Hunter Works
By: Yomi
CHAPTER 23
Disclaimer: Hunter x Hunter is copyrighted by Yoshihiro Togashi, Shounen Jump Weekly, Shueisha and Nippon Animation
Chapter 23 - He's giving himself away
Wednesday, Lobby, Hunter Works
Killua was still rubbing his naked arms that were pimpled with goosebumps, wishing that he had bought a long sleeved top despite the sunny weather, after having filmed Illumi's first real scene in Hunter x Hunter. Beside him, Hanzo reached down and ran his hand through his white hair, an affectionate gesture, but unwelcome nonetheless.
The goosebumps wouldn't go away no matter how much heat he was able to generate with the friction. He gritted his teeth and successfully warded off a shiver.
"Was it really that bad?" Hanzo leaned down and asked, his whisper causing Killua's heckles to rise. The child's expression paled and he quailed on the spot.
"What do you think?" he wanted to growl, but his voice was mute, stolen away by his wretched cowardice. The lump lodged in his throat did not help either. "How did it look from your point of view?" he managed to inquire politely.
Hanzo stroked his chin, and his eyes, twinkling with mischief, rolled up in thought. He gave a small hum as accompaniment and bit his lip when he arrived at an unfavourable answer. "I don't really know if it's wise to talk about it here."
"Everyone's still too damn busy getting changed for lunch. Do tell. I want to know what other people thought."
"You really want to know?"
"Yes!" In part, Killua's frustration was spurred on by what he perceived as a teasing answer to a perfectly technical and professional question about Illumi's acting standards. The fact that Hanzo shrouded himself in secrecy and conspiracy over an inquiry so innocent made Killua want to pinch Hanzo's cheeks. Hard.
"Promise you won't tell anyone who could endanger my career and or future prospects?"
"Promise!" Killua expelled in exasperation and was already on his tiptoes to capture a sizeable amount of fleshy cheek between his thumb and forefinger but Hanzo was quicker and grabbed him by the upper arm, painfully near the armpit, and dragged him towards the exit. The ninja did not dare to speak until they had passed beyond the rotating glass doors and were out in the open and the sun. Surveying his surroundings once more with eyeballs that were on the verge of popping out of their sockets, Hanzo had to deem that those who were innocently strolling by were indeed innocent before he would continue.
"He didn't look like he was acting."
Killua blinked. "Come again?"
The bald ninja wiped cold perspiration from his forehead and bent down lower as if he feared he could be overheard by invisible specters.
"He really looked like he was going to kill you back there. I swear it. Couldn't you hear the deadness in his voice or see the lackluster in his eyes?"
"That's what we call 'really good acting'," Killua said, rolling his eyes. "Maybe big bro is a better actor than we thought."
"Yes," Hanzo said gravely, "perhaps he's a better actor than we all thought indeed."
The insinuations ticked Killua off and he creased his forehead the way his dad would when the actors were restless and treated their instructions with careless indifference. The shooting had been successfully quick today, but Killua did not experience the usual elation of finishing a session early, where there was time enough to spare and throw a football in the park before lunch. His scene today, the confrontation with Illumi in the last trials of the Hunter Exam, unsettled him more than he'd like to admit and his co-actors implications did nothing other than to confirm his insecurities. And he feared that others could see the fear on his face.
Earlier that morning, he had noticed that Menchi was literally drooling before the sessions began. Killua knew what was on her mind and wouldn't mind betting his week's pocket money that everyone also caught onto Menchi's wavelength. She doubtlessly thought she was to be presented with Illumi's greatest humiliation ever, as he was entrusted with a long, intense scene, a dramatic monologue, when he had not an ounce of acting experience. She almost had the confetti out to celebrate his failure. And let's not forget her daily strutting in her tartish, revealing number, notably so in front of Hisoka.
But as most of the Genei Ryodan, who were sitting in the shadows of the studio and intently watching, noticed, Illumi performed his scene with the faultlessness of a blade straight from the fires of the forge. Kikyou could have trained him with his lines, but knowing Illumi's solitary preferences, it was more likely that he had abnormal powers of observation and learnt a lot in the two months where he watched them all act, or he was an undiscovered talent, a diamond in the rough.
People like Menchi and Neon were disappointed with the display, of course, even if they were not the ones personally shamed in any way other than having their expectations dashed, but Killua thought Hanzo of all people would not indulge in their types of gossips. He thought the ninja stood on Kuroro's side and exerted their efforts to sway everyone's opinion from animosity to neutrality when it came to the Zoldick big brother.
"Now what are you implying?"
Hanzo absorbed Killua's dangerous tone without taking offence. "It makes me wonder, if he's such a good actor and all, whether he may be acting around us or not. It's been two, three months now, Killua, and he could have been manipulating us like puppets. God knows Hisoka fell for it in the first days before he came to his senses, maybe he's been jerking with us too."
"You're jumping the gun there," Killua said quietly.
Impervious to the silent warnings, Hanzo was determined to say what he needed to say. "You think? Maybe I'm a little too excited by conspiracy theories, but it wouldn't do you harm to keep your eyes peeled open a bit more."
"He's going to be my real step-brother soon. I'm not going to suspect anyone," Killua replied and crossed his arms, just like his father would, indicating that the subject of discussion was at an end. Hanzo sighed, in that patronizing manner which served to irk you more than it helped to let the subject go.
"Well what do you want me to do about it?" Killua snapped.
"I've been hearing some strange things," Hanzo murmured, raising his eyebrows meaningfully.
"Gossip? You want me to trust gossip now? Gossip over a family member?"
Hanzo looked sideways again, and glared profusely at a couple pushing a pram past on the street and wouldn't relent until they were clearly out of earshot. "Is it still gossip if it comes from one of the members of Hunter Works?"
"Who's been talking? I wouldn't trust Menchi's words as far as I could chuck a pregnant cow. Goodness Hanzo, you're supposed to be an intelligent man!"
This time, Hanzo checked the rotating glass doors to make sure no one else had left the building yet. "Machi."
"Oh? And what did she have to say?"
"Do you know who Machi's sister is?"
Killua launched a swift kick at Hanzo's shins, but the latter, with his lightening quick reflexes, jumped back and evaded the blow. There was a stunned expression plastered on his face.
"You talk in circles, enigmas and riddles one more time, and I will bite you," Killua said, then bared his fangs to let Hanzo know just how sharp and deadly his incisors were, and the type of wound they were capable of inflicting. The older man gulped and held his arms rigidly by his side as he broke into a recitation of all the facts he knew.
"I heard Machi talking outside the ladies change rooms at Toguro's Gym last night. She said that her sister had left Northside and has decided to be a good girl again. The name of Leona Bluesummers might mean nothing to you, but she was the girlfriend of Hisoka's cousin, Iori Yagami."
Killua was impatiently tapping his foot on the ground with a flat, expectant look in his narrowed eyes. "I'm waiting for the bit where 'Illumi' becomes relevant."
"I'm getting to that. Would it make you jump out of your skin if you heard Leona say that she saw Illumi in Northside?"
That certainly captured Killua's full attention. "Big bro, in Northside? You're kidding. Why?"
"The 'why' is a good question indeed. But what if you also knew that Iori Yagami has become a degenerate, insane and vile creature in the form of man? I hear they say that Iori has acquired some pretty vile habits and interests."
Killua clicked his fingers at the revelation. "You mean I should be asking why big bro is even meeting up with these horrible kinds of people!"
"Not so loud!" Hanzo gasped, bending down as if he would go unnoticed that way, and his eyes were darting around like pinballs in a frenzied game of pinball again. "Keep your voice down! This involves Hisoka's baby cousin. I don't want to get on Hisoka's bad side."
But Killua was beyond listening to the older man, his reason and rationality swept away by the new discovery. "So my brother is not only going into the murkiest, seediest place in all Anime City, but he's also going in there to meet the most despicable man."
To Hanzo's surprise, there was not a note of horror in Killua's voice but the dawn of wonder and awe on his young countenance, not to mention abhorrent amounts of respect. Killua continued:
"He looks as frail as a woman, has a voice softer and sweeter than my household maids, and he's going into Northside to conduct transactions with dangerous lunatics! Hanzo, I have the most awesome brother in all Anime City."
Hanzo shuddered and squinted, then furiously rubbed his eyes hoping that he was seeing wrong. "You're….not upset or afraid?"
"Why the hell should I be?"
"Because your brother is an unreadable man!"
Killua viciously grinned, fully revealing the wickedness in his character. "All the better. Dad says that the surest way to survive in this world is if people cannot read you to anticipate your moves. Can you read my dad?"
"The Director? I dare not!"
The grin broadened and a giggle escaped. "Exactly. Bro will therefore make a very successful businessman, make Hunter Works ten times better than it is, and I wish him all the luck in the world."
Hanzo now massaged the sides of his aching temples, and he held up his other free hand in a sign of surrender. "Hold on, hold on. Aren't you afraid that Illumi could be deceiving you too?"
It never ceased to amaze the ninja the clarity and confidence in Killua's ringing laughter. The young child threw back his head and released his mirth and amusement in ragged cackles which made the older man feel embarrassed. He knitted his brows and pulled the director's son into a less conspicuous corner of the building, near some overgrown hedges, and peered straight into his face.
"Why should he?" Killua managed to say through trembling lips, in between his hoots of merriment, "I mean, what does he have to gain by being nice to me? He doesn't care for acting as in he has no long-term career planned in the industry. He's obsessed with his dolls and his clothes. He doesn't seem to need to rely on the Zoldick finances so much as he needs the publicity and acceptance within the social circles. I don't belong to the adult circles, so I have absolutely nothing that he wants."
"And his contact with Valerie? Does that not frighten you?"
The mentioning of her name immediately prompted Killua to correct Hanzo by muttering "Lady Valerie. What about big bro's business with her?"
"It's not good business," the ninja replied bluntly, for once, "she is no good business. Stay away from her and never let anyone ever see you speaking to her if you can."
"Why, I sat down with her only on the weekend."
Hanzo studied him with grave concern. "Yes, I know. News by my network travels faster than fire on a dry grass plain. As a friendly co-actor to another, I'm not going to tell you want to do, only suggest that you don't ever let it happen again. Valerie has just been implicated in Iori's downfall."
"Lady Valerie," Killua corrected again, and his irritation marred his adorable frown. "I swear you grown ups are becoming more and more terrified of your own shadows these days. I guess if you couldn't attack feminists and strong women, your days would be very boring."
"Attack feminists? What on earth are you talking about?"
Killua presented Hanzo with his most nonchalant air. "This is what it's all about, isn't it? Who better to pick on than a woman standing up against all you men? You guys probably see it as a sport."
Hanzo was ghostly pale in outrage. "I beg your pardon?"
"It's the same situation with my bro," the child continued, indifferent to the older man's anger. "He was different; he didn't fit into the mould; he had long hair. So you guys all picked on him for a month or so, and then when he didn't retaliate, you guys lost interest in him, well, except for Menchi and her sister, but she's strange, so now you busy yourselves by picking on someone new."
"No Killua, I'm serious. Nothing around Valerie is any good – her husband fully controls Salar like a puppet, as in Kaéry's uncle who is five times smarter than the Prince himself. Doesn't it frighten you someone could control, no, dominate, a person like that so totally?"
"It's really not my business. Salar is Kay's uncle, not my relative, so whether he's being whipped like a slave is the least of my concerns. Take some advice from me, Hanzo: the world is such a better place when you don't indulge in stupid gossip."
There was a short moment of silence where Hanzo groped for the right words a twelve year old with an adult's intelligence but a child's mind would understand. He looked at Killua gravely and sighed. "Your father didn't make it to where he is today by ignoring gossip. Information is invaluable, knowledge is priceless. I stand here now, as you friend, and I am going to give you the best advice in your life because I like you. If that means offending the President of Hunter Works, I'm still going to tell you."
"Geezus Hanzo, are these your famous last words? This serious gig doesn't suit you."
Killua's detracting comments were ignored as if they had never been uttered. Hanzo looked twenty years older when his brows were flat and lowered and his lips a sombre, humourless line.
"This is not about being bored and collective bullying. This isn't about chopping the tall poppies and the green eyes of jealousy. This is about your brother, who no one really knows, developing business connections and other unspoken collateral with a woman everyone would like to see dead. Your brilliant actor of a brother, who changes masks with the fluidity and perfection of a cyborg, is willing to degrade himself to sit on the same table with someone who has the power to push the almighty Salar around like a rag doll.
I love you kid. You may be a pesk and the unofficial prince of Brats, the purveyor of troubles, the kid with a forked tongue, but I love you like I love all the other actors and I would never want to see you hurt. Learn to be afraid, learn to ask questions, learn not to believe that what you see is what you get. You have a brother who looks like a woman, can cry like a girl but is able to deliver threats that will make hardened criminals wet their pants and run to mommy. I don't want anything to happen to you."
Usually, Killua's teflon-coated confidence could repulse anything that he didn't want to hear. Damn Hanzo this time. Damn him and his pesky serious tone and sincerity. Shaken and unwilling to admit it, he blinked hard several times and chewed on his bottom lip.
"I've heard," Hanzo continued in even lower voice that Killua could have been justified in thinking that it was his delirious imagination, "that everyone is mobilizing. Something happened and everyone is studying their own shadows to make sure it's really their own. I knew Salar's return with Vallanor's badge on his lapel was going to be an ill omen. Think about it, Killua. Salar gives a flat to Illumi ostensibly because of a soft-toy. Valerie is rumoured to have instigated Iori Yagami's demise. Valerie's husband has Salar at his beck and call. Illumi is seen with Valerie. Illumi is also seen in Northside. Use that brilliant mind of yours, Killua. Is this really coincidence?"
Killua scratched his chin and found his eyes trying to catch hold of the shadows lingering at the edge of his vision. He switched to sucking on his upper lip as he squeezed his eyes shut and urged his brain to go into overdrive. "You are suggesting that Illumi is a part of Vallanor?"
"You're the one closest to him. I hope you'll be able to find out."
Hanzo abruptly left him and disappeared around the corner of the building. Astonished at first, Killua understood as the bulk of the actors steadily ambled out into the open in a rumble of murmurs and general chit chat.
Out of reflex, a smile was chiseled onto his face and he jogged to join up with Gon. When he reached the younger boy, he took his hand and dragged him from the crowd. Gon sought to keep up with him using clumsy footwork, almost tripping over and knocking Killua to the ground, but Killua's urgency gave him enough momentum to fight out of the fall and into a stumble.
"Killua! What's the rush!"
"Shut up!" Killua grated, his hand around Gon's remorselessly tightening down, "I'm thinking."
"Well do you need to rip my arm off to think?"
Out of the public's earshot, their backs pressed close to the wall of a desolate studio of Hunter Works, both boys waited till their lungs had stopped aching before Killua let go of Gon, or rather, Gon reclaimed his hand by yanking it back.
He nursed his wrist, grimacing at the pinkish red lines, then glared at his friend. "Will you tell me what's going on?"
"What did you think of the shoot today?"
The glare vanished. "I thought it was great. I didn't know Illumi could hold up under the pressure. And – "
"And?" Killua eagerly pressed, gripping Gon's shoulders, pinning the younger boy against the wall in what would otherwise be a highly suggestive move.
"And Hisoka is about to declare his love for Machi!"
"The fuck?"
Gon spun Killua around until he was facing the direction of the damning scenario. Both simultaneously gasped and felt their jaws dislocating.
Killua reacted first and hauled Gon back into the shadow of the building, clapping a hand over the latter's mouth at the same time to prevent the wheezing noises of hyperventilation from reaching Hisoka's sensitive ears. Naturally, Gon fought against the restraints, and when freed from the clutches of his friend, was forced down on his hands and knees from the pressure Killua exerted on his back, both straining to catch those elusive words.
Hisoka was positioned twenty paces away from Machi. They appraised each other's resolve with their steady and cool looks. A breeze momentarily lifted Machi's bushy hair, which then settled down, flayed about her shoulders and bobbed in anticipation. An annoyed flicker with her finger broke the standoff and she breathed out visibly, then crossed her arms.
She was expecting an answer.
Hisoka's aghast expression tried to convey that his answer was bleeding obvious.
Yet Machi showed no signs of budging. Hisoka had to either spit it out, or she'd stare him down onto his knees with her piercing golden glare like she'd done so many times in the past to ward off unwanted attraction from other men.
It was a chilling glare.
Hisoka's defeat was signalled by the slump in his shoulders and the exasperated whine. "It's classical music!" he protested, as if that simple comment was supposed to justify everything.
Uncompromising, Machi's eyebrow archly lifted and she sniffed. "And?"
Hisoka rolled his eyes and clasped his hands together in pleading. "It's classical music. It's boring. It's boring. It's boring. What else needs to be said?"
"I am not going alone."
The whining increased in volume and ascended in pitch. "Why don't you go with Legato?"
"He said it was boring, boring, boring."
"So why me?"
"That's for you to gnaw on in your spare time. I am not going to the concerts alone. You're coming with me and that's that. Make sure you're free on Friday night two weeks from now. I'll come and – "
Machi was cut off by the suspicious sounds of scuffling and heavy breathing. Hisoka leapt from his stationary position, like a cheetah who had caught a whiff of his prey, towards the direction of the noise. Machi followed, and both adults discovered two children wrestling and grunting. Evidently, they were vying for the best spot to spy on them and fell into infighting, only to give themselves away.
Hisoka pulled the fighting boys apart by the back of their collars and dangled them up in the air, a particularly nasty grin on his face.
"Ok, how much did you hear, and how much of a beating will it take to get it out of your head?"
Threaten the Director's precious son, co-star of Hunter x Hunter? Had Hisoka finally snapped, or was the idea of people finding out that he was going to attend a series of classical concerts so humiliating that he was willing to put his career on the line?
Machi raised both eyebrows and quietly wondered whether her brother's scheme was such a brilliant plan after all. At the moment, it stood a greater chance of pushing Hisoka over the edge rather than into her arms.
"Knock it off," Killua scoffed, "you always think the world centers around you, shallow and self-obsessed idiot."
Gon's face turned a curious shade of green, which neither resembled lime green or olive green, and he redoubled his efforts in the struggles, coughing at irregular intervals.
"Then why were you two twisting and writhing on the ground? Practicing a scene for some illegal child pornography?"
"Keep your mind out of the gutters. We were fighting because Gon said some things I didn't like."
"I did?"
"He did?" Hisoka's unwavering stare showed that he wasn't convinced.
"Yeah. He called Illumi a freak and said he wasn't acting during the shoot."
Mentioning 'Illumi' had a dispelling effect – Hisoka's anxieties about being overheard were dispelled, Gon's strugglings stilled and Machi stopped thinking about the concerts. Killua gave himself magnanimous praise and continued to put Hanzo's words in Gon's mouth.
"He said that I should be afraid of Illumi and that there was bad gossip around him again. Gon says that Illumi has been doing a lot of illegal things."
Hisoka dropped the boys back onto the ground and stared at them hard. Not unlike Machi's glare, it had the withering effect and the boys felt stripped of their clothes around him. Involuntarily, Killua let slip more information than he intended.
Hisoka and intense seriousness was enough to jolt the sensibilities out of you.
Killua sighed and kicked the dirt on the ground, letting his dejection fly like the dust. "So I thought we should go to someone smart to help us dig some dirt. Then we can all set our little suspicious minds to rest about my brother."
Hisoka did his best to keep his voice neutral, but a quiver was detectable as was the raw harshness grating at the back of his throat. He looked every inch like the psychotic and unpredictable magician who slit people's throats and felt his face washed with their blood without a flinch. His was a face that you would look upon and make for the next horizon and the one beyond.
"And who were you going to see?"
Killua gulped. A veil, one that erased all colour from his vision, was pulled across his eyes as he recognized the grave he had dug for himself. The magician stood before him, resolute, determined to be involved in the matter. This was the man who had made headlines with Illumi on his brother's first days in town. This was the same man who had provoked the ungodly monster that took five men to restrain. And this was the man now taking stock of his options, the devious chess player designing his move and urging everyone to dance to his tune.
Illumi has connections with Lady Valerie.
Valeria has been implicated in Iori's downfall.
Iori Yagami is Hisoka's baby cousin.
Hisoka loves his baby cousin.
God help those who ruined Iori.
"The Prince."
Lola admitted that the visitors were an odd collection. Though Kaéry had as many adult friends as children from Saturday School, an unannounced visit in what was a quietly isolated week bought suspicion and welcome relief.
She tried to give her most friendly smile that didn't broadcast some ulterior motive. Still, Lola saw the children tremble. She patted their shoulders and steered them towards the living room. A brief nod was directed at Hisoka, and for Machi, the barely perceptible lift of the upper lip and a contemptuous drawl of "how nice to see you here, my dear." Apparently, the ill that Lola bore for Leona and her recent confessions had broadened to encompass the Bluesummers family members in general. In other circumstances, Machi could maintain her cool and deliver an equally pointed reply, but this was true Northsider. You lived longer if you kept your mouth shut and suffer the temporary humiliation.
The leather couch in the living room was cold. When Lola left the room to fetch the tea, Gon and Killua openly shivered at the chilled from the underside of their naked thighs as it contacted with the leather whilst Machi carefully kept her hands folded in her lap. Hisoka studied the unnaturally still surroundings with a puzzled glance and noted the top of the coffee table was coated in a thin layer of dust.
He accepted his cup and saucer from Lola, and tried to ask, being as unobtrusive as he could, "Is everything ok?"
The cup clattered in her hands but was deftly caught before its contents spilled onto the carpet and left an unremovable stain. She stuck out her tongue, fanning her hands furiously and threw Hisoka an apologetic look.
"Hot," she muttered, ripping tissue after tissue from the tissue box and mopped up the spilled liquid on the coffee table. "But it's funny you ask. What gave it away?"
"I never imagined a house where the Prince lived would ever be so quiet," Gon offered, recrossing his legs for the fifth time.
Lola blinked, secretly astounded by the accuracy and clarity of such a simple statement. She leaned back into the comfort of the pliant cushions and sighed.
"Saturday. Come Saturday, sanity will return and I can think clearly again."
"What's bothering you?" Killua asked, scratching his cheek. He saw Hisoka's eyes widen and Killua mentally slapped himself – bad question.
Lola ran her hand through her long black hair and snorted. "I'm having especially vivid dreams about chopping Valgarv into iddy biddy bits with a cleaver that has a dull edge. I get feelings akin to ecstasy when I fantasize about bitch slapping Filia for six hours straight. Then, to cool down, I move onto bashing Xelloss' rubber face into a brick wall for another six hours. Finally, I'd love to cause some general bloody mayhem and destruction in Northside, namely weeding some filth that has found root and is giving my brother a bad name. Don't tell Karasu. He doesn't need to know. I can still control myself."
They all regarded her with varying degrees of disbelief and had nothing to add.
The pupils of her eyes had shrunk down to the size of a pin point, and her grimly set jaw gave her a fearsome expression that she would eat you if you so much as breathed a little louder. Whatever she was picturing in her mind would easily score an x rating and involve three times as much blood and gore than a B grade 'House of the Dead' movie.
Silence suffocated all initiative to further dialogue as everyone feared that it would only induce more graphic and disturbing ravings from a woman who no one ever thought was truly stable.
"Kay's been a bit bored these past few days," Lola said after taking a large gulp of tea, ignoring the scalding sensations this time. "Xelan's not been allowed to come over. Usually, they'd be wreaking some chaos on the stock exchange at this time of day, or giggling about their conspiracies and games.
"So thank you for coming over to see him; company will keep his spirits up, until Saturday at least. I swear to gawd, if I hear him or see him cry, I am going to have to set fire to some houses."
The cup and saucer was replaced on the table with a forceful crash wherein hairline cracks appeared on the fine porcelain. Lola, oblivious, and most likely apathetic, to the damage caused, carelessly motioned for all to follow her up the stairs of the mansion and to Kaéry's room.
She rapped her knuckles on the door three times in staccato precision, regarding the painted white door as an obstinate bouncer who had to be negotiated with before you could pass into the splendours of the beyond. Apart from the whispers of air leaking from the four actors' nostrils, there was no response.
Lola knocked a little louder this time, but before the third strike could descend, the door opened a fraction and Kaéry's blue eyes peered at her, more innocent and adorable than a newborn kitten.
His mother forced the door wide open, revealing the Prince garbed in his wrinkled pyjamas and disheveled hair that had not come into contact with a comb for at least three days. He whinnied at his mother's intrusion and clung to her leg in a last ditch attempt to prevent her from going further into his room. Lola sighed and picked him up, planting a big kiss on his cheek.
"Your friends have come over to see you."
"Xe?" Kay peered past his mother's shoulder at the quartet of people who stood on the spot and fidgeted with their hands.
"You have friends other than Xe, you know. Go on, get dressed, brush your hair and entertain them."
"It's no big deal," Killua shakily forced out a laugh, "we just want to talk to Kay, that's all. Grooming is not a prerequisite."
"Aww Killua, you've got such a cute sense of humour," Lola uncharacteristically cooed, imitating other mothers who doted on Killua and would bend over and pinch his cheek. It bruised on this occasion, although he was sure it wasn't deliberate, and it occurred to him that Kaéry's mum was trying to crack a joke at her own expense. All right. He heard Hisoka's laugh and Lola brightened up, then stole a glance at her son to see if it had similar effects. Kay managed to pull his lips sideways, showning no teeth though, but desisted from slamming his door shut to the visitors. "Should I order some pizza from Luigi or anything?"
Gon nodded in enthusiasm. "We haven't had lunch."
Kaéry pushed his mother to the stairs and wiggled his fingers in good bye to urge his mother to return his privacy. Lola ruffled his messy hair once more before disappearing to the kitchens to make the call. Killua made himself count slowly to ten in his head before he spoke, to be sure that Kay's mother was out of hearing range.
"I need your help."
"I thought so," Kaéry muttered, rubbing his eyes, then stepped aside and allowed them to enter his room.
It was a room crammed from roof to floor with state of the art technology and shelves stacked with thick books that could make quite devastating missiles if dropped from great heights. What could be seen of the walls was a conventional dark grey over plaster to match the navy blue carpet. The bed sheets on his bed were twisted and tangled, the wall above his bed pockmarked with pinpricks.
"Who were you practicing your darts on?"
Kay bared his fangs. "Who do you think? I've run out of his pictures. I've had to unplug my internet connection just so I could prevent myself from contracting a hit man to take him out. Just he wait. When my plans kick in, it's going to have a snowball effect and he'll either die, be crushed, ruined or torn apart."
Hisoka blanched. The thermometer suddenly dipped by a few degrees and there was a chilly wind constantly teasing out goosebumps at the back of his neck. The Prince regarded Hisoka's pale complexion with a quizzical tilt of the head, no different to the adorable Labrador puppies on the television commercials, but merely shrugged, clearly disinterested to chase the matter further.
They all had to sit on the ground given the lack of chairs in the room, apart from Kaéry's personal recliner that Kay flung himself into at the first opportunity. Falling into the cross legged position, the Hunter actors tried to ignore the bizarre and alien objects scattered across the floor and the threat of the sharp, pointy objects dangling on fishing line from the ceiling.
Hisoka gave Killua a prod, urging him to brief the genius prodigy on their problems and Killua gave him a solid punch on the upper arm, hissing at him to shut up and not to push him until he was ready.
Killua cleared his throat and lowered his gaze to his twiddling fingers. Kaéry's violet contact lenses was not what gave his unwavering stare the uncomfortable edge; he was just a naturally intimidating son of a bitch. "I remember that you helped Karuto track down Illumi a few weeks ago when he went missing."
"Didn't he say that he was overseas?" Kaéry drawled. His feet pushed hard against the ground and his recliner sprung back with a snap, jolting the child onto his back. Gon followed Kaéry's line of sight and noted a liquid flatron screen plastered to the ceiling, displaying a blending mottle of colours mutating without end. If you stared at it for ten seconds, you'd realize it was the camera zooming into the colours, uncovering one layer after another and another for infinite. The fascination was well worth the eyesore.
"Karuto called you useless, but she's new around here, so she doesn't know that you never get anything wrong. If Illumi had been overseas, you could have hacked into Customs departure records within two hours flat, but that never happened."
A small lift of a corner of his pinkish lips was all that was needed for Kaéry to transform into his usual diabolical self. It was a horrifying thing to witness.
"What are you trying to say?"
Killua steeled himself and looked up. "You don't believe he ever left Anime City. And because he lied about it, you've been prodding Illumi's background for holes."
The Prince laughed a dry and humourless laugh. He tucked both hands behind the back of his head and his eyes never left the swirling chaos of flashing colours. "I started prodding before he lied."
"The incentive?"
Kaéry's smile broadened but at the same time, his teeth ground down hard to sustain the grin. His clawed fingers dug into the leather of the recliner and flexed, unsure whether they wanted to rip the stuffing out or not. Then, he breathed in deeply, everyone hearing the air sucked into his lungs, and relaxed.
"He made me afraid. He made my teeth chatter. He made me feel so dreadfully cold. I wasn't going to let someone like that get away."
"What'd he do to you?" Machi bluntly questioned. She crossed her arms and leveled her iciest stare at the child whose eyes were still glued to the kaleidoscope of pictures flashing overhead, bracing in advance for Kaéry's retaliation.
The child giggled.
"Nothing. Absolutely nothing. I think I was more terrified of what he stands for and who he is rather than what he did."
Hisoka let his face sink into one of his more menacing scowls. "He's a soft spoken doll-maker. What's there to hate?"
"Is he just a doll-maker? Is he just another fashion designer in our image-obsessed city? Is he just a rookie actor saying his lines because mother told him to do so? A human being can be many things, Hisoka, but there is always a part of him that is constant and unchanging. Note the operative differences between 'be' as opposed to 'is'. You are what you are, but you can be whoever you choose to be by the simple process of changing masks. However, when these two distinct states of mind begin to blur, you have a man of no definition, a natural-born shapeshifter able to instantly take the form of any person he desires, adopt any personality he needs, and of course, not a drop of honesty or sincerity in his actions or words."
"Are you calling Mr Illumi a liar?" Gon quietly asked. The lecture Wing delivered back at TGI that day when Milluki crashed in on their lunch resurfaced to slip ice-cubes down the front of his shirt. He shuddered and tried hard to recall what his nen master had said.
It was acceptable to lie when you're trying to get a feel for a new crowd of people as you can never be certain whether they'd appreciate you imposing your personality in their face. But everyone said that Illumi had fooled Hisoka and consequently made a fool of him too. He wasn't being polite and generally 'nice' to fit in – he had tricked someone.
"But what for?" Gon found himself echoing his trail of thoughts aloud. Kaéry gave a resounding clap and leapt upright on his chair, his blue eyes sparkling with vitality.
"Exactly! As my uncle would say – the why! If you answer 'the why', you'll get your answers for 'the how'."
Killua grunted to hide his chuckle. "The why and the how? Is this some secret language you share with your uncle?"
"The why," Kaéry explained, "asks about a myriad of things connected to reason and motive. The how is simply discovering the mechanism which executed the intent. Usually, evidence allows a person to solve the 'how' before they uncover the intent. In some cases, the intent may not even be relevant, as you might only be concerned with the modus. However, in Illumi Zoldick's case, since answering 'the how' based on circumstantial evidence leads to a result that makes it difficult for the ordinary person to digest, you've got to naturally pair it off with the why."
"I'm getting a headache trying to keep up, but let me get this straight. You know how Illumi made you scared, but the things he did which scared you were nonsensical, therefore you had to satisfy yourself by trying to find out why Illumi does what he does that is so frightening."
The Prince laughed and was on his feet, stretching. "Dad says Legato has cotton wool stuffed between his ears, so it seems the smattering of intelligence went to the female side of the Bluesummers line. That doesn't explain the questionable choices your sister made in following the lunatics to Northside however, but heck, you've got brains. Rejoice."
Killua mimicked Kaéry and was on his feet too. He glanced over Kaéry's shoulder as the latter rummaged through the lever arch folders and display books on his desk before releasing a satisfied 'ah' at a particularly thick volume and dumped it in Killua's outstretched arms.
"The findings of my research are all in here and I probably haven't even cracked the shell to get to the centre of the mysteries yet. Nevertheless, what I did manage to find without actually going to Mirriston to do some interviews has been…enlightening."
"Mirriston?"
"That's where Kikyou Zoldick and her two sons used to live. She moved when she was pregnant with Karuto, and incidentally, the year that she moved, her husband had died. Now, do you want to go through all that, or shall I summarize and direct you to the most relevant newspaper clippings?"
All four sighed. "Please, do us the honour. We know you love the sound of your voice."
Kay laughed again and took to sitting on the floor with the rest of them, deftly plucking out the desired documents that had earlier been flagged by colourful strips of plastic adhesive. His eyes glittered with malicious intelligence as he scanned through the highlighter markings. He began with a soft murmur, forcing his visitors to pay greater attention to his voice and his story about the small community and its hidden and horrifying sordid tales where Illumi Zoldick grew up.
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To the ignorant tourist, Mirriston was an idillic town straight out of the black and white shows from the fifties. Houses all shared the same low, impeccably white picket fence with hedge of neatly clipped daisies swaying behind. A gravel path led to the glossy oaken front door, which was never locked, for it was a safe community and no one had been burgled for the past twenty years. Given the community's strong adherence to their religious faith, every family had a mother and father and bundle of children hosing each other with jets of water in the heat of the hot summers. The streets were immaculate, the people hung affectionate smiles and decency and good manners was the social norm.
Mirriston had one school, religiously affiliated, and it catered for students from kindergarten to their final years of high school. Given the relatively small population, the school had around one thousand students who wore their uniforms spotless and black shoes polished till it attained the reflective qualities of a mirror. The credit for such discipline went to the principal, a tall man with thick curly brown hair, perfect white teeth, dimples on either cheeks and a smile to die for. Coupled with the spiritual aura of a priest, parents and children alike flocked to his congregations on Sundays and never found the ire to question his words.
He died of a heart attack in his own home, aged thirty nine. His eldest son was the one who rang for the ambulance, but by the time the paramedics arrived, there was nothing they could do.
Despite the principal's popularity within the community, his funeral was a quiet affair. His widowed wife and children had already left Mirriston after a gas leak from one of the heaters in the upper storey of the building ignited into a gigantic fireball that engulfed the building and didn't even leave charred matchstick-like foundations standing.
Fortunately, there was no one in the building at that time.
And so concludes a small chapter in the town's placid history, the only event to cause an upheaval in the townsfolk's lives other than the suicide of an eight year old girl called Melissa two years earlier.
Later police records, which were hastily covered up, raised a strong possibility that the dead priest had never touched his wife.
Yet she bore him two sons and was pregnant when he passed away.
So was there something insidious festering behind the death of a fit, and you couldn't say old, man who had always preached, and himself followed, a healthy lifestyle to his parishioners?
The local police never pursued the investigation, and according to internal and confidential documents, never had any interest in giving voice to the dead man. After all, against religious tradition, the priest's eldest son had applied to the morgue to have his father cremated, hence there was no body left to conduct a coroner's inquest into the death.
And what would you think if I told you that the chief investigator who ordered all investigations to be abandoned was new to Mirriston to replace the former chief investigator who was charged, and later convicted, for a number of corruption charges?
Kaéry had enough of the edge pieces of the puzzle to construct the general framework. Though he lacked the minute details, most of which he was unlikely to ever lay his hands on, the why and the how could still be answered to the degree that the imagination was sufficient to finish the computations.
"All I have is a hypothesis," the Prince said. "So, where do you want me to start?"
Author's Notes
It's been an astonishingly long delay! Due to my eagerness to finish Book I of Definition, I regrettably had this fanfic suspended for eight months! I wonder how many people are still following this fic. In fact, I wonder how many people have forgotten half the stuff that's happened in this fanfic.
I do offer my sincerest apologies for the wait. And this chapter isn't exactly pumping with action either! Well, the buildup will probably occur in the next chapter, when Kay explains the cryptic narrative at the end here (oh my god, is this Yomi's attempt at a cliffhanger?), and the chapter after that will probably be the first real high point of the fanfic. Fortunately, I had notes concerning the direction of the plot written down (and we're talking eight months ago), so whilst I have forgotten some scenes, they probably weren't important anyway and I still have my skeletal framework. The bad news is that even eight months ago, I didn't envisage what would happen past Chapter 25. There were some tentative suggestions, leading to a lot of rejections and "that's just not going to work!" sort of thing. Basically, I'm encountering slight difficulties with handling Vallanor and the ultimate clash with Elysian - I can't decide whether I want a big bang or defuse the bomb and go out on a whimper and focus more on the relationships between the Hunter characters as opposed to a grand, operatic struggle between two groups of OCs/non-Hunter characters. If you have any opinions or comments on this matter, feel free to raise them in the review. I might not adopt your suggestion, but at least suggestions get my own brain incentive to spin.
If you've been waiting for eight months for this chapter, thank you so very much for sticking by this fic. I hope to update this on par with Book II of Definition. It's a bit wierd writing a fic where the characters don't use nen when I've been obsessing over Kayle's nen for the past month since Book I finished, but thank god I've got 20some chapters to read to help me get back into the setting again.
Please review and let me know you're still reading. And if you have anything to say about my dilenma, please speak up.