My Little Sister

Tsuna and Ryuji ran down the beach laughing as more and more sand got between their toes. The scorching sun beamed down on them, probably giving them sunburns throughout the day but they didn’t care, since the two were having too much fun playing tag. Tsuna was cleverly dashing in and out of the wet area to mess with the consistency of where Ryuji would have to tiredly pursue her

She had not been “it” for so long that she spun around back peddling just out of reach making various faces to her panting brother. While it was mostly for her own sake, she thought that if she didn’t let him gain once and while it would spell the end for the game so she chose to keep the tension of the chase.

Ryuji unleashed a barrage of attacks, Tsuna responding by flamboyantly dodging each bound that Ryuji attempted. With the sand shifting underneath her feet began to bury it slowly more and more with each pounce this extra resistance made her slowly lose balance. So to keep herself up between the deep dodges she executed she reached down to use her hand to fasten herself then kicking off.

It seemed hopeless for him, all those years of being stuck behind a desk must have been catching up with him until he saw the pattern. Just as every time before she dipped below his hand. Ryuji quickly responded by pivoting his body as he quickly dropped his knee pressing her against the hot sand. While he tried to sound cool it kinda failed because each word was being broken up by the sound of him heavily wheezing concerning Tsuna of his health,

“You, know, you, might be more, huuuh, more, athletic than me, but I got brains over, you.”

Tsuna smiled saying as she raised her eyebrow,

“Yeah, yeah, you win grandpa, just try not to roll over on me okay?”

The two stared at each other for a moment before the realization of how long he had spent chasing her struck him,

“I know I won and all, but fuck does your shit-eating grin make me feel like a lost.”

Tsuna laughed as Ryuji loosed his knee from her back, allowing her to get up as she said,

“You're just lucky I wanted you to push me against the sand.”

Ryuji’s disgruntled face began to worsen, then fade as he leaned in to give her a small peck on the cheek. He said as he took her hand,

“You promised you would focus after we played a little so let's just focus on finding this supposed treasure, ok?”

Ryuji reached into his back pocket and unfolded the map, taking a moment to straighten it by lightly pulling on the ends.

“It should be somewhere around here, if the terrain hasn’t changed too much in however many years it's been since it was written then we should be on top of it.”

Tsuna smacked his hand to make him loosen his grip before yoinking the map away.

“Oh, come on Ryuji where is your sense of wonder, your whimsey? Plus it's laminated so it couldn’t have been too long since it was buried.”

Ryuji quickly grabbed her head and ruffled her hair retorting as he did,

“We bought it from a damn pawn shop, you know even if it did go somewhere at some point it’ll be gone.”

Tsuna turned back as she leaned forward, her shirt parting from her body just enough he could see her black two-piece swimsuit. It had a yellow daisy pattern and newly tanned skin from the sun seemed to stop just as it went under her clothes, making tan lines. He hadn’t even noticed how he had walked past her before his foot got caught on something, causing him to tumble onto the sand. He looked up aggravated, ready to say something until he heard his sister's voice yell,

“Ooooo a treasure chest, suck it Ryuji! I told you it wouldn’t be gone!”

Tsuna saw the corner of something that had appeared to be wooden. Its golden edges reflecting the sun's rays straight into Ryuji’s eyes as punishment for his earlier leering.

“FUCK OFF GOD!!”

Tsuna laughed to herself as she dug out the sand from around it with her hands.

“Ryuji, god doesn’t care enough about you to blind you for staring at my chest again. If he did it every time I saw you leering at me then you would need a second pair of glasses by now.”

She uncovered the top rather quickly, the wood being abundantly clear in just a few seconds of digging but as she moved to dig out the perimeter she saw something hill-like peeking out of the grains. Digging further she saw flesh like stubs protruding out of the chest. The sand around it was a shade of dark, dried-out crimson that bled its way into the wood of what they once thought was a chest. Tsuna stared in horror as the world began to deafen around her. Darkness crept around her eyes as her vision sank into this tunnel and this intense feeling of claustrophobia began to fill her body. Her breath quickened as her heart clenched from inside her ribcage. All was so entrapping, so suffocating. Tears began to well up in her eyes before being thrown aside landing face first into the sand, the grains around her impact flying in all directions. Ryuji’s voice pounded through the tension in her heart.

“Oh, my god it's a mimic!”

Ryuji began to grab and yank the mimic out in one thrust. The bloody sand attaching itself to the limbs, making these horrific strings of sand that dangled from it. He caressed the dried beaten corpse, the bones protruding out of it’s joints. The texture of it had felt slightly buoyant but the moment he pinched, it had flaked into a fine dust resting in his hand.

“Wow, it breaks in your hand at the slightest bit of pressure. Tsuna, come check this out!”

Ryuji turned back to see his sister cowering so he turned back pretending not to see as he grabbed the two edges of the mimic’s mouth, prying it open before grasping at its teeth to yank it open even further.

“And all of the teeth are lining the outside of the chest, ooo do you think it keeps the number of teeth between transformations?

Ryuji picked up the tongue resting it on top of his head, the spit pressed into his back and left his hair drenched as he did. He carefully looked underneath it onto the floor.

“It’s still wet enough to not shatter with a touch, must be because the sand didn’t make its way into its mouth.”

Ryuji put his full head in it, turning around excitedly.

“There are even wedges on the top. I wonder why the roof mimics a human mouth. I wonder where the stomach is, ooo must be under the tongue.”

Ryuji lifted the tongue, putting it onto the side of the mouth before it pulled itself back into place, into the position it had been resting for ages now. In a moment of annoyance Ryuji pulled it back out and pressed it into the bottom layer of teeth, impaling it on them so it would stay in place as he did his little quirky quest. Revealing a red diamond with a pirate's crest chiseled into it.

“A mimic and a pirate chest in one day, holy shit Tsuna you checking this out?”

Ryuji excitedly looked at Tsuna like a far too excited puppy, only to see her groveling in the sand rather than at the mimic. He looked at her and back to the mimic, trying to decide if he wanted to keep playing with the dead thing or if he should help his terrified wife. After way more deliberation than was reasonable honestly, the sun reflecting off of their wedding ring into his eyes finally forced him to help her. He took the gem and put it in his shirt's front pocket before he fully stepped away though.

“Sis are you alright? I know I pushed you over but the sand should have cushioned the fall somewhat.”

Tsuna tried speaking but each word simply stumbled as it escaped her mouth. She looked up at Ryuji as he saw a cold shade spread through her face. He couldn’t help but smile as he saw his wife be terrified. Ryuji grabbed her shoulders, pressing himself onto her, embracing her; Trying his best to sap away this moment’s terror so he firmly held her shoulders as he said,

“I love you Tsuna.”

Though her expression didn’t change so to do what he could Ryuji pulled away to stare into his sister’s eyes as he saw them slowly dilate. She looked around but oddly enough she stared at his clothes instead of his face. It must have been the issue of coming back to consciousness. He could tell Tsuna was coming back to her senses by the warm colors that began to flush her face. Her face began to slowly grow more and more excited before she put his hands on him, pushing him down of course, and straddling him as she pulled the ruby hanging out of his patch pocket.

“When did we get this beautiful rock?! Oh Ryuji, how much do you think we could sell this for? Actually… how about this, we’ll start off by shattering it then adding some accents to our wedding rings. Theeeeeen, we’ll sell off the rest! No more dingey inns, no more waiting for retirement funds, or payments from dad. Just, pure, fun!”

Ryuji clawed his way out of the sand to see his sister caressing the gem with more love and care than certain parts of his body had ever experienced. The gem pulsated for a moment as rays coming out of it like a disco ball straight into the ground. Though she saw his eyes wander back to the mimic so she quickly moved over to the chest, Ryuji hopelessly watched as she trampled on his hopes and dreams till there was no more, he simply cried in horror as the sound of cracking and squelching filled the air. She looked up trying not to look at the gore she was causing, she just imagined it was stepping on grapes as Ryuji’s hopes were crushed beneath his wife’s feet.

He broke into tears as he tried and failed to grasp at the blood-soaked sand, it simply slipped through his fingers and disintegrated back into the beach. Just as he thought all hope for the supernatural was lost he felt a cold hand through his shirt grab his shoulder. Ryuji’s eyes shot behind him to see not just one but a group of skeletons, all dressed in various manners of pirate garb; He nearly immediately pounced on the one that had touched his shoulder, rubbing his teary eyes on its ribcage wedging his glasses between the ridges.

“You’re back mimic! I thought I lost you!”

Ryuji’s eyes went up to meet eye to eye socket with the band of skeletons. Once he stood up he turned around to Tsuna excitedly.

“REAL LIVING SKELETONS!!!”

Ryuji gripped the skeleton’s waist, fastened it to his chest and slammed it down into the sand. Rubbing his face into the tough and dry ribs of a random person he had never met. He was having the time of his life until he looked to the side seeing his wife tapping her foot with her arms crossed as she watched this. Her scowl poured through the open air letting this thick aura infect his heart and filling him with the dread of death. She spoke, belting each word at him unrelentingly,

“You want a room? Cause just know if you continue you won’t be getting in the same bed as me again if you keep acting like that. So ask yourself, is this how you should treat your wife, or even sister for that matter? You know I get scared easily and what do you do to help me? You push me in the sand, ignore me, and force yourself on something as I watch? How disgusting.”

Ryuji turned to Tsuna, eyes slightly watering, pushing away the skeleton and not even wanting to look back as he crawled his way back to his wife. Going on top of her as he dug his hands into the sand to embrace her. He pouted as he buried his face in the side of her shirt,

“You always go and ruin my fun.”

Tsuna, sounding a little annoyed, responded,

“If you meant that I would kick your ass so hard you couldn’t walk.”

The skeletons had already swarmed around them seemingly using the time for their idle talk, slowly closing the circle they were enveloped in. luckily, there was a parting in the hoard revealing two figures one being comically shorter than the other. Even using her head to carry his various amenities and holding it all together was the hat that she wore acting as a bowl. He got a cone out of her hat as he said pridefully looking down at the two siblings.

“I am the captain of the Winess Pirates, tell me what age we are in and the laws you abide.”

The shorter one piped up, spinning around then striking a pose, whipping her voice to say in a prideful display,

“And me the co-captain.”

Ryuji walked up to the one who named himself the captain and stuck his hand out for what should have been a handshake. Like a surgeon cutting through the skin of a patient, he emotionlessly yanked the ulna straight out of socket as he took it for himself before he demanded not bothering to glare at them,

“Now move it.”

The captain's jaw loosened in shock before it dropped harshly onto the course sand. The girl quickly grabbing the jaw from the ground and pushed it back in place as she responded angrily,

“Show some respect! Haven’t you heard our names before? The Winess Pirates known to have sailed every sea this world has ever known and more even beyond that, we’ve pillaged every coast, taken what we desired, for we alone have the strength necessary to carve out true freedom for this world!”

Tsuna smiled as she bended over to grab the girl, holding them up in the air. All the skeletons quickly jumped into action. Though they all stopped in their tracks when the captain raised his right hand. The girl watching this unfold now knowing that no help was coming for her, Tsuna spoke ignoring her surroundings,

“Wait, was that actually you guys? Didn’t you guys disappear out of the blue after stealing from the king of Britain Sweyn Forkbeard?”

The many skeletons had knelt down digging their hands in the sand, pulling various weapons out of the sand. Each had been corroding, rusted and it seemed that if they attempted to use them they would flake away with a simple swing. Before the captain sighed putting his bony hand on his chin and cracking it in place before letting out in an almost sorrowful voice,

“Calm down pirates, it's probably a new age so things like manners might be different in this time.”

He looked at Ryuji holding his hand thinking about his last conscious day, the fame and glory he thought he would have. Now not even being able to see out of anything but an eye socket watching his arm be ripped away from him. His voice became quieter and more quaint as he said,

“So on a more important note, it seems as if these people simply don’t know us.”

The co-captain pushed Ryuji to the ground grabbing the captains arm from his hands throwing it at him, pressing down on his back as she pointed at Ryuji and yelled at the captain,

“That's just not true! One of them seems to know us, were you even listening? There is a chance that just one of them maybe it's just one of them who is stupid! There are always a few people out of the know so don’t think too hard about it captain!”

She turned to Tsuna, leaning forward in desperation but she didn’t add to it. So she gestured for her to speak and all Tsuna could do was look to the ground. Left speechless the co-captain demanded, screamingly helplessly at her,

“Tell him that the world still remembers us! Tell me we changed it!”

Tsuna smiled half-heartedly trying to think of something to say before kneeling down next to Ryuji and moving to help him stand as she let out in this pitiful, sorrowful tone,

“I don’t know, how to tell you this, so here is what you want to know. No, unfortunately nothing changed by all your efforts. Most people are exactly like my brother. Simply unaware of your existence, you have been forgotten.”

The girl choked up as she turned to the captain, gripping at where her cheeks would be clawing at herself. The captain walked by putting her hands to her side nodding. His stride being slow and methodical, there being a distinct hollow sway to his movements. But he had already been walking toward the crew so he had to take the blunt of it like any good captain would.

Their sorry skulls were pointed to the sand, the substance that was their resting place not so long ago. They formed a circle around him as he stepped to the center of the many bony figures. His own perpetual grin turned skyward as he screeched out into the clouds in this tone of pure defeat,,

“YOU HEARD HER CREW! WE DIDN’T CHANGE ANYTHING, LAW, ORDER, SOCIETY! ABSOLUTELY NOTHING CHANGED! BUT FREEDOM IS NOT IN WHAT YOU CREATE, IT’S IN WHAT YOU DO!”

Their captain turned around to look at his once fellow great seafarers crying to the stars,

“SO, WHAT WE WILL DO?”

The crew muttered among themselves without any loud response back. It quickly began to get louder as a fight began to break out amongst themselves. Before the co-captain came in between them yelling back to him,

“I DON’T KNOW CAPTAIN, WHAT WILL WE DO?”

Ryuji watched this and despite it only being a dried shell of a human he felt like he could still see tears welling down his cheek bones. Though his stance showed the pride of a leader who had won countless battles. The husk of the former leader rallied his fallen troops.

“WHEN YOU CAN’T DO ANYTHING YOU DO WHAT YOU CAN! SO TONIGHT, WE WILL PARTY TILL OUR SOULS GET TAKEN BY THE REAPER HIMSELF COME MORNING!”

Their weapons all begin to drop from their hands one by one before they break into a hardy, soul-shattering, cheer and begin to dig into the sand, pulling up barrels and cracking them open to reveal wine so aged it was as red as the ruby that had reawoken them.

They drank and partied all night as Tsuna and Ryuji joined, sitting to the side, leaning on one of the several already finished barrels. None of them could actually drink it but for good times they all acted like they could. The sand being stained a beautiful red that would last for centuries to come. Ryuji smiled shaking his head as he laughed to himself,

“How much more is going to happen today? Going from no supernatural stuff to all this is cool and all but it’s way more tiring than I could have ever expected.”

Tsuna smiled, leaning on the barrel so much she slid off of it and her head fell into Ryuji’s lap.

“Maybe if you didn’t go all analytical on them then it might have been less tiring. You're lucky that these are good pirates and not ones that would kill you for insolence or something. And on that note I can’t believe you thought about the supernatural so much that you already thought about how tiring it would be to encounter. God, you know you’re weird, right big bro?”

Ryuji chuckled as he looked down and caressed her face.

“I’d like to think it's why you married me.”

The two stayed there in that picture-perfect for only a second or two, feeling the emotion of it before Ryuji leaned down and shifted her hair up so he could lovingly kiss her forehead.

The captain came from behind leaning the barrel down to hit Ryuji’s head. He looked around frantically to see if anyone else saw them kissing wondering if they knew they were siblings or not. His careless deminer finally catching up with him feeling as if it had finally caught up to him. Maybe he didn’t see them kissing but that hope faded after he said,

“You love birds gonna come back to the party?”

Ryuji panicked, looking up and blushing as he sputtered,

“How much of that did you see?”

Tsuna and the captain’s eyes met before she looked back at her brother and grabbed his chin to make out with him. Ryuji pushed her off frantically while he frantically whispered into her face,

“Hey get off! Tsuna we don’t know how much he heard of that, can you save that for later?”

The captain let out a hardy laugh before saying,

“I like your sister Ryuji. She’s got a really good sense of humor.”

Ryuji looked to Tsuna who was bolstering a smug smile then back to the captain as they both broke into laughter before she spoke,

“Don’t worry big bro, that co-captain is actually his sister and lover too.”

Her big brother grabbed the barrel and let it fall gently on Tsuna. She tried to push it off of herself but Ryuji kept it firmly pressed over her, watching as she struggled.

“Not so easy to not be in on the joke now is it?”

Tsuna flailed her arms around while begging,

“Sorry sorry sorry sorry sorry sorry!”

Ryuji finally let up as the captain joined them on the other side of the barrel, the co-captain sliding in drunk but she quickly faded out of consciousness after talking to Tsuna haphazardly.

He decided to go easy on her, taking it off of her as she cuddled up next to him, saying as she reached out to the impossible to reach rock in the sky,

“You know, without these pirates we might of not have gotten married.”

Ryuji smiled caressing her cheek as he asked,

“How does that correlate?”

“Well before you asked if we could even date in the first place I had decided to go and check history to see how that panned out. It's more common than you would think but it seemed that each story ended in tragedy. All recorded that weren't nobles at least. The Winness pirates simply disappeared one day so I always thought it would have been nice if they could have lived a happy life together but.”

Tsuna grasped at the moon as her arm fell limply.

“Considering today I don’t think they did.”

Ryuji paused for a moment asking,

“Does that change our love at all?”

Tsuna raised up to give a peck on Ryuji’s lips smiling at him.

“No, maybe at the beginning it would have, but the thing is as long as I can stay in your arms I know that our story would never end up being a tragedy.”

Ryuji and the captain spoke on things for quite a while and he was so human. It put him off, seeing someone that is supposedly from something of legend felt like he should have been talking down on him but no. They just talked about the differences in time. Before the captain said,

“You know Ryuji, I think everyone thinks they're special while they're living. Everyone thinks of changing the world on some level and truly thinks they can do it, but I don’t think you ever really learn the scope of the world even through death. Maybe we live thinking we are special just for death to come along as the confirmation that we’re not.”

The skull looked to the moon before looking at Ryuji, his eye sockets seeming more empty than before.

“What a cruel fucking world.”

Ryuji nodded, trying to understand what he said and the various implications that came with it. He never quite understood why people cared about the outside world so much and the person standing before him was everything the mindset can make you turn out to be. Though weirdly despite knowing logically wanting to change the world is an idiots game he still dreamed of it. Wanting to make the world more interesting, so instead of talking logically as he would normally do in these conversations. He spoke from what his emotions wanted as he diverted his stare to the moon then responding,

“Is that cruel? ‘Cause it means in life you always have hope; Even if it's hope that doesn’t have meaning, it still is hope. If you ask me, life isn’t cruel, it's just your situation is. Just think of the times before you died, you really believed that things would change. So during your life you were filled with grand purpose and you would have thought that way from the beyond.”

Ryuji looked back at the captain, and he could swear despite the empty eye sockets he saw him staring at the moon glistening in his eyes.

“Maybe it's something of the old adage that ignorance is bliss, and who knows, maybe ignorance isn’t such a bad thing.”

The captain spoke,

“Th-”

Ryuji punched him straight in the skull.

“Shut the fuck up and go enjoy the rest of your life, you only got until morning after all.”

The captain got up and nodded, shaking his sister awake before joining his crew in their bliss. Singing songs, getting into fights, and drinking; Hoping that this freedom would last them till they lost consciousness and the sun's rays hit their bones.

The next morning Ryuji and Tsuna went to a diamond store to cut the ruby so that it could engrave their wedding rings to help remind them of the captain who wished to never be forgotten.