Chapter Thirty-Nine
Reject No One
In the day-to-day spinnings of ten million people cramped into a landfill masquerading as a city, resignation is constant. Dreams are pathological, at best the result of too much D2.
But even here, here in the barest of cities, despair is scarcer than hope.
Meteor City has always survived on the blood of brutal people with brutal determination. People who understood each other enough to ignored you and that person behind you, because they recognize I am nobody, too.
Yet now, as the Leader of the Spiders is rushed out of the decrepit court, people whisper. As he is thrust onto the stage, hurried towards his pain and death as if there's no time to waste, as the gallows swing before the man who named himself Chrollo Lucilfer's face, the crowd grows louder. Shriller.
The Spiders, they escaped. The Spiders, they are old by Meteor City standards, and rich by anyone's standards. They return their wealth to Meteor City. They do not reject the city that made them, and Meteor City takes nothing from them.
Yet one of them was, ultimately, more corrupt than they. A traitor, with the gall to confess, as if Meteor City might absolve him.
And that, that hope, is the ultimate proof of his treason.
Meteor City does not forgive.
"We're fucked." Feitan eyes Machi, who pounds out a text message to Illumi.
"And he knew." Nobunaga's voice breaks. "He knew he damned himself!"
For what? This skinny brat, the twerp who just tried to kill himself, the bastard who killed Uvo and Paku? The brat who bound Chrollo's nen? Who separated the Spiders from their leader when they still needed him?
Do we?
Do we still need him?
Nobunaga shakes. Doesn't he himself still need Uvo and Paku?
Do we still need him?
We always will.
"Would my Hunter Chairman position help?" Cheadle Yorkshire draws herself up on her tiptoes. She suspects the answer, but she'll ask, and she'll try, despite the odds.
"They're not fond out outside positions," Bonolenov admits. Bono, who for so long was the only Spider not originating from Meteor City.
But now Illumi and Kalluto have joined. And Oito, the queen who gasps into a phone to his left. The troupe is better for their presence. Outsiders can be a source of marvelous strength.
Nobunaga scans the crowd. Dare he believe? No, that is too much for him.
But dare he hope?
"I'll try anyhow," Cheadle declares. "Come with me, Leorio."
"No," says Feitan, blocking their path.
"What are you planning, another revolution?" Unma asks bluntly through the phone.
"Starting a war, probably." Oito drops her voice.
"Surely you jest."
"You know I don't, though I wouldn't prefer it," Oito says. "Not when people are in danger. How far are you from Meteor City?"
"At least another day, and no, we're not funding a war." Unma harrumphs.
"Good. I won't ask that. Just political aid." Oito feels nauseated. They won't be in time to save Chrollo. There really is only Feitan's plan left.
"Mercyn's fast, but not as talented as Captain Hisoka."
Oito breaks into ironic, frightened laughter. "And Tserriednich?"
"He and Benjamin are alive. For now, that's all I need."
Oito's eyes drift to Phinks, who sweats as much from anxiety as heat. To Kurapika, who might not recover if they can't save his lover. "I understand more than you know."
"Let's split up." Feitan grabs Machi. "You're with us, Chain Bastard."
Kurapika loves that nickname, in the sense that he hates every foul word he is. That despised nickname that reeks of every sin he's committed. He deserves it. He brought this upon Chrollo, with his chains, though he never knew to how great an extent he would regret it.
Until now. Now, he regrets everything. If he could erase his existence and by that erasure, save Chrollo, Kurapika would.
"Do you have a plan?" Kurapika says. There's something – about how Cheadle stopped, about Machi's calculated demeanor –
Feitan laughs. Bitterly. "It's too crowded."
"The City will tear us apart," Machi says. "They're going to flog him, whether we look on or not. Our only chance is when they take him back inside afterward. They won't execute him immediately. They always allow a last night."
"Add if we miss that chance?"
"Then we miss it." Feitan raises an eyebrow. "You used to be smarter than this."
"You're – I'll kill you." Kurapika teeters back and forth. "No, no."
Threats, his own threats, got him into this.
"I can't even threaten you anymore." Tears spill down his cheeks. "Feitan, what if it were Machi? Wouldn't you do – wouldn't you give – everything you had? Just for a one percent chance?"
"Our chance isn't even one percent." Machi sounds colder than she ever has as she and Feitan drag Kurapika back from the stage, away from the others.
Kurapika lurches away. "No – I'm staying. I'm staying as close as I can."
"Good." Machi holds him, facing forward.
Around them, the city teeters.
It's like a pendulum, Chrollo said once, watching Uvo knock back a vengeful assassin, an assassin whose face shows he finally sees that he cannot overpower Uvogin. The apex of everything he's believed. Losing faith may be the greatest or the darkest moment in history. Do they find a new way?
The assassin raised his sword.
Or do they destroy themselves?
Shalnark bet on destruction. Pakunoda too. Hisoka, perhaps to be contrary, bet with Kortopi, bet with the man he'd one day decapitate, that a new path would be discovered.
The man slit his own throat. Machi was glad she hadn't bet.
Machi has the same feeling now. As they stand at a courthouse, at their friend's execution, Meteor City has reached its own apex.
The City is losing faith.
Chrollo's hands are tied to the pillar before them. Two guards cut away his shirt.
He's seen this before. Over and over and over. Children who stole bread. The instigators of drunken brawls. Tourists who ignored the mafia proprietors. Store owners who got a bit too greedy. Anyone the mafia wished to scapegoat.
Chrollo braces himself. He looks into the eyes of the crowd instead of down, because he will not be broken.
"This is what happens when you betray the mafia," announces Aster.
The masked brute flicks his whip, and Chrollo refuses to flinch as it tears through his flesh. He will remain resolute. He will not falter – these people watching will know the power of the spiders – they will know that it is okay to defy mafia and royalty and anyone who holds them back.
But on the tenth lash, when the brute strikes the same spot for the fifth time, Chrollo's muscles jerk and spasm.
And there, to the left, is Kurapika, held in a bear hug by Machi's unmistakable pink hair. Though he can't see Feitan, he must be near Machi.
He gasps and focuses on righting his stance, focuses on ignoring Kurapika, but the brute seems encouraged by his pain. The whip digs into his back. Flecks of blood decorate the wooden stage.
Franklin and Bonolenov are to the left. Shizuku and Melody are near the stage.
Chrollo holds his breath as his muscles continue to betray him. Sweat beads his brow. He can't cry out. He can't.
He closes his eyes at last, allowing himself a grimace, a shudder.
When he opens them again, he sees the famed Chimera Ant hunters, standing straight ahead. Gon and Killua's friends.
Cheadle and Leorio hang back by the courthouse. Phinks is near them, Oito by his side, Woble in his arms.
Chrollo focuses on how much he loves their relationship.
But Phinks' face is full of horror. He holds Woble close, as if to protect her.
Chrollo blinks back tears. It's not the whip – it's his friends – why does he have to care so much – why did he always pretend he didn't –
A tear escapes, and he curses it as it falls to the wooden stage.
"He's crying!" jeers a slurred voice, and the crowd begins to heckle. The man whipping him releases a hearty laugh, reinvigorated by the energy of the masses.
Dirt pelts Chrollo, and probably human waste, too. Chrollo's grateful there's no rotten fruit to throw. Meteor City is predictable; people would eat rot rather than waste it.
"Enjoy your last few minutes alive!" cackles Valdrada.
Few minutes? What about tomorrow? What about a last night?
"Let's help," Kurapika pleads. He can't do anything. None of them can.
He feels like a child reading the newspaper. Seeing images of Kurta bodies, lamentations at the loss of beauty, because beauty was easier to mourn than people. Screaming at the train conductor to take him back immediately, impatient despite knowing he could never arrive in time to save them.
"You repetitive, kid," Feitan says in his ear. His sword pokes into Kurapika's side.
"I'm not a kid!" Kurapika whimpers. "We're not just going to let this happen, right?"
"Who's this 'we?' Joining us after all this time?" Machi can't resist asking. Even as her voice breaks.
Feitan licks his lips. If they save him with things as they are, the city will turn on every last member of the Spiders. People are always their most volatile when they lose faith.
"Well?" Machi turns to him.
"If we move," Feitan says slowly, "we do what Gyro wants."
"And if we don't, Danchou dies." Machi's eyes flood with pain. No more pretending they don't care about each other. The Spiders are a family.
Feitan's stomach seizes. If he saves Danchou, if he ascertains Danchou's survival, he risks Machi.
If Danchou were his child, would he act differently?
Kurapika's eyes practically foam scarlet.
Feitan remembers skinning a crippled boy. Starting with the arms he could feel. He saved the legs for last. The boys' parents shrieked and pled until all three of their eyes displayed Scarlet. Watching their family die, knowing they wre powerless to stop it. Powerless to stop even their eyes from betraying them, from giving their killers precisely what they desired.
He wonders if Kurapika feels like those parents now. And if he's never changed throughout the years.
When the full hundred-twenty-eight strikes are at last counted, Chrollo hangs limply on the stage, but still silent.
This is his victory.
Even when he sees Hisoka's unmistakably orange hair, and sees Illumi and Kalluto, the rest of his spiders, rush into the crowd, and of all people, Hisoka still looks appalled at Chrollo's state.
Even when the guards saw at the ropes binding him and he drops to the floor, hilariously weak, he stays silent. Pain surrounds him, permeating his ears and eyes and even his mouth tastes like blood, but he will be silent.
And then – then one of the guards pinches his macerated back.
A mewl escapes his lips, on instinct. He hasn't the ability to stop himself.
"What's the matter? Prefer the whip after all?" The guard laughs.
Chrollo can muster no more strength as they display him before the crowd.
"Let this be a lesson to you all." The guard slaps Chrollo's back, and he falls on his face.
When Chrollo is raised once more by the guards, he notices Owl in the front row. Doing nothing. Not even courageous enough to watch him.
Chrollo hates him, even if he suspects Owl's behavior is more than fair.
He's propelled towards the gallows, to stand atop that rickety trapdoor.
This is abnormal; people aren't executed on the same day as they're tortured.
Gyro must be trying to force the Spiders to act. But if they haven't yet, they won't. Chrollo is relieved that they have chosen their own safety.
But he – he wants to see Machi and Feitan's baby.
A scratchy rope – it may be composed of plastic trash bags – is tied around his neck.
He wants to see how Hisoka and Illumi manage their marriage, and invite Gon and Killua to join the Spiders.
A masked man holds forth a brand. The mark of a traitor – a teardrop below an eye, the mark Hisoka mocks with paint – is branded into Chrollo's cheek.
Chrollo wants to watch Nanika and Alluka heal, Kalluto grow, Phinks and Oito marry.
He winces at the singeing of his flesh, at the heat that bores into his face. The mark of one bound for death.
This is so anticlimactic. They could have at least crucified him. And, perhaps in his own delusions, Chrollo smiles.
He wants to hold wrinkled, arthritic hands with a grizzled Kurapika as the light fades from his eyes, with a smile on his mouth. He wants a million memories from decades of life together to warm his heart even after death.
Gyro waits with baited breath. Where is the Troupe? They and many hunters have arrived. They're brought meddlers, outsiders ready to interfere in matters of loyalty.
It's all he needs. Any second now.
Surely they are waiting for the loudest moment, right before death. Surely they will betray their leader's lover, sell him out for thirty pieces of silver, or maybe just the last pair of Scarlet Eyes.
They will save their leader; it's all followers know how to do.
Chrollo thinks it the cruelest of ironies, that he must look upon Hisoka.
Hisoka smiles slyly at Chrollo. His wink feels familiar.
Chrollo doesn't even possess enough strength to employ gyo, but he can feel Hisoka's plan as Valdrada reads the charges. No, they're crimes. Confessed crimes now.
Does he trust Hisoka enough to look away? Does he trust himself enough that, even if Hisoka betrays him one last time, even if Hisoka seizes this chance as his likely last chance to kill Chrollo, Chrollo would rather die looking at Kurapika than Hisoka?
His eyes frantically scan the crowd for those Scarlet Eyes.
Kurapika's bore into him. Pleading. Why?
It's too hard to have crimes chase you. You don't have the constitution.
Kura would probably whallop him for that. And he'd pin the Kurta beneath him and take those Scarlet lips in his.
Chrollo's eyes wrinkle, as if to smile again.
Kurapika has only felt pain like this once before. When he read that newspaper, that sensationalization, that glittering of his family's massacre.
He's spent years flagellating himself for not being there.
So he's damn well going to be here for Chrollo. He doesn't even fight Machi. He deserves to suffer; he only wishes Chrollo didn't have to.
I don't just love you.
I need you.
When the lever is pulled, when Chrollo crashes downward, he's not sure he has a final thought. Merely a feeling, a feeling that is all he ever wanted to feel.
Gyro feels numb. His plan failed. Their loyalties have ruined them, ruined their leader. No doubt the insecurities now infesting them will tumble their merry bad of thieves.
But he still doesn't have what he needs. The Eyes. And without them, he may never regain what he had.
That's the thing. About starting from nothing, over and over and over. Sometimes, with the luck and chance of life, you succeed. Other times, you fail. He failed in that he was born, and he is about to fail now.
The city rumbles. People have seen death thousands of times, but the death of a spider different; it is the death of faith.
"Riots soon," Feitan mutters.
Machi nods. She grabs Kurapika by the shoulder. "Franklin will get his body. You're coming with us."
"You – you murdered him! I murdered him! We all murdered him." Kurapika stumbles. He retches towards the ground.
"It takes a city to murder, doesn't it." Machi's eyes blaze as she wraps her nen stitches around Kurapika's wrists. "Come with us. You don't get to run away."
Kurapika has no more words. He simply obeys her, as they traipse through the crowd. If Machi meant to have revenge on him for his past sins, she's succeeded. But at the price of her Danchou?
He doesn't understand, even as Machi shoves people out of their way, because she has no more patience, because she is clearly infuriated.
A few streets from – from – from Chrollo – Kurapika stops at the sight of Hisoka. In front of the sagging circus tent, peppered by smaller tents outside. Resting tents for the performers.
Hisoka points to the nearest tent. "I always found it easy to hide in here."
Machi shoves Kurapika inside.
He starts at several butlers, hunters, the ants, and what looks to be the entirety of Killua's siblings.
"Kurapika." Gon grabs him in a hug.
"Gon…" Kurapika's pulse slows. His vision blurs. "There are Zoldycks. There are Zoldycks here, there are Zoldycks here…"
"You can ask," Illumi says, cutting to the point.
Kurapika gapes at the eldest brother. Of all people, he never imagined Illumi would be the one to understand.
But is Illumi right? Does Kurapika have the right to ask? This is Kurapika's fault.
"Why didn't we do anything?" Illumi fills in.
"That's not our job," says the chubby one.
Kurapika shakes his head as he finds his voice. "Nanika and Alluka –"
"Nanika's tired from taking us here," Alluka says, rubbing the shoulder of her sleeping twin.
"Move aside, Kurapika." Melody's soft voice floats through. She and Shizuku squeeze inside next, followed by Phinks, Woble, and Oito.
"It's going to be okay." Oito embraces Kurapika.
"How –"
The room grows silent. The rest of the spiders have arrived. Franklin bears Chrollo's limp, bruised and bloodied body.
"We had to wrestle him from the crowds." Franklin's voice cracks. He lays Chrollo out on the earth.
With a gasp, Kurapika bends over Chrollo. He presses Holy Chain against his bruised lips – the lips he once split himself. "Please, I'll give anything."
Killua tickles Nanika, who startles awake. She allows herself to be taken over to Chrollo.
Kurapika opens his mouth to beg more.
Nanika drowsily pats Chrollo's back, using as little nen as possible to avoid notice. His shredded wounds begin to close.
But there's no point. Chrollo is dead, right?
"All right, come on." Hisoka leans over them both.
Kurapika tumbles backwards. Aura begins to flood out every node in Chrollo. Multiplying auras, each stronger and more mesmerizing than the last.
Chrollo's eyes fly open, and he lets out a gentle gasp.
Kurapika forgets his own breath. He forgets to move. Because if he does, surely this will be proven an illusion.
Hisoka giggles. "And that, ladies and gentlemen, is the new technique I'd like to name Sugar Rush."
