Katekyo Hitman Reborn! belongs to Akira Amano. I am not profiting in any way from this.

It's been so long, I forgot what I was going to write for this. Thanks for waiting.

Chapter 3: Colonello.

"Kid, what're you doing in the rain? Dontcha got somewhere to be?" said a woman.

"I don't belong anywhere," said the boy. He was pitiful.

"... Then, why don't you come work for me? You any good with machines?"

"I can manage."

"Name's Sofia. What's yours?"

"... Marco."

"I think there's someone up there looking after you, boy," drawled Sofia, the mechanic who took in that poor, pitiful boy called Marco. Said boy looked up from his workbench, still holding nuts and bolts in his hands. His face and clothes were stained with grease and sweat. When Colonel ran for the warmth, he didn't expect to end up in one of Italy's hottest repair shops. He also didn't expect to have a short-tempered woman with a passion for shooting heavy guns as his boss.

"What do you mean by that?" he asked. Over the time working under such a compulsive, explosive person, Marco had learned to stay calm and hold his tongue. You know, just in case someone gets angry, and he becomes a target for a beating. Just in case. (But of course, he was just as hot headed, often getting into trouble with the customers and random people in the streets.)

"What, you never heard anyone say that before? Goodness, you're hopeless!" Sofia shouted at the sky. Not a cloud was in sight. The weather forecast predicted little chance of rain.

Marco only shook his head and waited for her to finish laughing.

"Listen up, boy. It means a deceased person who is important to you is watching over you. I'm saying good things are going to happen to you soon," Sofia explained.

"Are you saying dead people are good luck?" Marco missed the point, as usual. One would wonder if he was raised by a tree.

"NO! Goodness, boy, you'll be the death of me!" Sofia laughed as she collapsed onto the ragged sofa in the corner. Dust and lint flew up and danced in the air, making Sofia cough and tear up. Marco said nothing, did nothing. There was no need to bother her when she was in a good mood. Even if she were to be dying. She was that kind of person. And over the past year, Marco had learned how not to be Colonel. And Colonel definitely would've ruined her good mood in a snap.

"What's your dream, boy?" Sofia asked him after closing the shop. He looked up and thought for a few minutes. Marco wanted to be just Marco, but his time as Colonel was hard to forget.

"I want to be a soldier. Like a government soldier," he clarified, nodding to himself. "That's what I dream of."

"Really? You're weaker than me, Marco," Sofia teased. "You sure you wanna be a soldier? It's gonna be tough."

"I'm sure! I'm strong, and I can do it!" Marco shouted.

"Haha! You're so easy to ruffle up! Well, boy, you're in luck. I have ears everywhere, so I know everything, ya know. I'll be on the lookout for a soldier job," she laughed and went her way upstairs. Marco wondered if he should be worried. Sofia didn't sound like she was joking about having ears everywhere. Sofia didn't joke. She never joked.

"I have a feeling you're not telling me a lot, boy," Sofia stated a fact one day out of the blue.

"You've always known that, Boss," Marco replied with equal nonchalance, quickly returning to his meal. Beside him sat Falco, a hawk from who knows where. Marco should have left it alone, but it wouldn't stop following him. It circled above him for days before he finally cracked and offered it food. Since then, it never left. The hawk had once been dubbed Falke (the past would always haunt him no matter his efforts), but Sofia had scoffed and called it Falco. Marco didn't want to start an argument, so he let it be.

"Yeah, 'cuz I know everything. Obviously," she rolled her eyes. "I'm talking about your name. You got other names, don't you?"

Marco froze in his seat. He did not answer. He didn't have to. Sofia knew everything.

"I recall a certain name of Colonel being thrown around the underworld. Know anything about that, Marco?" she asked with little care, but her eyes glittered in the low light, peering out from beneath her hair. The eyes of a predator, focused and intense, far from careless.

"I don't know anything," he stammered. He cursed his stammer in his head.

"I wasn't born yesterday, Colonel. And neither were you. Also, you're not very good at hiding anything," she replied.

"I- I don't know anything," he repeated. Falco shuffled his wings nervously on the table.

"... Hmph! Suit yourself, Marco. I don't really care about your past, so I'll let you be," she tossed her head, stood up, and left, her meal long-forgotten. Colonel and Falco sat alone in the flickering lamplight.

"It's not bad, ya know," Sofia started one day. For a week, there was a tense and awkward strain between Boss and Apprentice. This sudden statement startled Marco, jolting Falco from his shoulder. Falco complained loudly, flying off to another corner of the garage.

"Huh?" was Marco's well-thought out, intelligent answer.

"Looking back at the past. It's not too bad. Just saying," Boss shrugged, never taking her eyes off the engine she was working on. The engine was fairly close to her face, but her eyes were looking somewhere far. Somewhere beyond the physical realm.

"You can look back at the past and smile or cry or whatever. Just remember, you can't go back," her eyes finally settled on Marco, looking deep, searching for something.

It was a long while before Marco graced her with an answer, "I want to leave everything behind. Everything that happened, I want to forget anything happened at all. It hurts too much to remember."

"You're a fool, you know that, Colonel?" Sofia leaned back and laughed through her nose.

"I know."

"I know you know. But do you know why?"

"I don't, and I don't care."

"Well, you should. Because my past and all that I've experienced is what made me into who I am right now. Without them, what good am I? I'd be like a baby! Hah! I'm better- no, stronger than that," Sofia's eyes seemed to finally find Colonel. He didn't have an answer for her. She didn't expect any, anyway.

"Also, ol' Birch would be upset if you tried to forget about him, don't you think?" she asked and left him alone once more. He needed time to think, and think, he did.

"Hey, Marco, come here," Sofia ordered, and Marco obeyed. Their relationship hadn't gone back to how it was originally, but it was better. More open. Less suffocating. Marco didn't feel the need to keep hiding. What was the point, anyway? Sofia knew everything.

"What is it?" he questioned.

"Well, boy, I pulled some major favors and strings to get you that new life you always dreamed about," she smiled, sharp and warm.

"What?" he was dumbfounded, light headed, about to collapse. His knees were going weak. Sofia doesn't joke. She's Sofia. She just, doesn't do that.

"I even got you a personal examiner from COMSUBIN, just for you, boy," she was self-satisfied, grinning ear to ear. She was happy with what she'd done. She was happier for the boy shaking, about to cry, before her.

She was so, so, so happy for the boy she called Marco.

"I am Lal Mirch, and I will personally be overseeing your training." The woman stood tall and proud. She was a soldier. Kinda like Colonel, but not really. He was never a government soldier. She carried on, "What's your name?"

"It's… Marco," he hesitated. Lal raised a brow, unimpressed with the scrawny thing before her.

"Uh-huh. You don't seem too sure of your own name, Marco," she hissed. She wasn't very happy with her situation. She knew this foreigner pulled strings for her to be there. She knew what he did was illegal (she didn't care it was actually Sofia that did it. Illegal was illegal, for everyone involved).

"I'm sure of my own name," Marco protested, puffing his chest out. He thought long and hard about everything, and he had finally come to a conclusion regarding an important decision. "I can even spell it. Do you want me to spell it?"

Lal narrowed her eyes, but decided to entertain him. "Let's hear it."

"It's spelled like this: C-O-L-O-" he began.

"Huh?"

"-N-E-L-"

"What?"

"-L-O. That's how you spell it," he finished.

"EXCUSE ME?! Are you mocking me?!" Lal was furious. How dare this nobody waste her time.

"I spelled it out for you. Weren't you listening? Surely, you can spell, too. Say my name, Lal Mirch."

"Colonello? Hah! What kind of ridiculous name is that?" she had enough of this guy. But this guy looked way too serious to be joking around.

"It's a great name, and it's mine! What kind of ridiculous name is Lal Mirch?" Colonello shot back. Her face was worth the extra hours of training.

It was the beginning of a strange relationship. One that would last for many, many years. Colonello would always look over his shoulder, back at the mess behind him, but his feet would always point toward before him. He didn't have time to worry about the past. Not when the future couldn't wait for him.