Chapter 6
All of my fingers were covered in dried blood from my finger biting and skin peeling by the end of the sixth day of my confinement.
Torude was letting me know of his lust for me. Three times a day. Conflictingly, he didn't lay a finger on me, saying he was saving me for his "dear old friends".
This didn't make any sense, it wasn't like the Troupe to take revenge on their enemies in an indirect way such as the case with me. The ferocious, strong Machi; who was, not to mention, one of the founding members of the Troupe that had a resplendent reputation for being a devilishly admirable, sinfully fair band; wouldn't punish Killua Zoldyck through a girl who he barely knew. There should be more going on underneath the surface. She wouldn't even be bothered to capture me, it was most certainly Torude trying to lure her into his trap.
None of these mattered to me, however. I was doing myself a great mental damage with my low key panic, feeling of vulnerability and hate that wasn't directed to anywhere in particular. Then, there was Killua. He was an assassin and even he had fallen into the trap. Something kept nagging me; another flair of mine that told me him being an assassin had been to his disadvantage, that he had calculated too much and missed a few points that had disguised themselves as ineffective. That he was in a worse situation than me now.
It was a pity I had no skin left on my fingers to gnaw at.
I tried to attract my mind away from the room around me. I tried to get into his mind and worry about myself as him, for a change.
He was mad. He was going crazy. He lost his senses, he was blaming himself for my abduction and he was going to throw himself in the eye of the storm.
He succesfully qualified as the daftest person I had ever met, even with all the credit he had taken for his matchless wits. He had so much unused space in his heart, he helplessly tried to fill it with everyone that crossed his path. Either by killing them and having their ghost haunt his heart, or by caring so much about them that their shadow haunts his mind. It wasn't easy to say that the second option was better, it meant death for Killua like the first option meant death for me. Fortunately, Killua wasn't dead yet.
He might very well not be on his way here. He might have concluded that I wasn't worth the fight. I didn't have any information whatsoever that could be used against him, we had literally just met yesterday. Whereas I didn't think he was the type to just forget and let go even it was someone he didn't know at all; he was also an assassin, which was a subgroup of pragmatists.
Right in the middle of my train of thought, Torude came to inform me about Machi's arrival at Garitea. Maybe Killua was dead. I could not know for sure, I didn't feel like believing Torude at all and according to him, Machi had come straight here after getting off the plane. My only solace was that Machi didn't look like someone who had just killed a person when she gracefully strode into my room.
"You have caught the wrong person, Torude." she said calmly. "This is not the girl in the report."
The words struck my head like electricity. What did that mean, the report? Did that mean that they had another reason to tail Killua, other than his execution of Lethia?
"I'm not even sure if that in the report was a girl, let alone a love interest like this girl here supposedly is."
They didn't know what they were doing. This made me feel a little more hopeful about my planned escape which involved doing some kind of Manipulation on Torude I haven't tried before. I didn't have the certain body part to demonstrate what I wanted my opponent's same part to do. But I couldn't think of anything better to do, and I was going to try this even if there were no chance of winning the battle anyway. I liked putting my thoughts into action and not worrying about the consequences.
"The cyborg nags at me all day long already, Torude." Machi was saying. "Just do something useful for once and find her. Black holes for eyes, for goodness' sake. Did you capture this girl because you're interested?"
"Machi, my love." Torude was fawning all over her, disgusting piece of feces. God, I was being so polite to that literal inhabitant of the Garitean sewer system. "You're hurting me. There is no one I love but you."
"You can want to fuck someone without loving them." Machi said.
"I'm not his right hand." I broke in, no longer able to listen to them commodifying me.
Machi's face got softer, guarded people's substitution for smiling.
"Let her go. We are not told to catch anyone but Alluka."
I wanted to record the change in Torude's face in the seconds surrounding Machi's words and replay it repeatedly.
Machi dismissed Torude and told me one last thing before letting me go.
"That white haired kid," she started talking with a blase voice, "has been too much trouble for us, he and his blond mate. They don't cooperate anymore, but what they have done is more than enough. You, on the other hand, didn't do anything to get under my skin, Lethia used to tell me you were a decent teacher." She stopped examining my stance.
"Go, but know that Killua Zoldyck isn't having the best time of his life right now."
I stood there languidly for a moment, and decided to try my luck. Machi didn't seem inclined to favour his alleged comrade over me.
"I'm not saying I'm the best teacher out there, but I think the real reason behind Lethia's incapability at Nen wasn't my mediocre teaching. She was most likely a victim of Torude."
She eyed me confusedly. I took it as a good sign that she let her state of mind show on somewhere I could see.
"Torude is a Nen leecher. He told me himself. Lethia never had any problem controlling her aura, her aura was inadequate nonetheless. I guess she had been drained of too much aura since she used to be close to Torude for a long time."
I made a small gesture of gratefulness before leaving, I knew Machi wasn't going to accept a bigger thanks.
In my short life, I have escaped many captivities. This one was merely a training for me. It hadn't been easy, and I only managed to break free with the help of another in the end, but I adjusted to conditions pretty quickly. It wasn't on my conscious, but I knew that I would always find a way, just as I had done up till that moment. My mind was already going on about what I was going to do next when I was dragging a bag filled with everything in my possession downstairs to leave the business centre, possibly for the last time in near future.
So began my quest to find Killua Zoldyck.
And to ditch Torude Rambion once again, because he didn't seem to like the idea of letting me go this quickly. He actually went as far as to block Machi's nose and mouth to make her pass out, and force me to go with him. This time, I put up a real fight. I fought his various Nen blades with a thick, heavy iron rod - a primitive weapon that was left there for me in case of a break-in at night while I was residing here - that supposedly gave him a real, throbbing, excruciating pain wen I practically shoved it up his tail. I was slashed across my face and bust fifteen times, but it was a fair price to pay for rendering a man fifty times stronger than me, bodily and Nen-wise, ineffective.
Now I could go look for Killua Zoldyck, of whom I didn't hear for a week. The first place that came to my mind to look for him was Kukuroo Mountain.
I visited Killua's place first, to see if there was anything I could rescue from the ruins. A couple of the residents of the now crushed building were still there, loading trucks with furnishing and belongings.
Looking at the remains of Killua's last five years was melancholic. Big changes in short times were always melancholic. Seeing his clothes in his wardrobe that was now nearly flattened, I wanted to pick everything he had up and build a new life for him in a new place. It was the least that could be done for the boy who didn't have a life given over to him for him to shape and live as he pleased, but a life that was neatly cut and regulated in his place so that he could impeccably play his part. It was the least I could do for the guy who turned my life upside down overnight.
I should learn to give him a place in my heart, to treasure him even if it meant hurting on my part. I secretly wanted to see how it felt to be hurt by a person I loved, how far would I allow someone to bend me, how long would it take for them to break me. I have experienced enough indifference in my first eighteen years, it was time to see how other things felt. Killua ignited those thoughts, and happened to be the subject of my undirected intense feelings that were always within me, hidden under a lid. Moreover, he seemed like the perfect subject I could have with this airheadedness of mine. Maybe I was a good match for him, too. He could take a breather with me, perhaps decide to keep me around for he liked the colour I painted his life.
I couldn't pick his life up the floor and pull it together by myself, in my current state of privation. I guess I just had to leave it there to wait for us until we return one day and build it again from scratch.
