An Amusing Interlude: Part 7 - Confession - In which the truth cannot remain hidden forever.
By
Deborah (Kosagi) Brown

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


QUOLL:

To say the days pass quickly would be a lie. Yet there's nothing like having a destination one would prefer not to reach to make time flow more quickly. After a week of traveling we reach an area that we both find familiar. Our reaction to it, however, is entirely different.

Kurapika stands in the field and gazes around, tears streaming down his face. This is the entrance to the village and the last time I was here it was a battlefield. The last remnants of the Clan, making their final stand against the invaders and the abomination that led them. Now, however, only grass and flowers remain and I'm granted a sharp aching vision of one boy burying the remains. It's my imagination, of course, but never let it be said that my imagination isn't a good one.

At last he turns and walks towards the entrance. Two tall stone pillars, their surface beginning to mottle with lichen and moss, guard the trail up to the village. He pauses, tracing the words in Kurota script carved into the nearest one. "May all who enter be welcomed. Here is peace and tranquility. Here is Heart's home," he whispers.

I realize I'm gritting my teeth. "You don't have to read it to me," I tell him. "I don't need you to tell me what it says." I don't need him to because I already know. I glance at the other pillar, resentment growing. May the wanderer find rest, the seeker find. "Heart's desire. Right." I find myself muttering. As Kurapika turns a startled look my way I give him a sour look and walk past him. "Well? Are we going to stand here all day?"

Kurapika's eyes on me are thoughtful and I'm surprised he doesn't say anything. Instead he continues up the trail.

KURAPIKA:

I've just received another clue, haven't I? I carefully avoid looking at the dark clad figure behind me, sensing that it would take little to push him over the edge at this point. I have to be careful. Bringing him here might be a mistake – it depends on how well he can control himself until I find a way to do it for him. Yet he can take the most incredible amounts of damage without losing that control. Otherwise he would have lost it when I captured him that first time. When my Eyes had surely tested his ten to its limits.

Stepping onto the village grounds, for a bare instant I expect someone, Jurik, perhaps, to run to greet me. It's a thought that's gone in an instant. This place is too silent. The wind that blows from the mountains carries only birdsong and small noises. No one yelling from one house to another. No hammer in the smithy. It was this way the last time, but the reason was more obvious in the battered and abused bodies of my people.

I have to force my eyes not to turn red. Not to incite Quoll's own Eyes. I don't look at him as I say, tiredly, "I don't suppose you could bother to tell me why you took their eyes?" When he doesn't answer, I look his way.

He's silent, gazing at the village without expression. Without feeling. I would think he was looking at a mildly interesting painting but for the solidity of his pose. To say he is unaffected would be, I think, a lie.

"I have nothing to say," Quoll answers after a moment.

QUOLL:

Rather to my surprise, Kurapika doesn't remark on my refusal to answer, just walks towards the main building at the center of the village. "Come," he tells me and I follow, silently.

It's odd. Something about this place makes him feel stronger. More in touch with his Self and who he is. His sorrow is immense, but at the same time, he's glad to be home and that gladness lightens his step.

I feel like a shadow trailing behind him, a shadow rapidly losing substance as he grows lighter. This place is not for me. Their fine words at the gate were meaningless for me. No rest. No welcome for the fallen. Even for one who hadn't known that he had fallen.

The inside of the town hall is brightly lit by the sunlight streaming through the windows. The walls are plastered with a pale, ever so faintly yellowish, substance. Translucent and a little reflective. The floors are wood, made of ash or beech, as are the rafters. There's something light and airy about the large room. The kind of place one expects to see kindly old sages conversing about philosophy.

Those 'kindly' old sages hadn't been all that philosophical about me, I recall with a sneer. The thought nearly sends my memories back into that time and I have to increase my use of ten to force it back. I'm so distracted by my efforts not to think at all that I don't notice what Kurapika is doing until it's too late.

A sharp sting in my arm brings my attention sideways. For a moment I think he's stabbing me, but the arm is a ridiculous target and I realize it's a thorn of some sort. "I don't know how long this is going to last on you," he says. "They've been in storage for a while."

I stare at him and – stupidly – feel betrayed. "What was it?"

"A drug my people use used when one of us was too sick to think clearly." He puts an arm under my elbow and as my knees start to give way and I feel myself falling, I understand why. As he drags me to a stack of pillows and leans me against them, he continues, "Otherwise the Ruby Eyes would be a danger to both patient and healer."

My head is spinning and my muscle control is nearly gone. It's not quite the same as the poison from my benz knife, but its effects feel similar. "It seems to block more than the Eyes," I whisper. My muscles are failing me. I can't think clearly, can't do anything at all. "Too bad side-effects are so incapacitating. Something like that useful."

Kurapika nods. "To be honest," he says quietly, "I'm not sure how well it blocks your Eyes, either. They're so different from mine." He looks down at me directly. "Would you try and summon them?"

I almost refuse, then, shrugging inwardly, call them forth. If the drug does its job, nothing will happen. If it doesn't this is Kurapika's gamble. If nothing else, he might be able to run fast enough to escape them.

KURAPIKA:

Quoll leans back among the pillows and stares straight ahead. Something is happening around him, a shadowy chaotic swirl of power that seems oddly muted. The drug can't contain his Eyes then, but it does have an effect. There's no emotion behind the swirl, no anger, no pain, no fear. Still, I wonder if I've made the wrong choice yet again. At least, if I have, it's only the two of us who will pay.

You knew the risk, Kurapika, I remind myself. His nature is not true Kurota. What would completely block my power might have no, to little, effect on him. I'd had hope when it had at least affected his body so strongly.

The power swirling around him doesn't have the same feel to it without his emotions to give it strength, though. I don't have any urge to attack him, no urge to tear him apart. No urge to destroy an evil parody of my Eyes. I kneel, reaching out to him, and he raises his head to look at me. He whimpers, trying to pull away and momentarily I feel his fear. Then the drug wipes that little bit away.

I realize at that moment that he's trying to avoid my gaze, that, without intending to, I've summoned my own Eyes. For the barest moment I'm looking directly into his Self and what I see there confirms everything I'd feared.

Memory shifts, twists in the brain. Thoughts intertwine to form tangled knots in the lines. We want to escape. We want to understand.

"Quite frankly, I've come here for help." Quoll looked from village elder to village elder and saw their puzzled frowns. Explaining the truth shouldn't be all that hard, yet he found himself hesitating, none the less. What would they make of him? Of his background and of his nature? He took comfort in the fact that his Spider waited outside for them. Even if these people rejected him, his friends, his family, would not. Family was so important to him. The forming of the Ryodan had been a need fulfilled. Yet these were his people too and he wanted, no, needed to understand.

At last he lifted his head. "I have the Ruby Eyes and I need to learn to control them."

Five men and women stared at each other, then at him. "Impossible," one said firmly. "Utterly impossible. Only those in our village have the Eyes."

Quoll shrugged eloquently. "And no one ever leaves?"

"Occasionally. They come back."

Raising a brow, Quoll asked, "Always?"

Back away. Unwanted. Not safe. The precipice is before us and we will fall. We must know. Only in knowing can we find a path out of this morass that we have worked ourselves into.

"Not always," admitted one Elder. "But it is still impossible. You are not one of them, not the child of one who found another of our kind out in the world. You are not of our blood, for all you bear some resemblance." His expression was growing worried, as if a thought was occurring to him that he did not like to think of.

Admitting the full truth was beyond Quoll, but somehow he had to make these people understand and help him. Help him before he lost control entirely. "I'm not full blood, but my father was Kurota."

He realized his mistake the minute he said those words. The shock of his explanation turned the eyes of every Elder in the room bright red, their fear and loathing nearly inciting his own Eyes into full attack. For a moment the power escaped him, but, somehow he managed to control the effect, to fight it down, but not easily.

No further Please no further Don't do this to us We need to know. Need to see. Must face what cannot be faced.

It didn't matter, though. The Elders were on their feet, anger and fury rising. "HALF BLOOD! THAT ONE! ABOMINATION!" Their anger grew, rage so great that his fragile control was lost. He might have been able to face one Kurota in such a rage, but not five. Not all aiming their loathing and fear at him. "Stop him. Those eyes Destroy all they hate. All they fear. All they love. KILL HIM!"

His Eyes released, the power flow around him caught at their minds, rebounded and echoed. The effect was agonizing, the more so because there seemed to be a magnifying effect that caused other minds to be caught in the flow. One of the guards came running in, spear at ready, about to run him through, eyes burning with the same fury.

Quoll couldn't move. Trapped at the center of the maelstrom, he was barely able to hold his own against the fury being leveled at him. Only Ubo's great hands, breaking the man's neck, stopped the Kurota before he closed. Quoll's Spider encircled him, trying to break him out of his trance, but to no avail.

As the maelstrom grew it gathered more in. He could hear his people fighting. One, Phinx, yelling at Shizuka and Mardi to get him out, to get him to safety. He felt the girls' hands on his arms, their support as they dragged him through a village of howling maniacs, barely aware of anything but the agonizing pain in his mind. Supported, though, by his real family, he found the strength to keep moving. The Eyes knew his true allies and would not willingly harm them. Instead they reached out, linking with the others and leaning on their strength.

They reached the entrance to the village somehow, though he was barely aware of anything but a blur of red eyes and clawing fingers. They wanted him dead. All other thought was lost in their rage and his own.

Not this no Please Too far We've gone too far Sorry Sorry to do this Sorry

Mardi's scream of pain woke him a bit. She was falling, one of his family was falling and he could do nothing but feel her death. The link of the Eyes to those he regarded as closer than blood shattered between them as she fell into darkness. The others were fighting and killing their way through the village, while the Elders, at the head of the pack, struggled to reach him, their hate and fury a physical force.

He fell to his knees, screaming with anguish and loss. Screaming with rage. If his Eyes had seemed to reach their full power before, he now realized that that had been a mere seeming. Locking onto the mind of the one nearest him, feeling her anguish at the loss of their friend and feeding off of it, he projected that fury outwards.

Now the magnifying effect played right into his hands. As he drained each attacker's mind their power joined into his and made the force of his attack that much stronger for the next one. His mind drove into those other minds, twisted them into knots and drank of their knowledge. One after another fell, minds drained, life force ebbing as their brains failed, no longer capable of so much as keeping the breath in their bodies. Within minutes all were dead and his mind – overloaded by knowledge not his own – fell into another kind of darkness.

KURAPIKA:

Pulling out of the confusion is about the hardest thing I've ever done. If Quoll wasn't under the influence of the drug I would never make it. Looking around, I find myself sitting beside him, his arms wrapped around me, fingers buried in my tunic as if clutching a lifeline. His expression is twisted and agonized and I wonder if I've pushed him entirely too far. I should not have done this, I realize. Nothing could have stopped me, though. Nothing short of the truth I've just learned. A truth I could only have learned through this means. A truth I would give anything not to know.

A tiny little whimper escapes Quoll's lips, but he's starting to relax. His clutch loosens, allows me to pull free and stand. Looking down at him, I wonder what to do.

I can't kill him. I couldn't kill him before when he was my helpless prisoner. The first time I'd had an excuse to hide behind – my friends' safety. The second time, well he was injured and utterly helpless, containing secrets that I thought I had to know. I wish now I didn't. Wish I could have retained some innocence. His people destroyed mine, yes, but I can't help but wonder what might have happened if they'd not reacted as they had. Can't help but wonder if the Genei Ryodan would have become our allies instead of our destroyers.

But that would never have happened. I had felt the effect of our eyes on him and his on mine. They magnify each other's responses. I would like to believe the Elders were unmatched in strength and control, but I am forced to recognize that they too were human and fallible. From the moment Quoll revealed he had the Ruby Eyes they should have used caution. Should have taken action to minimize the danger. Should have gotten him as far away from the village as possible.

I have to wonder, though, what would have happened to him if they had. Would they have killed him? Found a way to help him, despite their obvious belief that it wasn't possible? If the former, they would have died in turn, killed by his followers. If the latter – was it even possible to help him?

Looking at him, sprawled unconscious on the pillows, I know what I have to do.

QUOLL:

I open my eyes on darkness, feeling the force of the memories in my head, feeling my desperate need to release my Power again and defend myself. My eyes are glowing still. Only the fact that there's nothing and no one there to direct their power at keeps me from losing control. Instead, somehow, I force my ten back in control and sit up, pushing back the blanket that covers me.

My stomach is roiling and I seriously consider being sick. At last, though, I get the nausea under control as well and manage to stand up. I've been here for hours, I realize. Not much longer than that, but then I really didn't fully release the eyes during that nasty little trip down memory lane. Damn him. I didn't need that.

It occurs to me, however, that he did. I couldn't have told him what he learned. Still can't think about it too hard without finding the knowledge I've stolen trying to shred my brain into tiny little pieces. They aren't separate thoughts, aren't the minds of my victims, aren't even some small bits of the souls of the dead. They're just bits of information, bits of knowledge. Tastes and senses and loves and hates and deaths. That last's the hardest part, for I know exactly what I did to them. What it was like for them to die. I can only bear it by burying it deep. I do not fear death because, in a way, I have died a hundred deaths already.

There's other knowledge, too. Knowledge of what had happened, though it had taken me months to assimilate it. Months of patient reading through the clan's scrolls. Months of careful stepping through the minefield of stolen memories to find some way to control my nature.

And finding none. I am and I am not Kurota. Something is missing in my mind, in my brain, that would allow me to control what I am. To hold the effect of the Eyes to a minimum. They knew that was the case and they feared it. I walk to the doorway, wondering where Kurapika is and find a note pinned to it with a small dagger.

Quoll,

By the time you read this I'll have left the village. Just so you know, I've removed the Judgment Chain from your heart entirely, so don't worry about having to follow me. In fact, I think it would be better if you didn't.

In the last week I've come to understand quite a bit about what happened and everything I've just experienced has confirmed both it and one other thing. Because of what I understand now, I find that I cannot continue pursuing you, or your Spider. There is blame on both sides of the equation, but I think, perhaps, more lies on the Elders' side than yours. I think, had you any idea of what would result in your coming here, you would have turned in your tracks and left my people be.

A part of me wonders if I'm doing the right thing, leaving you alive. Having guessed what I have about you, I fear you. I fear what you can do. I fear it, and yet I cannot find a just reason to kill you for it. It is not your fault that you are what you are. Not your fault that you've an ability that you should not have and that you can only control in one way. It is, I think, to your credit that you have held the power so long and used it so seldom. I can only hope you continue to do so.

I would like to ask more questions. I would like to know who the idiots were who thought they could breed their own Ruby Eyes. That's what you are, aren't you? The result of a breeding program gone horribly awry. Were you thrown away? Or did you escape, I wonder? Not that it matters. Asking you more questions only risks causing you pain. Only risks summoning your Eyes. I don't dare do that, for both our sakes. Now I understand why you and your Spider would not speak. They feared to send you back over the edge into true insanity. Feared what I would do to you if I knew what you were. Just as you could not explain without reawakening the memories you've stolen.

That's why I'm leaving you alone, though I plan to wait until you're showing signs of waking up before doing so. That means, of course, that I won't be all that far. Still, I ask that you not look for me. We should not be near each other. Should not risk the result of our Eyes clashing ever again. For both our sakes.

I cannot do anything more but say this; You have done something horrible, but you have paid a price far beyond anything I could reasonably demand of you. More, I cannot find it in me to blame you anymore for what you did. For what you have done to me and my people I can only forgive you. And hope, one day, you can forgive yourself.

Kurapika.

To Be Continued


Author's Notes:

XD: Thanks for that screencap! I found the same scene in the scanlation from Toriyama's world and it *isn't* in the manga. Heh. Someone decided to put one there later, I guess. (Quoll: Hisoka, what are you doing with that marker? Hisoka: You want them to believe it's you, right? Gotta have a spider somewhere. Quoll: I understood that much. It was the mustache and goatee I was objecting to.)

Aelys: Thanks!

Yukitsu: I think turquoise can be read as green or blue, and it may be a matter of the way eyes see, too. Oh, and I think maybe Kurapika's eyes are brown when he's wearing those contacts.

Shinomori: I admit to a fondness for more complex characters and when you have a character like Quoll who is so very under written, it's sometimes *easier* to make up the complexities. We'll have to see what Togashi does. I have theories about what the Genei Ryodan wants on Greed Island and I don't think it's just a matter of fixing Quoll's problem. As for Yaoi, while I admit to reading and enjoying some PWP style yaoi, I do prefer some reason behind a relationship occurring, rather than just forcing two characters together because the writer thinks they're hot. I hope this episode helps explain a bit of what's driving Quoll's earlier reaction to Kurapika. Oh, and thanks for the edits... I'll probably hold off on the fixes until I've got this thing done, but it's good to know where they are.

Yukiko: I had to get someone to translate that grin but THANKS!

Blunt: Fanart Ooooh. Except the link's broken. Can you email me privately, or repost in the reviews? Ouchies!