Hello lovelies! I meant to start this chapter yesterday but I had some other things to do. Anyways,
In response to:
Lili: I'm happy you like it!
Mi-Chan: Yes, Lucius will have a scene where she learns much more, and a scene where she does perform Death Waltz. Don't worry, Lucius is by no means weak and I made it seem this way on purpose and you'll find out why! And I'd hope it was cute that he's actually worrying, How do you write a torturer, who happens to be one of the cruelest in the phantom troupe, in love? Well, I'm gettin' there.
Rinrikapyon: Well, he did kinda push Lucius off of a balcony and he did kind of run off with the chain user, lmao but he'll do anything for Killua, it seems.
Chapter 28
Blood trickles from the corner of her mouth, down her chin and neck as her body suddenly twitches, jolting her awake. Her eyes flutter open slowly and she coughs, trying to swallow the dried blood from the back of her throat that causes her to choke. She doesn't dare move, as every small movement produced by the twitching of her body sends pain up and down her spine like electricity.
She wants move her hand to check the back of her head, which pounds as if she had been hit in the back of the skull with a sledgehammer, but she finds that her arms and legs have been restrained to a wooden chair where she sits.
Although her blurred vision does not allow her to see exactly where she is, she can tell that the room she is in is large, and brightly lit.
And she can tell that she is not alone.
The room is quiet, but it isn't silent. From behind her, she can hear the breath of a stranger.
She coughs again, alarming the stranger. She can hear that the individual stands and backs away.
"Kurapika… Kurapika she's awake!"
The man's voice alarms another stranger, who enters the room quickly and rushes in front of her. All she can see of the individual is a blue and golden blurred silhouette.
She can tell from the blur's shaky breath that they feel hostility towards her.
But she soon finds out that 'they' is really a 'he.'
He speaks to her with a feminine voice, and at first she thought the boy in front of her was a grown woman, but his voice is familiar and she can imagine his face in her head.
But this confuses her.
She can't seem to remember how she knows him, as she can't remember interacting with him ever in her life.
The boy speaks to her.
"Where.. Is.. the Phantom Troupe?!" He yells at her in between heavy breaths, grabbing her shoulders and shaking her entire body.
She yelps as the pain paralyzes her. She only moves with the boy's hands as they shake her and the chair back and forth.
"Kurapika! Cut that out and calm down!"
The other man behind her moves to apprehend the boy, prying his fingers off of her shoulders. The man is dressed in black.
"Get a hold of yourself, idiot! You could knock her out again!" The man continues to hold the boy, who at first fought back, but slowly he calms. Once the boy named Kurapika ceases to resist, the man lets him go. "Killua's brother said that he had no clue where their base was, all he said was-"
"I get it! I know! Kalluto is no help, but he said this girl would know!"
"That doesn't mean you can torture her, okay?! Especially after I spent three days fixing her up."
She closes her eyes.
Three days… That must mean that she has been unconscious for three days. She exhales, calming herself.
What happened to her three days ago?
"I never implied that I would torture her! Let me handle this alone, Leorio!"
This silences the man named Leorio, and he backs away from the boy slowly.
"Fine, I'll leave but you're not handling this alone. I'm calling Melody down here, in case you freak out again. She's better at handling you than I am."
"Fine."
The older male turns and walks out of the room. He returns shortly with a short, plump figure wearing green and leaves the room alone. She blinks wildly at the two figures in front of her, trying to gather as much information about their physical appearances that her blurred vision will allow her.
The two figures shuffle around a bit, dragging two chairs in front of her and sitting. The boy with golden hair holds his head and stares at the floor, while the other figure seems to silently watch him.
Although it is difficult for her to keep her head up, as the pain in her spine and the back of her head nags at her to relax, she stares at the boy cautiously.
A bead of sweat inches down her forehead.
What should she do?
She can't free herself, not now. Having suffered such a serious injury, she can't even move a finger without feeling as though she had been shocked with electricity.
Should she negotiate?
No, the boy is in no mood to negotiate with her. Not right now, at least. She can tell.
She bites her lower lip as she continues to listen to the boy's breathing. In case he becomes violent and his breathing gets faster, she'll at least have a few seconds to react.
But suddenly, his breathing slows, and the boy looks up at her. She can see that his eyes are red.
"You." He says. "What is your name?"
"Lucius Dupont." She replies calmly.
The woman beside him mutters her name under her breath, as if she recognized it. "...Dupont?"
"Lucius Dupont." The boy spats her name. "What is your affiliation with the Phantom Troupe?"
She furrows her brow.
"P-Phantom Troupe?"
Is that some sort of gang? As far as she knew, not even her father has any affiliation with any gangs.
"Don't play dumb." the boy says in a forced calm manner. "At the Auselor Hotel. Three nights ago. You were with the Phantom Troupe, fighting me."
She frowns. "I do not know what you are speaking about."
"Don't lie!" He growls, standing from his chair. "I'm going to get this information out of you one way or another! It's no use playing dumb!" The boy walks towards her and puts a hand on the chair she sits on. "Now answer me truthfully."
The boy is close to her face now, and she can smell mint off of his breath.
"What is your affiliation with the Phantom Troupe, and where are they hiding?!"
She closes her eyes and repeats herself.
"I do not know what you are speaking about."
"Don't lie to me!"
She can feel his grip around her neck as he pushes her and the chair she is restrained to into a wall behind her. The woman gasps and shouts for him to stop.
"Kurapika! She isn't lying!"
The boy ignores her and continues to tighten his grip. Lucius gasps and chokes out an apology for the sake of survival but the boy ignores it and just grips tighter, sending signals to her spine to ache even more. The wall pushes at the back of her head, pain causing her eyes to water only a little.
"Kurapika stop, she isn't lying to you!"
The boy screams and the man dressed in black bursts into the room, immediately rushing to restrain the boy. The boy's fingers slip from her neck and she gasps and sucks in as much air as she can. She can feel the blood return to warm her cheeks as she catches her breath. Once she is back in a stable state, she looks up to see that the woman and the older male have successfully calmed the boy down.
"Melody... " the boy whispers, but it doesn't fail to reach Lucius's ears. "What do you mean she isn't lying…?"
"Leorio predicted that she would have memory loss after that fall. She isn't lying to you."
Memory loss?
"Is that so…?" The boy staggers as if he had no energy at all. "Then… what are we going to do with her?"
The three look at her, and she looks down, ignoring their stares.
"It should be temporary, but it could take months for her to regain her memory." Replies the older male.
"We can't just leave her, either." Says the woman.
"I agree. The way that one spider looked at her, I would say that she could serve as a valuable hostage." The boy replies.
Spider?
"I meant… It would be cruel to leave her out on the street so terribly injured. It would be wrong." The woman says. "But I suppose if you think about it that way... "
Another voice is heard. A child's voice.
"I have an idea!"
"Gon… we can't do that. She was helping the Phantom Troupe! You think if we just be nice to her, she'll be our friend and she'll give us all the information we need when she regains her memory and everything will be just sunshine and rainbows?!"
"That's exactly what I mean." Gon replies to leorio as he sits at the kitchen table.
The six of them sit at the table with him in the kitchen, two rooms away from Lucius.
Killua facepalms, Leorio sighs and Melody chuckles. He receives no reaction out of Kurapika, who is staring at his reflection in the polished wooden table and Kalluto looks up.
"Actually, that could work." He says.
"Why do you say that, Kalluto?" Killua asks.
"Well… She's not a horrible person. She comes from a group similar to the Phantom Troupe but they're not as famous and really, they do more underground work than they do steal. She told me that she isn't nice, but I don't believe her. She was really kind to me because she had no reason to hate me."
"You kind of shoved her off of a balcony. She has a reason to hate you now." Killua says matter of factly.
"Shut up Kil, I saved you. You owe me!"
Killua sticks his tongue out at his brother in response.
"My point is." Kalluto continues. "If we're kind and we can get her to have a change of heart, like Gon said, then we wont have to worry about anything. And I don't want her to hate me anyways."
"And she won't be bad anymore!" Gon concludes.
"Kalluto… this group you were talking about… who are they?"
Kalluto looks up at Kurapika.
"The Desdemona Shadowmen."
"Figures. Never heard of em'." Says Leorio. "Are they dangerous?"
"Well, apparently there's a lot of members. I've only met four of them. But Lucius is definitely dangerous, along with their leader for sure."
Kurapika looks back down at his reflection.
"Well, it seems like the only thing we can do now. I don't know if I can be really nice to her but I'll try." Says Killua while resting his head in his hand and his elbow on the table.
"I'm down as long as she doesn't kill me." Says Leorio. "I'll continue to treat her injuries as well."
Gon looks at Kurapika.
"What do you think?"
Kurapika stands from his chair, but he does not look back.
"Do what you want."
Then, he proceeds to walk upstairs into his bedroom.
Killua ponders to himself.
"...Don't people who lose their memory forget their names?"
Kalluto answers him with a playful tone
"Not all the time, idiot."
Feitan sits atop the mansion's roof, staring up into the stars in the night sky wondering why he feels so empty.
He lost his only source of pleasure, sure. But for some reason that doesn't sting as bad as the fact that Lucius is, in fact, gone.
It's not as if he is crushed. Not like the little girl was when the Troupe and the Shadowmen returned from the Hotel when she learned that Lucius was gone.
It's too hard to admit to himself. He can't even admit that he is in denial.
If he went to her bedroom, would she be there to speak to him? Would she appear as if nothing ever happened? Would she challenge him when he insulted her like she always did? Would she laugh lightly at his angry demands, and demand something in return like she has for the past months?
Why does he miss such annoying things?
Why is the strange, new pleasure from listening to her speak words that he couldn't understand so much more important than the pleasure that she rewarded him afterwards?
He groans.
He turns to the owner of the footsteps that approach from behind him.
"You can't sit up here and mope forever."
"Shut up, Phinks."
"Come on, don't deny it. You're moping."
Phinks walks up and takes a seat next to him.
"You missed the meeting." He says to him. "We haven't come up with a definite solution yet, but we're setting aside pros and cons."
Feitan ignores him.
"Why is she so important to you anyway? All you did was push her around."
"No." Feitan replies. "She no let me push her around."
"You must hate that."
Feitan doesn't deny that, nor does he agree. In fact, he doesn't know how he feels about that.
Phinks repeats himself.
"Why is she so important to you?"
Feitan shrugs.
"You're confusing, but you're taking it much worse than the Shadowmen or Rei. You've got yourself all cooped up in your room during the day, for the past three days, and you climb up here at night and you've barely eaten and you just stare off like-"
"Phinks, I confused."
"Huh?"
"I confused."
"I know that but explain."
"I hate her but-"
"You love her." Phinks interrupts. "You hate her but you love her."
Feitan is angered by this, and begins to refuse but Phinks interrupts again.
"No, don't even try to deny it. You're impressed by her, aren't you? You like it when she challenges you, don't you? You like it when she angers you, even when it's on accident and you hate that you love it. You hate that you love her."
Feitan wants to deny but he finds that he cannot speak.
"Well?" Says Phinks. "You don't have to nod or say yes or anything, because we both know it's true." Phinks stands in his spot. "You want her back, don't you? ...You're a thief, Fei. If you want something, take it."
And with that, Phinks turns and leaves Feitan alone on the roof of the mansion.
Phinks knows his shit.
