Bai Feng: Hi there! welcome to my official first LeorioxSenritsu story that is really thought out. :)
Even tought it´s not that much of a lovley-lovely-pairing in this story. sadly. :/
This story is more of a action story than a romantic story.
Even tought I love that pairing, so I write out a headcanon for them. If you don´t like it don´t read it.
Here is a biiiiiiiiig thank you to reeychan because that sweetie did beta-read the whole story! your the bestm dear! ;D
Have fun while reading and leave a creview if your nice. :)
Chapter 1:
Why?
That was the only question that filled Leorio´s head and it ran laps inside his mind like a rollercoaster.
To be honest, he has always been a trouble magnet. It was just like a birthmark to him–he had grown up in one of the derelicts quarters of Za-Ban, his friend Pietro died of an illness, he passed the Hunter exam because of luck, he befriends a little sunshine that was hunted by a crazy lunatic, he met a running meter who was a coldblooded killer in truth, the friend he wanted to save to finally cancel the debt of Pietros death ended up being the lapdog of a Mafioso.
Really, trouble always seemed to stick with him.
And while Leorio kept staring motionlessly, frozen into the black hole of the gun barrel that was pointed at him, he just kept on thinking about one question:
Why on earth would just one Trouble-cliché not spare him over?
"This time I want to pay." Senritsu´s little hands fiddled around her wallet, fishing out her bank card.
Leorio suddenly leaned over her and snatched away her bank card–panicky–like she was pointing a gun at the checkout girl in the grocery store and not with her bank card.
"Yeah…" he whispered down to her and did his best to not move his lips, while he smile nervously at the checkout-girl and pay their purchases instead of Senritsu. His words were pressed so fussed out over his lips that they already became as white and thin as a thread. "…What a good idea, Senritsu. Let the girl that is on the top the of the mafias blacklist pay with her bank card, so they can find out her whereabouts."
Senritsu was of course the only one who heard his reproach. Her big eyes drifted down in genuine concern to the ground as she started helping Leorio in putting their purchases inside the bags. Her voice was a thin whisper–more like a shaking singsong as she answered: "That´s not funny, Leorio."
"Who said I was joking?" He grabbed the grocery bags, and with his big hand on her thin shoulder, he pushed the young woman gently towards the exit.
Senritsu hobbled heavily, and buried one hand in his trousers to find a little hold–just like a small shy child looking for safety.Leorio found himself watching her desperate struggle to find a way of walking without hurting herself as Senritsu leaned heavily on the short children-crutch she was holding in her other hand.
She had kept her promise she made in Yorkshin to him as long as she could. Though it was obvious that she now felt as guilty as the worst criminal for breaking it in the end.
Even when the Nostrado family became more and more lost in the chaos of the fighting Mafia families that were left leaderless with the death of the ten Mafia Dons, Senritsu stayed at Kurapika's side while all the other bodyguards already left to save their own necks. She even stayed with him when she came to a point where she wasn´t able to leave the Mafia without being handled as a traitor.
She was a caring person, she was a honest woman, she kept her promise.
In the end it was a bullet shattering through her knee that forced her to leave Kurapika's side.
Light Nostrade was an envious employer and she ended up hiding at the only place she known to be safe in before being punished for stealing important information from the Mafia family. Important informations she never even had known at all. Who would search for her, hiding on the Campus of Za- Ban´s University, one of the biggest crookest cities in the world? Nobody would expect her to stash right under Light Nostrade's nose. It was a good hideout.
But Senritsu was a Hunter.
Hunters are egocentrics.
Hunters are free people.
Hunters are boundless.
Hunters are people who would never let themselves chained to some place, like she had been during the last month.
Senritsu was far too gentle to say so, but being forced to stay hidden in Leorio's apartment made her feel lost, futile, useless–more like a bird in the cage. A little songbird that was kept away from the free sky she loved so much.
"But I WANT to do something…just something. Please let me pay next time. I feel like a sponger," Senritsu quietly said as she carefully pulled her wool cap deeper in the level of her face.
It was a late autumn evening. Almost black rainclouds had filled the dark sky so tight like it was covered with a pitch black cerecloth. The streets were nearly empty of cars as people had fled home before the oncoming autumn storm.
Senritsu looked dismally up to the sky and sighed heavily.
Leorio bit his lips watching her. He leaned down to the short woman in a helpless try to cheer her up, while quipping like a nasty little boy: "You can pay me back with sexual favors when we are back in my apartment."
Leorio had the glory sensibility of a giant elephant in the little china-shop, he was just a man after all.
As an answer, the young woman twitched so hard like an icy cold hand stroked down her thin back and she convulsed with creepy shock.
Leorio lifted his free hand defensively and laughed at her completely startled face. "Okay, okay. Don't look at me like this!"
Leorio's helpless wringing hand made Senritsu chuckle a little and while Leorio tried depressingly to apologize, she chuckled even more–hiding her little laughter sheepish behind her free hand, like a shy little girl.
"It was just a joke, Senritsu! A JOKE!"
Senritsu's quiet laugh released the young man from his awkward stammer. "Leorio…" she started with a tiered smile playing softly around her lips. "Are you really that depressed with your lovelife that you have to make such jokes?"
At least he managed to make her smile a little.
It looked as if a huge rock has fallen down his slumped shoulder. He grunted moodily. "WHAT lovelife are you talking about?"
They walked past the streets, heading against the next bus stop. The streets were surprisingly silent, the big city held anxious its breath, awaiting the coming storm.
Leorio keep surly mumbling in his non existing beard "I have none….I feel like I never had one."
The little woman chuckled. "Well, I am the really wrong person to talk about this with…." She winked at him and in her melodic voice was a soft tone of mischief. "But maybe you should turn around and go talk about that topic with the checkout-girl that use to make eyes on you whenever you pay here?"
"WHAT?" Like Senritsu had slapped him in the face, the young man stiffened and looked over his shoulder back to the little shop, trying to see the checkout girl through the window. There was a little blush running in a wave of heat over his face and he curiously leaned down to Senritsu while walking, rubbing awkwardly the back of his head. "You sure about that?"
"Heartbeats never lie, Leorio." The young woman little hands danced to the lovely tact of a melody that could only heard by her. "Though to see her drooling for you I don´t even have to listen to her heartbeat."
With a wide smirk Leorio patted her thin shoulder. "Someday…" he said to her with the excited voice of a man who was plotting against someone in the most mischievous way, just as Senritsu was his partner in crime: "Someday the two of us will bar-hop. With that ability of yours, that night will be damn profitable!"
Senritsu just laughed. A friendly smile stroked softly over her pale lips: "Oh, you know I would out-drink you, my friend."
They didn´t had to wait long for the bus. Just five minutes after they reached the bus stop the vehicle crashed along the streets, like the driver had the devil himself in his back.
Before they even could sit down, the driver started to drive again as he was fearing the coming storm already thundering behind them. Leorio rescued Senritsu when her crutch loosed the ground. She nearly fell back as the driver started the bus again, and with his warm hand in her thin back he led her in a seat like she was a little child that just learned to walk.
But even if the bus driver gave his very best to escape the coming storm the poor little prey that was the bus got caught by the hunter that was the storm. They were caught by the first ark raindrops before the bus could even cross the next street.
Thick black raindrops hit against the bus windows, like thousands of fists that wanted to break in.
Senritsu had crawled in a seat in the middle of the bus and leaned her head against the window–eyes closed, carried away by the orchestra of the falling rain that sang to her like hundreds of voices.
Leorio sat next to her, with her children-crutch carefully placed on his knees. His gaze lay slightly on her. "You know, Senritsu…you don´t have to worry at all."
The young woman opened one of her big eyes, smiling tiered. "Oh?"
"About you feeling like a sponger. I like to have you around me. And if you still want to do me a favor for keeping you, you can teach me some Nen-stuff, so I can beat up Kurapika the next time I see him for not calling me all the time." Senritsu's thin lips curled up in a sleepy smile, but the young man wasn´t finish yet so he continued talking and tipped one finger (very, very) carefully on her damaged knee. "Besides, after all you have been through you need some holiday, I think."
The bus stopped, two men entered and sat in the first row of seats in the bus.
In the next moment Senritsu's little hand lay on Leorio's and softly lead his much bigger hand away from her small knee. There was a shadow running over her worried face, twisting her lovely smile. "I am not worried because of this, Leorio. I am worried about you. I don´t want you involved in those Mafia wars. Not you."
Her hand was warm like a soft veil over the back of his hand.
From one moment to another she suddenly pulled her hand back, like something had bitten her.
Senritsu shrugged.
All of a sudden her eyes were wide open and the young woman stiffened. She was like frozen statue of ice in her seat.
A familiar sound rang in her ears–loud, cold, dangerous.
The bus stopped again, this time a group of four young students entered. Leorio took a short glimpse at them. They laughed and the sound of it was like a half forgotten echo he remembered from the floors of the university.
With a wide smile Leorio raised his hand to greet the other students, but suddenly Senritsu grabbed his hand and pushed it panicky back on the seat, so abrupt that he huffed in total surprise. "Senritsu, what–"
She sat next to him, motionless, ashen faced, scared and heavily trembling like a leaf.
"Don´t say something!" she hissed suddenly, her voice was thin and fragile, like the sound of a shattered glass that fell on the hard floor. Leorio wanted to open his mouth but she was faster. Her little fingers clinched so hard in his hand that her short nails left red marks on his skin. Like a heavy sack she slumped down in her seat, hiding behind Leorio's taller silhouettes. "That heartbeat…I know it…I heard it at the Nostrade mansion…! He found me!"
Leorio felt like a icy cold hand stroked down his back and he needed all his willpower to not turn his head to the group of students. His words were just a quiet whisper as he answered slowly: "You mean, one of them is from the Nostrade Mafia? That can´t be! Senritsu, they are students from the university! That´s impossible, he can´t be here. Light Nostrade can´t know that you're here! You–"
A pistol shot crushed through the sound of the rain pattern and swallowed Leorio's last words like a screaming mouth.
The two men that had sat in the first row of seats had stood up–one with a gun in his hand–had shot through the front window. Little glass pieces lay on the floor to his feet like glittering diamonds. The other man stood straight by the bus driver, pressing a gun brutally in his pale cheek.
The man that had shot through the window pointed his gun at the six other passengers who were staring breathless back at him.
"This bus is now abducted. If you move, you will die. If you talk, you will die. If you try to call someone outside, you will die."
Tbc...