A/N: Hello, all! I'm back with the next chapter, and this one marks the beginning of the end. One of my reviewers called it aptly when they said the last chapter was the turning point. Things are going to speed up swiftly and bring the conclusion to the story rapidly. That's why this chapter isn't quite as long as the rest, but you'll hopefully be understanding about that since I am managing to wrap things up sooner rather than later!

Disclaimer: Nothing owned, nothing earned. Entertainment purposes only. Thanks!

Htelobbihs: Chapter Nine

By: Rae

-An "Ouran High School Host Club" Fanfic-

Kaoru paced the small waiting room Kyouya had taken the group to after their split. Hikaru sat on the patient bed and watched nervously as his twin became more and more agitated with every moment of waiting on some sort of news. They realized immediately that Kyouya had given them a private patient room, but neither of them cared enough to ask if they had displaced any patients. Kyouya was silent on that point as well.

Toru and Kanako sat in the twin reclining chairs, basking in the comfort of the Ootori hospital system. Kanako was nearly asleep after her harrowing hour of trying to prevent Hideyo from hurting herself while suffering the seizures that gripped her. Toru held her hand in his and looked rather exhausted himself, which wasn't surprising given his recent rescue and long day.

The door opened and Kyouya appeared. The former vice president of the host club walked heavily into the room and sank into the couch against the window. His eyes closed momentarily as he did so, and it was only then that the four noticed the bags under his eyes.

"Ootori-san?" Kanako asked, roused from her drowsiness and concerned for the young man who had been so essential in finding her and her fiance. "Is everything all right?"

Kyouya opened one eye and glanced at her before closing it again and replying, "No, it's not." His voice, somewhat hoarse and extremely tense had both twins nearly standing at attention. It wasn't often that Ootori Kyouya became so affected by something that he lost his normal cool. When that happened, the Hitachiins, as with the rest of the club, knew something was very wrong.

"What's going on, Kyouya?" Hikaru asked, always eager to get things out in the open. His twin stayed in the corner he'd ended up in when Kyouya entered the room, but even anger at Hideyo's unfortunate situation could not temper his concern for his friend.

Kyouya sighed but refused to look at anyone as he reported, "Ayanokoji-san will be fine. The doctor wants her to rest a bit, but she is conscious and has been able to drink and eat a bit." He went silent after imparting this information, but no one could have missed Kaoru's relief as he sagged into the bed with his brother. It had, after all, been three hours since they brought Hideyo to the hospital.

"But there's something else that's troubling you, isn't there?" Toru voiced softly, not wanting to upset his former classmate but knowing there had to be some reason that Kyouya would not look at them.

Kyouya opened his eyes and glared out the window at nothing, seeming to wrestle with himself. He opened his mouth to speak but halted, glancing suspiciously at the twins, before turning to level a look of immense displeasure at Toru. "Yes," was his only response.

Now that his fears had been allayed, Kaoru began to wonder what had happened to his senpai to make him so stressed out. Rarely had anyone in the host club witnessed such raw exhaustion and frustration pouring off the Ootori third son, and for someone who cooly made business deals that left hundreds of lives in the balance, it was nearly a feat impossible to bring such a troubled countenance to Kyouya's face.

Kaoru glanced at his brother before carefully asking, "This doesn't happen to have anything to do with your father, does it?"

Kyouya's head nearly snapped up, but he managed to hold his peace. The only indication that anything was amiss was a flash of his glasses as he pointedly raised his head to regard Kaoru severely. "I don't see how it could, Kaoru," he responded. "No, this has more to do with the situation we find ourselves in and the swiftness of the resolution I desire. I do hope Tamaki and the others will be able to find Shiro quickly..."

A cell phone rang then, and the others jumped slightly at the suddenness of it. The harsh ringing had interrupted Kyouya, and while Kaoru felt slightly annoyed at being deprived of an explanation from the shadow king, he also wondered what news they would be facing next. Looking up, he saw Kyouya pull a phone from his pocket and look at the display.

Kyouya's eyes narrowed as he noted the number on his phone. It was not one he recognized, but he had learned never to ignore such things, especially since his father had the delightfully annoying habit of having business partners call with outlandish requests. Flipping the phone open, he hit Send before the caller could hang up.

"This is Ootori," he said tersely into the receiver. He had half a mind to end the call, but something stopped him.

"Kyou? Is it really you?" The voice on the other end would have caused him to slump into the nearest chair had he not already been sitting. "Kyouya, please, if that's you, I must know... I don't know how much time I have..."

"Hold on a moment," he replied quickly, cutting the voice off mid-sentence. Lurching out of his seat, he put a hand on the arm of the couch to steady himself before glancing at the room at large and announcing, "I'll be back momentarily. Please excuse me." Then one Ootori Kyouya quite nearly raced out of the room, if one could call the slightly faster and longer strides he made to the door racing.

"What was that all about?" Hikaru asked, watching his friend's retreat. Surprised glances and negative shakes of the head were all the answer he received.

---

"What do you mean we can't find Haruhi?" Kasanoda nearly yelled at Reiko, failing to keep his calm in the face of this news. "You said those papers told where all the kidnapped people were!"

Reiko stared at him evenly and waited until his breathing had slowed before responding, "I was unaware Fujioka-san was among the missing, and unfortunately this paper merely tells the locations of most of the kidnapped victims. It was a premature assumption on my part to say that it detailed the locations of all of them."

Kasanoda remained silent, the wind having completely left his sails, as Tetsuya asked, "So who isn't on the list besides Haruhi?"

"No one," Reiko answered, forestalling the obvious questions by continuing, "but in response to the whereabouts of Hoshakuji Renge, the paper only says that she was transferred to an airport in Tokyo and put on a plane bound for somewhere. It appears she was placed on a private jet, but I'm afraid I don't know much about the airline industry."

Tetsuya and Kasanoda exchanged glances before Kasanoda said, "I wonder if Haruhi was with her. Tamaki said she was kidnapped from school, and I'm guessing they didn't bring her here since we didn't see her. It seems like they keep making it harder and harder to find people, and it appears the kidnappers have some weird connection to the host club."

The two friends continued to mull over the possibilities as Reiko went back to her file folder and began perusing more of the pages inside. Pulling out a page with different names on the front, she noticed two heavily circled names of people she knew very well. Putting the page aside to study more carefully later, she took another piece of paper out of the file.

The men stopped talking when Reiko gasped. Turning to her with alarmed looks on their faces, they kept silent as she looked up at them in shock. "They're getting married!" Her voice was incredulous, and she glanced back down at the page, reading quickly. Then she repeated, "They're getting married. That's why his name is circled; that's why she isn't..."

Kasanoda narrowed his eyes and asked some rather pertinent questions when the former mistress of maledictions trailed off, "Who's getting married? What are you talking about, Reiko? I don't understand."

Reiko ignored the familiar way he used her name and instead insisted, "I never would have guessed, and Mitsukuni never said anything about it. I just don't know why I never saw it before."

The continued delay of information had Kasanoda nearly growling as he spat out, "What's going on, Reiko? What have you figured out?"

She looked up at him, surprised by his tone of voice, and explained, "The reason one of our number was kidnapped is simply because she was about to change the course of the kidnapper's plans entirely. Since the kidnapper couldn't afford such a change, I believe, the plans were altered at the last minute. That's why we were all kidnapped. It wasn't some grand design. We were kidnapped so the kidnapper wouldn't have to face one very important decision."

Tetsuya, fed up with the cryptic answers, retorted angrily, "And what decision would that be?"

Reiko leveled a serious gaze at him before answering, "How to end a marriage without disrupting a business venture."

---

Kyouya walked back into the patient room, one hand to his head, looking supremely relieved, and the rest of the group exchanged glances. Before anyone could speak, however, his phone rang again, and they were left waiting as he yanked it from his pants pocket and glanced at the Caller ID. His breath left him in an annoyed huff as he flipped the cell open once more.

"What is it, Tamaki?" He asked in lieu of his normal greeting.

"Kyouya, we have Shiro!" Tamaki's voice came over the phone loud and clear. "And we have the clue for Nekozawa, too! I'm not sure what it means, though..." His voice trailed off as he mumbled something to someone else with him. "Oh, Kyouya, Shiro says the men were talking about some master plan having to do with some sort of secret deal. Do you know what that could mean?"

Hikaru and Kaoru watched in concern as Kyouya's relieved face became stony once more, and he said, "I think I might know what that means, but if I'm right, we're in a lot of..."

Tamaki quickly cut him off by saying, "Oh, Kyouya, I have to go! Kasanoda's calling me! I'll call you right back! Oh... we're on the way to the hospital, by the way... talk to you soon!"

Kyouya flipped his phone shut and sat back down on the couch, his face blank and eyes calculating. The twins knew this look, and Hikaru began by saying, "Milord found Shiro?" Kyouya nodded absentmindedly. "And I'm guessing they're coming back to the hospital?" Again Kyouya nodded. "You have another problem now." His voice was nonplussed and matter-of-fact, but it got Kyouya's attention.

"Don't try to hide it, Kyouya," Kaoru said before his senpai could interrupt. "We know that look, and there's obviously something going on here that you don't want us to know about."

Hikaru picked up where his twin left off, "You were deliberately evasive with Milord on the phone, and that usually means you have more than an idea of what's going on. So tell us what you've figured out."

---

"I can't find my phone," Beppe grated out, pacing the small library in his Italian leather shoes. Renge smirked from her hiding place as she listened to the conversation.

"Where did you have it last?" His companion asked lazily, not bothered by his problem.

The pacing stopped. "I can't remember where I left it," he growled. The pacing resumed. "But that's not the point. She's getting anxious, I can tell. We need to figure something out or we'll be in trouble. I think this is going faster than she expected."

The sound of a Coke can being popped open filled the air with a slight fizzing noise before she replied, "What can we do? If we run, she'll bankrupt our families. If we fight, she'll still bankrupt our families. Who can we get to help us? There's no one as powerful as she is. Not even that idiotic Suou or the Ootori third son. They've got their own problems as it is."

"Are you sure Kyouya has no way to help us?" Beppe's question left Renge feeling shocked for a moment until he continued, "She's already said he planned to do something that would make him richer than even his father. Perhaps if we asked him for help..."

"There's no way he would help me or anyone associated with me," was the bitter response to Beppe's hopeful suggestion.

Renge's brain began to turn with ideas and plans. She sat and ignored the conversation as she mulled over what she'd just heard. Apparently someone knew a lot more about Kyouya than he thought anyone did, and she was worried about how his plans played into the hands of the kidnapper. As she'd been listening to the conversations of Beppe and his annoyed girlfriend, she realized they weren't just holding her and Haruhi for entertainment.

The time she had spent listening to them revealed the two were deeply involved in trying to convince their families to let them wed. For whatever the reason, they had gone to the bloody wretch who ordered the kidnapping in the first place for advice. Beppe seemed to have opposed the idea from the very start, but his girlfriend was the one to push him into it. With that, Renge figured out, their fates were sealed. The woman had gone to their families--apparently she had a tie to the woman's--and convinced them she should assess the match and the possible financial productivity to both families and then give them her analysis. What Beppe and the woman didn't realize was how she would manipulate her assignment by forcing them into this horrid arrangement.

After making it visibly worse by forcing Beppe to pretend to be Haruhi's lover, the two were furious but had no means of escape. Renge understood that, to a certain extent, this never would have happened without the two because they were obviously the ones holding herself and Haruhi, and as she'd pieced the story together, she knew the last two captives were the most important to the crazy, old woman's plans. She also realized this meant one of the other hosts wasn't as safe and careful as he'd hoped to be.

However, the two never intended on falling into such a trap, and they were certainly not enjoying the arrangement. Renge wondered if some sort of bargain couldn't be made between herself and her unwilling captors. She knew her part in all this was something they were unfamiliar with, and as she tuned back in to their conversation, she realized she was the new topic of conversation.

"I just don't understand why we're holding Renge, though," she was saying. "She's going to force Haruhi to remember her past, and then what will happen? I can't imagine that going well for us. Why couldn't she have just hidden Renge somewhere else like she did all the others?"

Beppe sighed before answering, "I'm not sure, but I think there's something we don't know." He paused as she scoffed loudly. "I'm just saying Renge might know more than we think. Perhaps she's involved with someone in the host group? Or she has some sort of company connection we're unaware of?"

"Do you know that her father lives here?" The woman asked, not replying to this question. "He runs a rather large corporation centered mainly on the videogaming industry, but there's talk that he's making a large change soon. I hear he's going to be having Renge married off soon to a wealthy family that owns a business he can use to market newer, more advanced technology. They say it will be the best business match in years; though, no one's quite sure where Renge stands on this match."

Renge's breath caught in her throat. Something had happened, and now she was sure that their plans were being broadcasted in public, and he would not be happy to hear that.

"Where did you hear that?" Beppe's incredulous voice let her know he was not privy to such details.

"From her, of course," she replied, the derision in her voice making it perfectly clear who "her" was. "But I'm not sure everyone knows about this. It seems she has a lot of information we don't have, and I'm beginning to worry. I know Renge's family is powerful, but she seems to be afraid of this match. I don't see why, though."

Beppe hummed thoughtfully for a moment before saying, "I think the match itself isn't what worries her. I think it's the results of the match." He stopped talking, and Renge waited for him to continue. "No, really... perhaps this match would be even more powerful than her."

"Who could be that powerful? We know she's got our families by the throats, and Ootori's even wary of her." Renge smirked at that knowledge. It was something she'd have to tell him later. "I've heard Ootori-san wanted to make sure she could never take his family down, so he made some bad investments. You already know my part in all of that..."

Renge clenched her fists, remembering so clearly why this woman made her want to rip her hair out. "Because you almost stole the business right out from under him," Beppe sarcastically answered her unspoken question. "You and your father, with help from her, almost made Ootori lose his precious business empire. But his stupid third son had to get in the way."

"Not just Kyouya," she said, and Renge glared at the casual manner in which she spoke his name. "Haruhi. That's why she hates her so much. That's why we're here. It's all because of Haruhi and her stupid devotion to that Tamaki. Why else would she go to such lengths? She's a mad woman. This shibboleth crap she keeps spouting, the way she won't refer to Tamaki as anything but 'that woman's filth,' she's completely lost her mind!"

"And while her mind continues to go, we're stuck dealing with the crap from this botched plan of hers," Beppe said wryly. "You know we'll be put into prison. She won't even have a trace of her presence in this; somehow she'll be able to pin it all on us. And I don't think the Suou patriarch will be able to get out of prosecuting us. She'll find a way to keep us quiet."

The words were spoken solemnly, and Renge's eyes widened as she realized how true they were. She knew then that she had to help. Feeling her heart rate increase, she wondered if she wasn't about to make the biggest mistake of her life. Flexing her muscles slightly, she drew in a deep breath and then released it slowly, relaxing as she did so. Her hand sought the phone in her pocket briefly, feeling pleased at its comforting presence and the connection it gave her to the outside world; then, not wanting to be caught with it if anything went awry, she quickly hid it in the room before exiting.

Standing before the door to the room they were in, Renge paused, trying to decide whether to knock or simply enter. Never one given to fear and feeling no respect for the two within, she pushed the door open firmly, smirking slightly when they looked up in surprise.

"You two seem to have a problem," she said. "Now that Haruhi is beginning to regain her memories, you'll be in trouble if she finds out. And since most of the maids here are on her paycheck, it won't take long for her to find out."

"So what?" The woman spat, looking at her hatefully. "It won't matter anyway because that idiotic Tamaki and his friends will never find her, and you'll never see her again."

Renge smiled at that, feeling triumphant when her adversary looked at her askance. "Are you saying that because you mean it? Or because you're trying to convince yourself it's true? Because either way, you're wrong. You're so very wrong, and once they come here to retrieve Haruhi, the Suou and Ootori families will sue you for wrongful imprisonment. And you'll never see the light of day again."

Beppe stood, shielding his girlfriend protectively. "You're stupid if you think we'll even let them near this house. They won't be able to find you two if you've already been taken away. Besides, if she doesn't want you found, then that's how it will be."

Poor comfort, Renge thought to herself, looking at his slightly sweating face and trembling hands. "Let's not lie, Beppe. The old bat's senile and won't be able to keep up this charade much longer. You'll go down, and even if anyone suspects her of a thing, her money's good enough to keep the naysayers quiet for a very long time. Unfortunately, you two are the mice who fell into the paws of the cat... a very old, wicked, sadistic cat."

Beppe and her nemesis exchanged glances, and Renge grinned victoriously when she noted their fear. She wanted them to be afraid. She would get her revenge now before they had a chance to find out she was going to help them. But, as she noticed their fear, she also saw that Beppe was looking sadder, more morose. And the hated woman was beyond herself with distress, a tear creeping surreptitiously down the side of her face. She dashed it away angrily.

"What's you point?" She asked Renge pointedly. "Are you coming to gloat? It's not like you'll be able to go back to Japan anyway. She's got your father and his company right where she wants it. You're stupid if you think she won't rip the silver spoon right out of the palm of your hand before she lets you go. She hates you as much as she does Haruhi."

"I know," Renge replied calmly, looking her straight in the eyes. "I know she hates me, and it's the reason why she hates me that I'm standing here now. My father's company is going down the tubes fast, and she'll buy it out from under his nose as soon as she finds a way to. We've known that for ages, and that's why Father has never trusted her."

Beppe looked at her skeptically, but Renge stopped his coming question by continuing. "Don't you think we'd find a way to stop her? We're not that stupid. Father and his advisors agreed on a plan of action because no one wants her to sink her talons into the company. He's liquidated," she said simply, not admitting defeat or resignation, merely stating a fact. They looked at her blankly. "Don't you get it? He liquidated the company into a different account. We don't own it anymore."

Beppe's jaw dropped. "But she said you all were going bankrupt soon... that the company couldn't survive the economic crisis. She said your father was doing everything he could to keep it in his clutches; that's why he's encouraging his employees to buy as much stock as possible, so he won't lose everything. How can... how did this happen?"

Renge grinned at their awe-struck faces, "Easy. We do one thing in secret: liquidate the company. And we do the other in public: create the facade of a crumbling corporation. By doing that, she thinks we're falling and tries to worm her way into buying us out, and we gain a formidable alliance with a company known primarily for its power."

The woman gasped softly and breathed out, "You didn't..."

Renge glared at her before saying, "Yes, Eclair, we did. And now you two are going to help me and Haruhi help you."

---

"There are several things I believe I have figured out," Kyouya finally, slowly replied, staring evenly at the twins, "however, because I am not positive, I believe I will keep those things to myself."

"Who called you earlier?" Hikaru demanded to know. He was growing angrier at Kyouya's evasiveness.

"Tamaki, obviously," Kyouya replied with a hint of a smirk. His eyes narrowed when Hikaru growled slightly in response. "My previous caller is none of your business, Hikaru."

"Who do you think you are?" Hikaru yelled, jumping to his feet in his anger. "What? You think you can simply sit back and figure everything out and then mock us as we try to put the pieces together? I knew you were sadistic, but Haruhi's life is on the line!"

Kaoru stood with his brother, putting a reassuring arm around his twin, but Hikaru shrugged it off angrily as he continued his tirade. "You've always been this way. Always making us wonder what your motives were, trying to keep us from figuring things out, putting Haruhi in danger. Don't shake your head at me, Kyouya! You let her follow Milord when he was going to France. She fell out of the carriage because of you!"

"Actually," Kyouya interjected softly, "she fell out of the carriage because the two of you let her take it alone after it wrecked. You both know it was broken from the accident, but you told her to keep going. And I thought you were happy about that."

"Shut up!" Hikaru hissed viciously. Toru and Kanako looked shocked and scared by this outburst. Kaoru stared at Hikaru, standing uneasily next to the twin he loved but couldn't quite understand now. "You always put her in danger, and now you know something we don't! You won't tell us because it brings you sick pleasure to watch us, like you're some great lord or something. Well, I'm telling you right now that you will tell us exactly what you know because Haruhi. Is. In. Danger." He paused for a moment, taking great, gasping breaths, before he finally glared once more at the Shadow King and said, "She could be dead for all we know."

Silence filled the room with that horrific thought. Kaoru looked repulsed and visibly shaken at such an idea. Kanako buried her face in Toru's shoulder as he held her tightly, rubbing her back and staring at the group before him, shock written across his face. Kyouya, however, looked as unaffected as ever, but Kaoru and Hikaru noticed his eyes were troubled by something.

Before anyone could speak to break the silence, it was effectively broken with the banging of the door as Tamaki and crew entered the room.

"Mon ami, we know where Nekozawa-san is," he crowed excitedly, running over to Kyouya and patting him affectionately on the back, seeming to not notice the tense atmosphere. "Kasanoda said Reiko found a file telling her where everyone but Renge and Haruhi were, and they're on their way to rescue Nekozawa right now! Isn't it wonderful? We won't have to..."

Tamaki trailed off as he realized no one had moved since he entered the room. He looked around, seeing Kanako staring at him as if he'd grown a second head, Toru mimicking the look on her face. The twins were standing across from Kyouya, Hikaru with his narrowed eyes fixed angrily on Kyouya's impassive face, and Kaoru looking in shock at the group who had just entered. Tamaki stepped slightly back from the incensed Hikaru, wondering what could have happened.

Hunny and Mori had, upon entering the room, assessed the situation correctly, and now both cousins moved swiftly, Mori to Hikaru's side and Hunny to Kyouya's. They looked grim with the determination that things--whatever those things were before they'd arrived--would not escalate any further. The fathers stood slightly inside the opened door, but both Ranka-san and Yuzuru moved inside the room and shut the door swiftly behind them when they realized something was very, very wrong.

"What's going on?" Tamaki asked, directing his question to Kyouya. It was the wrong thing to ask.

"What's going on?" Hikaru mimicked sarcastically, directing his anger at Tamaki. "What's going on?! We're chasing after a psychotic kidnapper who's managed to keep us up nearly 48 hours straight, and we still haven't got a clue where Renge and Haruhi are. They could be dead for all we know! That's right, Kyouya," Hikaru said, having caught a subtle change in Kyouya's countenance at that last thought. "Renge and Haruhi could be dead! And you know something that you won't tell us!"

Tamaki turned in shock to face his best friend, eyes pleading with him for information, but before he could speak, Kyouya's mouth opened, and what he said surprised everyone.

"Renge and Haruhi are not dead. I spoke to Renge myself, and I know where they are."

With that pronouncement, all hell broke loose.

..........

Author's Note: Yes, I managed to get it closer to the end! And I still haven't compromised everything... though I did give a great deal away in this chapter. And if you've figured out my tricks and traps, good for you! I look forward to how the rest of the chapters will go; now that I have an ending to build on, I feel the last chapters will be rather easier to write.

Thank you all to everyone who reviewed the last chapter! I really appreciated it and will enjoy replying to your reviews shortly! Please let me know what you thought of this chapter, and thank you for reading. I hope you enjoyed it! (By the way, if you felt Hikaru was a bit OOC, don't worry; so did I! But that's what happens in tense situations, you know? So, he'll be normal again soon, I promise!)

Until next time...

-Rae-