A/N: Hello, back again with another chapter! Right on time too! Just some notes, in A Series of Beautiful Contradictions, Kuroro says he is 26 and Midoya 25. However, I realised that was a mistake on my part. They should be 24 and 23 then. Hence, I've adjusted their ages in this story.
Anyway, hope you enjoy this chapter too! They're still feeling things out so perhaps not too many exciting things happening just yet. We'll come to it. Soon. And I hadn't had time to properly edit the chapter, so please forgive me if there're mistakes etc in it. I tried my best!
Disclaimer: Hunter X Hunter, Logic of Sense, and any other books/movies/songs etc referenced in this story (other than The Inaccessible Unconscious) do not belong to me.
It's Just Like Stepping in Dog Shit When You Don't Own a Dog
When you wake up in the morning, there are some things you just don't expect. Climbing out of bed and stepping into dog faeces when you don't own a dog is one. Opening your eyes to see fairies, elves and dwarves dancing on your chest is another. However, Kuroro would have thought it more likely his rest would be disturbed by Tolkien's wet dreams than… this.
This was… this was… what was this anyway?
Picking up the child by her wrist, he dangled her in front of him and looked her up and down, taking in the flimsy hospital gown she was wearing before looking up to stare at her face closely. "You're Midoya," he said, and though he had meant it as a question, it came out as a statement, largely because the child did resemble Midoya to a startling degree.
Well, when he said 'resemble', he meant it in very general terms. The child had Midoya's features: the piercing black eyes, pale skin so fair it was translucent, and dark curly hair. But that was where the resemblance stopped. Instead of the long, frizzy hair that Midoya sported, the child's hair was cropped in a pixie cut close to her skull. While Midoya was pleasantly plump, this child was skinny, and not in a way that looked healthy. Kuroro had seen pictures of Holocaust survivors who looked healthier than her with her dark hollows in her cheeks and eyes, and ribs and joints sticking out prominently beneath atrophied muscles. Unlike Midoya who suffered from chronic severe acne, the child's skin was clear, marred only by peeling around the lips and nose, and deep, purple circles under her eyes.
"You're staring," the child noted in a quietly serious way that was entirely unlike Midoya's, except in her more introspective moments.
"Well, yes," Kuroro admitted bemusedly. "That's because you are… Midoya, right?"
"Yes I am."
"Are you sure you are Midoya? Midoya Kito?" Kuroro pressed, just in case. 'Midoya' wasn't exactly a common name, but then who knows?
The child fixed him with a disquietingly unblinking gaze. "Yes, I am sure," she said solemnly. "I am Midoya June Kito."
"Well what happened to your breasts?" Kuroro demanded, torn between outrage and distress that one of his favourite parts of her body were now gone.
The child gave him a look filled with suspicion and distrust, but didn't comment on it. Kuroro couldn't help noticing that she hadn't mentioned the fact that he was still dangling her a good foot above the ground and that she seemed entirely way too comfortable with a strange man invading her comfort zone. Those were such… Midoya traits.
"Who are you?" she asked, her eyes searching his face now.
"You don't know?" Kuroro frowned. "You have no idea who I am?"
"I have never met you before," the child informed him. Her eyes slid slowly to the left then to the right. "Where am I? I'm supposed to be in…" She hesitated.
"In the York Shin Mental Asylum?" Kuroro guessed and the child's eyes darted to his before dropping to stare at the floor.
"Yes," she said simply.
Right. Now he had an idea of what was going on. What he had felt just now, what his clever, sensitive Midoya had sensed before he did, was a surge of Nen. Whatever it was, probably a Nen trap of sorts, the target had been Midoya. The Nen had captured her and… somehow turned her back to the time when she was in the asylum, somewhere between the ages of seven and ten. Though she looked younger, he knew for a fact that she had to be slightly older. He, on the other hand, though not a target and thus not shrunk, had been caught on the fringes of the power, which accounted for the backlash. He had no idea what happened to the chain-user but he hoped it had something to do with explosions and tiny pieces of Kuruta flying all over the place. Unlikely, but one can always fantasise. Still, fantasies were for later. Now, he had another problem to deal with.
"You really have no recollection of who I am?" Kuroro asked the child, trying not to feel too frustrated. He had just gotten her back damn it.
The child shook her head, her eyes still watching him with that strange blankness that Kuroro normally never associated with Midoya. That woman's eyes were always so full of life and energy and…
"I'm your Kuroro," Kuroro tried. "Don't you remember? I'm your lover, your partner. We've been together for years."
"My what?" The child's eyebrow shot up in a manner that was so much like the Midoya he knew that Kuroro felt a jolt of relief. "I'm too young to have a lover… sir."
"Oh dear lord you called me 'sir'," Kuroro muttered, appalled. "This is unacceptable. You don't call anybody 'sir'. Not even Netero, and you actually respect the man. The only people you call 'sir' are, perversely, the people whom you can walk over freely with no consequences whatsoever."
Now the child (Kuroro could not think of her as 'Midoya') was staring at him with a look that suggested that he probably needed to join her in the mental asylum. Probably as neighbours. They could swap drugs and sleepovers and spend the whole night watching Rorschach tests. "You said your name is…"
"Kuroro Lucifer," Kuroro said hopefully, but her face remained blank. "You have… you don't remember. You have amnesia or… something. Given how young you are now, I'm going with the latter."
"Mr Lucifer…"
"Call me 'Kuroro'. Please. I beg you, and if you actually remember me, you would know that I don't do that lightly. Don't be respectful to me. It's too scary. You're only this respectful when you're about to disembowel me or do something very disturbing to sensitive parts of my body."
"Kuroro then. You must realise I am only eight and a patient at a mental asylum. I understand that sometimes… people have… have preferences for… younger people, but I feel compelled to inform you that this is highly illegal and immoral and that you should seek treatment…"
"I am not a pedophile," Kuroro groaned. "This is too much. My bones are still broken from yesterday and now you're gone again. Keeping you by my side is really almost too much work. Some days, I honestly wish I didn't like you this much." He fixed her with an intense gaze. "Midoya, when I first met you, you were twenty-three. You're head of the Kito family and a blacklist Hunter. Does that not ring any bells?"
The child's head tilted curiously at him. "I am eight," she said calmly as if that was an indisputable fact, as sure as the earth goes around the sun.
"No, you're not," Kuroro said stubbornly. "We had a Nen attack just now…"
"What's 'Nen'?"
"What's Nen?" By this point, Kuroro was ready to just climb back into bed and pretend this was all a bad dream. "Alright, you obviously have no memory beyond your age," Kuroro muttered. "Okay, Midoya, now I want you to listen to me with an open-mind. What I am going to tell you is going to sound incredible, but it is, I swear on my life, definitely the truth." He then proceeded to outline his history of her. It was far more difficult than he thought it would be since she had no idea what Nen, Genei Ryodan or Hunter Association meant.
Somehow, he managed to produce a semi-coherent narrative which produced another curious head tilt from her. "You say that I am currently twenty-six years old," she stated solemnly. "And that you are my lover, age twenty-seven. You claim that there is this strange superpower in this world known as 'Nen' and that we are both masters of it. You also say I am currently head of the Kito family. I hope you understand that given the state I am in, I find that very hard to believe."
"It's the truth," Kuroro said firmly. "Something has happened to you that have reduced you back to your childhood. If not, how do you explain what you're doing here?"
Another head tilt to the other side. If Kuroro wasn't so upset about his Midoya being reduced to a state which was entirely not sexually appealing, he would have admitted that the gesture was freakishly cute. "You kidnapped me," the child suggested, which, Kuroro had do admit, was an entirely logical and reasonable assumption to make.
Doesn't mean she wasn't wrong and that Kuroro was going to let her continue being wrong. "Do you have any memory of being kidnapped?"
"No, but I'm…" the child's eyes slid away from his, "I'm not always…"
"You were drugged ninety percent of the time; I know, you told me," Kuroro said impatiently. "Come on, this is your own body we're talking about. You should know if it feels off. Do you feel drugged in anyway whatsoever?"
The child hesitated but didn't reply. "What else did I tell you?" she asked instead as her eyes returned to his. "If you are truly my lover, you must know things about me that others wouldn't."
"Ah… well…" Kuroro hesitated. "That's a problem. I know very little about your early life since you hardly ever talk about it. Most of the things I know about you are from your current… oh, stop looking at me like that. I swear I am not a paedophile so stop judging me."
"So you don't have a criminal record?" the child asked with a sharpness that was more like the Midoya he knew.
"Well… I do… But it is not what you think. I already told you; I am Dancho of the Genei Ryodan, a Class A criminal group. We rob and murder people. I definitely have criminal records for crimes against humanity, robbery, murder, genocide, that kind of thing. But definitely no sex crimes."
"So you're saying my adult self is dating a murderer and thief?" the child's tone gained an edge. "I'm not so sure I like my adult-self very much."
"Well I like your adult-self a lot more than I like you, you obnoxious little…," Kuroro muttered. "Alright, let me see if I can remember things about your childhood. Your father is called Mahou and your mother is Miharu. You have an aunt named Annabella Dunstan, who is your mother's sister… among other things, and you have a cousin, among so many other things, named Armando Basilio." The child's eyes darkened at the mention of that name but he continued. "You're the only child of the Kito family, the only direct descendant I mean. You're a super-genius. By the time you were nine, you were doing quantum physics and… oh wait, you aren't nine yet. Um… the heirloom of the Kito family is the Infinity Gem. It was lost sometime while you were in the asylum, I'm not sure if it has happened to you yet. I must add that you found it recently, by the way. As in recently… for your adult self. You also have a cousin named Clemence Priduex."
"This is general knowledge, Kuroro. What…"
"You killed your father."
The child's eyes widened and Kuroro could see how blood-shot and yellow the whites of her eyes were. "I what?" she asked faintly. "What did you say?"
"And your mother," Kuroro continued. "They died when you're ten, but knowing you, I bet you've already started planning their deaths."
The child's face had gone deadly white. Kuroro wasn't sure if it was fear or anxiety he was seeing on her face, but he knew it disturbed him. He had never seen Midoya look frightened before. She was too powerful and proud for that. "What else… do you know?" she asked, and her voice trembled with the question.
"That you can use Gyo," Kuroro said. "The… what did you call it? Ah yes, the 'glow'. The bright outline of light around people and things that you see? That's Nen. The technique you are using to see it is called Gyo."
At his words, the child's head jerked back violently as if he had slapped her. "That's not funny," she said, and Kuroro heard real anger in her voice.
"I'm not joking," he told her. "I know you were told it's a symptom of some kind of… mental disorder or something, but it's not. I can see it too, the glow. It's just Nen. Everyone has it, but not everyone can see it."
Now her lips were trembling. She was clenching her jaw so hard he could see the muscles working in her neck. "You're lying," she said finally, her voice weak and confused. "You must be."
"I'm not. Do I look like a liar to you?"
She lowered her head, avoiding his eyes.
"Midoya. Look at me."
She shook her head.
"Midoya."
This time, she lifted her head slightly, looking up at him with red-rimmed eyes. Good lord, she was crying. Kuroro had only seen Midoya cry once in his life, but it was enough to let him know how bloody awkward it was trying to comfort her. She was too proud for that. Now that she was this… vulnerable little thing, it made things worse. What was he supposed to do now? What did people do to babies who cry? Leave them in the sun to die from exposure? That's what he would have done if this wasn't his lover he was talking about. And could anything sound more wrong than that? Well, only one thing to do. He went with what he knew would work on his Midoya.
"Midoya, you are more powerful than you know," he told her. "This… condition that has haunted you… you turned it into one of your greatest strengths. You mastered Nen, Midoya. You learned how to control it, to turn it on and off as you needed it. You are one of the most powerful and feared blacklist hunters in the world because of your innate talent with Nen. Believe me; you have absolutely nothing to fear. You are an apex predator at the top of the food chain and all those people who seem so big and powerful now are but pitiful, weak prey before you."
The child looked up at him from under her lashes with a look on her face that he could not decipher. "I wonder if I should believe you," she said. "What you say is too alluring for me to believe. Yet I want to."
"Then believe me." Kuroro smiled faintly. "Let's go about returning you to adult-hood, shall we?"
She hesitated, but only a second longer. "Alright," she agreed, her face blank and serious again. "There's not much for me to do anyway, as a child in a… an asylum." Her eyes slid away from his again in a manner that suggested social awkwardness and a great deal of insecurity. "Where are we? You didn't tell me."
"Your penthouse," Kuroro said, standing up. "It's where you live when you're being a Blacklist Hunter. You're still living at the Kito mansion too, if you want to know, but you only go there when you're being June Kito. Your ability to compartmentalise your life has never failed to astound me."
"Okay." The speed at which she accepted what must be an incredibly bizarre explanation was just Midoya-ish enough that Kuroro almost sighed in relief. She looked around furtively, eyes gliding over the empty furniture and pile of books spilling out of the bedroom. "Why is it so foggy?"
"I don't know. It's not usually…" Kuroro paused, bringing his hand to his mouth. "Good question. Very good question, in fact. Your ability to see straight to the most important issue at hand is obviously innate. I didn't think about it before since I was too busy trying to figure out what had happened to you. But this fog… yes, I think I can hazard a guess. I don't think we're in your penthouse anymore."
"We're not?" The child had stood up by now, standing shakily on skeleton-thin legs and looking for all the world like a new-born gazelle who had exactly three seconds since exiting the womb to learn how to run or be torn apart by the lions closing in on the horizon. "Where are we then?"
Kuroro walked over to the window and looked out. The view was the exact same one he had seen a million times before, sleeping on Midoya's couch. Yet, it was also so different. Gone were the neon lights of the world's greatest city of sin. Instead, the buildings looked grey and dull, as if all life had been drained of them. The heavy fog added to that impression, turning everything beyond a certain distance into a blurred outline, almost as if the world beyond that point had ceased to exist. "Perhaps, we're in an alternate reality." He shrugged. "The Nen attack or trap could have dragged us into another world."
"Okay," the child said, accepting his explanation again without even asking whether it is possible for alternate realities to exist, how anyone could access them if they did, and which pitiful reality was filled with nothing but fog. "What then?" she asked instead.
"Then it's easy," Kuroro said happily. "Chances are, your change isn't permanent. We just need to find a way back to our world and you'll be back to normal again." Another thought struck him and he frowned. "There is a problem though. Right before we were dragged into this place, we were facing off with an enemy." Not really the truth, but whatever. Adults lie to children all the time and who was Kuroro to break that millennia-long tradition? "That he isn't here with us means… he wasn't affected by the trap so he's still in our world, in your apartment. I'm really not comfortable with him having free reign of that place. Your journal is in there and I have no idea what kind of secrets you write in it."
"Is he the one who brought us here?" the child asked with that freakishly adorable head tilt again.
"No. I don't think he has powers that allow him to do that." Kuroro thought some more as he patted her head absent-mindedly. "Besides, it's not like we can do anything about it if he does decide to poke around your apartment anyway. No use worrying about it."
"I'm still worrying about it," the child mumbled.
"So, what do you…" Kuroro stopped, finishing the rest of the question in his mind. He was too used to asking Midoya for her opinion; she tended to have the most marvellous insight and the most devious schemes after all. Given the state she was in though, she was now entirely reliant on him in more ways than one. Not only did she not know Nen, she did not have the mental and physical capabilities of his Midoya. She was Midoya before she became Midoya, and a pathetically, absolutely helpless little thing at that. Right, so no marvellously complex schemes today. "Let's take a walk," he finally said.
"Walk?"
"Outside." Kuroro gestured at the window. "Whoever created this world made it this way for a reason. Only way to find out what is to go out and have a look around."
"Outside. You mean outside the window?"
"Well, yes of course I meant outside the…" Kuroro stopped himself and glanced at the child staring at him in disbelief. "This is going to take getting used to," he muttered. "I always use the window to enter and leave your apartment. It's just more convenient than going through Julius, who always insists on checking with you if it's okay if I go up. And sometimes you're in the bathroom or sleeping or just not in. Then I end up having to sit around waiting for you to turn up, which is just annoying."
"Ah. So you climb the side of the building and break into my apartment instead?"
"It's easier. No, I'm not lying, so you don't have to look at me like that. You really need a better poker face, dear. Learn from my Midoya. She has the best poker face I've ever seen."
"Are you sure I'm dating you?" she demanded in a voice that was surprisingly strong for such a fragile-looking thing. "I assure you that I have a very low opinion of my adult-self now."
"Don't insult my lover even if you are my lover," Kuroro sighed. "I'm feeling terribly confused now. Shall we just get on with it so I can get my Midoya back? You have no idea how disturbing it is to find the body I've been having sex with now reduced to a seven year old's."
The look she gave him was as sharp and as wry as any Midoya could give, or would be if it wasn't blunted by apprehension and wariness. "And I assure you I am not the slightest bit traumatised to discover that I've been having sexual relations with a man twice my age," she replied.
"You weren't…"
"How are we going out the window?" she demanded, pushing forward with an immature aggressiveness that he had never seen Midoya display before. In her defence, it felt forced and was probably brought on by nerves. But then, Midoya never got nervous. Why would she be nervous since she's little-Midoya, which is just a tinier version of Midoya? Kuroro had never realised how much two decades can change a person. "Are you a mountain-climber on top of being a serial killer?"
"I'm not a… oh never mind." Without warning, Kuroro leaned over and picked little-Midoya off her feet. She tensed in his arms immediately though she tried to hide it. Ignoring her increase in heart rate, he strode over to the window and looked down. Normally, the road would have been visible to him even from this height. With the fog, he couldn't even see if the ground existed anymore. "This might hurt," he told the child, but she simply turned her head away from him. Then when he finally leapt out of the window, she gave up altogether and shrieked breathlessly in his ear as she clung to the fur of his coat. And Kuroro knew just how pissed she was when she yanked his hair violently once they were safe on the ground. Then she apologised with a look on her face that said she thought he was going to hit her.
At least his brave, tough Midoya was still somewhere inside that emaciated frame, Kuroro thought in an attempt to comfort himself as he tried to reassure her that he wasn't going to hit her. Somewhere deep… deep inside.
A hard male body lay above hers, naked, flesh gleaming with perspiration as it moved against her. She could feel damp skin rubbing against her bare skin, could feel large, rough hands gripping her hips. Deep but calm breathing ghosted over her skin, hinting at barely kept together restraint.
It wasn't an unfamiliar sensation. It was even pleasant enough. His hands were gripping her, hard enough to bruise but gentle enough that it felt like he was massaging her hips. When his hips met hers, there was no violence to it, no possessiveness and dominance. It was firm, yes, but smooth – pleasant. Almost enjoyable.
She realised her arms were wrapped around this man, going under his arms, which were placed at her sides, and curling around his back. Her arms felt different. They felt… strong, powerful. If she wanted to, if she squeezed hard, she could snap his back in half. That knowledge astounded her.
"Midoya," he whispered against her neck and she turned her head slightly. His face was buried against her neck so she couldn't see how he looked like. All she could see was short hair, ruffled and wet with perspiration. "Midoya," he repeated. "Midoya. Midoya." Her name was an incantation spilling rhythmically from his lips. There was no aggression in his voice, no desire to control, to dominate; there was just pleasure, agonising pleasure that drove her name from his lips.
Out of curiosity, she dug her nails into the muscular back, and dragged them down. Hard enough to break skin, but not enough to draw blood.
His voice caught in mid-groan and he started to move faster. "Evil woman," he gasped, in his voice turning rough and hoarse. "Oh, you evil woman. Have you thought about my question?"
"What question?" she asked, and was startled by how different her voice sounded. It was slightly deeper, rounded and full, and… confident. It sounded like power and control, authority and pride, confidence and self-assuredness. It was nothing like her voice.
"About the question of the virtual," he breathed, his face going into her hair which was long and dark and curly. "About… why people fear it so much."
"Ah." The words came out of her mouth though she had no idea what he meant. "I think people fear it because they want to believe the real is verifiable. But they forget that the real is not always actual, that the real can be as intangible as the virtual. And so you cannot always verify it, not when you can't see it, or touch it. Like love. Like lust." Her hips thrust against him on their own accord and the man above her sucked in a sharp breath.
"Very good," he whispered, frantically, dazedly. "Very good, Midoya. I like it. I like that explanation a lot. I…" He continued to speak, but she knew he wasn't talking to her anymore. His voice was distant and desperate, the words gushing from him like a river. He was not holding a conversation; he was lost in his own pleasure, drinking it in as he moved faster and faster until he gave a strangled gasp against her skin.
As he lay above her, breathing deeply but regularly, she murmured, "Good?"
"Very good," he whispered and he lifted his head to look at her. His eyes, somehow luminous in the dim light, fixed onto hers. "Do you remember me now, Midoya?"
Midoya shook her head. "No," she said. "I've never met you before."
Somehow, though his expression did not change, those molten eyes looked sad. "Try," he whispered. "Try to remember me. Try to remember what we had."
"Alright," she agreed.
Then she woke up.
The warmth and damp wrapped around her didn't disappear with the fleeting dream. If anything, they were even more intense, draped around her like a heavy, wet rug. It was suffocating, yet strangely comfortable at the same time.
Briefly, she remained still with her eyes closed as the world rocked her gently. Strong, solid arms cradled her easily. Something furry brushed against her face, tickling her nose. She was being carried by… him. The man she had just met. The stranger with the emotionless black eyes.
After they had left that building by jumping out of the window, he had put her on the ground and allowed her to walk by herself. They had travelled through York Shin as she had never seen it before; York Shin with massive, gleaming metal skyscrapers covered with deep, dense fog. They had walked for a while – then she had fainted. At least she assumed that was what happened since she had no recollection of falling asleep.
"You fainted," a smooth, smoky voice said and she opened her eyes to see the man known as Kuroro Lucifer looking down at her. "I'm no doctor so I will not bother to speculate why. Feeling better now?"
"I suppose," Midoya replied sluggishly. She was, she realised, curled up in his arms with the flaps of his coat tucked around her. The warmth she was feeling was his body heat. And the damp was… "It's so foggy," she murmured, looking around. While she had slept, the fog seemed to have closed in upon them. Now, they could barely see two feet in front of them.
"I know," Kuroro said. "It's highly inconvenient if we can't see where we're going. Normally I would ask you to lead in this situation, since you have a photographic memory of the streets of York Shin." He looked down at her with those blank, black eyes. "Do you still have it? The map of York Shin in your head? It would be incredibly useful now."
Midoya met his eyes and couldn't help wondering why she had fallen for this man. His expression was so… well, non-existent. There was barely any emotion in that face at all. It was all in his voice and even then, it was muted. Well, that was assuming she had fallen for this man. For all she knew, what he had told her was an elaborate story with the intention of… well, she had no idea what he could accomplish by lying to her. That certainly didn't mean he was telling the truth though. "What is the last place you remember passing?" she asked hoarsely.
"The Bank of Stephanus," he told her. "That's the last thing I saw before the fog closed in around us."
"I don't know where that is," she replied. "Any other landmarks?"
"The Sundae Place was right next to the Bank." He gave her a mildly exasperated look. "You like the sundaes there. Especially the one with rainbow sprinkles."
"Oh. Yes, I do. I've quite forgotten about them." Midoya closed her eyes in thought. "That's near Sixth Street."
"Yes." The man's eyes were distant. "We proceeded straight down past the Sundae Place for about twenty minutes."
"Seventh Street," Midoya told him. "We're nearing the central square." She paused. "I've never heard of a Bank of Stephanus before."
"How could you not? It was established ten years… oh." He smiled at her, that faint smile that was more a quirk of the corners of the lips than anything else. "Your map of York Shin is probably a little dated. No matter. I've gotten my bearings. Once we hit the central square, I'll have a better idea of where we are."
"Mmm." Midoya continued to stare up at the face floating above hers. He was an extraordinarily good-looking man, not, perhaps, conventionally so, but more in the gothic fashion (or perhaps 'gothic' was mainstream now; how would she know anyway what with being stuck in a mental asylum and all that). His skin was pale, like hers, and his hair and eyes black, like hers. His eyes were large, pretty and cold as ice, and he had a straight, aquiline nose and full lips. He was also, he claimed, a mass murderer. Who could have told with a face like that? "Am I pretty?" she asked impulsively. "As an adult, I mean."
He blinked down at her. "You've never asked me that question before, even as an adult," he said, looking somewhat confused. "There's no point to it and you are fully aware of that. After all, you have no illusions about the fact that you are an ugly woman, Midoya."
Now it was her turn to blink at him. "I am?" she asked. "I do not grow up to be pretty?" She tried to decide if that bothered her. Then she tried to decide whether she should even bother to try to decide if she was bothered. In the end, she gave up and just commented, "Mother is pretty."
"I can't judge since she's been dead for years by the time I met you." He glanced down at her. "And no, you don't grow up to be pretty. You developed acne, your hair got incredibly frizzy, you have fine lines around your eyes, you are overweight and your lips have a tendency to peel. About the only time you look pleasant on the eyes is when you're wearing a lot of makeup. And even then, your choice of eye shadow colours is always appalling. I'll admit you wear them well, but seriously, orange on your skin tone? Purple or blue would suit you much better."
"Oh." Midoya thought about that and decided that if she ever took to wearing eye shadow in the future, she was going to wear orange and she was going to look downright pretty doing it. "Then why do you like me? If I'm not pretty, I mean."
"That's easy, dear. You are smart," the man said, barely paying attention to her as he looked around. "You are very smart in a way that few can match. And you are very fun to be with. When presented with a dangerous situation, you walk right in with your head held high, a smile on your face and twenty-six different schemes brewing in your mind. You are also very strong; much stronger than most people ever realise. My dear, you are a powerful warrior and a brilliant tactician, and you have the character of titanium, strong, unbending, unbreakable titanium. Netero once said you could rule the world if you wanted to, and I believe him." He paused. "Netero is your sensei. He's the one who taught you Nen. He's dead."
"Did I kill him?" she asked, since according to him, she seemed to do that very often.
The man's lips quirked again. "No," he told her. "You didn't. You loved him. You cried like a baby when he died." Another pause. "He tried to kill you after he was dead and he succeeded even from beyond the grave, which probably proves what a brilliant schemer he was. But he underestimated you. You came right back, because like I said, you have twenty-six schemes in your mind, and one of them involved rising from the dead."
"What? I came back from the dead?" Now Midoya's image of her adult-self included black stitches along bloodless wounds and her walking around moaning about brains. She didn't even like brains. They tasted like chicken-flavoured jelly which is just disgusting. "How on earth did I do that?"
"You built a mini-defibrillator in your brain," the man said casually, as if that was the most normal thing in the world.
"Oh." Midoya blinked. "A mini-defibrillator? That is…" She could only call a spade a spade "really cool. Really, really cool. I think I might like my adult self."
He laughed. To be specific, he gave a brief, low chuckle, which, Midoya realised, would be a full-blown, uncontrollable guffaw in another person. "You would like your adult self," he told her. "I certainly do."
Midoya didn't reply as she sank deeper into his arms, drawing the flaps of his coat closer around her. It was tempting to believe him; tempting to believe she wouldn't die in the asylum, alone and half-crazy, that she would grow up, to become the lover he spoke so admiringly of, to become a powerful Hunter and honourary mafia (what did that mean anyway; that people would only stab her in the back if she wasn't wearing a proper mafia suit that day?). It was tempting and that was why she didn't fully believe him. The best traps are the honey traps after all, the ones that make you believe your life isn't as messed up as it really is.
"Do I have more friends?" she wondered out loud. "Other than you, I mean."
"You have an apprentice," he told her. "Pepeka Timbal. He's madly in love with you but you treat him like your child. He's…" the man cringed "I'll admit he's a good man, but honestly, he has the straightest, truest moral compass I've ever seen. It's bloody annoying." He smiled at her. "And you have other friends. I believe you count Ging and Pariston as friends, though I verily believe you will castrate me if you knew who I was talking about. To be more accurate, you're frenemies, isn't it? That's the slang nowadays at least, according to Shalnark, my resident geek."
"Frenemies? What does that mean? It isn't even a proper word," Midoya protested and he chuckled again.
"True." He stopped suddenly and lowered her to the ground. "You need to be able to walk on your own."
"Why?" Midoya asked, as she cautiously lowered her bare feet to the ground, her hands still clinging to his arms feebly.
"Hear that?" the man lifted a finger. She shook her head and he frowned in a way that she had come to realise meant he was comparing her with her adult-self. "Growls. Sniffing. There's some kind of creature ahead. I will need to be able to fight it, and I can't do that if I have to carry you at the same time. You need to learn how to walk on your own."
"Okay," Midoya said because that made perfect sense to her even if it kind of somewhat scared her. She didn't trust this man fully but being in his arms made her feel infinitely safer than standing on the ground by herself. With how thick the fog was, she was afraid she would lose him and then she would be on her own in this large, strange world.
"Stay close to me," he said quietly. "But if I tell you to run, run."
"How will you be able to find me in this fog after?" she asked with what she felt was quite a great deal of reason.
"I'll be able to," he assured her. "I can see your Nen quite clearly, even in the fog."
"Okay," she agreed because she was half-afraid of getting him angry. She had a feeling he was the kind of person who was slow to anger, but when he did… well, she didn't think he would be a very nice person at all.
And then she didn't have time to think anymore because he was walking forward. Stumbling, Midoya tried to catch up with him, clutching his coat fiercely. His gait was fast and her legs were still wobbly, so she had to practically run to keep up with him. He slowed a little when he realised that, but didn't stop walking. She was starting to get the nagging feeling that this was a man who did not care much for weaknesses.
For what felt like an eternity, Midoya scampered after him, making sure to keep a good hold of his coat even if it meant that she fell constantly when he picked up his pace and scraped her knees. The cuts stung, but she had felt much worse than that. Besides, she was fully aware that there were worse things in the world than pain.
Abruptly, a low growl, deep and menacing, rumbled through the air. Midoya froze and it was a good thing the man stopped when he did or she would have been dragged off her feet again. "I hear that," she said very softly.
She felt his hand grip hers, and at first, she thought he was trying to comfort her. Then she realised he was trying to pry her fingers off his coat. "Let go," he said quietly. "I can see it. It looks like a big… dog. I'm going to engage it and I need you to stay here."
Midoya opened her mouth to protest but found her words dying in her mouth. "Okay," she said, and reluctantly let go of his coat. Could she really trust this man to protect her? On what basis would she do so? Was there any other option at all?
While she was still puzzling about it, Kuroro had already strode into the fog and vanished from sight. Blood pounding through her veins, she crouched down, becoming unnaturally still in the dim, foggy streets of York Shin. She couldn't hear anything, not Kuroro or the creature, and she couldn't see anything. It was a horrible situation to be in, but for some reason, Midoya felt like giggling. Amidst the terror running icy cold through her veins, she felt like bloody giggling. There was obviously something wrong with her, something…
An unearthly scream filled the air and the desire to giggle vanished immediately. Midoya curled up more into herself, absolutely still except for her eyes, which darted around, trying to spot the danger. Another scream, but this one didn't stop. It echoed through the fog, wailing like a siren broadcasting straight from Hell. She tried to figure out where it was coming from and failed. In this fog, sound seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere at the same time.
Then through the fog, her eyes picked up a shape advancing towards her. It was dark and tall, and she couldn't see who or what it was. "Kuroro?" she questioned tentatively even as she knew it wasn't him. The glow around this thing, visible even through the fog, wasn't Kuroro's. Kuroro's was blue, calm and confident, and as steady as a rock. This glow was bright red, spiking and vibrating with rage and wrath.
Slowly, Midoya got to her feet and started to move backwards, but the dark shape continued to advance on her. As it got closer, she saw that it was walking unsteadily, writing and wriggling as if in agony.
"Kuroro," she said louder, no longer calling out to him but calling for him. "Kuroro."
Then the shape broke through the fog and Midoya's eyes widened. A massive creature stood before her, at least eight feet tall with the body and legs of a diseased, mangy dog - and the torso and face of Armando Basilio.
"Kuroro!" she shouted as the creature advanced on her, the torso writhing and shaking. Its skin was shredded, ripped right open in places, and it had large, gaping wounds that were filled with blood and pus. Spittle and blood dripped down torn lips and dyed shattered fangs a wet red. "Kuroro!"
The bright, green eyes of Armando Basilio fixed onto her and he screamed.
With a loud gasp, Midoya rolled to the side, just as the horrible creature pounced on the spot she had been on. Without bothering to stop and stare, she scrambled to her feet and ran in the direction Kuroro had disappeared in. Behind her, she heard the creature coming after her, screaming a wordless, violent scream of rage and death.
Midoya wanted to shout for Kuroro again, but she couldn't draw enough breath to. Already, she could feel the strength draining out of her limbs so unused to physical activity. But she forced herself on. The conversation with Kuroro floated back to her, and she remembered what he had said about her and titanium. At the moment, she felt more like cotton candy than tough metal alloys. Humans were such delicate, fragile things, filled to the brim with soft, mushy bits. Which bits would this creature eat, she wondered almost hysterically as she ran, and which would it leave scattered across the streets like road-kill?
Abruptly, a second dark shape burst out of the fog in front of her and Midoya cried out.
Kuroro, his face and hands splattered with blood, coolly snapped, "Get down." She dropped immediately to the ground, covering her head in a futile attempt to fend off claws and fangs. There was a flash of something hot and bright above her, and the creature was cut off in mid-scream. Behind her, far too close behind her, something hit the ground with a heavy thud.
Slowly, Midoya lifted her head and glanced back. The fog seemed to have cleared a little, such that she could see up to ten feet again. The creature lay right behind her, shaking and rolling in its death throes. Calmly, almost nonchalantly, Kuroro walked up to it and crushed its head. That stilled it right away.
"Are you alright?" he asked, offering her a bloody hand.
Midoya gripped the offered limb with a strength that surprised her. "Perfectly fine," she said, and felt a jab of pride that her voice barely shook. His eyebrow went up at that and a true smile spread across his face. For some reason, that discomforted her so she gruffly demanded, "What took you so long?"
"There was another one of these back there. I was fighting it," he explained, lifting her to her feet and dusting down her hospital gown. He peered at the scratches on her knees and hands intently then pulled out a handkerchief and started dabbing at them.
"Oh." Midoya glanced at the creature behind her again. "Why… why does it look like Armando?" she asked hesitantly. "Is it Armando… is it really Armando that turned into that?"
Kuroro shook his head. "No, the creature I fought looked like Basilio too," he told her. "I don't think those are the real Armando Basilio. I think they might be… well, if we are really in an alternate reality, in all possibility, they are the denizens of this place."
Midoya frowned. "Why would the denizens of an alternate reality resemble Armando?" she asked.
"Another excellent question. You do have a knack for this, my precious little genius," Kuroro murmured, and she heard fondness in his voice. "Unfortunately, we can't answer them yet. There isn't enough information. But, there is one way to find out."
"How?" Midoya asked.
"Whoever it was that dragged us here did so for a very specific purpose," Kuroro told her as he finished wiping down her wounds. "If we examine it properly, we should be able to figure out what that purpose is. And once we do, we can figure out who is behind this."
"So we're going to walk around aimlessly?" Midoya asked. "I understand I'm not the criminal mastermind here and that I'm only eight, but even to me, that sounds pretty… silly. You know. Just saying."
Kuroro gave her an odd look. "If you think I'm being silly, just say so," he told her. "You're my lover, my partner. We've always been blunt with each other." He shook his head. "Alright, I get it; you're only eight which happens to be a very low point in your life and so on. That's the first clue, by the way."
"What?"
"Think about it," Kuroro said finally, and she heard that touch of impatience in his voice again. "You have a perfectly functional brain, Midoya, and a brilliant one at that. Even if you're only eight, you should be able to guess at this."
"Muh," Midoya replied and defiantly refused to cry. "You said I'm… I'm twenty odd."
"Yes."
"As are you."
"Yes, go on. We don't have all the time in the world."
"Well," Midoya said, standing straighter in the hope it would make her look less upset, "If you're twenty odd and I'm twenty odd, how come I was the only one who got turned to eight?"
"Oh, finally. Yes. So?"
"So… I'm the target?"
"Yes. And?"
"If I'm the target… the alternate reality is targeted at me. The way you said it… it sounds like this world was created for a specific purpose, most likely by that weird power you mentioned - that Nen. Since I am the target, it will be designed around me."
"Very good. So?"
"So…" She stared at him blankly.
"So we should visit places that are significant to you," Kuroro finally said with a sigh. "That whoever designed this place knows about your past is evident, given how they reduced you to that one point in life when you felt the most vulnerable. If they know that then they know a great deal about your history. It really isn't difficult, Midoya. You have no idea how much I miss you right now. The actual you would have reached this conclusion a lot sooner than this."
And in that instance, the cotton candy in her turned to titanium: hard, unbreakable titanium made up of stubbornness, annoyance and a good deal of anger. "I do know how much you miss me. You keep telling me that." Midoya planted her fists on her hips and fixed him with a stern look. "Well, unfortunately, you are stuck with little me for the moment, so just suck it up and bear with it." His eyebrows went up. "Given that I am, as you like to say, quite helpless at the moment, we are relying on you to return me to my former self. That would probably proceed a lot faster if you stopped whinging about it." Now his large, eerily black eyes had widened enough that she could see the whites of his eyes clearly. Briefly, Midoya wondered if she had pushed him too far and if he was going to hit her.
Then he laughed, a full-out belly laugh that was so at odds with his menacing looks that she gaped at him. "I apologise," he said, chuckling. "I forgot that even if you are a child, you are still Midoya in infant form. That was a very good scolding, dear. Not quite what you would have done as an adult, which would have been softer, gentler and thus infinitely scarier, but the essence of it was there. I promise I will stop laughing in a while so don't glare anymore."
"I will glare as and when I like," Midoya told him firmly, since he didn't seem incline to hit her. Another growl, further away but still frightening, ghosted through the fog and she jumped despite herself. "Alright, enough chatting," she said, clinging on to his arms, "get me out of here. Now."
"Yes, my lady," Kuroro replied wryly and picked her up again. "Now, whatever happens, stay close to me and don't let go."
"Why?" Midoya asked, settling despite herself into the warmth under his coat.
"Because I see ten more of these monsters and I'm going to run straight through them. If I drop you, you will probably be torn to shreds before I can save you." He smiled sunnily at her. "But no pressure, dear. Just relax and enjoy the ride."
"Oh how nice." Midoya clung as hard as she could to his coat and settled in for the ride. "No pressure at all. Just the way I like it."
"As humans, we have a very strange and bizarre relationship with that which we cannot touch. On one hand, we vilify what we fear, what we deem false and faked, like virtual reality. On the other, we valorise that which we desire, like love and passion. What exactly though makes something intangible, invisible and inaudible like love 'true' while something like virtual reality false? Breaking it down further, what is the difference between love for your parents and siblings, and love for your significant other? What makes one 'true love' and the other not? The answer is nothing. There is no real, tangible difference. Therefore, the difference between the real and the virtual is essentially semantics.
A controversial thought, but an exciting one too. The wonderful, terrifying thing about the intangible lies precisely in its nature as flux. In its impermanence, in its liminality, what has no physical being becomes changeable, malleable, as easily shaped as liquid metal – by oneself or by another."
The Inaccessible Unconscious -