An Amusing Interlude – Part 6: Chase – In which the past catches up with us.
By
Deborah (Kosagi) Brown

Hunter X Hunter is copyright Yoshihiro Togashi. Quoll and Kurapika aren't mine more's the pity.


QUOLL:

"So you realized what was up and decided to interfere?" Abram Sirsun asks as he sits across from us at the table. "I can't really argue with the results, but It was a bit dangerous."

I shrug. "More dangerous than what they were planning for us? They had a bomb on board after all"

"All the more reason that what you did was risky."

Another shrug and I answer, "Do you think they would have hesitated to kill everyone, including themselves, if they didn't get what they wanted?" I glance at Kurapika, who isn't looking too happy with me right now. "And, after all, we didn't know you were aboard. Frankly, at first we thought you were one of them." I'm reminded that I still have his wallet and hand it back to him.

Sirsun looks rather like he's swallowed a rotten egg whole. "You picked my pocket when you fell on me" At my smile, he sighs. "All right. I guess there really isn't much else to say except" He eyes me, expression thoughtful, as if wondering if he ought to say something and not sure how.

"Except?"

"Dodake, Danchou."

I blink, it's my turn to be startled. Still, bowing my head, I reply, "Ca veste, Shir Sirsun."

He rises to his feet and looks at Kurapika. "And thank you as well, young sir. The two of you were a great help. I've made sure a car is ready for you in back. Please feel free to take it as far as you need to go."

When he's gone, Kurapika stares at me. "What the hell was all that about?"

I stand up, picking up my coat. "He's from Star City. He was thanking me for our help, and I, unlike certain rude young men, was telling him he's welcome." I should have recognized his accent earlier. Too many distractions, no doubt.

"Star City? Like you" Kurapika looks thoughtful as he gathers his things together. "He called you Danchou He knows who you are And is letting us go despite it"

"Because of it," I correct, opening the door and gesturing for Kurapika to precede me. "One thing you might want to keep in mind, Kurapika. To you, the Genei Ryodan are an evil blot upon the universe. To most of the public we're thieves and murderers. To the inhabitants of Star City We're heroes."

KURAPIKA:

I sit in the car as Quoll drives, eyes on the road ahead of us. I'm in a sour mood and not inclined to talk. Not that he cares. The radio is blaring some pop song and he's singing along happily. It's a moronic song, too. He's doing it to be annoying, isn't he?

Glancing his way, though, it looks more like he's simply enjoying a pleasant drive. The window on his side is down and blowing his hair and he looks too cheerful to be believed. Sometimes I have to wonder about him. I know we're going where he doesn't want to go, after all.

Other thoughts are intruding on me. An idea that has been bouncing around in my head ever since he stole that woman's nen. "You could have just killed that woman. Why didn't you?"

Quoll stops singing and shrugs. "I needed her Skill."

"So? What was stopping you from killing her afterwards?" I ask, watching his face. His expression shifts, becomes guarded. The face of the Ryodan's leader, instead of a kid on a joy ride. "Everything I've heard about you people says you don't hesitate to kill."

"In front of an audience? Scarcely a good idea," he answers lightly, though that guarded expression hasn't changed.

"She was going to kill you. She would have killed everyone on board. I doubt anyone would have mourned." Narrowing my eyes, I add, "It's your nen isn't it? Just like my conditions for Chain Jail. You can't kill the source of the power you steal."

He stares blankly at the road ahead of us. At last he says, "One of the biggest mistakes nen users make is explaining their abilities. Do you think I'm stupid enough to do that?"

I go silent, watching him and thinking. He's made no admissions, but I know I'm right. That I've guessed at something important. That blanket trick of his had belonged to one of a group of nen users the Ryodan had captured. He had appeared to be dead, but I'd heard that the body – like those found after the Ryodan's attack on the auction – had been faked, though no one knew where the guy had disappeared to. I remember what Quoll said about my chosen conditions and have to wonder. Does he not kill his victims because he can't? Or because he doesn't want to?

I turn my eyes away from him and notice something in the rearview mirror. That car It looks familiar.

"We're being followed." Quoll's calm confirmation of what I suspect only startles me because it shows how well he reads me. I really wish he wasn't so good at doing that. "Nostrad, I'd say. There's just something about the Mafia that not even native dress can hide. You think they breed 'em to look that way?"

I watch the car, ignoring Quoll's banter. "How'd they find us?"

"Likely who ever it is that's watching for your nen. Considering we were over the ocean at the time, we had to be either on a plane or a ship. All they had to do was find out whether there was a plane that had run into some sort of trouble." He speaks as if he was fully expecting this and I suppose he must have been. "I'm trying to find a good place for a fight. There's only six in the car, so at least one, more likely all, are nen users. Possibly one will be the woman from before, possibly another. They may or may not have realized I was with them, but since they think I'm nen free at the moment."

I glance his way. "There's still the Eyes."

"I think they'd consider that worth the risk. The more fool they," he answers, dryly. "Neon, bless her perverted little heart, is very attached to getting her own way. Too, as long as I have her nen her father's going to have to do everything in his power to get it back." He shrugs. "They'll try and knock me out first, most likely. I'm not sure what kind of threat they consider you, but they brought 20 men and a nen user that last time." He goes silent and his eyes distant again as he plots. "We get out of sight long enough to split up a bit. Not far, obviously, but we need them to split up, too. I'll deal with the ones that follow me and you handle yours, then meet back at the car."

Last night's fight and his easy assumption of command had rankled. Now, with no one to hear us, I feel no compunction about demanding, "Who put you in charge?"

QUOLL:

Kurapika's sudden sharp question startles me. Pondering it momentarily, I realize what he means. "Hmmm. I suppose it isn't reasonable to treat you like one of my Spiders," I admit. "I apologize for being rude, then. The question is, do you have a better idea?"

His expression shifts to confusion, as if he had expected a different response. At last he shakes his head. "Not really." Looking ahead, he adds, "But won't it risk the Judgment?"

I'd already thought about that. "You gave me a certain amount of latitude," I tell him. "It's not reasonable for us to stay together at this point, so we separate a bit, then come back together. As long as my intent is to go back as soon as I've dealt with my attackers I should be all right." I'm not absolutely certain of that, but who says life has to be certain?

"All right," he says. "Then does that area up there suit?" He points off towards the forest to our left. "Plenty of cover."

"A game of hide and seek," I agree, scanning for ways to get close. He points again, further up the road. "I had to come down this way when I left home. There's a road further up into the mountains through those woods just about a mile ahead. We would have been taking it anyway."

Nodding, I keep our speed level until we're almost there, then gun the motor, spinning us over onto the road – more a dirt trail – in question. Kurapika grabs hold of the door and seat, but makes no protest.

Behind us I see our pursuit pass the road and screech to a halt. I push our speed, gritting my teeth against the thumping and bumping as we race into the woods. As we turn a corner, I stop the car and throw myself out, rolling into the underbrush. On the other side I can hear Kurapika doing the same.

Then I'm up and running, deeper into the woods.

KURAPIKA:

I grew up in a place similar to this, if not even more thickly forested. It's easy for me to work my way through the underbrush. At last, though, I'm forced to use one of my chains to pull me up into one of the trees. Somewhere behind me I can hear someone crashing through the woods. Two big men, guns in their hands. One spots me and fires, but I use my chain to block the shot. It's a good thing, too, because what hits my whirling chain is a blast of nen energy not unlike what Quoll had faced the night before, though more bullet like in its appearance.

Swinging the chain around, I use it to redirect the force of his attack back at him. With a startled yell, he goes down, rolling around through the dirt to avoid the flames. The other man fires at me, but his bullets are even easier to deflect. Not a nen user? Or just biding his time? I decide not to waste time testing that out and send my chain at him in a single direct blow. He falls to the ground in a heap.

Another blast from the nen user comes at me and I barely leap out of its way. Then I call on the Ruby Eyes and send my attack chain flying off at an angle. "Hah!" he yells. "Missed!" He starts to aim, only to be struck in the back of the head as my chain ricochets off several different trees, angling its way back at him.

Dropping to the ground, I look at the two. Deeply unconscious, they're no longer a threat. Yet it seems to me that this was too easy. Without looking around, I listen, but there's no sound Except, that is, for a distant yelling that tells me that the others must have caught up with Quoll. I ignore that, letting my dowsing chain drop. There's someone else here. Where.

The chain swings sideways and I turn in that direction. Nothing seems to be there, but a faint oddity makes me peer more closely. This guy's another nen user. Some sort of chameleon power that he's using to sneak up on me. When he realizes he's been discovered, though, he starts throwing small daggers my way. So many that I'm hard put to block them all. I dodge behind a tree and throw my chain at him, but miss. He's hard to see and hard to keep up with because of his ability.

Right. Only one other way to do it, then. I drop the attack chain again and extend my dousing chain, throwing it in his general direction and letting its nature do the rest. I can't put nearly the strength into it I can the attack chain, but I don't need to. It strikes him mid forehead and knocks him cold.

Sighing, fairly sure there are no more, I head back towards the car.

QUOLL:

I don't like forests. Give me the jungle of the city over trees and vines and green things any day. Especially green things that insist on hitting me straight in the middle of the face, I think dodging below another branch, only to run into a lower one. Fortunately, there's a clearing ahead. Space is going to be a requirement in the next few minutes.

Behind me I can hear people running through the brush. Three pairs of feet, one going high and moving fast. I have a feeling I know who that is and when I break out into the clearing and find her leaping in front of me, I'm not surprised.

"Fancy meeting you here, Lucifer Quoll," the woman says, voice dry. "Ready to give up? You don't stand a chance against us this time."

I glance behind me and see two men in identical grey tunics and black pants come running out. More nen users, I'm fairly sure, because they don't have the look of a Mafia goons. If anything, their faces seem too empty of thought and expression. "Should I be complimented that you regard me as worth three of you?" I ask.

"You'd be nothing for me if it weren't for those Eyes," the woman tells me, sourly. "So they're here to block you. Both your Eyes and your escape." She gestures and I realize I've been chased to a cliff-side. "You're trapped, Quoll."

I raise a brow. "The Eyes aren't nen," I point out. "Do you really think that's going to do any good?" Not that I'd use them, anyway, but she can't know that.

The two gaze at me with an expression I usually only see in the mirror. "We do not use nen," one says. There's something strange about his voice. Something not quite human. Something familiar. At the same time I feel an equally familiar hum in the base of my skull. A hum that is rapidly turning into a headache.

"They're machines," the woman explains. "They're programmed to send a signal that interferes with brainwaves. Yours in particular, Number Q013."

Standing utterly still, I gaze at the ground. Well, well, well. My past catches up with me again. I shrug, though, looking up at my attacker. "All right. No point in arguing about this, then. Come on. Take me if you can." I'm reasonably sure the machines won't interfere. They always were too limited in their thought processes for that.

She rushes me, moving fast, so very fast that if I wasn't enhancing my own speed I'd be down in a flash. This time I have her measure and I know something of what she can do. No point in trying to get her with the benz. She knows about it and it's too obvious a weapon. Instead I keep dodging and evading, though I take several sharp blows in the process. I can't afford to let this go on as long as I did before. Then I had no choice. This time, though, all I need to do is find the perfect moment.

It comes at last as she begins a series of cartwheels intended to end in a drop kick. It's a spectacular move. One which will certainly do some damage if I let it reach me. Instead I call up my book and flip it open to the best possible page, using the Skill I find there. She disappears, only to reappear several yards away and past the edge of the cliff.

The last I see of her is a stunned expression before she drops. Her scream ends suddenly, a half second or so later. I take a deep breath, intending to use the same nen on the machines when I'm enveloped in agony. I drop my book, falling to my knees and start screaming.

KURAPIKA:

The screams start just as I arrive at the car. I'm not sure whose they are, but something about them is so horrible that I can't help but rush towards them. It can't be Quoll. If he hit the point of needing to scream like that he'd be using his Eyes and I'd know it. Probably kill him for it, for good measure. I may have to kill him anyway if he's gone berserk enough to torture someone that way.

As I break my way into a clearing at the edge of a cliff I realize I was wrong. Not only are the screams Quoll's but I can understand why, though not how he's holding back the Eyes. He's crouched between two men, arms covering his head, rocking back and forth. There's something going on, a power I don't recognize, flowing between his attackers. Some sort of harmonic that must affect brainwaves. I'm getting a bit of it and it's enough to set my teeth on edge.

One of the men speaks, "Specimen Number Q013 has been subjugated. Prepare to return to base." His voice is strange, mechanical.

I lash out with my attack chain, expecting the blow to at least knock the man over. Instead he turns and something about the shape of his face, the smooth perfection of his skin and the blankness in his eyes tells me he's some sort of automaton. "Secondary target located," it says and the harmonic increases strength, focusing itself on me. I feel strange and when I try to summon my Eyes in response I find I can't. I still have my nen, though and I use it to wrap my attack chain around the thing.

Behind him I see Quoll's hand move. He's still the center of the other machine's attention and the pain he's in can't be much less than mine, but taking the second one's attention off him lets him summon his Skill Book. It flips open and I see a picture of the girl we'd fought the night before. Then a plasma blast bursts from his left hand, striking his attacker in its lower right stomach.

Somehow, that's enough. It collapses into a heap, as does Quoll. His target, however, tells me what I need to know about my own opponent. I center as much strength as I can into hitting the thing in the same spot. To my relief it too falls.

QUOLL:

I take long deep gasping breaths. I could go for the rest of my life and not get that treatment again, I think. It's everything I can do to force my Eyes to stay quiet, to keep the power controlled. Kurapika is too near, too much a danger and in too much danger for me to chance releasing it. At last, though, my ten does its job and restores equilibrium.

By the time it has, Kurapika's finished off his opponent and knelt beside me. I ignore him in favor of laying face down in the grass. My head hurts like hell and what I really want is to crawl into a hole somewhere and not come back out. Kurapika is apparently opposed to that idea, though, and proceeds to use his healing chain on me.

At last I begin to feel somewhat human again and I roll onto my back. He's looking at me strangely. "What did that thing mean, Q – zero – thirteen?"

Taking a deep breath, I force myself to sit up. "That isn't your business," I tell him in a flat, no-nonsense, voice. One that I hope makes it very clear that I won't take any prying.

Apparently, though, he's in a mood to ignore my tone. "More of your Spider's business?"

I look at him, long and hard. "Not all my secrets are the Spider's," I tell him coldly. "But they are still my secrets. Leavebe."

His grey eyes meet mine for a long, silent, moment. Then he nods. "For now, at least," he agrees. He stands up and holds out his hand and I take it, letting him help me up. "We'd better get moving. Am I right in thinking we'd better go easy on the nen?"

"Very much so. They'll be hunting us down soon enough. No point in leaving a trail." Glancing around, I note that we're not all that far from the point where we'd have to leave the car anyway. I'd like to try and convince him not to go, to make him understand that this is not a good idea, but he's stubborn. Stubborn and convinced that – somehow – taking me there will force some truth out of me. Truth that cannot bear revealing. "We should get moving. It won't be long before we have to start in on foot."

KURAPIKA:

I look at him. He's doing it again. At my expression, though, he sighs. "I'm what I am, Kurapika. If you don't like it, don't drag me along." He pauses, glances at the automaton I destroyed. "I should thank you, by the way. Your timing was perfect." His expression holds little, but I think I see an embittered line in his lips, then he turns to me with a more charming smile. "So, thank you, Kurapika, for not letting that thing turn my brain into stir-fry."

Something in his eyes causes me to pause. A mocking expectation that tells me he's not waiting for any response. My feelings about him haven't changed enough that I want to be polite to him, but "You're welcome," I tell him in as even a tone as I can manage. Rather to my surprise, he blinks at me, expression momentarily stunned. "Let's go."

He follows behind me back to the car and we start driving again. He's oddly silent now, not even bothering with the music. Instead he has a distant look on his face, faintly sour. The expression of someone thinking about things he doesn't want to think about. That's okay. I'm thinking of things I don't want to think about either.

The problem is, I should be thinking about it. I should be trying to work out ways to get past the walls he's building up, the careful lies and evasions he's built to hide the truth from me. And from himself. Glancing at him, I can see his expression getting cooler and more distant the closer we come to our destination. Everything he has said and done so far tells me that he fears this. Fears it as he does not fear death. I think if he feared it much more he would willingly embrace death rather than face it.

Something horrible happened that day. Not just to my people, but to him as well. To him and his Spider? I wonder. I understand part of it, but not why he thinks I would be even more willing to destroy him if I knew it all. It's obvious he went there seeking his past. Possibly even to learn what he was. Having felt the power of his Eyes, I think it would have been impossible for the Elders not to try and stop him. Possibly even try to kill him, only to bring his Eyes fully to bear on them and all the others. Not one of us could have held back against the power in him.

Yet there is more, there must be. Why else would he be so secretive? What is it that makes him expect me to be even more of a danger should I find the full truth?

QUOLL:

I feel him staring at me, watching me with that intense, searching, look that makes me want to slap him. He's not a stupid man. He knows this is the last thing in the world I want to do. Does he think that I'll suddenly break? That somehow the stress of this trip will force the truth from my lips in an agony of confession?

I find my lips tightening, as if doing so will somehow hold the knowledge in my head back. Damn him for this anyway. I'd take his efforts to kill me as a given, but this is something else and I don't like it and don't want it. Nor do I need it.

So why don't you just break the judgment and be done with it? I ask myself. Maybe because doing so is a stupid kind of suicide. I don't fear dying, am prepared to die for a good reason, but I just can't find it in me to consider avoiding the scene of the worst crime I've ever committed to be a good reason.

"This is probably a good spot," Kurapika says, pointing off towards the trees. "We can leave the car here"

"No," I tell him. "I'll shrink it. If we leave it, it'll be found." Again he gives me that look. The one that says he's resenting something I've said and I realize that – once more – I've acted like I'm leading this insane field trip. "Er I apologize. May I suggest we take it with us, once I've shrunk it?"

Kurapika's expression turns startled, though I don't understand why until he says, "Why do you insist on being so polite?"

I examine his face for a long, silent, moment. "Because in our situation, politeness may be the only thing that will keep us from killing each other. It isn't just my Eyes that incite violence between us, you know."

KURAPIKA:

I stare at him, stunned. "No, I hadn't" It makes a strange sort of sense and provides yet another clue as to what happened that day when he killed my people. He turns and gets out of the car and I follow suit, saying, "I'll get the bag of stuff out of the trunk." I want to discuss things further, try and work my way around to more not so subtle hints, but everything about his posture tells me that such an attempt would be futile.

Quoll nods, not saying anything, and I open the trunk to take out our one, small, bag. Contained within are the supplies Quoll had shrunk before and while I deplore the source of his skills, I can't argue with the result. This trip will be a lot easier because he did this.

As he pulls out his Skill Book and prepares to shrink the car, I consider his comments. He's probably right that we need to be more polite to each other, difficult though I find it. Yet he surely realizes that his efforts to get me to be polite to him haven't exactly helped keep my Ruby Eyes under control. There's more to it than that and I think I know what it is.

He's been leading the Ryodan for years now. More, I think he is a proud man. The kind of man who must chafe at finding himself forced to follow in my lead like a puppy on a leash. No matter what else I feel towards him, he needs respect as well. Needs to feel less like a prisoner on the way to execution. Needs to feel some measure of control in a situation where he's lost all control.

Quoll's dark eyes meet mine and his brow shoots up. "Well? Ready?" He picks up the car and drops it in his pocket.

I nod, starting up the trail into the mountains.

To Be Continued


Author's Notes:

Oy. Between running an art show and a sinus infection, my mental state resembles Swiss cheese. Fortunately, this segment was written already, so I don't need to hold off posting it. The next segment needs work still, so it may be a few days before I write it.

I've been of two minds on writing past the upcoming Chapter 7. I could finish things there and plan a sequel, or I could just keep going. At the moment, with all the little detail thingies to elaborate on, I'm inclined to just keep going and end the thing later. We'll see what I think when my brain is no longer full of cotton candy from the medicine. (SFX of Kosagi floating somewhere above her keyboard.)

Shinamori: I hate when I lose " marks. Could you point them out to me? Private email at kosagi@woh.rr.com will be fine. Re: Quoll's 'perkiness'. The Quoll in my head is a rather odd mix of personalities. Without actively being a split personality, he, like most people, seems to be able to shift his attitude based on the situation. If he is perky to Kurapika it's probably partly because it annoys. He's capable of shifting attitudes based on the situation, obviously. A fact our more prosaic Kurota seems to find confusing.

Cel: Thank you.

Shinamori: Hmmm. I think you may be meaning how he reined in his emotion over Pakunoda's death vs. his reaction to Kurapika's presence, rather than Ubo's. Let me know if you meant something different. To answer your question, keep in mind that he uses ten for control and that all his ten was going towards dealing with the physical pain. There's a bit more to it than that, which I shall have to elaborate on as I go. I don't know whether this will go from a buddy/buddy fic like "48 Hours" or if those two will develop any relationships. (Kosagi admits to having fondness for yaoi, but the relationships need to happen on their own, rather than forcing the characters into it. Kosagi also has a raging allergy to yaoi that involves a guy who may as well be a girl in a man's body, or shouto, but that's beside the point.) I definitely will expand on the difference between the Ruby Eyes over the course of the fic (or in the sequel, if I go that way). Mundania It's a term often used in SF fandom, so I'm not sure if it's worked its way into the common vernacular. (I think I swallowed a dictionary when I was little eh heh.)

Yukitsu: Well, this is an Alternate Universe Fic, of course, but I like to think that Kurapika is capable of being something more than a vengeance hungry maniac. Re: Spelling It varies so much that I'm inclined to consider the Toriyama world version the most likely. I'd have to go look up the manga to find it and at the moment I'm too lazy. I'll probably fix the spelling when I'm finished to clean stuff up a bit. For now, I'll stick with Kurota. And looking at my screen caps of the anime, I could call his eyes turquoise, but not true green by the few shots I've seen. So, for now, I stick with blue.

Blunt: Hey, thanks for the info. I am going to have to see about picking the anime up. All I have is the first OVA and some AVI's of the beginning of the fight between Quoll and the Zoldicks. Personal take on the matter is that the anime must have decided to put the spider tattoo in because it isn't in those scenes you describe in the manga. Or at least *I* can't see anything on his right arm that looks like a spider. Oh well. Is his left arm missing in the anime, btw?

Yukiko: Yeah, most likely OOC. It's difficult to tell what they'd do with each other if Togashi-san were handling this. (SFX of Kosagi grumbling that there isn't more plot to the current story in Jump.) Still, as long as it's fun and isn't blowing anyone's mind, I'm satisfied. grin

Lynlyn: Answer to your email in a day or so. I have little brain left at the moment.