think of a single thing to comfort him.

Tsuna stopped struggling against the illusions that bound him. He was afraid to even try to turn his head to look at Reborn, afraid to see the disgust in his eyes at his weak, pathetic student who couldn't even try to save his friend. Yamamoto's silence was a harsher condemnation of his pathetic inaction than a hundred of Gokudera's apologies, and Reborn's cut him even deeper.

Lambo was hanging limp in Levi's giant hand, all of his irrepressible energy drained by the fight. Tsuna was bound by Mukuro's illusions, and even when he had fought him before, he didn't think he had hated the other teenager this much. How could he be willing to let Lambo die? Whatever the penalty the Cervello made him pay for interfering, it wasn't worth Lambo's life. His tiny body just hung there, as the Varia assassin took sadistic pleasure in shocking him over and over, watching the five-year-old jerk and twitch in a gruesome parody of dance. This was horrific. He should have just handed over the rings as soon as this began, forfeited the match. Anything was better than watching this, helpless.

He hated himself for not interfering. But he was bound tightly in Mukuro's web, and with the threat against his Kaa-san, he didn't dare to fight. He knew Mukuro would do it, knew the psychotic young man would kill his Mama, Kyoko-chan, Haru-chan, and anyone else whose death would hurt Tsuna, if he did anything that would send him back to prison.

Mukuro loosened the vines around his head, letting him turn and see his friends. Yamamoto-kun's ever-present grin was gone, and his knuckles were white as they clenched tight on the baseball bat in his hands. Gokudera-kun had hands full of dynamite, eyes flicking everywhere. Tsuna knew he was calculating where to throw for the best effect, how he could possible save them from this mess. But there was no way out. They didn't dare move after Mukuro's threat. Lambo was going to die and it was all Mukuro's fault. All Tsuna's fault.

Desperately he tried reasoning with Mukuro. "Please, Mukuro-san! Let Gokudera-kun help! If I don't forfeit my ring, you won't go back to Vindicare, right? Lambo is just a child, we need to help him. Mukuro, I trusted you!"

"Then you are a fool, Tsunayoshi. The Varia have already won one match. After this, they will have won two. I am not willing to give them a greater lead for no purpose other than a weak, useless child. You think I could not stop your friends? My possession does not have an expiration date. The only reason Gokudera-kun is not my puppet right now is courtesy. I am more than willing to take his body. If you are so desperate to save the boy, why not have your tutor shoot you? Save him with your dying will?" Mukuro gave another mocking laugh. "Even with your dying will, you would not be able to overcome me with enough speed to win the match and save the child, and your tutor knows it. Relax and watch, Tsunayoshi."

Levi had stopped tormenting Lambo in order to watch the drama. The attention of the entire Varia was on them, rather than on the match in front of them. Lambo shifted and whimpered, but Levi paid him no attention. After hanging still for another moment, Lambo burst into action with a last desperate spurt of energy.

He writhed from Levi's lax grip, ripping his ring out of his hair and throwing it to the assassin as he tumbled to the floor, lying motionless once again. Tsuna couldn't even see his chest moving. He looked like a corpse, lying in a gap between the metal rods.

Mukuro's illusions vanished as soon as the Cervello announced Levi as the winner. Tsuna dashed to the tiny body which still lay there unmoving. This was all his fault. All he could do was stare as Gokudera-kun carried Lambo-kun to the side, laid him down gently on the ground, and started CPR.

The rest of the Varia were laughing, as though a child's torture was a game. Tsuna squeezed his eyes shut. He didn't want to watch any more, wasn't brave enough to endure the inevitable death. But he couldn't block out the laughter.

Chrome had enjoyed baking with M.M. a lot more than he thought he would. His only memories of cooking were slaving away under the glare of Aunt Petunia, but rather than put him off, it gave making cake for his own consumption a thrill of the forbidden. Being allowed to make a mess, get flour all over the work surface, pile up the dirty pans instead of washing as he went, and even eat raw mix out of the bowl made him feel a giddy kind of joy.

He felt a strange sense of achievement as he looked at the row of fairy cakes. They were a little too dry, and the icing was a little too sweet, but he had made them, for himself. And for his friend.

Chrome wasn't exactly sure what made a friend. Before he came to Japan, he was used to classifying people as Mukuro-sama, enemies (the Dursley's, the Weasley twins and Voldemort) and everyone else. Then he met Kyoko-chan and Haru-chan. He thought that he could probably class them as friends, but they only knew the front he had put up. The shy, insecure, incredibly feminine boy. M.M. knew more about him. She knew that Mukuro-sama valued and trusted him, which meant he must have skills and powers that were useful. She knew that he was male, and had never imagined him to be anything else. Even if she was only tolerating him for the sake of time outside a cell and helping Mukuro-sama, she was good company.

The fairy cakes were quickly eaten, and the guard returned them to Chrome's cold, bare room, locking the door behind them. The sugar was helping Chrome stay awake, but he knew that tiredness would soon start creeping in. He wasn't allowed caffeine, as a chemical stimulant would disrupt whatever mental invasion they were planning. He wasn't looking forward to seeing how they were planning to keep him awake.

"What do you do for fun?" Chrome asked M.M., who was looking disgustedly at a smear of icing on her top. Chrome didn't want to tell her that it was in her hair as well. She had so appalled at his lack of hobbies, he figured she must have a few of her own.

"I like reading, and checking up on my investments. I play the clarinet," she replied shortly.

"You play music?" The idea intrigued Chrome. He had never had the chance to learn an instrument. Dudley had taken piano lessons for two weeks when he was eight, before he threw a tantrum and Aunt Petunia let him quit. Uncle Vernon had scoffed and slapped Dudley on the back, telling him that 'music was for nancy-boys anyway, not fine young men like Dudders!' Since then, music had held a forbidden allure for him, since anything the Dursley's disapproved of must be good.

"I'm not teaching you the clarinet. That's my instrument," M.M. declared immediately. After a moment, she reluctantly conceded "I know the basics of guitar. If you can get hold of one I can teach you."

As M.M. went to talk to the guard outside, Chrome indulged in a private thrill of anticipation. He realised that he was looking forward to learning with M.M. just as much as he was to showing Mukuro-sama. It was a strange feeling, but a good one.