[A/N]

- Lovely XS fans, I wonder if you're still out there. It's been more than a year since I've uploaded a fic - I think I've forgotten how to write a proper story. I had this plot idea on paper for ages so I decided to release this for the new year.

Happy new year and hopefully you will enjoy the one-shot!

Chapter 2 - Box Weapons

Squalo dreaded the moment those box weapons would arrive at the Varia mansion.

He had endured endless weeks of agonising discussion between his teammates, for nowadays the juiciest gossip always seemed to involve nothing but box-weapons-this or box-weapons-that or what-animal-are-you-going-to-choose or how-big-do-you-think-they'll-be or something else equally bland and stupid that needless to say, involved box weapons. One couldn't simply speak without turning the topic into a heated conversation of (yet again) box weapons, in which the conversers spoke so passionately they could have been paid by the manufacturer to advertise box weapons. For a torturous period of six weeks, Squalo witnessed the Varia squad transform from top-notch assassins into gossiping teenage girls. He also learned apparently that apart from being useful assets in battle, these miraculous box weapons could also cure cancer, save mankind from inevitable doom and eventually bring about world peace.

Squalo personally never saw the big idea with using flame-powered animals for combat. The Vongola brats have them. Big deal. He paid no mind to those playthings until that wimp Tsuna insisted that the Varia join in with this idiocy. When the teenager first suggested this, Squalo laughed viciously and expected Xanxus to throw a fireball at the brat's face and tell him to get the fuck out of his sight. Well the latter did happen, but what Squalo did not expect was the rest of the squad thinking it would be a splendid idea. To add salt to the injury, the shitty boss agreed with them. By the end of the week, Squalo seemed to be the only person in the squad who didn't sell his sanity for a pretty metal box containing a pretty fighting animal.

So when those animals finally arrived much to the anticipation of everyone in the Varia mansion, Squalo sat grumpily in his corner choking at the revolting mixture of happiness and excitement in the air. His gloomy demeanour had no effect on the dense, euphoric atmosphere so he resorted to plan B – that is - to hope they'd quickly throw his box weapon into the bin where it belonged. He paid no attention to his teammates until a painful whack on his head told him that somebody had indeed thrown his box - but at his head instead.

After glaring at his assaulter - for he knew only one person in the world could throw objects at his head with such accuracy – he stormed over to where the others were gathered and not without a fair list of curses and insults in mind.

But instead of being greeted with large, intimidating creatures that could mercilessly kill those granted with a gift of life they did not deserve or tear buildings apart - the type that would make this box weapon farce slightly more bearable, Squalo was greeted with a group of animals smaller and cuddlier than they had any right to be. For a second he thought (with hope) that there had been a mistake and that the manufacturers, rather than send them fully-grown killing machines, had sent them fluffy pieces of meat. For surely the beautiful and majestic peacock Lussuria had been bragging about all summer could not be that fluffy brown object in his hands? And the man-eating liger Xanxus had been so insistent on reminding him about could not possibly be the puny, white kitten on his lap? When Squalo had managed to find his voice again, he called them out with a loud 'what the fuck is this shit' before he felt a click in his brain, followed by a sense of dread, followed by the irresistible urge to rip his hair out as he realised just exactly what the fuck was happening.

Babies. The manufacturers had sent them babies. And Squalo knew too well that no matter what specie, the presence of babies in the Varia mansion gave way to a whole new crisis, a kind of torture so horrible that it was only reserved for the deepest and darkest realms of hell.

But then Lussuria reassured him that these animals were supposed to be cute and cuddly and not-yet-lethal. And when Squalo raised the question of why the fuck that was the case and how the fuck baby animals could be an asset rather than a nuisance in battle, Lussuria answered 'Squalo don't be silly, we raise them up of course!' as if it were the most obvious thing in the world, as if any brain-damaged idiot could grasp the obviousness of the words he just stated, and that there's no way any normal person could not identify this as the obvious course of action to take.

Squalo did not know what was worse – the fact that this was all really happening or that nobody else seemed to raise any objections. Which meant, to his horror, that everyone –including his boss- had been inflicted with some incurable mother-complex during this period of box weapon fever.

To top it all off, when he opened his own box weapon at the insistence of his team, the baby shark that jumped out lacked all the qualities it was rumoured to have. For one, this fish did not have the necessary capabilities to cure any disease at all, let alone cancer. Furthermore, Squalo could not imagine anything less likely to be saving mankind from doom or dictating world peace. Overall, the animal was a letdown through and through, failing his already piss-low expectations.

Squalo responded to this disappointment like any normal assassin dealing with an unwanted problem would: he made it someone else's problem. Whilst the others were admiring their box weapons like a group of proud fathers, Squalo took his undesired pet outside to the Varia swimming pool, tossed the baby shark into the water and left without a second glance. As far as Squalo knew, his blade was the only weapon he needed in battle. And this whole box-weapon-baby crisis was bound to hit a dead end once his teammates recovered from their temporary insanity and realised how utterly useless these animals were.

Unfortunately the others disagreed.

It took a month for Squalo to realise that he was fighting a losing war and that the Varia's attachment to their box weapons, far from dying down, multiplied tenfold. Instead of focusing on their missions, the Varia members spent all their time locked inside their rooms with their respective animals. Granted, this had its merits as the mansion became eerily quiet all of a sudden – a result of the members being uninterested in anything but the wellbeing of their beloved pets - and Squalo no longer had to spend half his day yelling at them. In fact Squalo never had to yell at anything these days. The lack of noise disturbed him and he feared that his voice was rapidly disappearing from lack of use. Sometimes he even got the impression that he was the only person living in the mansion the way he walked down the empty and silent corridors, seeking an excuse to yell at something.

But fuck, he wasn't lonely. Definitely not lonely. He vowed to the shrine in his room that he didn't need those good for nothing pieces of shit to make him feel at home. He wasn't lonely. Squalo convinced himself that this was the long deserved peace and quiet for all his years dealing with this dysfunctional family. He wasn't lonely. Not even when he spotted Lussuria decorating the garden, a glowing yellow pea-chick following him around. He wasn't lonely. He felt nothing when he watched his own shark baby swimming in the pool from his room, the only box weapon unwanted by its master. Fuck it, he wasn't lonely. He wasn't lonely. Not lonely. Never.

Squalo grew desperately in denial to the point where he muttered to himself every night about betrayal and how his teammates had abandoned him for a bunch of revolting animals. Especially Xanxus. He liked to blame Xanxus for all this shit. Him and his stupid white cat Bester. Bester. The name drove Squalo into a fit of rage and confusion that he couldn't explain. For some reason he found the liger kitten to be more annoying than the other box weapons. It was definitely not because Bester spent everyday locked up in the same room as his boss, sleeping on the same bed as his boss, sharing dinner with his boss, taking an occasional bath with his boss or playing games with his boss. Hell no. And it wasn't because nowadays Bester took most of Xanxus's attention, Xanxus's time, Xanxus's love and Xanxus's affection. No, this didn't bother Squalo at all.

But that didn't stop him from storming into Xanxus's room the day he couldn't take it any longer. And before Squalo knew it the questions came flowing out in a stream of accusations along the lines of what-the-fuck-is-wrong-with-you and what's-so-special-about-that-stupid-box-weapon and when-did-you-turn-into-such-a-pussy and stop-ignoring-me-you-bastard and you-never-let-me-sleep-on-your-lap and you-spend-too-much-time-with-that-thing.

And Xanxus met these accusations the way he did best: by ignoring them. And then Squalo yelled further. And Xanxus glared. And Bester glared too. And Squalo glared at Bester, silently cherishing the thought of turning Bester into sashimi to see if the damned thing can glare back then. 'Bester's a stupid name,' Squalo snarled for lack of anything better to say, to which Xanxus replied in a half-amused voice 'you're the one who thought of it'. That shut Squalo up.

Fuming, the swordsman cursed himself for forgetting the game they played the day after obtaining those box weapons. A game that involved Xanxus getting to pick a name for Squalo's shark in return for Squalo picking a name for Xanxus's liger. Needless to say, Squalo had agreed if for any reason just to make Xanxus happy and he picked a name he found when reading one of the old Vongola history books – "Bester". And Xanxus, being the lazy ass that he is, picked the last three letters of Squalo –"Alo"- instead of thinking up a proper name. Back then Squalo had shrugged at his boss's lack of effort for he couldn't care less what the shark was going to be called and neither did he expect Xanxus to take the game seriously.

'I didn't think you'd be stupid enough to use it!' Squalo growled back in annoyance. To hell with Xanxus for actually being serious about the naming incident. If Squalo had known back then, he would have suggested names along the lines of 'maggot' or 'piece of shit' or 'trash vomit' or something else more befitting of the irritating creature sitting on Xanxus's lap, being stroked by Xanxus's warm hands.

'You're jealous,' Xanxus remarked and Squalo wanted to wipe that knowing smirk off his boss's face before attempting to vehemently claim that he would not in a million years ever be jealous of the stupid liger. Xanxus saw right through the lie much like the way he saw through everything about Squalo and then told the swordsman to 'go play with his fish'. Before Squalo could storm off in rage to do just that, Bester jumped off Xanxus's lap to give Squalo a nudge on the leg – a gesture that Squalo interpreted as mockery. The swordsman left furiously, not wishing to be humiliated further.

Squalo never imagined the day he would swallow up his pride and dignity and a bunch of other things he held to value. But for the sake of proving to Xanxus that he wasn't a loner or a loser or a hundred other things that Xanxus never accused him of being, he would swallow up anything much less his pride.

And so there he was, sitting beside the pool where he last abandoned his box weapon, watching the glowing blue shark-baby swim around before remarking that this was the most pointless thing he ever tried to do and it may just be easier to let Xanxus think he was a loner. After five minutes of blank staring, Alo noticed its master nearby and gave a soft cooing sound causing Squalo to grunt and hope that his pet could do something more entertaining than simply make weird noises. As for raising the shark up, Squalo had next to no idea what baby animals needed to survive but he himself got on fine with just food, swords and Xanxus so he assumed the box weapon should be no different. He decided to start with food.

'Shut up, I'll get you something to eat,' Squalo growled in annoyance before realising that hadn't the slightest idea what baby sharks liked to eat. He didn't think Alo would like the cakes Lussuria made. He wouldn't expect it to eat the candy Bel brought home. He wondered hopefully if sharks ate baby ligers but then remembered that it would be less painful to jump off a building than have Xanxus catch him trying to turn Bester into Alo's dinner. At this point the only logical option was fish. And where the fuck Squalo was going to get this fish was beyond him because as far as Squalo knew, the Varia mansion was amply provisioned in corpses, not fish.

A few hours later after multiple treks to the Varia library he never knew existed, reading up books he never knew people would waste time writing and learning shit that he never dreamed of learning, Squalo found himself on a boat in the middle of the ocean with nothing but a fishing rod, a sword and a baby Alo hovering next to him. The fishing rod was broken in half, Squalo was swinging his sword wildly underwater in the hopes that a fish stupid enough would fall for the blade and Alo floated calmly near its master's shoulder observing all his failures with silence. It only took another half hour for Squalo to give up completely.

'Catch your own damned food,' Squalo snarled at his pet before dropping off to sleep.

When Squalo opened his eyes again, he saw fish.

Big and small, fat and thin – fish of all sizes and colours flopping around and over him on his boat. And before he could wonder whether he was just hallucinating or simply insane, he spotted Alo diving through water as easily as it did air, dropping what looked like the entire ocean onto the boat.

Squalo sat gaping much like the way he gaped when he first saw the baby box weapons. But then his gape turned into a grin, and for the first time in months he considered that maybe the shark wasn't entirely as useless as he had thought.

Alo couldn't cure cancer, but at least it could catch its own dinner.

When the shark-baby noticed its master awake, it stopped in mid-air before floating over to face Squalo – evidently awaiting his approval. The swordsman heard cooing noises.

And this time Squalo took only one look at Alo before understanding that the baby shark had been abandoned before it had the chance to prove itself –no…himself. Squalo had never given him any acknowledgement, had always treated him like an object of no use and had left him to starve for a month before giving him any notice. He remembered clearly now, that this was the exact same way that Xanxus had treated him after his "defrosting". Squalo recalled the hurt he felt back then when Xanxus refused to acknowledge the dreams they shared together as teenagers, the way he threw Squalo aside without glancing back, how Xanxus kept to himself for days, weeks and months before Squalo won back his respect with blood, sweat and tears. Mostly blood and tears. It had been Squalo's hardest battle, pulling Xanxus out of that dark pit of isolation – making him comprehend that he was not alone in his pain and there were still people he could trust and rely on after his father's "betrayal". People who won't laugh at his failures or talk behind his back or use him to their advantage or abandon him. People who waited eight years and would have waited their whole life to see him return to continue fighting the war they had started.

Squalo felt even worse now that he had inflicted this same battle on another creature – no less a creature that had no origins, known nothing except a master who did not want him, a creature created for the sole purpose to kill and fight and serve. Alo had feelings. Feelings that Squalo was blind to see, just as he was blind to the many others things that weren't swordplay or Xanxus. The other members of the squad saw the box weapons as an extension of themselves rather than a nuisance and in a sense they understood more than Squalo did that a part of themselves should not be abandoned the way Alo was abandoned. And Squalo, realising this finally, vowed again to the shrine in his room that he would give Alo a chance.

After cleaning his boat up – and by cleaning, Squalo meant tipping its contents back into the ocean – Squalo returned to the Varia mansion with a fair supply of fish, a new bond formed and a new outlook on the life ahead of him. Best of all he could officially brag to Xanxus (if ever accused) that he was no longer a loner.

Having Alo as a pet meant that Squalo had the perfect excuse to make noise again. He yelled and bitched to a creature that was all too willing to listen to him without complaint. He took his shark for a tour around the Varia mansion, pointing out photographs on the walls – a holiday in China, a trip to the beach, Bel's 18th birthday and events that Squalo had forgotten but was reasonably delighted to remember again. He showed Alo the Varia kitchen and complained about how he had to inspect every single steak that Xanxus wanted to eat just in case his boss threw a tantrum. He carried Alo to the training grounds and lectured him about the different types of swords, how to tell the quality of the blade and the most effective ways to slice up the enemy. He even let Alo sleep in his room after he realised that box weapons did not like being kept inside their boxes, just as anyone would hate being locked up.

Squalo felt himself become his own hypocrite as the weeks went by. He spent his mornings exercising with Alo and his afternoons showing videos of his famous swordfights while giving a blow-by-blow account of how he thwarted his opponents. He bragged about his victories and his achievements and retold his own coronation as the second sword emperor. He spoke about being granted the title of Varia Boss before recounting the Vongola's shock and disbelief when he handed this very title to Xanxus. He even spoke of his loss during the rain battle – the time when he, despite having over ten years more battle experience and skill, was still defeated by a brat who had undergone serious training for only a week. A result, Squalo concluded, that could only be explained by an invisible yet impenetrable piece of armour in his opponent's possession, an armour to which all logic and reason fell apart.*

At night Squalo brushed Alo's teeth. In the morning Alo would wake Squalo with a nudge. Once per week they would go fishing. Fishing actually meant Squalo taking a nap while Alo did all the work.

Life was good in the Varia mansion. Squalo ignored the mocking jibes made by Bel and his mink (who Squalo liked to call Bel 2.0 – smaller and more annoying than ever). He was satisfied with the knowledge that Alo could swallow Bel 2.0 and make his death look like an accident at his command. Lussuria on the other hand never missed the chance to comment on how motherly Squalo had grown - but only before Squalo nearly made mince meat out of his peacock. Yet Squalo only recognised his own development when he no longer fantasised about making sushi out of Bester.

It was an encounter one sunny afternoon which sealed Squalo's opinion that the arrival of the box weapons was a joyous and prosperous occasion. Squalo was in his swimmers trying to turn Alo the shark into Alo the surfboard and failing miserably until he was spared his hundredth plunge into the water by a dark presence in the air.

'Stop playing with your fish,' commanded the dark presence better known as Xanxus. Bester who was now slightly bigger than a house-cat sat obediently at his master's feet. Squalo got out of the pool grinning in spite of himself - either from amusement or triumph or happiness or all of the above, he didn't know. All he knew was that Xanxus had unlocked himself from the office just to come down and visit him. So Squalo waited. But Xanxus gave no response. And Squalo grinned harder. And Xanxus gave no response. And the two men stared at each other. By now a million different comments came to mind, ranging from did-you-miss-me to look-who's-jealous-bastard to serves-you-right-you-piece-of-shit, depending on what kind of asshole Squalo wanted to be.

Fortunately for both men, Squalo was not feeling like an asshole and neither would he ever, given the choice, make his boss angry when he could make his boss happy instead. And so he started the conversation with a small 'sorry', for previous experience told him that passivity was the best way to deal with Xanxus during those rare moments of weakness when the Varia boss was most vulnerable.

Xanxus didn't reply but Bester pranced over and gave Squalo a nudge. The Squalo a few months ago would have kicked the liger into the pool, but the Squalo now was no longer so petty nor so blinded by his own stupidity. He recognised the nudge for what it was – a playful gesture of affection rather than a condescending gesture of mockery, and understood that the liger as an extension of Xanxus was able to express all the rare emotions Xanxus felt but withheld from pride. To think that Squalo had fantasised about killing Bester was as unthinkable as Squalo killing Xanxus himself and the swordsman wondered if he could ever atone for those hateful feelings back then.

Squalo sat down, brought Bester close and began to stroke the liger, wondering if Xanxus was going to stop him.

'I'll let you sleep on my lap,' Xanxus muttered softly before leaving quickly, possibly to hide his face.

And Squalo found himself grinning yet again.

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-END-

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*Plot Armour. Sorry I couldn't resist sniping this moment. Yes, I'm still butthurt that this happened and no, I won't get over it.

[A/N] - thanks for reading. I know I've abandoned the fandom but I still appreciate your reviews :)