Hey guys, Lunamon810 here. Why yes, I am still alive. And boy, do I have some explainin' to do for you guys. I know, I haven't updated for eleven months. Like, in a way, exactly eleven months. Because fifteen of September 2014 was the last time I updated, and it's the 15th of August right now.

Listen, guys. This is about to get sort of real, so if you don't really care why I went MIA for eleven months, just read the chapter. You won't offend me. But as you guys probably have seen me say, my mother had a stroke in June of last year. My mother is my childhood, my Dad I only saw once or twice a year. He had no hand in raising me either, he wanted to be the cool dad that showed up with expensive gifts then didn't have to deal with you for six more months. I would give up everything to make my Mom happy. My laptop, my amv editing, my writing, my online friends. If it made her happy, I would do it.

Anyways, I had doctors telling me that 100%, she would not wake up. It was a cold feeling at first, and then I went numb to it. After that came six months I have little memory of because I fell into such a deep depression despite my Mom waking up. Evidently, I didn't take care of my diseases (Type 1 Diabetes, Addisons Disease, and a Thyroid Disease.) and landed myself in the hospital quite a few times. I came out of that in January. A week later, child services come and took me away from my home. I then went to a foster home where I was emotionally destroyed, every mistake I made was made out to be as bad as purposefully breaking an antique. Which, mind you, I never did. My inspiration for writing was absolutely destroyed.

Then I got uprooted and moved to another foster home, and things got better. But on the inside I was still scared to talk to anyone or reach out for help because of what had happened so far. Still to this day I am scared to show anyone anything, whether it be writing, emotions, work, grades, anything. I'm still trying to work myself out of it. But finally, I'm getting to visits at home on the weekends, and it's like my world is falling back into place now, slowly but surely. And thus, my inspiration hit me like a ton of bricks.

So here's the next chapter. I started this one almost eleven months ago, and so it's been written over a long time. Hopefully I didn't make mistakes, I read over it and read over it and tried to fix any little mistake I saw, but I'm human, and spell check is only so effective.

Thank you all so much for the reviews you leave and the support you give, the PMs you send to make sure I'm alright, a few people even found my youtube channel when I didn't respond because they were scared. TTUO isn't over. In fact, it's still going strong. I literally think about Ellilou everyday, mostly because I RP as her with my friends, but it is still part of my daily life. Just because writing it wasn't doesn't mean my passion is dead.

Anyway, please allow me to get off my soap box. I hope you enjoy~

"Where are you headed so early in the morning?" Killua asked sleepily, rubbing his eyes as he looked at me. I pulled my black hoodie down over my head and adjusted it, turning to look at him. I hadn't prepared for one of them to wake up, but hey. I wasn't a trained liar for nothing.

"I wanted to go look around town by myself for a bit. Ya know, clear my head and stuff. Especially after that nightmare last night."

Killua was quiet as I walked towards the door, "You sure you don't want me to come along? We already talked about this… You aren't allowed to assassinate for them anymore. You aren't, are you?"

"First of all, you two don't control what I do. Neither of you are my boss. Second of all, no. I am not going to assassinate. I respect your guys' opinion. If I kill anymore for money, I doubt Gon will accept my money. I'm just going to look around." With that, I left the room. As I was walking down the hallway, I heard a door open, then someone slammed me into the wall. I wasn't there for long though, and I slammed my foot into their stomach. I turned and froze, "Gon!"

"Y-You.. You were lying, w-weren't you! Y-You're going to go assassinate!"

"Gon-"

"Don't lie to me!" He looked genuinely angry. He had tears of frustration in his eyes and all. "You can't lie to me, Celeste!"

"I'm not lying to you! I'm just going to scope out the city! I'm not trying to pull the wool of your eyes so if you could kindly get off of me, it would be greatly appreciated!"

"We've been here too long for you to just now be scoping it out! You already said it yourself, you know this entire city!" Gon was right, there had been a flaw in my lie. Holy crap, I messed up. Gon actually looked hurt, and it was my fault. Ouch.

I looked away from Gon, "Look, it's the only efficient way I know to make money. If you want Greed Island, this is what I have to do."

"I'd rather never find my dad if finding him means people have to lose their lives for it!"

"They're going to die either way, whether or not I'm the one who kills them! So what does it matter!?"

"The fact that you have blood on your hands because of me! I never wanted that! I know this is how you were raised but I'm not going to let you continue to assassinate for me! It's just not worth it! There are plenty of other ways to make money!"

"Little miniscule amounts like you guys have made won't get Greed Island for you! So buzz off!"

"I'm not accepting any of the money you've gained if you go out there and assassinate anymore!" Gon said stubbornly, crossing his arms as his eyes fixated on me. This was probably the sharpest, strongest glare he'd ever given me. Holy crap. He was genuinely angry at me. I never thought there'd be a day where Gon was able to keep a started face while he was trying to stare me down.

"Then I'll buy the damn game myself and hunt the fucker down alone." I turned away from him, shaking. I was certain my palms were bleeding from how tight I clenched my fist. As I went to take a step, another voice stopped me.

"If you can knock me out, we'll let you go, and accept all the money you get," I turned to look at Killua.

I smirked, though that didn't quite portray how I really felt. I didn't want to hurt him, "Haven't we already demonstrated how much stronger I am than you?"

"Then this shouldn't be any problem for you." I nodded and extended by claws, grinning. "You can move first."

"Very well, little brother," I launched at him, but by time I reached him, he was already gone. I ducked just in time, or else he would've delivered a swift chop to the back of my neck. I kicked my leg out behind me to hit him as I swung around on my hands, landing back on my feet. I looked quickly, unable to locate him. Chills went down my spine when I realized he was behind me. I hopped up and kicked off the wall to get myself away from him.

He was there too. He punched me in the stomach, causing me to mentally groan in pain. Physically, I acted like nothing happened. I kicked him hard enough he slammed into the wall, but it didn't seem to phase him. He grabbed me by my hair and held his claws to my throat. How had he gotten the upper hand in this situation?

"Ellilou, it's about time you learned that I'm stronger than you. And that there are always going to be people who are stronger than you." Then, he hit the back of my neck, and I was out.

When I woke up, the clock read four pm. He'd knocked me out for that long? I sat up and popped my knuckles, glancing around. Killua was missing, however Gon was sitting in the bay window. I stood up, "Where is he?"

"He's getting food." Chills slipped down my spine again. There was no eagerness or love in his voice like usual. He sounded disappointed or emotionless one, and neither sat well with me. I shoved my hands my pockets.

"So now you're going to hold a grudge against me, are you?"

"I'm just mad at you right now, Ellilou… You had no right to take away their lives! T-They didn't do anything to you! Even if they did… you shouldn't have killed them!"

I growled, trying to restrain my claws from extending, "I don't need the riot act read to me, Freecss! It's my choice, and it doesn't concern you! It's what I know to do and you can't change that! What does it matter, what's done is done-"

"But it shouldn't have been done and it shouldn't repeat itself! Your first instinct is always to kill! It's sickening! So if I make you mad," He got to his feet and put his hand to his chest, "Are you going to kill me!?"

I growled, "You fucking know I wouldn't hurt you so don't even give me that shit!"

He growled right back at me, "And how exactly do I know that? You weren't an assassin for years, yet you went back to it! Obviously you can change in the blink of an eye! Or is it just that you never changed at all!?"

I growled and slammed the lamp off the table, it crashing and shattering on the floor, splinters of glass landing in my feet and legs. I turned away from him and headed towards the door, "Go rot somewhere worthy of your presence like a junkyard. I'm sick of trying to protect you when you don't give a shit about whether I do or not."

"Celeste-"

"Going somewhere?" Killua asked just as I went to close the door behind me. He had bags of food from the closest fast food franchise in his arms.

I crossed my arms again, "Well, I'm not on hotel-room arrest, so yes, I am. Unless of course your idea of entertainment is watching me and Gon fight each other with psychological daggers."

He raised his eyebrows, "You two had an argument? What about?"

"You know what it was about. Now if you'll excuse me-" I went to step around him, but he stepped to the side to block me.

He scowled at me, "You aren't going anywhere. Now get back in there before I have to knock you out again."

I figured I could release my aura and scare him off, but I didn't want to be compared to Illumi. So, I slammed the door open and stomped into the bathroom, closing the bathroom door shut with a loud bang and locking it as well. Before I knew it, I smashed the mirror that took up most of one of the walls, uncaring as the shards fell around me. Those cuts didn't mean anything anyways.

Someone's fists banged on the door, and Gon's voice followed, "Ellilou! Let me in there!"

"No," I responded calmly, crossing my arms, shards falling to the ground and clattering against their brethren. Speaking of brothers, it was about then that Killua smashed the door open, nearly hitting me in the process. He grabbed me by the throat and lifted me a foot up.

A deep growl released from him, "Don't you get that we're just trying to protect you! We're trying to make it so that you can be who you want to be, not who Mom and Dad want you to be! This is what they and Illumi want! They want you to go back! They want the calling of the assassination to call you back and they want to hold you there, chain you down there! I-I…" He choked up, a couple of tears rolling down his cheeks, "I don't want that!'

I was tugging at his hands, but they wouldn't budge. Why? I was stronger than him, damn it! That was when I remembered me fighting Kurapika the previous day. Kurapika won. He had been stronger than me. I stopped struggling then, let my muscles relax, and met Killua's eyes. There wasn't malice. I wasn't met with the anger I expected. Instead, I was being pleaded at by fear and desperation. My little brother wanted to make sure I was safe, that I didn't let myself become who I never wanted to be. He was trying to resurface his crazy older sister.

"Ki… llua..." I said softly,slowly reaching my hand out and touching his cheek, gently wiping his tear away with my thumb, "I'm here. I won't become one of them."

He released me down, my bare feet crashing onto broken glass I was certain he'd forgotten about, and he pulled me into a hug so tight I was worried for a moment that he was trying to suffocate me. He buried his eyes in my shoulder, not crying but clearly fighting against himself not to. I loosely put my arms around him, placing my hands on his sides as I let my heartbeat naturally calm as my brain felt like it was going a hundred miles an hour and two miles an hour at the same time.

"Ellilou… We're not against you. And we are thankful for your attempt to help, though we hate how it was done. We're going to use the money you earned, but if you earn more… Please don't let it be because you killed someone else. I told you once and I'll tell you again… I'd rather never meet Ging than people die for it."

I felt like someone reached deep inside me and wrapped their boney, firm fingers around my heart, then proceeded to yank at it. It was the most painful feeling I'd yet to experience. I would rather be hanging upside down into a tank of water again before I ever would want to feel that again. I met Gon's eyes, his mirrored Killua's. In that moment, the remains of my confusion and anger were washed away. All that was left was regret and fresh understanding of my poor little brother's thought process. Their correct thought process.

"I… Thank you guys… Really… For not letting me drown under their power. I just… I'm no sales woman, and math isn't particularly my thing… So in this situation, I felt useless. I felt like there'd be no way for me to help you guys except to… to assassinate. I didn't want to look back on this journey and remember being useless and just a tag along. But… Now I've learned the hard way that I'd rather be useless than a Zoldyck… Because now I get to look back on this and… and remember I'm a murder."

Gon shook his head, "That's not true, Ellilou! You help us a lot, all the time! Money isn't the only thing we need! We need to feel secure here, you know there are hundreds of people here right now who could and would hurt us! But I don't worry about it for a moment because your here! If it weren't for you, I'd spend all my time worrying about running into the wrong person!"

I closed my eyes to avoid him seeing my own tears as Killua stepped back from me, "But I failed you. Someone could of hurt you those times I snuck out…"

"It doesn't matter now," Killua said calmly, "We're past it now. Now what matters is earning enough money for Greed Island."

I sighed, "Do you guys have a game plan yet?"

"We're meeting with Leorio in a half hour to talk over our next step. Right now, we're hunting for -" Killua paused and made eye contact with Gon, then looked back to me, "These guys, their bounty is two billion jenny each."

"Two billion jenny? How many heads on the dinner table does it take to crank your bounty up that high?"

"I don't know, but don't go all worry-warts on us. Gon, Leorio, and I are being cautious about it."

"Wait… Was that why you hung up on me yesterday? That… You shouldn't do something that dangerous without me there to bail you out if you get in trouble!"

Killua frowned a bit and crossed his arms, "Have our fights proven nothing to you? Ellilou, I'm stronger than you are. If I can't get us out, how would you have? I wanted to do it while we were gone so that you didn't get sucked into it and become their enemy too. Plus, that way when you found out, you would've been separate from us and have been able to save us."

"What if I didn't find out, Killua? What if I spent the rest of my life wondering where you guys disappeared to because you never told me a single thing! What if these guys are expert assassins like us, or even Mom and Dad level! They would never find the body if they decided to hide you guys! I would spend the rest of my life remembering that last phone call, trying to dissect it, wishing I'd been more persistent, that I could've been there!"

"Ellilou, why are you getting so bent out of shape over this! Nothing happened!"

"Because you do things like that! Because if I don't stress to you how dangerous it is and how much it upsets me, you'll never stop doing it! And then one day, something will happen!"

Gon stepped in between us, but not in front of us, "She's right Killua. We're a team, it's not fair to leave the other one out to worry. We should've waited and made her a part of the plan. It wasn't fair to make her worry."

Killua sighed, "I guess your right. But Ellilou, really. Please start having more faith in us, okay?"

"It's not that I don't have faith in you… It's that I don't have faith in fate. My fate." I slowly walked past them, driving more glass into my feet. I made my way to the bed and sat down, sighing.

Roughly twenty minutes later, Leorio showed up. And before they started to conduct business, Leorio immediately noticed the glass in my feet and would have none of my excuses or ignoring it. So I ended up laying on back with my brothers sitting on either side of me while Leorio held my feet and used tweezers to pick each individual shard out. It certainly wasn't the most pleasant feeling I'd ever had, but it made me sort of happy. It proved things weren't too broken around us, that we were still helping each other and working as a team.

After he had disinfected the cuts and wrapped my feet up, we finally got to actually talk about the game plan.

"There's no messages in the inbox, no one wants to just hand out the information," Leorio announced with a defeated voice, his head slightly hung.

Gon nodded, sighing, "No one wants to give us information unless we pay them for it."

Killua shook his head, "Which is something we can't to do, because we'll be losing money for mostly fake information. We won't know what to trust and what not to, and we'll be paying for all of it."

"Is someone going to tell me who the hell we're trying to hunt down? Because right now, I wouldn't know the difference between the guys we're hunting and a trash bag salesman."

Killua suppressed a laugh, "You could make a lot of money as a trash bag salesman in this town. Partially because of all the trash from tourist traps, and partially for all the dead bodies."

After I was done laughing, Gon looked at me, smiling, He handed me a piece of paper with people's' pictures on it, "We're hunting down these members of the Phantom Troupe."

Haha, no you aren't. I gave him the biggest glare I think I've ever managed as I got to my damaged feet, "Hell no you are not. It's the Phantom Troupe, Gon! Killua! Mom and Dad told us not to screw around with those guys! If Mom and Dad wouldn't want to fight them, why the hell would you agree to hunt them down! Yeah, you'll find them alright! And two minutes later someone will find your corpse while they on the damn otherside of town!"

"Ellilou, it's not a big deal-"

"Killua, this is like making a contract to Satan that you're going to hunt down God! There's such a small chance you'll find them, you're going to be wasting so much time trying to find them you'll never make any money other ways! And then if you do find them, you'll die! Then you certainly won't be buying Greed Island! Or doing anything for that matter!'

"Listen, we already put five million jenny into this! We can't just withdraw now! We have to at least think about putting our best into it and weighing our options!"

"You would think that death would weigh out as a pretty heavy bad option!" I snapped at him, glaring, "What about you! You're supposed to guide them to success and better lives as an adult, not march them into their graves!"

"Listen, Ellilou," Killua looked calmly at me, seeming nice again, "We only have three more days. We need to just gamble it and hope for the best."

That one hurt, "Hope for the best? It's like you're throwing away what we've gone through so far! Me going back home so many times! Gon almost dying more times than I can count! You almost continuing on as Illumi's slave! Me almost going on as Illumi's slave! If we hadn't started this journey, I never would've laid eyes on any of you again! You would've never gotten free! So how can you just lay aside the outcome like that and gamble with it!?"

Leorio put a hand on my shoulder, suddenly standing up again, "You're not going to win their argument. Their minds are set on this. All we can do now is help them try to survive this, game or not."

"Our best bet may be to try and get some information online," Gon suggested again, meeting Killua's eyes.

"No way. There was already an ad for 8 million jenny for any information possible." Killua dismissed.

"No, I'll give them 15 million!" Gon declared, holding up his Hunter's License. I didn't quite get it, but I knew it couldn't be good. Anytime I saw him with that thing I started adding up all the potential damage he could do with it. Not to other people, but to himself. God knows it's gotten him into enough trouble already."

The basic gist of his idea was to take out a loan of a hundred million jenny in turn for his Hunter's License, which he would get back when he paid back his loan. He signed the contract, received the money, then it was time to get a move on. Leorio then lead us to go buy a catalog. I was just hoping this wasn't one of his little explicit catalogs.

He explained it on our way there, "Southern Peace is the most famous auction room in York New. The catalog, which also includes the entrance ticket, costs twelve million jenny. The sale lasts five days, from the sixth to the tenth of September. But it's impossible to know what's being sold without buying the catalog."

He got snappy at Killua because it seemed like he was blowing him off, but I stayed out of that one. I'd received his information, so that's all I needed to know. We paid a lady with short black hair for a catalog, and received a book thicker than her thumb was tall. It was impressive, I wouldn't want to be on the receiving end of a good hit by that thing, that's all I'll say.

Are you finally admitting that there are things you wouldn't be able to muscle through?

"Hush." I snapped, forgetting not to say it outloud. Thankfully, the three musketeers were too busy reading the catalog to notice my outburst of insanity. Apparently the ticket inside allowed five people to go in, which covered the four of us, thankfully enough. Didn't want to have to waste my time and energy sneaking past security. Anyway, only one person was allowed to use the ticket to bid, the rest of us had to be silent little dolls during it. So of course, since he was the one who used his Hunter's License for the money, we allowed Gon to be the loudmouth.

Not that he wasn't already one. This just meant he was now a certified one.

They located Greed Island in the book, thankfully there was in fact one for sale. It also gave us some information on the game, like that there were an unlimited amount of players. Also, it was impossible to interrupt it. That sounded reassuring. Then something really struck me, "Wait. We may never be able to leave the game?"

"That's what it says," Killua nodded, not seeming too concerned.

"Gon, is Ging really so important that we should risk not being able to come out of a video game? Of seeing Aunt Mito again? Of seeing our world and friends again?"

"Weren't you the one spouting out stuff about not throwing away all our progress so far?" Gon asked, not seeming aggressive but more sheepish and uncertain. I sighed and shut up, knowing this would just be another pointless argument I lost. I surely was letting them rack up points against me.

"One copy will be sold each day on the sixth, seventh, and eighth of September. On the ninth and tenth, during the afternoon, there will be two copies sold each day. Each game will start at a bid of eight point nine billion jenny each."

"So basically, we don't have even an eighth of the minimum bid, and that's with some over-generous rounding down." I said, "Great. Just the kind of news I needed after being told my main source of income was now forbidden."

Leorio looked at Gon, "Are you sure you still want to pay fifteen million for any information on the Phantom Troupe?" After Gon confirmed it, Leorio told us our next step, "Then we need to make our first move to get online and post the announcement on the site. Then we'll check back later for responses."

Gon suggested the use of bait, but Killua pointed out that a ton of lies and misinformation could still arise. Leorio said we should sort it by where the informer confirms his information that he's seen them. We'd knock off the ones that said the Troupe was in places it likely wasn't, and pay closer attention to the ones that said they saw them in York New. While we still wouldn't be sure if it was true or not.

"For the single, simple reason that the mafia controls every circulation way, whether it be by land, air, water, or underground, I can't believe they would succeed in leaving town without being caught."

I shoved my hands in my pockets, "Long story short, Troupe's in town. Lets go."