When the door opened, it opened with a burst of pressure, the drag of suction on the air, the brief inside-out of reality's texture. His ears popped as they gave way to the change, but it was easy to ignore; he trusted the void to take him more than he trusted his own two legs to carry him through it.

Knov sucked in a breath of air and fell against the white wall of his Nen compartment. He was here, and here meant safety. Over the course of his Hunter career, this was one certainty he'd come to depend on more than he'd like, but at the moment, it was this crutch that kept him sane. Because absolutely no one outside could reach him here.

"Did you set the portals?"

Kite sat cross-legged by the opposite wall. He was the only other person in the room.

"Mm-hmm," Knov hummed, unable to make his mouth form the words.

"… What happened?"

God, did the man have to pause before every time he spoke? The beat of quiet set him on edge—couldn't stop shivering—and Knov suddenly needed to talk.

"Th… that aura, how did you deal with it? H-how did you—did you touch it and not… and keep going? How could anyone… keep breathing when… it's… it's so… that aura, it's—"

Blood-curdling.

"—couldn't—c-couldn't get any farther than the… oh, God… the central staircase. I couldn't. I'm sorry. I couldn't."

"If going farther meant that you had to probe a Royal Guard's En, then it was the right move to turn back. There's no way you could've entered it and survived," Kite replied.

He already knew that. Damn it, he already knew that. But it didn't mean anything, in the end.

"I think it might've been Pouf's En," Knov breathed.

"… Yeah."

That fucking pause. "How could you stand it?" he asked. "Stand being in it? And then think about…" Keep breathing. "About going back there?"

"Well, I wasn't in Zetsu like you were, so my Nen could buffer the impact," Kite said. "Besides that, Gon and Killua were there, and I had to protect them. For their sakes, I couldn't let myself be overwhelmed."

That's right; Gon had touched that (aura), too. The literal child among their ranks had already stood inside of it and then somehow managed to breathe—managed to face the prospect of feeling it once again. Was Knov just exceptionally weak?

… No. That wasn't it. Gon was just a weird kid; he had a certain scariness to him, a ferocity that made him a unique case. Knov recalled the boy's own aura when Morel had asked him to prove his strength, ordering Gon to hit him with everything he had, to attack as though Morel were responsible for Killua's disappearance.

Kite had been the one to stop him, laying one sad hand on his shoulder.

Sorry, Mr. Morel, Gon had exclaimed. I was really… about to rip your head off!

"I'm not going back there," Knov mumbled, just to hear himself say it. "I can't. I can't do it. Can't make me do it."

It was more than pain and more than death. It was to walk off the ledge and burn up in the atmosphere, to scatter yourself on the cosmic wind. Look into the abyss, and the abyss looks into you; peek beyond your flimsy veil and know that you are nothing.

"So Palm and I will fight Pitou by ourselves?"

Scum. Coward. Failure. Traitor.

"I'm sorry," he croaked, and the regret burned like a brand on his throat. "B-but I'll tell her to control herself! Really, she's not that bad, I swear—I really swear. When things get serious, she knows how to focus on th-the task at hand. She's reliable as an ally."

Kite shifted slightly, fingers drumming on the side of his arm, obviously restless. Currently, it was just him and Knov in the sanctuary of his Nen space, meaning that Gon was out in the dangerous world—which meant that Kite wasn't able to watch over him like the paranoid bloke that he was. Though, at this point, Knov was probably the most paranoid out of all of them. Probably, haha.

"As long as she doesn't turn on me," Kite sighed.

"P-Palm and I have a long history. I know she'll do what—what's right. I remember when I first met her, heh, heh-ehe-heh, heh-heh, haah," Knov giggled, suddenly pushed to laughter; he really couldn't stop shaking. "I found her in an insane asylum."

"Not surprising," Kite muttered.

"How'd you… meet Gon?" he asked.

The man's gaze wavered momentarily. "Gon?"

"Uh-huh. Uh-huh."

A few seconds of silence passed.

"Or—you, uh—don't have to tell me," Knov conceded. "You don't h-have to if you don't want to."

"… I met him when he was a little kid," Kite said after the longest pause yet. "Littler than he is now, anyways. He'd gotten himself in trouble, and I saved his life."

"Heh-heh-hah-h-how fortunate, heh." His breath was clouding up his glasses.

"Then he told me that his parents were dead, but I figured out that he was Ging's," Kite continued. "They've got the same look in their eyes—the look of a good Hunter."

"And that's why you, uh… feel so responsible for him? Why you're s-so fatherly?" Knov asked; it had bugged him once, the nature of Kite and Gon's relationship. Remember how that had bugged him? Way back then, when he hadn't yet known what was lying in wait just beyond his field of vision, that (thing called aura)? When he had actually thought he could go up against it? He had really, really thought—

"Hard to explain, I guess," Kite said. "He's my… my friend."

"Friend," Knov hummed. "That's nice."

Kite shot another glance at the door.

"Are we friends?" Knov asked.

"Sure."

Knov looked down to check his watch; it was digital, so the image was static, and he so desperately wished it were an analog clock—ticking, tocking, ticking again. He wanted to watch the movement of the hands, to see them wind their way around the minute, around the hour. He needed to know that time still moved in the endless white of Hide and Seek. That life went on.

"Excuse me," said Knov as he wandered toward the exit, his bare feet leaving muddy footprints on the cold tiles. He unlocked it and found exactly what he expected: an empty room, four walls and eight corners, void of life and shape and color and sound.

Once Knov heard the click of the door shutting behind him, he collapsed to the floor and began to cry.

Once Kite heard the click of the door shutting behind him, he staked his fingers through his bangs and let out a heavy sigh. Now he had to fight Pitou with Palm alone. Great. Fucking fantastic. Thanks a lot, Knov.

At least Gon should be back soon. He'd left to pursue some ants with Knuckle and Shoot while Kite had been off chasing his own target, the lion that had been on the news; Leol, was it called? In any case, Kite had killed the stupid thing, so now there was nothing to do but wait for Gon to return.

… It'd been a long time since Kite had saved him from the foxbear. God, why did Knov have to dredge up that old memory? He didn't like to think of Gon as being so… weak. So vulnerable. He wanted to believe he could fend for himself.

Still, even back then, Gon hadn't really been weak, per se. There was that look about him, determined and headstrong, ready to challenge and give and receive. He'd recognized it immediately, that the boy had a want—the mark of a born Hunter, something Kite happened to lack. At that moment, in the face of such a thirst for life, he'd been thrust into awareness of his own deficiency. This is what Ging meant, Kite had thought. This must be the "want."

Kite didn't know what he wanted to do with himself. He stumbled through life and took what fate decided to hand him.

Whatever fate decided to hand him, be it joy or grief or a possibly pregnant woman.

Who knew when Knov would be back, and who knew when Gon would walk through the door? Who knew if Kite would even survive this whole ordeal? This might be the last time he's ever totally alone. This might be his only chance to ask. And he really… had to ask.

Kite dialed the number and held the phone to his ear.

"Hello?" Spinner greeted through the call.

"Tell me you were on birth control."

"… Would it even matter if I weren't? Would you stay with the baby, if I had one?"

And as always, she just didn't get it. That he couldn't stand to see more of himself in the world.

"Just tell me."

It was silent on the other side of the line, and he felt his heart stall.

"Please," he whispered. The torture of uncertainty was the duality of suspense, to be caught between desperation and resignation, hope and despair. If the fall doesn't kill you, then the turbulence certainly will.

Please, God. Please.

"Yes, I was on birth control. You can relax."

Overwhelming relief.

"Thank God," he weakly praised. "Thank God."

"Is that all?"

"No!" he laughed, flooded by a sudden high; it was the first piece of good news he'd gotten in literal months, and it left him feeling giddy as all hell. "I've been wanting to apologize for a long time: I'm sorry I missed our dinner date, and I'm sorry that I hit you."

"Oh. It's fine."

It came out like a pleasant, long-suffering sigh—like she really meant what she was saying. "Really? That's good to hear!" he exclaimed. "I'll make it up to you sometime. Just let me know if you need anything."

"… Try to be happy, Kite."

"Happy?" he repeated. "Yeah, I'm happy! I've been so nervous, you have no idea—"

"No, I mean after you get off the phone. I want you to do what you need to be happy."

As understanding dawned down, Kite smiled a bit at her naivety, and a bit more at her goodwill.

"Can you promise me that? That you'll choose the path that'll treat you the best, in the end?"

"… I promise to do what I think is right," he answered. "That's the only way I could ever be happy, in the end."

A moment of silence before she breathed another sigh.

"Okay, Kite. Okay."

"Are we good?"

"Yeah, we're good. I've… got to go, now, though."

"Alright. Oh, just a heads-up: I'll be offline the next few days. Taking care of ant stuff."

"I'll, uh, keep that in mind. Bye, then."

"Bye."

As Kite put his phone away, he distantly wondered if he was doing the right thing. Not telling her that he might die soon, and that the happiness of most people was contingent on things out of their control.

Spinner put her phone away and sank deeper into the armchair. Stacked neatly on the desk beside her were two plane tickets: one for herself and one for Banana, still warm from the hotel's printer. She was done with this place, and Banana had offered to go with her; the ecological survey had been finished for months, the team officially disbanded. They'd stuck around because Kite had stuck around, but that wasn't enough to keep her anchored, anymore.

Kite. Frustrating, patient, good-hearted Kite. So easy to love and to idolize. The one who listened to her and Stick in their hour of need, saved her home and her swans from certain doom. After that, she'd sworn to herself—and only to herself, of course; no one else needed to know that much of her business—to stay by his side no matter what course he took. And for a beautiful while, she'd been able to keep up.

If there was one thing she was sure of in this crazy world, it was that he deserved a good ending.

"Where to now?" Banana asked, sitting on the end of the bed. "If we're not sticking around."

But she couldn't be anchored, not anymore. He didn't need her, and she didn't need him. The world is large, and life is short, and her wings were yet untested. It was time to go. Time to fly.

"We'll figure it out as we go," she answered.

She was free to roam wherever she pleased, so was it wrong of her that she only wanted to go home?

"—ain't funny! Really! Fuck off!"

The door opened, and in came Knuckle, Shoot, and Gon, with Knov bringing up the rear—being the only one who could open the room, of course.

"No one's laughing," Shoot sighed while Knuckle wiped at the tears gathering in the corners of his eyes. They both congregated at the hoard of food in the center of the room, but Gon plopped down where he stood, obviously exhausted; he was covered in shallow scratches, clothes torn up and stained with ant blood.

"Catch!" Knuckle called as he tossed him a water bottle. Gon chugged it in three seconds flat and let the empty plastic fall from his hand.

"I'm guessing you got your target?" Kite asked.

"Yeah, plus another," Knuckle said. "Tell him, Gon."

Gon stared at the scabs on his knees and released a long breath. "We split up for a little while, and this chameleon thing started following me. It could turn invisible, but the smell of smoke made it easy to track. So I acted like I didn't know it was there, and then I took its head off."

He was quite prone to decapitation, lately.

"What about you, Kite?"

"Yeah, I got mine."

"Sweet," Knuckle grunted. "We're gonna go stake out the palace with the boss, now. We only stopped by to drop off Gon, 'cause he's beat."

"Alright. See you later."

"Yup."

Knuckle and Shoot walked out into the natural world, Knov closing the door behind them and then reopening it to a different compartment. "Call me if you need anything," Knov said as he departed—eyes blotchy and red behind the glint of his specs—leaving Kite and Gon to themselves.

Should he sit down next to him? Offer him something? It was difficult to know how to act with Gon in this new unreadable state. There was a part of him that you could talk to, interact with—and then there was a part of him that was simply null, a wavelength giving nothing but static. You could listen, but you wouldn't hear anything. Even when it didn't swamp him with those moments of disassociation, it was still undeniably present, lurking just under the surface. He could not be pushed or pulled. There was no handle with which human hands could get a hold on him.

And now Kite had to leave him at the most perilous point of the boy's life thus far: confronting Pouf in what was essentially a steel cage, the burden of finishing what they started in NGL resting squarely on his twelve-year-old shoulders. What a fucking nightmare.

And yet for all of Gon that couldn't be seen, Kite still had to believe he operated by certain known principles. Gon's faith in Killua's continued survival was as strong as ever, and as long as that faith remained, he wouldn't want to go anywhere they couldn't be together. So Gon wouldn't let himself die.

He couldn't tell if it was a good thing or not—that if Killua was truly dead, they would almost certainly never be able to confirm it.

"What is it, Kite?"

"Hm?"

"You're staring at me," the boy said. "You wanna say something. So spit it out, already."

"… What is it that you want, Gon?" Kite asked.

He laughed. "From you? To stop staring at me."

"From life," Kite clarified. "What do you want from life?"

"… Find Killua," he muttered. "Find Ging."

There was something funny about it, the fact that so much of Gon's life was centered around finding people. Perhaps it was fate at work, giving his time on Earth this one consistent theme for some narrative payoff only God would get to see. Or perhaps it was the fact that Gon just didn't care about the usual things Hunters strived for; what he cared about was people—in their realness, in their physical presence, in whatever he got out of spending time with them. To get that, he'd have to find them; ergo, he'd always want to find people.

Something about that seemed very sad.

"Do you think you'll ever want to find someone else?" Kite wondered.

"No."

"No?"

"After I get Killua back, things will be different," Gon stated. "Then I'll just be focused on keeping him."

"… Ah," Kite hummed.

"Because Killua's mine. He was born mine, and he grew up mine, and someday, when we're all old and crumbly, he'll die mine."

Does Killua get a say in this, Kite wondered.

And then Gon seemed to sense his qualms, somehow, because he suddenly turned violent at Kite's silence, the manic hostility heavy on his aura. "I love him, Kite! And he loves me!" the boy shouted, eyes wider than Kite had ever seen them. "Nothing will ever change between us! So I want you to just—rip up any doubt you have about that, before I do it for you. A stranger like you doesn't get to look into our lives and decide anything about us. You can just shut up and nod your head. That's it. Nothing else. So stop."

"… A 'stranger like me'?" Kite hesitantly asked.

"Yeah, that's right. I don't know you. You're a stranger."

The frenzy had left him, now. Gon was flat, unaffected.

With the threat of an assault dissipated, Kite relaxed a bit.

"Huh. Thought we were pretty well-acquainted at this point," he said quietly. It was better to chase this line of thought, where Gon appeared to be less inflammable; talking about Killua at any length could be dangerous.

But still, even without a discussion on the Killua problem, this was… headway, maybe. Gon was opening up. Maybe there was an opportunity here for Kite to help him, somehow.

Fucking hell. He did not have the tact for this.

"Well, we're not. I don't know you," Gon said as he laid down. "I thought I did, but then you broke your promise. The person I thought you were would never do something like that."

The promise to go to NGL, of course. Although technically, Kite had only said he'd go with Gon, and since Gon hadn't been able to go, the conditions he set for the promise were void. But it was a laughably bad idea for Kite to bring up such a technicality right now.

"I'm sorry," he apologized softly. Arguing about it seemed like an equally bad idea, so he put himself at Gon's mercy.

"Whatever," the boy muttered. "I don't care."

That's what all the kids say. But what did it even mean, in this context? Did he not care about Kite being sorry, or was it a more general statement about the conversation itself? Why was it always so hard for Kite to gain traction in these sorts of conversations?

"Oh, Gon," he finally sighed, the sound heavy with all the things he wished he knew how to say. "What am I going to do with you?"

"Whatever you want, I guess," the boy whispered back.

"Do you know how worried you make me?"

"Yeah."

"Do you care?"

"No."

Kite slumped down against the wall beside him. "Well, I care—about you, that is. I care a lot. Is that so wrong?"

"No…" Gon choked, face hidden beneath his arm and body turned toward the wall. At long last, an emotion that wasn't psychotic rage, and already Kite was fucking things up. Shit, was he crying?

"Hey, hey," Kite murmured. He tentatively placed a hand on Gon's waist and tried to roll him over, but the boy resisted. "Gon. Come here."

"No…!"

"Come on," Kite urged. "Don't hide from me."

The boy shook his head against the floor.

"Gon, would you just—" He cut himself off and turned him over forcibly, frustration getting the better of him. Gon struggled halfheartedly for a moment before giving up and let himself lie eaglespread on his back. Palms turned up toward the ceiling, tears leaking out of his unfocused eyes. The picture of surrender.

"It's awful, being so worried all the time, isn't it?" Kite said. "I know how you feel."

Gon sniffed and closed his eyes.

"… There is no pressure," the boy eventually said.

"What do you mean?"

"I won't mind it if I die."

… No.

That was the one thing he wasn't allowed to say.

He wasn't allowed to throw away that last known principle—that he'd try to keep himself alive. If that were no longer true, then…

(Hold him fucking down.)

"Don't say that," Kite pleaded, pulling the boy upright in spite of knowing how fed up he was with Kite's intervention. But fuck, he couldn't just let him lie there like that. He couldn't just let him say things like that. It was not okay. It was so not okay. Holy shit, it was so not okay.

"If I die, I'll go to hell, but I'm okay with that. I'm ready."

"Gon, I'm serious," he warned through his teeth.

"I'll never get to see Bisky again, though. I hope she won't think too badly of me."

"Gon," he said again as he grabbed the boy by his shoulders. A movement that went nowhere, but he had to do something—but what next, where did this lead to—embrace him, brace him, slap him, shake him—?

"No, Kite. Let me go."

"Don't you fucking 'no' me," he snarled, seizing the opportunity to make a push with words. "You have so much to live for. So much!"

"And how would you know, huh?!"

"Because I—I know you!" Kite shouted back. "You might not know me, but I know you, and I know you've probably got a million other friends just waiting for you to get off this godforsaken island! People who love you, Gon! And they may not mean as much as Killua does, but that doesn't make them worthless, damn it!"

Gon had nothing to say to that.

"Now listen here," Kite demanded, holding Gon tighter for emphasis. "In three days, we're invading the palace, and I'm not going to be with you, since I'll be facing Pitou. So it'll be up to you to look after yourself, and you are going to stay alive. Do whatever it takes to make that happen, no matter what you have to run from or who you have to fucking slaughter. You are going to keep a cool head, and you are going to keep yourself safe, because if I find out you fucking died, I swear to God…!"

Gon tore one shoulder out of Kite's chokehold and grabbed the wrist of the hand still holding on to him.

"Let. Me. Go."

Kite let him go—the boy scrambling to his feet and taking a step back from him—and the regret was immediate.

Surely it was a sign of love, staking so much of his heart on the welfare of another. What else but love could be such an engine for pain?

"I'm sorry," he said softly. "I didn't mean to crowd you like that."

"Yeah."

"You just made me a little too angry."

"Yeah."

"And I wanted to get the message across."

"Yeah."

"Gon," he sighed and leveled his eyes with the boy. "What can I do to make you see that… that your life would be a shame to waste?"

"I already know that, Kite."

But Kite didn't feel like he did. "There are so many fantastic things in the world, things you've never even heard of. Stories that would blow your mind. Food that would blow your taste buds. So many wonderful things, and you haven't experienced any of them yet! You can't let it end here, not while there's so much left to do. So you have to stay alive."

The anger faded bit by bit, and in the wake of this change, all Gon really looked like was someone very tired.

"When all of this is over…" Kite murmured deep in his throat, taking Gon's hands into his own and bringing them together. "We can go looking for Ging, okay? And after that, we'll travel all over the world—go anywhere you want to go. Do anything you want to do. And I'll show you all of those amazing things, Gon. I promise."

"… Yeah," the boy quietly replied. "With Killua, too. When all this is over."

Saltwater sprayed the side of Zeno's face as he trekked across the narrow ridge through the crashing of waves against the rockface. The sun hung low in the sky above, vividly orange in the way of the early sunset, with the color playing off the choppy waters in mellow bands. No gulls or fish could be found in the area; all nearby life had long since fled from the tranquil ferocity radiating off the figure at the end of the cape. Being simple animals, they could not comprehend all the nuance of human focus—that the wrath was, in fact, directed inward, and they were entirely safe from harm.

Netero was just as excited as he'd expected him to be.

"Well," Zeno said. "It's time."

The golden light of worship faded away, and Netero rose from his meditation—or fell from it, depending on your perspective.

"Indeed," he agreed. "The money's been transferred to your account."

With a nod of acknowledgment, Zeno formed the Grand Dragon and mounted it alongside his old acquaintance.

"This might be the last time we ever see each other, you know," Netero reflected.

Zeno snorted in professional amusement. "Are you trying to say goodbye? To me of all people?"

He knew for a fact that Netero hadn't said a word about this to his followers or family; the only goodbye they'd get is whatever video tapes he left them. Many would consider it a singular honor, this attention from Netero. Not Zeno, but many.

"Ah, I guess this is a bit odd," he chuckled warmly. "Well, in any case, it's certainly been fun."

Zeno thought about it for a moment and chose not to contradict him. Maybe there had been some enjoyment sprinkled in there, somewhere down the line. It was only natural.

"Ten minutes left," Morel announced.

Kite reluctantly stood up and channeled his Nen. It was do-or-die time.

"YO, FUCKTARD! ABOUT TIME YOU CALLED ME. IT'S BEEN, LIKE, WHAT, TWO AND A HALF MONTHS?"

"… That's your Hatsu?" Knuckle asked disbelievingly.

"Unfortunately," Kite sighed.

"HEY, YOU BETTER WATCH YOUR MOUTH, ALBINO. I CAN'T EVEN COUNT HOW MANY TIMES I'VE SAVED YOUR UNGRATEFUL ASS. SERIOUSLY. I CAN'T COUNT ANY HIGHER THAN NINE, AND IT'S A NUMBER BIGGER THAN THAT."

"Just give me the damn roll."

"YEAH, YEAH. DON'T GET YOUR PANTIES IN A TWIST. BRRRRRRRRR—"

Knuckle fixed Crazy Slots with an even more befuddled stare as the numbers whirled through its mouth. "Why—"

"SIX!"

Kite took hold of #6 and decided to answer what he knew Knuckle wanted to ask. "Yes, its… personality is part of its design. To make it stronger, I gave my ability the restriction that it'll—"

"ANNOY THE FUCK OUT OF HIM WHENEVER HE USES ME, HA!"

"Yeah, that," he muttered. "It seemed like a good idea at the time."

Knuckle winced in sympathy. "So this is six, huh."

#6, the harpoon. It was one of four weapons with no gimmick attached (aside from having unlimited harpoon shots), simply being an insanely powerful version of the weapon it imitated. In an attempt to better collaborate, Kite had already explained the abilities of his various numbers to the rest of the group—with literally everyone calling #3 total bullshit. He didn't even know if #3's power would work, considering the fact that he'd never died before, but if it did… well. Pseudo-immortality sounded nice.

"It's an okay roll, I guess."

He'd have to make do, at least in the beginning.

Standing on the palace balcony, Shaiapouf was faced with his greatest challenge yet. The Selection was going well, with his brainwashed soldiers being the ones to impart his wing scales on the dumb masses outside the palace; they were so saturated with his own cells that they carried a perpetual cloud of scales around their bodies, so the surrounding populace fell to the first level of hypnosis by virtue of just being near them. Subliminal Message had evolved such that those under his mind control eventually converted their cells into his own, like a virus bursting free from its host. Even with his impressive foresight, he hadn't expected his Hatsu to strengthen so drastically in such a short amount of time.

And none of this did anything to change the fact that the King was in the girl's room.

Since the hypnosis could be left to the soldiers, Pouf was free to leave his clones at their posts throughout the palace—a habit he'd gained after the debacle with that boy, to keep his own surveillance system even while Pitou's En flooded everything in a two-kilometer radius. With his clones keeping eyes and ears on every nook and cranny, he'd had no choice but to watch the King depart from His throne room to the den of that snot-nosed brat.

Where He'd shown concern for her injuries, called her an honored guest, and now traveled to meet with her again—not even having her summoned to Him, but actually getting up to visit her Himself.

With this peculiar agony rending the fabric of his soul, Pouf was caught by even more surprise than he would've ordinarily been at the next two events to occur.

One: Pitou's En disappeared.

Two: a voice boomed down from the heavens, carried to his ears by the stormy winds—

"Dragon Dive."

Author's Note:

I'm sorry for being late ;-; I promise I'll be on time next week

Next week is the palace invasion! Get ready