Third came Chrome, the one that had allegedly not been brought in by Tsuna, but by Mukuro (prompting Ken to call their Sky 'contagious' in his urge to collect people; everybody laughed, although no one but Tsuna bothered denying it). Honestly, the biggest red flag in her case was exactly that: she had been chosen by Mukuro.
Apparently, she had some talent for Mist Flames and the older illusionist had found her, replaced all her missing organs with his Flames (Shoichi hadn't known that was possible and itched to study that in more detail. From how Verde stared, so did he) and took her in as his apprentice. Besides that, Chrome looked like a nice, shy girl that wouldn't make any waves.
The remaining four newcomers made something of a unit and it took Shoichi some time to unravel the various bonds between them. Haru was… Hayato's stalker? She looked at the Storm with hearts in her eyes and was quick to jump in his defense, but compared to Takeshi's disturbing intensity, her enthusiasm appeared quite refreshing.
(Hayato obviously didn't agree, but then again, he never shook her off quite as harshly as Shoichi knew he could. Either Tsuna had instructed him to go easy on the girl, or the Storm didn't hate her as much as he pretended to. Maybe both.)
Unless Shoichi had gotten it wrong, Hana and Kyoko were best friends, with Haru as a more recent addition to their circle, and Ryohei was Kyoko's brother. His fellow Sun appeared a bit (a lot) overbearing at first glance, especially with the tiny sparks flying from his shadow-boxing fists when he grew too excited, but all of Shoichi's reserves vanished the moment he saw him interact with the younger members.
Nobody who could look at Fuuta, I-pin and Lambo with such tenderness, who could talk with I-pin about martial arts so passionately, patiently wait by Fuuta as he rambled about his rankings or be attentive to Lambo's bragging, nobody who could do all that could be bad.
No wonder Tsuna's Flames had snagged him up so quickly: they shared the exact same mothering tendencies, although they didn't quite express them in the same ways. Kyoko seemed to have some of those too, but more watered down, at least towards strangers. Maybe she'd warm up to their resident children after a while.
In contrast, the more Shoichi saw of Hana, the more he understood Kyoya's, Mukuro's and Hayato's blatant reservations towards her.
She struggled to fit in. Clearly, sociability was not her forte, more so with younger kids; Shoichi could pinpoint the exact moment she decided to keep her distances from I-pin, Lambo and Fuuta. Not that he saw a problem with that specifically – it was bound to happen in such a large and growing group as theirs. For instance, he himself tended not to mingle with Mukuro more than necessary, they just didn't click. It didn't mean they hated each other or couldn't work together, just that they didn't get along as well as they did with other members of Caeruleus.
Let's be honest for a second, the lynchpin, the one everybody revolved around and that tied them all together no matter their differences, the one that set the pace was undoubtedly Tsuna. Even Haru quickly started to take her cues from him, despite her infatuation with Hayato, as did Chrome, Chikusa and Ken who obviously followed Mukuro. Perhaps that was where the problem with Hana came from: she gravitated around Kyoko, not Tsuna, and she struggled to adapt to the others' tempo in consequence.
Hopefully she would find a place in the group soon and learn to dance to their beat. Hana had issues with people who were not Kyoko, but she visibly worked on those and made an effort to adapt; apart from that, she was smart and less prone to shenanigans than the rest of them. Shoichi would hate to see such an asset and potential ally leave because she couldn't fit in.
Chapter 36: that learned of the ranking planet
Magsimula sa umpisa
