The Speed Hunter

by Bugz-Toon

The Speed Hunter follows the adventures of Ryozha Tenryu, a young Hunter who joins up with Gon and Killua for a hunt. Fabled treasure, spies, legendary warriors, haunted castles, commando raids, and lost valleys. Complete and LONG. Reviews welcome.

5. Chapter 5

Dawn poured its slow golden flood over the great city of Constantis, and Ryozha awoke to the wailing call of the Muezzins. He rolled over in bed and stared out across the sprawling, low-slung city. Constantis had few of the gleaming towers favoured by its more modern cousins- much of the city was still the same adobe and brick it had been a thousand years before.

Slender minarets soared above the city, and in the distance, the crowded, ancient palaces of the Old City could be seen across the Bosphorous Strait.

Ryozha sleepily watched the busy seagoing traffic as ships of every size and description plowed the shining Strait. The three boys were staying at a small hotel on the Asian side of the city called the "Harem", which Killua seemed to find very funny. However, it wasn't too expensive, and it was quite close to an Internet cafe, several restaurants, and one of the main transit terminals.

It had taken the three boys nearly a week to reach the city after hearing from Jack Fettham. They had said their goodbyes to Wing and Zushi, but Bisuke had said that she would probably see them again soon, so don't even bother with goodbye.

-I still find that vaguely worrying...- Ryozha thought muzzily. -Too bad checking Fettham's mailbox didn't yield anything- the address was here in Constantis, all right, but it was just a Post-Office Box that the clerk said was weird- stuff went in, but it was always empty the next day, and no one came in or out.-

He shrugged and scrambled out of bed- thanks to Ryozha's internet-trawling skills, they had a meeting with one of the black market dealers who claimed to know Fettham in less than an hour- and pulled on a pair of shorts. It wasn't even completely light yet, and it was already quite warm.

-Thank goodness it's Winter here...- Ryozha thought, -this place is an absolute OVEN when Summer comes. Always kind of liked this city, though.- He met Gon and Killua downstairs in their little hotel's dining room and breakfasted on fresh fruit, cereal, and thick, strong coffee (which only Killua drank).

At the rendezvous point, they found no-one other than a small boy, who took one look at them and scampered off, ducking down a maze of alleyways. They followed him easily, but lost him when he squirmed through a hole so small that none of them could fit through it.

A little stymied by this turn of events, they wandered one of the huge Bazaars for a couple of hours, simply drinking in the atmosphere and studying the merchandise from a hundred exotic lands. Ryozha eyed one of the hand-woven carpets hungrily, but decided against it. -Pity...- he thought, -That rug is gorgeous, but the only place I can call 'home' right now is Grandfather's school, and I'm only there a few times a year...-

When they returned to their hotel, they found another message from Wahid, the contact who claimed to know something about Fettham.

'My apologies,' the message read, 'I see that you are more familiar with the way things work here than I had assumed. Perhaps a meeting on neutral ground? The Ayasofya Museum, at 8 PM, is largely deserted. Please meet me there.' The three boys looked at one another. "Well, that's the day pretty much shot..." Ryozha complained.

"Why?" asked Gon. "Why don't we try seeing if anybody else knows about Mr. Fettham?"

"Or if anyone knows anything about this Wahid character." Killua added.

Ryozha blinked. "Uhm... right." he said. "Sorry... I guess I just get too much of a one-track mind sometimes." He hesitated, then said "Killua, are you sure it's a good idea to go digging on this Wahid guy? If he's as well connected as he seems to be, he'll get wind of it, and we might scare him off."

Killua cocked his head to one side, considering. "True," he said, "but on the other hand, if we DON'T dig around a bit on him, he may assume we're clueless and try to put one over on us."

"Why not just wait until tomorrow to see what we can find out on Mr. Wahid?" Gon interjected. "He won't tell us everything tonight, and after he's met with us once, we can probably find him again."

Ryozha and Killua both nodded. "Right." they said in unison. The three boys then consulted briefly, and decided to split up.

Gon took the largest area, on the North side of the Golden Horn, Killua took the smaller section on the Asian continent, and Ryozha took the densely-packed 'old city' in the Southwest.

--

Ryozha jogged over the massive Bosphorous Strait bridge. -Heh... only bridge in the world that connects two continents.- he thought, chuckling at himself as the bit of 'guidebook knowledge' came floating back to him. He glanced at his watch, then lengthened his stride, cruising easily at a couple of hundred miles an hour. -Better hurry- only have about ten hours to cover half the city and ask questions.-

As he sped along the bridge, he noticed the Ayasofya in the distance. Deciding to make a fast detour, he sped up into the supersonic, then hopped over the railing, swallowing his downward momentum just before he hit the water, and skimmed across the shining, polluted waters of the Strait.

Switching to "In", he blurred noiselessly up the riverside paths to the Ayasofya. A couple of quick superspeed circuits later, he thought he was familiar enough with the place to be comfortable later that night. Satisfied, he sped away, curving down the twisting streets into the heart of Constantis.

--

On the other side of the Bosphorous, Killua was headed deep into one of the seedier districts of Constantis, every sense alert, openly and obviously looking for something. Finally, a man in loose cotton robes approached him. "Does the child wish to buy something rare?" he said. Killua raised an eyebrow.

"That depends on what kind of rare thing we're talking about." he said noncommittally. "There are many things that are available to the... discerning... customer." Killua studied the man. He was obviously Arabic, so Killua thought back for a moment.

Ryozha had given him a few tips on dealing with the denizens of Constantis based on what he'd seen last time he was there. He had admitted up front that he hadn't been there very long, but he HAD gotten to know a few of the locals, so...

The first thing that came to mind was what Ryozha described as the Constantisites' love of haggling. -Heh... wish Leorio were here.- Killua grinned to himself. His thoughts were interrupted by the strange man saying "Perhaps the young sir would like to see some... samples?" Killua raised an eyebrow. This guy's habit of throwing in significant pauses at apparently random intervals was getting on his nerves. He controlled himself and merely said. "Sure." he said, following the man into one of the dimly lit door arches.

--

In another part Constantis, Gon was hunting in his own way. He had visited the Constantis Land Registry office, and found that someone matching Jack Fettham's description had owned a house on the Asian side. Following his instincts, he had come to a largely residential district. Wild-child senses outflung, he studied his surroundings carefully. Unfortunately, here, as everywhere in Constantis, people seemed incapable of driving without determined, prolonged use of their horns. Otherwise, Gon might have caught the faint sound, on another block, of Paedric Shea cursing his cab driver, and recognized the voice.

--

Ryozha had found another branch of the land-registry office, but had left that lead for Gon, since it was in his section of the city. He had hit the library and a few government offices, and, after a brief bit of research, had found the local Hunter office.

Once there, he had asked the young woman at the desk about the old Nen Master who had passed through here years ago. The young woman- she had introduced herself, a little cryptically, merely as 'Oz'- scrubbed a hand through her short-cropped red (dyed?) hair, obviously thinking hard. Then she stood abruptly, making Ryozha jump, revealing a slim figure in loose-fitting sweats, and spun to march over to a set of dusty filing cabinets.

After a few minutes of digging through her records, Oz produced an old folio. In it was a photo of Fettham (-Huh...- Ryozha thought, -I had no idea that Ping Lee was such an artist- that was an amazing likeness in that book of his.-), along with a brief description and the notation -Headed for parts unknown in company with a local guide-, dated nearly fifty years ago.

He scratched his head. "Is there any record of who this 'local guide' was?" he asked Oz.

She shook her head. "Honestly, you're lucky you got that much. Then again, deaths-due-to-Hunting do tend to get noted down... So if this follows that trend, the 'local guide', whoever it was, probably came back alive. Whether or not they still are is anybody's guess, though- that was a long time ago."

Ryozha gave her one of his lopsided grins and said "Thanks. You tried, anyways."

Oz smiled back at him. "Come on back if you think of anything else you want to know, short stuff." she told him.

Ryozha made a disgusted face, then she winked at him. His eyes widened a little, but he only said "Sure." he said, his mouth quirking wryly. Then he grinned... and vanished.

Oz blinked. Then she murmured "Show-off. He'll probably be back- he looks a little too stubborn to let go of this one easily."

--

In a hall deep within the Aerie Stronghold, the Enforcer was on his knees. "You called, my lord?" he said obsequiously.

"Of course I did, Ethan, or you wouldn't be here." the slim, elegant older man seated on the fancifully carved chair in front of him said. "Do you have any progress to report on the matter of the Speed Hunter?"

The Enforcer nodded. "I've seen to it that he's taken care of... and also his partners." He hesitated. "If I may be so bold, my lord..."

The older man waved a hand negligently. "It's never stopped you before- go ahead, boy."

The Enforcer nodded, privately seething. "Why have you been sending other members of the order to attack him after you assigned me the case?"

The old man shrugged. Choosing his words carefully, he said "For all your... praiseworthy devotion to duty... you have a tendency towards... overzealousness. In the unlikely event that one of the others is able to capture him, we'll be able to find out what he knows."

The Enforcer nodded, then bowed deeper before getting up and leaving. The old man watched him go, frowning. -I no longer trust him as I once did...- he thought, -but he is still our most powerful warrior, and it is doubtful any other would be able to capture as elusive a foe as this Speed Hunter.-

He sighed deeply, cradling his chin in his hands. -The years have changed us all. Who would have thought that the idealistic boy that I took in all those years ago would grow into the bloodthirsty savage he now is?- He shook his head. -Perhaps it's time we came out of the shadows... much ill could come of this wealth, but much that is good as well.-He frowned, a look of fear crossing his face.-No... too many would disagree, though- protecting the Treasure has become an end in itself, and many of my brethren would see the world cleansed by fire before releasing that 'sacred' duty.-

Tiredly, the old man got up and left the room as well.

Back in Constantis, Ryozha, Gon and Killua rendezvoused on the Yeni Galata Bridge, above the Golden Horn Strait, at around seven-ish. They headed across the bridge,and plopped down in the shadows of one of the many alleyways lining the street.

"So... how do we want to work this?" Ryozha said. "Not having a plan nearly caused a disaster last time... we need to be more careful."

"I'm not sure..." Killua said, "I don't know enough about this city, except a little about it's history."

Gon nodded. "It's hard to say until we know a little bit more about the people and the area."

"Some say that you cannot know the people of this land UNTIL you know their history." a new voice interjected from behind them. All three boys whirled.

"Oz!" Ryozha blurted. Oz grinned and stepped out of the shadows. She started to say something else, then stopped when she saw the looks on their faces.

She glanced around, then appeared to remember something. "Oh... right." she said, releasing her "In", seeming to snap into focus.

"I couldn't sense you at ALL!" Gon exclaimed, and Killua nodded.

Ryozha shook his head. "I couldn't sense you either, which is weird..."

Oz looked at him oddly. "You have a better En than your friends?"

Ryozha cocked his head in surprise. "What? No, nothing like that. It's just another aspect of my ability." Ryozha answered evasively.

Oz smiled faintly. "It's no surprise, I guess. It might come to a shock to you guys, but I'm a pro Hunter too. They call me the Ghost Huntress, 'she who is never seen'- the only reason I'm here is because my Master thought I should get some 'administrative experience', so he arranged for me to work at the Hunter office here in my hometown."

Ryozha raised an eyebrow, Gon nodded enthusiastically, and Killua radiated skepticism. Oz ignored them all and continued "I remembered what it was that was bothering me about the question you asked. You said something about meeting someone regarding Jack Fettham?"

Ryozha nodded, still unwilling to give anything away. Oz's eyes narrowed. "It wouldn't happen to be Wahid Faizal, would it?" she asked.

Gon, Killua and Ryozha all looked at her for a long moment. Then, carefully, Ryozha asked "How... did you know that, exactly?"

Oz's mouth twisted in an ugly frown. "Faizal has a bad reputation around here- I know for a fact that he's lured at least ten Rookie Hunters to their deaths, and a minimum of three Pro Hunters. He's a rare-artifacts specialist on the black market. And unfortunately, one of the rare artifacts he deals in is Hunter's Licenses. There was a note in Fettham's file that had fallen in behind the cabinet- Wahid Faizal intercepted the last two Hunters who came here looking for him. They haven't been seen since."

Upon hearing this news, Gon looked... not worried, exactly, but definitely unhappy. Killua's face had become a blank mask, and at his side (the one AWAY from Oz), his hand twisted into a lethal blade. Ryozha himself thought -This doesn't sound good. We haven't found a lot else that could lead us to Fettham...-, but it was Gon who spoke.

"So you think we should stay away from him?" he asked, sounding disappointed, of all things (although Ryozha couldn't say he was surprised...).

Oz shook her head. "Not exactly... Here's what I have in mind."

--

At precisely 8 PM, in the lobby Ayasofia Museum, Oz strode through the doors. Ignoring the dapper man in a neatly pressed suit and tie who came smilingly to greet her, she strode directly towards a pudgy, greasy-looking older man wearing the uniform of a security guard... or at least, what could be taken for the uniform of a security guard from a distance.

Gon watched the doors anxiously as they swung shut, obscuring his view. The lobby was, unfortunately, too open for any of them, even Killua, to conceal themselves and keep an eye on things.

Killua had stationed himself behind the Ayasofya, watching two of the rear entrances, and Ryozha was hidden on the rooftop of the adjoining Topkapi Palace, watching the whole area. Gon had far superior eyesight, but Ryozha had argued persuasively that he could get to anywhere he needed to be a lot faster.

Inside the Ayasofya, Oz strode up to her nemesis. "Faizal." she snapped by way of greeting. "You've tried for my license before, and you've failed. I've been hired on by the Hunters you were looking to ambush, after I warned them about you. They're still interested in dealing if you are, though. They want Fettham, and you look like the best lead out there now."

She glanced behind her, pinning one of Wahid's hapless lackeys with her glare. "Jakeem, knock it off. You can't sneak up on me. Faizal, get your goons out of my face and we can talk."

Wahid Faizal considered her for a moment, then shrugged. "Come." he said, "Let us have Chai, and we can, indeed, talk."

Shortly after that, Gon called the other two. "They're moving." he said.

Then he sprinted for the corner, around which there was a taxi waiting for them, idling at a nearby taxi stand. Diving into the taxi and followed closely by Killua, Gon gave the license number of Wahid's Mercedes to the cabdriver that Oz had arranged. A couple of blocks away, Ryozha leapt from the Topkapi Palace rooftop in a blur, following on foot.

The Mercedes arrived without incident at a large house in a prosperous section of Constantis, on the North side of the Strait. Ryozha watched from a perch high in a thick, leafy sycamore-fig tree on the far side of the street as Wahid, Oz and one of Wahid's bodyguards climbed out into the warm evening light, and the Mercedes headed off to somewhere behind the house.

For some bizarre reason, his player had kicked into the "Phantom of the Opera Suite" a while before, thunderous organ chords crashing around his ears as he trailed Wahid's car. A moment or two later, Gon and Killua slipped silently up the street, hugging the shadows of the walls bordering the estates that lined it.

Rhyozha watched with a mixture of admiration and envy -I'm not sure I could ever learn to move like that...- he thought to himself, -If I hadn't known they were coming, and from what direction, I never would have seen or sensed them. As it is, I can barely keep track of them, even with both Nen and my seventh sense.-

He hopped out of the tree and jogged over to the other two. There, they waited for either Oz's signal, or some sign of trouble.

They got trouble first. Gunfire erupted from the room that Oz had 'marked' for them as Wahid's 'dealing room' on the digital floorplan she had constructed of Wahid's mansion. Gon, Killua and Ryozha glanced at each other, then they moved. Fast. They piled over the wall (or, in Gon's case, THROUGH the wall), Killua pausing briefly to slice the main phone line in half, then split up.

--

Halfway across the city, the reason for the Phantom of the Opera Suite moved steadily through the darkening streets. Shea followed the Iron Wolf, jittering impatiently. The Wolf stalked the streets, following the Speed Hunter's thin, stretched-out scent. They moved through the worst sections of Constantis, the denizens of the night avoiding them uneasily, predators avoiding a far greater predator.

--

Ryozha sprinted through the grounds, smashing guards, sensors and traps alike with gleeful abandon, moving far too fast to be seen. As he worked his way through the gardens and rolling lawns (-Gyeesh... this guy must be STINKING rich to be able to afford this much water for grass in a climate like this...-), he heard shouts and crashes from inside the house that told him Gon was at work.

He paused momentarily as one guard got pitched out a window to land in front of him, then winced as another followed the first headfirst through the WALL. -Heh...- he snickered to himself, -Gon's version of 'downgrading security' is a little noisier than Oz expected, I think...-

Inside, Gon was throwing guards around, leaving a trail of unconscious bodies. -This is really weird...- he thought, -There no Nen users here. I kinda thought that a powerful black-market dealer like Mr. Faizal would have the strongest protection he could afford.- He worked a shrug into the whirlwind of combat and continued.

Killua slipped quietly through the halls on the other side of the mansion, a shadow among shadows. He smiled faintly at the thunderous sounds of chaos coming from where Gon was, thinking idly -I couldn't ask for a better diversion.- Another burst of gunfire erupted from Wahid's 'dealing room', and Killua sped up slightly.

He reached the door, tensed, and then smashed through it, a faint, blurred shadow dropping Wahid's guards too fast to be seen clearly. He pitched the trigger happy idiot who was still firing at Oz out the window for emphasis, then followed, leaping lightly to the ground and fading into the shadow of the trees.

On the street, Killua and Ryozha met up. "Think we should go get Gon?" Ryozha asked. Killua shrugged. "I think he's almost done... I haven't heard anything break in almost a minute." There was a final, resounding BOOOOOOOOMMMM that echoed faintly out across the street, and a section of the mansion roof caved in, quickly followed by that entire wing of the building.

A moment or two later, Gon appeared through the hole he had made in the wall, looking a little sheepish. Killua slapped him upside the head. "Idiot! You were just supposed to take care of his guards, not knock his house down!"

Gon rubbed the back of his neck, embarassed, but said "It was an accident! I just... kind of threw one of them... through... a support beam..."

Ryozha gave a half-shrug. "Oh well." he said, "Not much we can do about it at this stage in the game." Killua looked unhappy for a second, the shrugged as well. They stood patiently for a few minutes (well, Gon and Killua were patient, Ryozha was... not), then Oz came out, leading a shell-shocked, miserable Wahid.

"He's ready to deal now." she told the three boys.

All five of them squeezed into the taxi that Oz's friend Ata was driving. Wahid Faizal gave a couple of monotone directions, and they headed for the outskirts of the city.

As they drove, Wahid seemed to come back to life again, at least a little. "I see the messengers that the Hunters used, but no Hunters." he said to Oz. "Do they still trust me so little, even after they have destroyed me?" Oz grinned evilly, every inch of her except her mouth saying 'I'm gonna ENJOY this one...'.

Aloud, she said drily "Faizal... these ARE the Hunters."

Wahid sat in stunned silence for a moment, expressions flickering across his face like summer lightning, before comprehension crashed down like... well, it was hard to describe. You know what it looks like when a chunk of a glacier falls into the sea, doing that terrible, slow-motion crashing thing? That's kind of how the expression hit.

-He's got it.- Ryozha thought.

Wahid twisted around between Oz and the driver, a pleading look on his face. "Why?" he asked pleadingly, "Why do you wish to destroy Wahid, little ones?"

-He don't got it.- Ryozha thought, his mouth twisting in disgust.

Oz elbowed Wahid sharply, making him twist back around abruptly, and said "I'd have more sympathy for you if you hadn't already been the death of thirteen Hunters to steal their licenses, Faizal." her tone sharpened, and her eyes became drills of polished agate. "Including my fiancé, Daival. That's the you didn't sell, did you know that? I was disappointed when the Mafia boss you bilked didn't have you killed on the spot."

She glanced into the backseat where Gon, Killua and Ryozha were sitting (or, in Ryozha's case, fidgeting). "Count yourself lucky I'm on comission to these three, scum, and that they need information that only you posess. Next time we meet... well, I'm sure that I can find SOMEONE willing to post a bounty on your worthless head."

After nearly two hours of driving in uncomfortable silence (and, in Ryozha's case, borderline terminal impatience), Wahid said "Turn here."

Obediently, the taxi turned down a narrow dirt pathway that led off the highway into the darkness of the countryside. Ryozha glanced at the other two. Gon caught his meaning and nodded, so Ryozha opened the door and hopped out of the moving car, racing ahead.

A few seconds later, he jumped back in. "No ambushes ahead that I could see or sense." he reported.

Killua finally spoke up. "What exactly are we going to see, Wahid?"

Wahid turned, considering him. Killua's gaze hardened. Oz opened her mouth, but before she could say anything, Killua snapped "Don't waste my time. I know when you're lying."

Ryozha almost smiled at this, the brief flash of amusement overcoming the agony of impatience that the last two hours had been. -You'd think that an experienced black marketeer would be a better liar... maybe 'cos we're kids? Eh... whatever.-

Wahid recovered himself, and said simply "My father was the local guide employed by the madman Fettham. My father has never spoken of what he saw on his journey with the madman, not once in the forty-five years since he returned. He has a small house here, on this country road, where he lives as he has for the last eighty-seven years, excepting that one journey with the madman." This much conversation seemed to exhaust Wahid, and he fell silent again.

They passed the rest of the two-hour journey in silence, pulling up in front of a small, unremarkable house set back a ways from the road.

As they approached, Wahid waved tiredly. "Here." he said.

Oz nodded to Ata, who turned the taxi into the narrow dirt driveway. The three boys piled out of the backseat, Killua vanishing into the shadows, Gon fading into the countryside, and Ryozha disappearing in a blur of speed to search the area, returning a split second later.

All three watched with great interest as Oz grabbed Wahid and... flowed... through the door without opening it, passing through the metal like it wasn't there. Wahid gibbered slightly, but remained remarkably unaffected otherwise.

-Almost...- Ryozha thought, -almost like it's happened to him before..?- He half-shrugged. -Oh well... it's not important now, and it's pretty obvious that these two have a history.- He glanced at Gon and Killua, then he and Killua both nodded to Gon. They would remain hidden while Gon, Oz and Wahid dealt with Wahid's father.

Ryozha watched tensely from the shadows, all six senses tuned to the finest pitch. Wahid moved down the path with infuriating slowness, Gon and Oz close behind, both glowing gently with Ten, ready for anything... anything, that is, but what actually confronted them.

An old, old man shuffled out at Wahid's call, as skinny as his son was fat. "Wha..?" he started to demand petulantly, then he caught sight of Oz and Gon.

He flinched back violently, his face crumpling and taking on the aspect of an unhappy child. He spoke at length to Wahid... -Bugger...- Ryozha thought, -he seemed to be able to speak English a second ago, but all of a sudden he's lapsed into Turka? Not good... no, wait... Oz almost certainly speaks Turka, since she said this is her hometown, and so far she's proven pretty trustworthy.-

The old man stopped speaking and refused to say anything more, watching Gon and Oz fearfully. Gon started to say something, but Oz waved him off.

She strode into the darkness, and whistled shrilly for Ryozha and Killua to come and follow her. Over her shoulder, she called "Ata will drive you back to town, Faizal. We have things to take care of."

Once they were well out of earshot of Wahid and his father, Oz motioned for a halt.

The three boys clustered around her in the darkness, and she sighed. "Faizal's father is as mad as he keeps claiming Fettham is. The old man is barely maintaining any kind of grip on reality- he called Faizal 'elder brother', and reacted like a small child frightened by bullies."

She hesitated. "It sounds crazy, but I think that the madness of Faizal's father was set off by our Nen. Something he saw, or something he experienced, in his journey with Fettham, must... must have made him sensitive to it somehow." She stopped for a long moment. "In a way, I'm almost glad. That... Faizal... lives daily with the madness of his father as punishment for what he's done. Perhaps now, Daival can rest a little easier."

She stopped again, and took a deep breath. "In any case, the important part of their conversation was, when Faizal told his father that we wished to know about Fettham, he said 'Send them to the Castle. I... burned... all I know into those... stones.'" She stopped. "Hmm... Sorry," she said, "neither of those words translates very well. The word for 'burned'... well, it means the same as in English, but it also has connotations of 'throwing away', as well as 'etching deeply'. And 'stones', well, it means big rocks, of course, but there's also overtones of boundaries, mountains, and terrible, terrible age."

Gon, Killua and Ryozha looked at her expectantly. She said nothing, apparently gripped by some vast inner struggle. Finally, she said "There is one place in this land that fits that description. The Fortress of the Forgotten Crusade." Something about the way she said it made Ryozha glance around uneasily, half-expecting an ominous crash of thunder. His mouth quirked, and he laughed silently at himself in the darkness.

The smile vanished immediately as Oz continued in the same deadly serious tones. "Few even know it exists. Among those who DO know, however, it holds a fearsome reputation. It's age is impossible to determine- rumour has it that even the great Hunter Ging Freecs was baffled by the enigma it presents."

At the mention of his father, Gon stirred, but kept quiet. "At least three different legends hold that the Fortress is older than the mountain it sits on, and that the land itself forced it out, trying to get it as far away as possible. Beasts of myth and legend roam it's hallways... although there are far fewer of the more vicious types since Ging's visit... and the ghosts of bygone years haunt it still. I will lead you there- it is not far from here, and we will see what the night holds, together."

Ryozha, Gon and Killua glanced at each other, then shrugged in unison. "Let's go!" Gon exclaimed, speaking for all three. Oz led them off at a fast pace, through the arid hills and down narrow, snakelike valleys. Ryozha roamed in wide circles, speeding around them as an outrider, all senses alert.

Ata lay slumped on the ground, a small pool of blood forming around a hole in his temple. Wahid stood over him, still-smoking gun in his unsteady hands, tears of bitterness and humiliation rolling down his fat cheeks. "I have kept few enough of my vows, my father." he said to the night air. "But this one WILL be kept. All those who call to mind your journey with the madman... the journey that stole your livelihood and your mind... will perish like the dog the madman was." He dried his eyes, his face becoming a cold mask. He dumped Ata's corpse the rest of the way out of his taxi and drove off.

As he reached the city limits, he pulled out his cellphone. He punched a rapid series of numbers with one hand, then another, longer sequence. "The Palace has fallen." he said into the cel. He waited for the proper counterphrase, then said "Open Lot 80369 and distribute it to all available men. Have them take the helicopters to the Fortress of the Forgotten Crusade and kill everything they find there."

He paused as the voice from the other end said something, frantically. "I do not care if we are left with no men in the city." he snapped. "My orders stand."

The journey passed uneventfully, and soon they found themselves standing on a hidden pathway above a vast ravine. Set into the stone of the mountain there was a massive gate, and, dimly in the darkness above them, parapets and towers could be seen. Oz motioned for a stop again, and said "Here's where it gets tricky. I can get two of you inside easily, but I then I would have to leave those two in there alone to get the third, which I'm reluctant to do because of the danger."

Killua and Gon both glared, and Ryozha sagged resignedly.

"Don't underestimate us!" Gon said. "We're Pro Hunters too!"

Oz looked at them sombrely. "Don't underestimate this place." was all she said.

Ryozha waved off her concern and said "Don't worry about it. I'm pretty sure I can get in without any trouble."

Oz gazed at him for a long moment, then said "Fine. Gon, Killua, give me your hands." Gon offered his hand immediately, and Killua gave his a second later, a little more hesitantly.

Ryozha gave them a half-grin, invisible in the darkness, then took off back down the path in a long streak of golden Nen. Oz led the other two towards the gate as the soft sound of Ryozha's sprinting got fainter, then started to grow again. As Oz, Gon and Killua passed smoothly through the ancient stone of the gate, their last sight of outside was Ryozha blurring up at speed, then making a ninety-degree turn and running straight up the wall.

On the other side of the gate, Ryozha dropped easily to the ground as the other three emerged from the stone of the gate.

Oz smiled tightly at them. "Now you know why I'm called the Ghost Huntress." was all she said. She started to move forwards, then looked seriously at them. "Stay close. I know a little about the layout of this place- I was in training when Ging brought his map out, and got a good look at it."

They passed through dusty hallways of rotting splendour, Oz's flashlight lighting the way. Ryozha let his seventh sense play about, testing every motion of the dead air. Struck by a sudden thought, he pulled his keychain out and played the mini-maglite he kept on it about, its small, intense beam flickering across ancient stone and dry-rotted wood.

Abruptly, a spectral face lunged through the stone, its loose mouth contorted in an inaudible, tortured wail. Ryozha jumped back, then stopped when the thing simply passed through him without effect. Killua started too, his hands crackling with electricity that appeared as suddenly as the ghost, but the ghost was already gone.

Suddenly, more wraiths appeared, swirling around and through the nervous party in a silent storm. After a few tense minutes, as they worked their way down the hallway, Ryozha turned irritatedly to Oz. "Can these things solidify, that you know of? Or generate illusions or anything? 'Cos they're not registering at all on my seventh sense- as far as Kinetic Energy goes, they may as well not be there."

Oz hesitated, thinking, then said "No, as far as I know, these can't affect the physical world at all, except by flying around in front of you, blocking your vision."

Ryozha gave a one-shouldered shrug. "In that case," he said, "they barely even qualify as a nuisance." He raised his voice. "Look, if you ghost-things can hear us, bugger off. I realize that we're probably the closest thing to entertainment you've had in the last few centuries, but we've got work to do."

The tortured spirits continued to swoop around them, and Ryozha made a resigned noise in the haunted darkness. "Oh well... it was worth a shot." he said, then stopped. Oz was staring at him in disbelief, Gon was looking a little confused, and Killua was laughing his head off.

Once Killua had recovered a little (he had nearly laughed himself sick), they continued on, ignoring their spectral honour guard. Abruptly, one of the doors they had passed shattered in a shower of rotten wood. Ryozha shifted to speed awareness, idly picking rotted wood out of his hair as he studied the hulking, hairy thing that shambled out of the darkness, attacking them with what seemed a sort of desperate futility.

He flicked his beam across it. -Huh... thing looks sorta threadbare. Low budget ancient horror or something?- he thought. Whatever it was, it didn't betray even the slightest trace of Nen, putting it into the 'barely even a threat' category, at least in his estimation. Ryozha half shrugged, stepped around the thing, and kicked it in Killua's general direction. A snap of electricity, the smell of ozone mingled with burning hair, and it was all over.

As they progressed down the hallway again, Oz said in a strained voice "You guys are certainly... casual... about all this."

Gon, Killua and Ryozha glanced at each other. Gon spoke first, saying "I don't know about Ryozha, but for Killua and me... well, Hisoka was a lot scarier than any of these things."

Killua nodded, barely visible in the glow of the flashlights. "Yeah," he added, "the Genei Ryodan too... heck, even the monsters on Greed Island were tougher than this."

Ryozha glanced at his partners with a new respect, but said simply "I dunno... I'm not gonna worry about the ghosts too much if they can't do anything to us. And after finding the Sea of Lost Dreams by accident while I was hunting something else, single-handedly sailing a tramp steamer through a tropical hurricane after the crew had all been laid low by some weird disease, breaking the hold that the Black Lotus Gang had on trade between Alispear and the Southern Peace, and being partially digested by a forty-foot monster for nearly a week, well... let's just say that budget rent-a-horrors don't do much for me anymore." He shuddered. "Especially the being digested part. Ye-uch, that was disgusting."

He glanced at Gon and Killua. "I have to say, though, I've never tried anything as dangerous as tangling with the Phantom Brigade, or as difficult as Greed Island- I had a chance to check Greed Island out briefly, but had a comission that I had to fulfill, so I couldn't stay. Seemed like a cool, if dangerous, place, even if I couldn't figure out what the heck I was supposed to be doing." Gon and Killua laughed, and after a moment, Oz joined in, a little uncertainly.

The rest of their search through the crumbling Fortress passed in amicable chatting, trading stories of memorable hunts they'd been on. Ryozha was fascinated by Gon and Killua's tales of their time in the Battle Tower, and shocked that Hisoka had actually gotten his license.

"I passed the year that he killed an Examiner- I guess it was the year before you did, Gon- and I have to say, he's one of the most dangerous beings, man, animal, or magical beast, that I've ever laid eyes on." he told them. Gon and Killua nodded, then Gon went on to tell of some of the times that he had encountered Hisoka.

When he was done, Ryozha shook his head disbelievingly. "Man... I can't believe you're still here, Gon. I can't think of many things I'd want LESS than that deranged clown taking an interest in me..." he stopped, turning his light on the wall beside him.

"Weird... I could have sworn I saw something there." He shifted to Gyo, irritably waving the ghosts off like a cloud of bugs. "You'd think these useless things would have gotten bored and gone away by now..." he muttered.

After a minute, he turned to the others. "Oz, where exactly are we in the fortress?" he asked.

She paused for a minute, then stuck her head through the wall. "Good," she said when she had pulled it back inside, "like I thought, we're just inside the outer curtain wall, facing out across the ravine."

"AHA!" yelled Gon just then, nearly making Oz jump out through the wall.

She sagged against the stone, fanning herself with her hand. "What?!" she snapped irritably.

"This way!" Gon called excitedly, sprinting down the hallway, Killua right behind him. Ryozha glanced back at Oz, then followed them at a fast clip. Oz glared after them in annoyance, then hurried to catch up, shoving the monster that popped out to attack out through the wall and letting it plummet into the ravine without even pausing.

She caught up with the three boys on the parapets.

"Here it is!" Gon sang out cheerfully.

One one of the cornices, the spidery trace of letters made from Nen-fire could be seen. Gon started to read them, then stopped. "Uhm... this doesn't make any sense..." he said hesitantly.

Killua laughed and pushed him aside. "Oz?" he said, motioning. Oz glanced around uneasily, and the three boys did as well. "Something's wrong." she said. "We can come back to this."

Abruptly, Ryozha let loose a burst of kinetic energy, knocking everyone sprawling. A split second later, the flat -CRACK- of a high-powered rifle could be heard.

"Scatter!" Oz snapped. Ryozha didn't hear her- he was already beating the sniper over the head with his own rifle.

This accomplished, he glanced around quickly, all senses extended. Making no attempt to disguise his presence, he appeared next to Killua, who was busy pitching another gunman over the parapet. The two conferred quickly, then he blitzed over to where Gon was beating up a couple more gunmen, evading their fire with a balletic ease that even Ryozha found himself slightly envious of.

He spoke briefly to Gon, idly stepping around the bullets that whizzed past. -Honestly...- he thought, -subsonic ammo? I guess they don't know what I can do, but still... they may as well be using spitballs against me.-

He moved off, and a split second later, he found Oz throwing still more gun-toting goons around. He waited patiently until she was finished with that group, then passed along the simple plan they had come up with. She, in turn, warned him that these were Wahid's men they were dealing with, and they had a fair bit of experience dealing with Nen-users.

"Be wary of traps." she warned him. He nodded gravely, and sprinted back to where Gon and Killua were dealing with their assailants to pass the warning on.

Safely back in Constantis, Wahid Faizal sat in his garden and stared sightlessly at the ruins of his home, patiently waiting for news of the Hunters' deaths. Between one heartbeat and the next, he was dangling off the ground, his neck in the grip of a shaggy-haired giant who had appeared from nowhere.

With his free hand, the Iron Wolf stuck a photo of Ryozha under Wahid's nose. "Where is he?" he said with his usual flat calm.

Wahid looked at the photo, then said "Dead, or soon to be." in strangled tones.

The Iron Wolf said nothing, simply squeezing a little tighter. Wahid, correctly interpreting this as a request for more information, choked out "My men have set up an ambush for him and his party at the Fortress of the Forgotten Crusade. He won't escape."

Without warning, another man was in the garden, his hand dripping with gore. Wahid stared at him in shock, then at his own eviscerated stomach.

He clutched feebly at his intestines as the newcomer hissed "You are right that he will not escape... but not because of your foolish ambush. The Speed Hunter is to be MY kill."

Leaving the crumpled form of Wahid's dead body laying where he'd dropped it, the Iron Wolf glanced down at his erstwhile partner as they moved off.

"Was that necessary?" he asked with a faint trace of distaste.

Shea looked at him. "Necessary?" he snickered. "No, but it WAS amusing. Besides, now he cannot bother us or report back to the boy, should he happen to return here."

The Iron Wolf didn't bother to reply, returning to his usual impassive demeanour, but the ever-present inner voice snapped (Scum or no, that is but one more death that you will be brought to account for.) He ignored it for a time, then, when he could ignore it no longer, shouted within the confines of his mind (The strong live, and the weak die. It is the law of the hunt!).

Unusually, the inner voice he refused to recognize as his answered him (Nature red in tooth and claw, huh?) it said sardonically. (Perhaps it is the law of the hunt, but it is not the law of men. And whether you like to admit it or not, I AM a man.) (It grows in strength. This is not to be tolerated. I am the Iron Wolf; to have a weakness is to be other than what I am.) Troubled, although giving no outward sign of it, he followed after Shea.

Ryozha moved through the crumbling fortress in a shrieking blur, blasting armed goons aside with his shockwave alone, not even bothering to look back as they bounced around. -By not absorbing the sonic booms I generate at this speed, I don't even need to slow down for these idiots.- he thought. -Still... gotta be careful. At least three of the ones that I've bounced off the walls have been carrying some really nasty weaponry- grenades, rocket launchers, some kind of weird machine gun... could've sworn one guy that I saw down the hallway even had a tripod-mounted minigun.- He extended his senses still further and kept running, leaving a trail of unconscious bodies behind him.

Killua swam in shadow, invisible death dancing amidst the hapless killers. -Can't afford to let them herd us, he thought, and we have to be doubly careful in our movements, since they're guaranteed to have some traps set up- maybe even some that could kill us instantly. Since we got Nen, it's easy for us to underestimate those that don't have it, but...- Not bothering to finish the thought, he continued on his way, eliminating gunman and monster alike.

Gon sprinted through the ancient castle, smashing everything that came against him, his keen senses carefully extended, seeking any hint of the traps that he was certain were there. -This is really weird... I'm not finding anything. I wonder if Oz is having any more luck?- he wondered.

Oz wasn't. Sliding invisibly through the walls, she jumped slightly every time some new horror roared out at her. -I can't believe those kids are so blase about this. Then again, I've heard stories about the Dark Magician Hisoka... she hesitated in mid-thought, scanning her surroundings. I could swear this castle is shifting around us... like the very stone is trying to herd us somewhere. It seems impossible, but if even a tenth of the tales about the Fortress of the Forgotten Crusade are true, stranger things have certainly happened here. Best be on my guard.- With that thought, she too continued on.

Suddenly, all four Hunters found themselves staring at one another from different portals on the outskirts of the central keep's main courtyard. Warily, they approached one another.

"I just turned a corner somewhere in the outer wall!" Gon exclaimed.

"And I was in one of the towers in the Southwest Corner." Ryozha said, "But when I came out the door, it led here all of a sudden."

"Apparently the castle has decided it prefers the presence of Wahid's men to ours." Oz said, frowning worriedly.

"The... castle? Decided?" Killua muttered. "Come on, Oz, it's just an old building. It can't decide anything."

Oz looked at him. "No, it's just an ancient haunted ruin, infested with unimaginable ancient horrors. Such places often have a limited awareness of their own."

She turned to Ryozha, who was making small urgent noises in the back of his throat and tugging at her sleeve. Then her gaze followed his pointing finger and locked onto one of the castle turrets. Ryozha, Gon and Killua were already accelerating upwards in a powerful, terrified leap, as dozens of missiles turned the courtyard into an inferno.

From all corners of the courtyard, the miniguns, missiles, grenade launchers, heavy machineguns and rifles of Wahid's helicopters and men filled the night with fire, raking the courtyard, tearing the ancient stones apart, creating brief windows into Hell.

Thirty meters above the sudden man-made volcano, Ryozha, Gon, and Killua were riding the shockwave. As they neared the top of their arc, Gon and Killua twisted around so that their feet were pressed against each other. Ryozha, catching on to what they were doing, did likewise.

Then they shoved off each other, hard. Ryozha, thinking of it at the last second, sent a hard pulse of kinetic energy into Killua and Gon, launching them far faster than their leg muscles could ever have taken them. He accelerated himself as well, praying that their strength and his boost would be enough to carry them clear.

Oz rose smoothly from the stone floor of the castle turret, tears leaking from her eyes as she prepared to toss the murderers into the pit of molten fire the courtyard had become. Instead, she stopped in shock as she found Gon already there, standing over the unconscious bodies of the helicopter crew. "Buh..?" she managed.

"Oh, hi Oz!" Gon called out. "I'm glad you're okay. Killua and Ryozha are on the other turrets, taking out the guys there."

"Buh?" Oz said again. When Gon just looked at her oddly, she managed to find her voice.

"H... How did you..?" she managed to stammer.

Gon looked at her still more oddly. "We jumped." he said matter-of-factly, one eyebrow raised.

Oz blinked. "Of course." she said. There didn't seem to be much more to say, so she simply shrugged and slipped back through the stone of the floor, heading for one of the towers where the stacatto burst of gunfire could still be heard, thinking -There seems to be even more to these little Hunters than I first thought.-

Ryozha skimmed along the battlements, dodging incoming fire from the goons who were slowly coming to realize that they hadn't gotten even one of their targets with their 'instant inferno' trick. -Well... at least the chainguns are a little harder to dodge...- he thought. -Makes it a tiny bit more fun.-

For no special reason, he decided to stand right in front of one of the groups of thugs clustered around one of the minigun tripods. Stretching his speed awareness to the limit, he dodged bullets, redirected them and sucked kinetic power out of them, all while moving so fast (and then returning to the same spot) that he didn't seem to be moving at all. After about twenty seconds of this, Wahid's goons broke and ran, screaming. Ryozha laughed, and chased them down, bringing them all down in a split second.

On another portion of the wall, Killua was chasing his own screaming targets. -Wimps.- he thought, -You'd think none of them had ever seen someone slice their gun barrels in half with his bare hand before...- He gave them an indifferent look, unlimbered his yo-yos and let fly.

Oz stalked the darkness like an angry spirit, materializing in front of Wahid's men without warning, striking them down before they had time to think, or even fully perceive that she was there. Occasionally, one of them would fly past to bounce off the walls like rag dolls as Gon worked his magic, knocking his foes flying in all directions.

When all of Wahid's men had been safely disposed of, the four Hunters rendezvoused back on the battlements where the old man had burned his knowledge into the stones. Bit by bit, Oz translated the fifty-year-old story. Finally, she read: "About the madman I will say no more, save this; if you wish to join him, jump from this point and use the same abominable power he wielded." Oz stopped. "That's it." she said, "The writing ends with that line."

Gon, Killua and Ryozha glanced at one another. Then they jumped off the wall in unison, flaring bright with Nen. A violent swirl of colour, the sense of time and space being rent asunder, and they were gone. Oz stared after them. Eventually, she sat down, still focussed on the same point in space.

Sunrise found Oz still sitting in the same spot, staring at the vacant point in space, patiently waiting for the three boys to reappear. Then a hand grabbed her, pinching a nerve and paralyzing her. She tried to ghost free, but found that the same nerve hold had rendered her into a Zetsu state as well.

From behind her, a voice said "You may consider this... payback... for the Empress Tita affair, 'Ghost Huntress'." Unable even to scream, she was pushed over the parapet, to plummet to her death in the ravine.

Back on the wall, Paedric Shea dusted off his hands. "A stroke of luck to find that wench here," he commented, "I've been wanting to do her in for the last three years."

The Iron Wolf said nothing, focussed on shutting out the voice at the back of his mind. He stirred slightly, his attention returning to Shea when the little man swore viciously. "I hadn't counted on this..." he said, "The instructions are in Turka, which I cannot read. We will have to return to the city and find a Nen-user who can read this gibberish." He paused. "Actually..." he stopped, digging around in his pocket. Shea produced a grubby notepad and a stub of pencil and began to labouriously transcribe the Nen-letters in the stone.

The Wolf sniffed around briefly, then commented "The scent is fresh- not more than a few hours old, but it ends here... almost as if they had jumped off."

"The secret of their disappearance will be revealed by the writing on the stone." Shea said confidently. He continued to copy down the Nen-letters.

--

Somewhere else...

An old man watched as a hawk circled in the sky above him. It wheeled lazily for a while, then, when the old man whistled, descended sharply, growing larger, and larger, and larger, until it was painfully obvious that while it might be hawk-shaped, it was the size of a private jet.

It landed next to him, and he stroked the sleek head, studying it intently with Gyo. After a moment, he withdrew his hand, and the titanic hawk lunged back into the air, bending trees a hundred meters away with the rush of wind it's wingbeats generated.

In the undergrowth, out of sight through the trees, something massive stirred at the rush of wind, then settled again. The old man bent to examine a small, fragile-looking plant with delicate blossoms that was growing through a slab of solid granite, cracking the tough stone.

He poked it briefly, then pulled out a knife and brought it around in a blurred arc, slicing at the flower. Half the knifeblade spiralled off into the distance, to stick into a tree with a -thunk-. He studied the untouched flower with a small smile, then looked up. A change in the wind warned him of something approaching.

Gon, Killua and Ryozha were spat out of the howling vortex and landed in a heap. As they disentangled themselves and scrambled to their feet, they found themselves in broad daylight, in a hidden valley, filled with strange plants and furtive movements in the undergrowth. Ryozha started to move off to do his usual superspeed tour of the area, but Gon grabbed his arm and shook his head seriously.

"Something's not right here." he said, looking around and testing the air. Ryozha settled back, uneasily eyeing their surroundings.

They had landed in a small clearing, surrounded by an odd, semi-tropical forest. Gon was circling warily. Killua had his hands in his pockets and was outwardly relaxed, but Ryozha knew him well enough by now not to be fooled by that. Ryozha fished his staff out of his pack and held steady... at least, steadier than he felt... scanning the area with his own unique senses.

Their vigil was repaid by the sudden sound of crashing in the trees.

"South!" Killua snapped, although both Gon and Ryozha had already turned in that direction.

A split second later, the three scattered as something huge, horned and bristly slammed out of the undergrowth, charging them. Ryozha glanced around, his reflexive shift into speed awareness giving everything a surreal, slow-motion appearance. To his right and above, Gon was already trying to communicate with the thing before he'd even landed. Further to his right, Killua had his yo-yos out and was charging for an electrical attack.

Ryozha frowned briefly, then landed, ran around behind the thing (even seeing it clearly, he had no idea what it was- it looked like the work of a brilliant, extremely bored taxidermist sprung to life) and swatted it on what he hoped was the rump with his staff, causing it to whirl (very, very slowly, at least from his perspective) and chase him. He raced back and forth, taunting the beast, hoping that Gon would be able to get through.

Dropping from speed awareness, he glanced over at Gon, who he was surprised to see had tears in his eyes. "This poor... thing... is totally insane." Gon said, flopping down and sitting back. He shook his head. "I don't know what happened to it, but its mind is broken. I can't believe it's still alive."

Ryozha watched the thing a little more closely, the tics and jerky movements he had previously dismissed as being from rage suddenly taking on a new significance. He shook his head grimly.

"I don't think we have much choice, then." he said. "It's one of the laws of the Hunters- no beast that tries to kill a human may live." Killua nodded, and even Gon unhappily agreed.

The three spread out around it as it spun madly in place, trying to keep them all under it's small, piggy eyes. Then, together, they struck, bringing the enormous animal down with a single, united strike.

The beast crashed to a halt in a cloud of dust, sliding to a halt at the base of a tree. Then, by common, unspoken consent, they started to bury it. As they were doing so, an old man emerged from the trees. He watched them in silence for a while. Once the creature was buried, and Gon had put a crude grave marker on it, he spoke.

"Tell me, boys... why did you kill that animal?"

The three glanced at one another, then Gon answered. "It was crazy... suffering and mad." The old man blinked, apparently a bit taken aback by this bold statement.

"And you assumed this because it attacked you?" he asked.

Gon looked shocked. "Of course not!" he said. "I could communicate with her, at least a little bit. She told me herself."

If the old man had looked taken aback before, he looked downright stunned now. He shook his head slowly. "I never... I never knew..." he murmured.

He sagged, suddenly seeming much older. He came to himself, apparently remembering that he was not alone. He looked at them closely. "Are you boys the ones that young Lee wrote me about?"

Ryozha cocked his head to one side. "Yes, sir." he said, "Are you Mr. Fettham?"

The old man nodded. "Follow me." he said.

He led them a short way through the trees (-I could swear...- Ryozha thought, -No, it can't be... but... are the trees and bushes actually moving out of his way..?-) to another, much larger clearing. In the center of the clearing sat a quartet of enormous birds, three eagles the size of private passenger jets and a smaller bird- a falcon of some kind- that was only the size of a light plane.

Fettham motioned to the Eagles, naming them in turn. "These are Agrippa, Aguila and Agnes." he said, "And this one is my personal mount, the Pilgrim." He glanced at Ryozha, who was snickering.

"What?" he asked, raising an eyebrow, his eyes twinkling faintly. "Let's see you think up a girl's 'Ag-something' name." Ryozha laughed a little more, then calmed down a bit.

Gon interrupted, his eyes shining. "You said Pilgrim was your mount." he said, "Does that mean we get to ride Agrippa, Aguila and Agnes?"

Fettham smiled at his enthusiasm, and nodded. "Yup." he said, "We need to, to reach my house."

After a brief explanation of how he'd trained the birds, Fettham helped each boy onto an eagle. "I know you can get up just fine by yourself," he said, "but it's better if a familiar voice is talking to them as you get on- I don't get a lot of visitors out this way."

Ryozha leaned forward to stroke the Aguila's soft neck-feathers. -Glad I didn't get the one with the silly name...- he thought, then laughed at himself. -Can't believe I actually care about that...- he thought. The giant eagle turned his head to regard Ryozha with the clear gaze of a raptor, then shrugged powerful wing muscles, bursting into the sky with the sound of distant thunder.

On either side of Ryozha, Gon and Killua rose aboard Agnes and Agrippa, Gon a little more confidently than Killua. Ryozha glanced in Gon's direction and grinned. -Bet he's already gotten that bird to tell him her life's story... Y'know, I just thought of something. Mr. Fettham said that these birds could understand some English...-

"Hey Aguila." Ryozha called to his eagle. The giant bird rolled one eye back towards him inquiringly. "If I were to jump off, could you catch me without injuring yourself?" Agrippa gave a minor squawk and a distinct nod, giving off a feeling of... amusement?... at the same time. "Would you mind if I did it just for fun?" he asked. The bird didn't give any audible response this time, but there was a definite, almost human, shrug worked into his powerful wingbeats. "Rock on!" Ryozha exclaimed.

Standing up on Aguila's back, he let himself tumble off backwards, doing a lazy backflip, twisting around and swan-diving towards the ground with a shout of "YEEEEEEHAAA!" The wind roared past him as he soared downwards, then Aguila passed him with a rush of wings. Smoothly inserting himself under Ryozha, Aguila pulled out of his dive and rose to join the others again.

Fettham was circling on Pilgrim's back when Ryozha got back to his altitude, looking torn between concern and anger. Pilgrim squawked indignantly, and Fettham grunted "Yeah... kids." in agreement.

Gon looked entranced, and Killua looked intrigued. "Can we do that too, Mr. Fettham?" Gon called out.

Fettham looked grouchy, but snapped. "Bah. Whatever."

Gon called something in a shrill, eagle-ish scream, and Agnes screamed back, apparently matching his enthusiasm. He leapt upwards, clear of Agnes' back, flipping, tumbling and rolling as he plummetted, before straightening into a clean dive, rocketing towards the earth. Killua had jumped off at the same time, simply sliding off Agrippa's back, and the two raced each other towards the ground. Agnes and Agrippa caught them, bearing them back upwards, then, at the boys' urging soared higher still.

Ryozha spurred Aguila up to join them, then thought of something. He checked his kinetic-Nen reserves, and grinned wickedly. He leaned forward and whispered something to Aguila. The eagle gave a screech that sounded suspiciously like a snicker, and surged above the other two.

Gon and Killua didn't notice as they dove off again... and then Ryozha passed them like a missile, arrowing towards the ground in a streak of Nen-fire. Then he gradually redirected his momentum, swooping upwards and rocketing by them again. He looped and spun around them as they fell, then swung clear as the three eagles came in to catch them again.

Fettham watched them for a while, circling lazily atop Pilgrim's back, before eventually losing patience. "All right, brats." he snapped. "Did you have a reason for invading my home, or did you just come here to abuse my birds?" He ignored the indignant squawk from all three eagles at the (somewhat outrageous) suggestion that they were being abused. "Well?" he demanded.

Ryozha looked at him oddly. -Mood swing, much?- he thought. He shrugged and dug the ring out of his pocket. Flipping it to Fettham who snagged it easily, he said "Here. Ping Lee said you're probably the only one alive who can figure this thing out."

Fettham turned it over in his hands a few times, looking skeptical, then pushed a fine trickle of Nen through it. The resulting flare of Nen from the ring nearly made him jump off Pilgrim's back in startlement. He tried it again, looking increasingly interested.

Finally, he said "For a challenge such as this, I can forgive much."

-Forgive..?- Ryozha thought, a little nonplussed.

"You may as well keep playing up here- this is going to take a while. Aguila and the others know their way home- you are welcome to stay with me as long as it takes me to figure this out."

With those words, Fettham urged Pilgrim forwards, and the huge falcon arrowed downwards outstripping the eagles the way Ryozha normally outran Gon and Killua. The three boys and three eagles looked at each other, then, with a unified shrug, continued with their skydiving, riding the eagles like feathered rollercoasters and then hurling themselves off at the top of a particularly spectacular loop.

In the catacombs below Constantis, a Knight-Guardian dropped his sword and clutched at his throat, turning a strange colour before collapsing with a gurgling noise.

"One more pile of bones amongst a thousand." Shea commented, brushing his hands together and turning away. The Iron Wolf said nothing, as was usual. "I cannot allow these fools to interfere with my hunt for the Speed Hunter, even if I have to kill the lot of them." Shea continued. He shrugged, giggling slightly. "This puts us further behind him, once again... but I cannot..." he broke off, snickering and snorting madly. "I cannot..." he continued once the spasm of deranged laughter had broken off, "allow interference on MY HUNTS!" he said, his voice rising to a scream.

The Iron Wolf watched him warily. (He's been growing steadily more unstable.) his inner voice commented, (Ever since he found that handful of men with strange weapons here and killed them all with a touch, he's been growing crazier with every one that he tracks down and murders.) (For once, we are in agreement. The trail goes cold as he pursues this mindless vendetta- it has been more than three days already.) the Wolf told the inner voice. (Not exactly what I meant...) his inner voice said, (but I'll take what I can get.)

Back in the Fettham's hidden valley, Ryozha was growing restless. -Riding the eagles is still a blast,- he thought, -but I can't shake the feeling that we're being closed in on... we've been here for days. Thank goodness Gon can cook, because I sure can't, and Fettham is cloistered in his 'lab'- haven't even seen him since supper of the first day we were here.- He sighed. -I know there's nothing to be gained by chasing off all over creation while our best lead is here, but...-

He wandered out of the house. Gon and Killua were off someplace, chasing one of the fantastical Nen-creatures that Fettham had built, but he still wasn't alone. Aguila swooped down out of the sky and landed next to him, hopping companionably along beside him when he made no move to get on.

He wandered for a bit, occasionally stroking the giant eagle's soft neck feathers. He fetched up alongside one of the streams that ran through the valley, glowing and sparking with Nen. -I'll admit to being impressed by THAT...- Ryozha thought, -Wonder how long it took him to figure out how to permanently imbue moving water with Nen?-

He paused. -Y'know, that gives me an idea... there's a new trick I've been wanting to try out, especially since we're so far away from traffic and trainyards, and the usual stuff I use to recharge my kinetic Nen.-

As Aguila looked on with interest, Ryozha studied the stream for a second, then knelt down and stuck his hand in it. He reached out with his aura, and the fast-tumbling water began to slow, taking on an odd, reddish cast from his Nen. Then there was a massive flare of power, and when his ears stopped ringing, Ryozha was laying on his back a metre and a half from the stream.

-Note to self...- he thought, as Aguila peered down at him curiously, -don't try that in a stream that's been heavily imbued with Nen.- He glanced down at himself to check his kinetic power reserves. -Works better than I'd expected, though...- He glanced around. -Now I kinda wish that I'd gone with Gon and Killua, instead of staying behind in hopes of getting some answers out of Mr. Fettham. I still feel a bit of the odd-one-out with them, though... even though they've pretty obviously accepted me.-

He half-shrugged. No point in sitting around feeling sorry for myself.- he thought. He swarmed up a tree in a heartbeat, scanning the valley. Then he hopped out, swallowing his own momentum to land on Aguila's back as gently as a feather falling.

"C'mon, Big Bird- let's hit the sky and see if we can find the others." Aguila squawked agreement and shot into the sky with a thunder of wings.

Soaring high above the valley, Ryozha scanned it, but was distracted by a horrific crashing to the East. Steering Aguila that way, he swooped in, then froze in terror, nearly falling off Aguila's back. Roaring amidst the trees like a million flames from a private Hell, Paedric Shea's awesome, maddened aura spread like a blight, sickening all it touched.

"Oh, bugger." Ryozha breathed.

Shea stood in the midst of a spreadening zone of blackness, plant and animal alike dying as his aura caressed them like a diseased lover. He flickered in and out of view like a badly tuned television signal, his madness so great that he couldn't maintain focus. He laughed as his Pestilence Touch swallowed the life of all it brushed against.

On the ridge above, separated from Shea by nearly a kilometer of space and rock, the Iron Wolf watched Shea, both voices in his mind stilled by the horror of what he was witnessing, his knuckles white around the powerful rifle he had brought.

In the sky above, Ryozha unfroze. "Get the others." he snapped to Aguila. "As fast as you can move." With that command, he leapt off of Aguila's back.

He let himself freefall for a split second, orienting himself. He was dimly aware of Aguila wheeling off in a flurry of powerful wingbeats, then time slowed to a crawl. He studied his target for a second, tiny in the distance. -Okay... from what I can see, there's about 1/3rd of a second delay before his aura takes effect... and it looks like it's feeding off what it's killing. If I can get him clear of the forest and back into the rocky area, it might slow him down a little. I can only hope that Gon, Killua or Fettham will be able to do something to help...-

With the quiet determination of one who thinks he's about to die, Ryozha charged his kinetic Nen, building a massive charge of kinetic power held barely in check by his Nen. -I hate doing this- I always wind up with a headache for days afterward- but it's my best chance to take him down. Okay... here we go...- He released the tension, suddenly hurtling forward like a bullet from a gun.

Arrowing downward at a steep angle, Ryozha homed in on his maniacal adversary like a supersonic missile. As he approached, he shouted "KOU!", bringing his aura around his fist and swinging it forward.

The hit blasted Shea like a cannonshell as Ryozha backed it up with an explosive burst of kinetic energy, dumping every bit of momentum he had into Shea's head and shoving most of his kinetic reserves in after it.

Shea tumbled limply to a halt in a broken pile of rubble. Then he giggled. Laughing insanely, he scrambled out of the half-mile trench he'd dug with his head and turned. Then, moving faster than Ryozha would have thought possible, he charged, his diseased aura reaching hungrily towards the boy Hunter.

Ryozha scrambled backwards, horrified. Then, from behind Shea, he heard the shout of "First comes Rock... Jan... Ken... Pon... ROCK!" and Shea suddenly sped up to go flying past overhead. Gon and Killua raced up.

"Are you okay, Ryozha?" Gon called.

"Yes. Don't let him touch you!" he yelled back.

For the next few minutes, Gon, Killua and Ryozha danced around Shea like piquadores around a fighting bull, firing off stinging attacks, diverting his attention each time he tried to go after one or the other of them. Berlioz's "March to the Scaffold" was thundering from Ryozha's headphones, and he was growing desperate.

"This isn't working!" he called to the other two. "The only reason we've lasted this long is because he's too crazy to realize we're baiting him!"

No sooner had he said this than he realized he'd made a mistake- he had taken his attention off of Shea long enough to call the others. A stinging blow to the side of his head sent him sprawling, and crazed little man was on top of him.

Time slowed for Ryozha. Shea's hand glittered with evil-looking Nen, descending with painful slowness. -This is it...- Ryozha thought, -I'm going to die.-

On the ridge above, the Wolf had collapsed, clutching his head, the rifle fallen by his side, forgotten. In his mind, the voice he would not... COULD not acknowledge as his was raging (Remember... you must remember... REMEMBER!!)

As Shea brought his hand down, Ryozha's attention was diverted by an angry scream, shrill even in the surreal, slowed-down world of speed awareness. Then Aguila shot past him, slamming into Shea like... well, like an eagle the size of a bus. Aguila carried the little man off, tearing at him with beak and talon, joined by Agrippa and Agnes.

The bloodied Shea fought back, his hands curled into claws as he ripped and tore at Aguila, his aura curling around the great eagles like smoke the colour of madness. His Nen overwhelmed the eagles' weaker aura, and Aguila screamed, his great heart bursting, as feathers crisped and blackened. A split second later, Agrippa and Agnes screamed also, then abruptly went silent.

Aguila's remains crashed through the treetops and hit the ground on top of Shea, Agrippa and Agnes' broken forms landing on either side, mouldering as though fresh-dug from a grave of months. Shea burst from Aguila's carcass, giggling and gibbering. Ryozha, who had been frozen in horror, exploded with anger.

He rocketed forwards, slapping into the little madman like a runaway train, and the lithe assasin wailed as he was buffeted by shockwaves and burned by friction fire, his elusive opponent everywhere and nowhere. His wailing peaked, becoming a scream, and his aura flailed in all directions like a crazed octopus. Ryozha backed off, fear replacing anger, as Shea's aura grew again, consuming still more of the valley.

-That's it.- he thought. -We're doomed. Even with my speed, I can't get close to him now, and Aguila... he choked a little... Aguila isn't around to carry me aloft any more to repeat the trick I pulled the first time.- Then he set his mouth in a stubborn line. -No! I'm NOT giving up.- He sprinted back to where Gon and Killua were watching, openmouthed.

When he arrived, Gon turned to him, looking speculative. "How much kinetic power do you have left, Ryozha?" he asked.

"See for yourself, Gon... not much." Ryozha answered glumly.

"Hmm..." Gon mused, then half-turned to Killua. "Do you think you could recharge fast the way you did when we were being held prisoner in that bunker?"

Ryozha blinked. "You mean by Killua beating on me? Should be able to charge up some that way, yeah... you have a plan?"

Gon nodded. "Start charging." he said, "I need to get something else ready."

After a few minutes of Killua's full-out hits, Ryozha's red kinetic-Nen aura was back up at a healthier level, his regular golden aura once again relegated to lightning flashes spiking through the dominant scarlet aura. Gon returned a moment or two later, holding a huge boulder.

Ryozha gave a strained grin. "I like the way you think, Gon."

Gon shrugged. "It's not very different from what Killua and I did when we were training with Bisuke on Greed Island- remember that scissors guy, Killua?" Killua nodded, then stood back. Gon heaved the rock back, ready to throw, and Ryozha hopped aboard, ready to pump the kinetic power he had absorbed from Killua's punches into the rock and accelerate it to (hopefully) devastating speeds.

Before Gon could let fly, however, a new shape loomed over the valley. Rising from the trees, a giant figure could be dimly seen. The Spirit of the Valley loomed forwards, feet made from pure Nen brushing the trees aside like tall grass as it reached for the little assasin.

Fettham appeared silently next to the boys. "I made that as the final defense for my valley." he said sombrely. "I had hoped that I would never see the Spirit of the Valley awakened, but..." All four watched in silence as the Spirit of the Valley gathered Shea up, Nen-fingers the size of tree trunks closing around him.

The Spirit hoisted Shea high in the air, and the onlookers froze in collective horror as the green Nen of the Spirit became discoloured where it touched Shea. The stain of Shea's mad aura spread down the Spirit of the Valley's arm, and the giant groaned in a voice like cracking trees.

As the stain spread across the Spirit's chest, the flat -CRACK- of a high-powered rifle could be heard, and Shea screamed as his shoulder was shattered by a high-velocity bullet. The madman's aura receded a little as the Spirit's green reasserted it's dominance, then a second -CRACK- rang out, and Shea screamed again as blood blossomed from his knee. His aura collapsed inwards with a rush, burning too intensely to look at for a split second before vanishing entirely.

The Iron Wolf climbed down tiredly from the rocky ledge toward the trio of Hunters and the old man who owned the valley. He raised an eyebrow at Gon, who was still frozen in the throwing position, holding the three metre boulder. Ryozha hopped down off it, and the Iron Wolf walked up to him.

He stuck out his hand, and said "Ryozha Tenryu? I'm special agent Davis Thompson, known lately as the 'Iron Wolf'. I'm sorry you got tangled up in that mess."

Ryozha took his hand tenatively and shook it. "What mess?" he wanted to know.

The Iron Wolf grimaced. "I was assigned three years ago to go deep undercover and bring in Paedric Shea, or bring him down, if necessary. He's wanted in the Republic of Allixen for dozens of crimes, to the point that the Hunter Commitee told us he was all ours if we wanted him. Oh- Paedric Shea was the little loon that you were fighting and who's currently... hanging... in midair... Never mind, not even gonna ask."

Gon, Killua and Ryozha looked at the Iron Wolf for a long moment, before Killua finally asked "So if you were assigned to take him down three years ago, why didn't you do it... well, three years ago?" Davis 'Iron Wolf' Thompson sighed deeply and sat down against the rock that Gon had set down a moment before.

"It's a long story," he said, "but the short form is, I volunteered to test a new torture-proofing process- what it was SUPPOSED to do was to cause me to revert to the personality of my alias- whatever it was at the time- in the face of torture, locking all knowledge of who I REALLY was away where even I couldn't get at it. Instead, the 'Iron Wolf' personality took over as soon as I laid eyes on Shea for the first time, and I've been unable to break loose until now."

"Now? What's so special about now?" Killua asked skeptically.

"I think I can guess..." Ryozha said slowly. "The vortex, right?"

"Vortex?" Gon asked.

"The thing that brought us here, Gon." Ryozha said patiently.

"Oh, right." Gon said. "I'd bet that the vortex is what drove Wahid's father crazy, and if it was, then it's not too unlikely that it would mess up mental conditioning too." Ryozha continued.

Thompson shrugged. "That might be it- I do know that my Iron Wolf personality was a lot weaker after we popped out of that hole in the air. I guess I got shielded from the worst of it because my real personality was in the back seat, so to speak."

Fettham looked troubled. "It would seem that unless you have Nen to protect you, my teleportation holes have some unpleasant side effects, although some good came of it this time. Something I'll have to work on, I guess."

Later, when Shea had been safely ensconced in one of Fettham's laboratory outbuildings and Aguila, Agrippa and Agnes buried, the three boys conferred with Fettham and the former Iron Wolf. "I actually would have come to get you whether the Spirit of the Valley had awoken or not," Fettham told the boys. "since I had just figured out the ring less than twenty minutes before that little madman attacked."

"Speaking of Mr. Shea... what are you going to do with him, Mr. Fettham?" Gon wanted to know. 'Iron Wolf' Thompson glanced up sharply at the question.

"Well..." Fettham started, "if it's all right with the Iron Wolf here, I was going to keep him here for observation. His Nen has burned out completely, and he's barely alive. I was actually planning to see if I could rebuild his mind- from what I could see when he was ripping up my valley..." an expression of pain crossed Fettham's face, but he forced it back "he had used the Condition and the Pledge in an unwise way- in exchange for the ability to kill instantly with his aura, he sacrificed a little of his sanity each time he did so. What we saw was simply the end result of that."

Fettham looked at 'Iron Wolf' Thompson's uncomprehending face, and sighed. "Basically," he said, "Shea is in a coma that he'll probably never come out of. I plan to see if I can revive him and restore him to sanity- if I can, I'll be in touch with your government."

Thompson thought it over, then shrugged. "Works for me- doesn't seem to be a lot of point in bringing in a half-dead vegetable. So how am I getting home?"

"Well, I can't send you back through the vortex..." Fettham started, "would you be able to make your own way home from the Southern Peace Jackson Expeditionary base? That's the closest transport hub to here."

Thompson shrugged. "I could probably manage it without too much trouble." he said, "And to be honest... as fascinating as this place is, I'd like to get home as soon as I can- I haven't seen my family for more than three years. My son is about the age of these three- I'd like to see him again."

"Easily arranged." Fettham said, "You'll be on the outskirts of the expeditionary base in less than two hours." He stepped outside and whistled, and Pilgrim stooped down, landing with a flutter outside the house. "Hop aboard." Fettham smiled. Thompson eyed the huge bird warily, then shrugged.

Jumping onto the falcon's back, he called out "Feel free to keep the rifle for whatever- it's illegal military hardware, and carrying it around would cause more problems than it would solve." Ryozha, Gon and Killua came outside, and all four waved as the tracker soared upwards, disappearing from view in the Northwest.

Back inside, Fettham pulled out the ring. Feeding a delicate thread of Nen through it, he held it away from himself as a huge relief map sprang out of it. All three boys studied it carefully, Gon with his eyes shining with enthusiasm, Killua as impassively as usual, and Ryozha with a certain feeling of relief. -Finally, we're getting somewhere...- he thought.

Then the map winked out and another grew in its place.

Ryozha blinked. "Er... what?" he asked.

Fettham smiled faintly. "There's at least eight maps in this thing- which one you get depends on how you feed your Nen through it." He paused. "I'll teach you how to get the different maps out of it, but it may take a few days."

Ryozha glanced at Gon, who grinned. "That's fine." he said. "If we're going to do this, we're going to do it right."

"Good boys." Fettham said. "We may as well start right now... it works a lot like imbuing your Nen into something..."

The next few days passed swiftly- Fettham trained them carefully in the mornings, and in the afternoons they helped to replant the valley. By the third day, Gon could consistently get six of the maps, and Ryozha and Killua four. That afternoon, rather than taking them out to the fields scorched by Shea's Nen, he took them into one of his outbuildings. There, under a warm heatlamp, three huge eggs lay.

"I wasn't going to show you this," Fettham said, "but I figure you earned it- you fought for my valley when all you had to do was take to the hills. Meet Ryozha II, Gon II, and Killua II... or at least, they will be when they hatch."

Gon's grin was so big that it threatened to take off the top of his head, and even Killua looked pleased, but Ryozha shook his head. "No, Mr. Fettham... Could you name the first one Aguila II?"

Fettham looked at him for a long moment, then nodded. "Of course, kid. Anyways, now that we've got the sappy stuff taken care of, let's get back to work."

By the fifth day, they could get all eight maps consistently between the three of them- Each of them could get one the others could not, along with the five that all of them could get. "That's it, then." Fettham told them. "I can't teach you a thing more. Where're you headed from here?"

"Probably back to Constantis." Ryozha said, "Since we can protect ourselves with our Nen, we can use your vortex, so it's the easiest place to get to from here, and we need to check these Nen-maps against regular maps, so we can figure out where they are."

Fettham nodded. "Actually, I can help you with part of that..." he said. "Pop up the third map- that's almost definitely the Green Jewel Plateau, not far from Antananarivo. I had a hunt there 'round about sixty years ago. Nasty area, but beautiful."

"Thanks, Mr. Fettham!" Gon exclaimed.

"Don't mention it, kid. Anyways, you're wasting daylight- if you're in a hurry, you should probably get back to Constantis today."

Gon, Killua and Ryozha glanced at each other. "Of course." Killua said.

A short while later they were standing on the edge of the clearing that the vortex to Constantis was. "All right," Fettham said, "don't forget to jump as you come out of the wormhole, or you won't make it back into the Fortress." As they moved towards the vortex, Fettham called after them "Oh, and Ryozha- tell that brat Ping Lee that I'll come out of my valley when I'm good and ready... but he's welcome to come visit me, if he's willing to work." Ryozha grinned, tossed him a lazy salute, and hopped into the vortex.

A few moments of time-space distortions later, they were once again on the battlements of the Fortress of the Forgotten Crusade. Gon stretched out, and the other two followed suit. "Feels like this Hunt is finally getting somewhere." Ryozha commented, pitching an importunate monster off the battlements. "Things are starting to pick up."

In another part of the world, Ryozha's words echoed through a small room. The Enforcer studied the tiny glowing image of his target. "Yes," he murmured with an unpleasant smile, "things are starting to pick up indeed."