From the Frying Pan (Into the Fire)

Chapter One

Tsuna scrawled his signature on the last sheet of paperwork remaining on his desk with a dramatic flourish and fairly threw his pen down in celebration. "I'm done!" he exclaimed aloud, resisting the urge to jump up and dance in celebration. If he did, he was sure Reborn would find out about it—even from halfway around the world—and then Tsuna would die painfully for disgracing the image of a mafia boss.

Still, even that terrifying thought couldn't shatter Tsuna's good mood. For the first time in months, he could finally go to sleep early! With this goal in mind, Tsuna grabbed his suit jacket and just about skipped to the door. Before he could reach for the doorknob, however, the door was pushed open, just barely avoiding smacking Tsuna in the face.

Curiously, Tsuna peered into the hallway—and then was promptly hit by the urge to curl up in a ball on the floor and cry, regardless of the Reborn-induced death that would be sure to follow if the hitman ever found out.

"Why?" he whimpered, his finely-tailored jacket slipping pathetically to the ground (much like what he wanted to do right now) out of suddenly numb fingers. "How could this happen?

A trio of servants of the Vongola mansion stood in front of him, each looking apologetic. It wasn't the people that were the issue, though—it was what they were carrying. Each person was pushing a metal cart piled high with papers, seemingly keeping from collapsing into a mess on the ground only through the demonic energy they were undoubtedly imbued with.

"The Cloud and Mist Guardians have crossed paths in Japan, and the Varia has destroyed another few villages. The rest are accumulated damage reports from your other Guardians or reports on issues that have arisen within the Vongola Alliance," his head butler offered in way of explanation as the other two servants began wheeling the carts into his office.

"B-but," Tsuna couldn't help but stutter, mouth opening and closing in a manner extremely unbefitting for a twenty-two year-old mafia boss. "I finished everything already!" he almost whined in a plaintive voice.

"My apologies, Boss," the butler bowed. Tsuna was certain that this move was only done to hide a smile at his pain, the traitor. The man was hired by Reborn after all—he had to have a sadistic streak. "Please continue working hard, Boss. Call us if you require anything whatsoever."

"Do my paperwork," Tsuna instantly ordered, shamelessly abusing his authority even though he knew the attempt was fruitless.

"I apologize, Boss, but I am not qualified fill out your reports," the man bowed again, then beat a hasty retreat with the other two servants in tow before Tsuna could do something satisfyingly petty like order him to personally clean Mukuro's room (just to make him suffer as much as Tsuna had to). The door closed with an ominous click, trapping Tsuna in his office with no company but three massive mountains of paperwork.

Tsuna stared longingly out the window nearest to him for a moment, wishing he could just fling himself out and fly away with the aid of his trusty gloves, before a revelation hit him. He could just do that! Well, not the flinging himself out the window part, but if there was ever the perfect time for him to run awa—ahem, take a well-deserved vacation to a relaxing and reclusive area, now was the time.

The mafia world was in an unprecedented state of peaceful prosperity after his painstaking efforts at reform, and Tsuna was confident enough in the Vongola Alliance's power to leave the country for a few months for a nice, calm vacation. Even without him, his Guardians, the Varia, the CEDEF, and the various families allied to the Vongola would undoubtedly take good care of Vongola.

Plus, as luck would have it, Reborn was currently in America for a meeting with an extremely important weapons dealer. Hibari was still in Japan with the Foundation, and Mukuro and Chrome were both wandering somewhere around the Pacific (supposedly on mafia business, but that was always doubtful whenever Mukuro was concerned). Gokudera, Yamamoto, and Ryohei were also away from Italy at the moment, and the children were all at a prestigious boarding school (for mafiosos-in-training, of course). Tsuna could be out of the country before any of them came back and tried to stop him, and they would be forced to deal with his paperwork instead!

Tsuna practically crowed with triumph at his master plan, conveniently forgetting the fact that the people he forced his paperwork on (who would probably end up being the Varia until his guardians returned) would undoubtedly hunt him down and drag him back.

He would be brutally reminded of these facts in the future, but for the time being, ignorance was bliss.

"Now," Tsuna mused aloud, "All I need is an excuse to go away…" If he claimed to be on a business trip for Vongola, then when Reborn inevitably found out (which hopefully wouldn't be until a few months later), maybe he would only be half-killed rather than be brutally wiped off of the face of the earth then resurrected to fill out paperwork for the rest of eternity. Reborn could be merciful, right? Tsuna had already been the boss for over six years now, of course even his Spartan tutor would have to show some leniency. "This is a great plan!" Tsuna said out loud to the stacks of paperwork, which thankfully did not take on anthropomorphic qualities and talk back. Tsuna took a second to visualize that, and instantly knew what his next nightmare was going to be about.

(Now would be a good time to mention that Tsuna was extremely sleep-deprived, and thus in no state to be making rational decisions. Paperwork does horrible things to a person's sanity.)

Tsuna grabbed a handful of papers off of the stack closest to him and riffled through them, searching for a suitable excuse. A repair bill from the Varia, a lawsuit for Mukuro, a village petition for Hibari to get the hell out… all the usual inconveniences. He was about to give up on this pile and take up a new bunch of reports when he hit the jackpot.

"Ferro Family disappears before scheduled elimination, culprit unknown… Azzurro Vanel, boss, drug dealing… Hm, Britain? Perfect, perfect," Tsuna muttered to himself. Indeed, this was the perfect "business trip." This sort of low-level investigation would've normally been assigned to a new recruit—after all, nobody really cared about the disappearance of a little family such as the Ferro family, especially considering the fact that the family was already slated for a raid conducted by the Vongola Alliance, endorsed by Tsuna's continuing attempts to reform the mafia from the inside. Depending on who would have ended up in charge of said raid, it was probably a kinder fate for them to have disappeared first anyway.

The mission was even in Britain, the place where mafia families went to die. It couldn't have been more perfect. Tsuna could easily just hop on a ship to England and loiter around there for a few months on beautiful, blissful vacation under the pretense of "investigating."

Humming cheerfully to himself, Tsuna folded up the piece of paper and tucked it into his pocket. "Goodbye, hellish paperwork," he exclaimed, waving gleefully at the stacks of paper as he swept through the door. "England, here I come!"

…

Two weeks later, Tsuna was convinced that this was the best decision he'd ever made. He'd arrived safely in London with nothing on him but a Storage Box-but then again, a Storage Box was more than enough. Within the box, he had stored a few sets of clothes, a fair amount of money and of course, his weaponry.

He had some difficulty in finding a place to stay, initially, as people-shockingly-tended to be wary of foreigners with accented English and no real identification to speak of. Still, eventually an inn-keeper folded under the considerable combined force of Tsuna's cajoling, money, and above-average looks, and Tsuna was ushered into a rather dingy room, where he was informed he could stay indefinitely as long as he had the money to back it up.

Even though the room was small and not exactly sparkling-clean, Tsuna didn't mind in the slightest. Here, at least, there were no appearances he had to keep up with as the Tenth Vongola Boss, no judging eyes, no loud and chaotic fights keeping him up at night…

Plus, of course, there was no paperwork. (That was the most important part.)

Tsuna had wandered around town for a few days doing nothing in particular-he bought a few sweets here, talked to a couple of kind people there, and generally just had a great time. Every so often, he would actually investigate a little, casually calling up some of his underworld contacts in the area. Even if no mafia families chose to base in England, there was no shortage of informants who retreated here for that very reason.

In the course of his "investigations," he had discovered a surprisingly little amount of information considering just how proficient his contacts usually were. He had managed to find out, however, who the people that Azzurro had last been seen in "public" (or as public as the Underworld could get, anyhow) with were: Ciel Phantomhive, Angelina Dalles, Arthur Randall, and a Chinese man named Lau (no last name known).

There were two other German men in the last known meeting as well, but they had already returned to Germany and Tsuna had no intention of chasing them down until he had exhausted all other leads… Which, at the snail-like pace he was "investigating" at, would take at least until Reborn finally" hunted him down, so he doubted he would ever have to try to track them down.

Most of his sources seemed to agree that the most likely culprit for the disappearance of Azzurro and his Family was Ciel Phantomhive, due to his status as the Queen's Watchdog (which was, as Tsuna finally figured out after much confusion, a nickname for the Phantomhive family's job of taking care of the English Royal Family's dirty work). The other possible suspect was Arthur Randall, who was Scotland Yard's police commissioner-which definitely gave him a motive to go after the Ferro Family. In both cases, it was likely that Vanel was eliminated for his involvement in the drug trade.

Personally, Tsuna thought that the culprit was probably Ciel Phantomhive-the Ferro Family had disappeared into thin air after all, and if the Scotland Yard had managed to arrest him and his entire Family, then the Vongola should've easily been able to trace Azzurro's location. It was a pretty cut-and-dry case, to be honest; Vanel had probably overreached himself and attempted to set up a wide-spread drug trade in England, and promptly got eliminated for his trouble. If Tsuna wanted to, he could probably go hunt down this Ciel Phantomhive and figure the whole thing out right now, then return home to Italy…

Ha, yeah right, that wasn't going to happen. Tsuna was going to drag this whole thing out for as long as possible and enjoy his time off.

Anyway, that was enough investigating for now, right? He'd even managed to find a prime suspect! Now, if anyone came after him, Tsuna could actually say with confidence that he had done something useful. He could relax without worries now…

Hm, come to think of it, wasn't there some Indian culture exhibition going on nearby? That sounded like fun, maybe he'd drop by there…

…

Apparently, Tsuna mused to himself as he stared up at the stage, Destiny really wanted him to investigate the Ferro Family and return back to Italy as soon as possible. ...Could Destiny be working for Reborn? That was actually terrifyingly possible-it would certainly explain a lot about his life.

Then again, maybe it really was a freaky coincidence. Regardless, the fact remained that the black-clad man standing on the stage and making curry with unnecessarily dramatic motions was, apparently, the butler of the Phantomhive family.

'Hm… That means that Ciel Phantomhive should be around here too, right?' Tsuna mused to himself, shifting to casually look through the crowd. Just because he wasn't interested in actively investigating didn't mean he couldn't take advantage of an opportunity that practically fell into his lap. Who knew, maybe he'd actually need to know what Ciel Phantomhive looked like (cough, when someone caught up to him and tried to drag him home, because the more proof he had to show he'd been investigating, the better).

Nobody in the crowd really stood out as "Queen's Watchdog" material, though. Then again, there were a lot of people, so maybe Tsuna just couldn't see him right now. He'd just wait until the butler came off the stage and met up with his master. Until then… Tsuna rocked back on his heels and sniffed the air. The curry smelled delicious. Tsuna didn't exactly have that many opportunities to try authentic curry, but even he could tell that the two leading contenders in this curry battle were the Phantomhive butler and the Indian chef.

After the judging (which featured an unnecessarily excited and vaguely creepy blond man), Tsuna realized that Destiny really didn't work for Reborn. In fact, Destiny must be helping Tsuna, because it led him to this blessed place, where Tsuna was able to eat two different plates of the best curry ever. He was practically in tears of joy just tasting it.

It was official. This was the best decision he had ever made.

After he had devoured both dishes, Tsuna belatedly remembered that he had previously wanted to find Ciel Phantomhive. Skimming through the crowd, he quickly found the butler, who stood out quite a bit thanks to his height, handsome features, and black clothing. Still, he couldn't see anyone near him who could be the Earl Phantomhive…

Out of the crowd of people around the butler, there were four older males, but two of them were Indian, one was Chinese, and one was dressed in chef's clothes. None of them could be Ciel, but then who was? Tsuna glanced through the faces once more, and his eyes caught on the high-quality, fancy clothes of a boy. Someone with clothes that fine… could it be?

Then the boy turned around, and his Hyper Intuition twinged. There was no mistake-this child was the elusive Earl Phantomhive.

"Goddammit!" Tsuna cursed aloud. Out of his many reliable contacts, not a single one thought to inform him that Ciel Phantomhive was a pre-teen boy who couldn't be older than thirteen? Not one? He really needed to get new informants…

I mean, sure, Tsuna knew what it was like to be an inordinately young leader, but even he had ascended his mafia boss-ship at the age of seventeen. Back when Tsuna had been thirteen, in the B.R. (Before Reborn) ages, he had been a useless wimp. There was no sugar-coating it.

A four years difference between the age Tsuna had first become a mafia boss and the (estimated) age Ciel Phantomhive was at now as a Lord didn't seem like that much but… It really was. The only reason Tsuna was able to become a mafia boss was through the extreme, life-threatening trials he had faced in his training years. Also, Reborn.

But he really, really doubted that Ciel Phantomhive had his own Reborn (because the thought of another existence like Reborn's in this world was so utterly terrifying it just couldn't be true or else the universe might implode), so what exactly must've this child gone through to obtain his title as an Earl?

'Most likely an orphan,' Tsuna mused to himself. 'Otherwise, his father would definitely still be in possession of the title.' Without his permission, Tsuna felt sympathy well up inside of him for the child. To have to carry the weight of a name tainted by the Underworld at such a young age… More than anyone, Tsuna understood how it felt.

Regardless, the young Earl Phantomhive had made his choice by stepping into the Underworld. Despite his age, it was still entirely possible that he had been the one to make the Ferro Family disappear. After all, Mukuro had eradicated the Estraneo Family at around the same age… Tsuna couldn't allow his personal emotions to interfere with the investigation. The truth must be fou-

...Wait a second. Why was he becoming so serious about this?! This was supposed to be a vacation, a vacation. If luck was on his side, then he wouldn't even have to deal with Ciel Phantomhive much at all!

It wasn't any of his business anyway.

With that thought in mind, Tsuna turned away from where he was gawking unattractively at the motley group standing together, ready to leave the building… Before he doubled back, grabbed five more plates of curry, and hightailed his way out of there.

Who cared about Ciel Phantomhive? Tsuna was on his hard-earned vacation, and goddammit he was going to enjoy it before Reborn caught up to him!

A/N: So… It's me? TiM fans, please don't kill me. Anyway, thanks for reading! I hoped you enjoyed it. I wrote this mainly because there are not enough good Kuroshitsuji crossovers, and I like writing weird crossovers in the first place. Before I get a review asking about how the timeline works, it's basically like this: the Kuroshitsuji timeline runs like canon, but the KHR timeline is moved forward. Tsuna and co. are still Tenth Generation, though, mostly because it doesn't make sense to me how KHR canon works. If Vongola was founded 400 years ago, then each boss would have to have stayed in power for around forty years; to me, this seems entirely impossible. Giotto, for one, definitely couldn't have stayed in power for much more than 10 years, as he still had time to move to Japan, settle down, and have kids. I imagine that most other bosses, with the exception of a few like Timoteo, couldn't have had that long of a lifespan considering they're in the mafia. Plus, I doubt very many ascended to power when they were as young as Tsuna. If you disagree with me, just roll with it and think of a plot device if you want to.

Anyway, that was longer than I thought it would be. Again, thanks for reading! I do have a question regarding reviews… Basically, I have a really bad habit of not answering reviews for a really long time, as I tend to see the review, fangirl over it, then tell myself I'll reply to it later. What I want to know is this: do you still want me to answer your review even if it's, like, a month late? I truly do appreciate each and every review that's posted, so I would be happy to answer all of them… I just end up feeling really awkward and guilty if I do forget to answer for a really long time, so I end up worrying if I'm actually being a bother by answering…