A/N: Oh my gosh, for real, I seriously did not think I would be able to finish this chapter. Still, because of some class cancellations and several failed attempts to write my thesis proposal, I ended up writing out chapter four of this story instead. More than half of it was already written months ago, but I couldn't get a certain part right (I'm still not sure if it's all right now) and had to do multiple rewrites again. I actually re-uploaded this chapter because I thought when I uploaded it the first time that it seemed to be missing something…

I'm sorry I'm such a slow updater, but I promise I'll see this to the end.

In this chapter, I'm launching a lot more clues about the story's spin on the Zoldycks and shedding a little more light on the other characters in this story. I'm hoping everything works and crossing my fingers that I'll be able to tie everything together in the end somehow...

Your reviews and ideas would be much appreciated!

Cheers.

UNTOUCHABLE

Chapter IV. Family Histories

Mito recognized, with the sweetest satisfaction, the small changes in her small household as days went by. After so many years, there were, again, three sets of utensils left drying by the kitchen sink after every meal. Tracks of dirt, only hastily cleaned, were often left on the floors from the boys' frequent forays into the woods – something Gon had done only rarely ever since his grandmother left him and Mito to take charge of the shop on their own. She discovered more discarded wrappers of chocolates and sweets in the trash bin (Killua's), and less of discarded scratch papers filled with failed attempts to answer one mathematics problem or another (Gon's). The laundry and the dirty dishes piled a little higher every day, even as the washing and cleaning time reduced significantly as the silver-haired heir had taken to learning household chores with a remarkably competitive seriousness.

Indeed, Mito noticed the rapid changes in their young guest's demeanor as well. While, in the first few weeks he had been rather difficult to read – warm yet distant – he grew more and more open in the days that followed – less tense, more childlike. Gon, too, lost the marks of fatigue that used to show in the slouch of his shoulders whenever he came home from school, and Mito observed how, in the passing days, the lingering scent of menthol smoke in Killua's room reduced and dwindled until only the scent of his cool, wintry musk remained, becoming as familiar to her as Gon's warm, woody autumn.

It did not hurt that the veterinary shop saw a spike in female clientele when Gon eventually suckered Killua into doing some of the tasks around the clinic with him. Girls with pets that were not at all unwell began to drop by at random, bringing one fish breed at a time or asking for advice on some possibly nonexistent "other pet," to ask for prescriptions that would require them to return again and again.

While Killua did little to help actively in the veterinary processes, settling instead to observe and accompany Gon as he worked, he was a remarkably efficient clerk and he straightened out the Freecss' cluttered records of customer credit balances, schedules for pickups and visitations, and inventories of supplies in no time at all. He dealt with hard bargainers smoothly and swiftly, and had a strange way with cats that calmed them in spite of severe pain or discomfort.

Once, on another orange-lit dusk when Gon had not yet returned from delivering a newly healed puppy to its owner and Mito had just finished with a debridement in the back room, she chanced upon the silver-haired heir receiving an injured kitten from a wet-lashed, wide-eyed five-year-old. The darkened blood from what appeared to be wounds sustained from a fight looked stark and frightening on the messy white fur of the yelping, frightened kitten as it cowered in one corner of its cage, tail puffed up in terror.

It surprised Mito then how comfortable Killua seemed to be, reassuring the little girl that her pet will be alright – big brother's promise! – even as he told her that he was not the vet and that, no, he couldn't heal her pet then and there, she would have to wait for Mito-san to come back. The image was strangely compelling, and, against her professional judgement, Mito hovered just within the inner room to let the little girl's cajoling of Killua continue a little longer.

Finally, at the girl's teary-eyed pleading, Killua opened the cage and hesitantly reached in to take the frightened kitten out, at which point Mito stepped in, even when she noticed the animal visibly relax in the heir's hands.

Minutes later, as she tended to the kitten's wounds, she enlisted Killua's help to calm their patient as she worked.

"So...you have a younger sibling?" she said, out of the blue, her hand moving deftly to trim the fur surrounding the kitten's injuries.

Killua looked surprised and he averted his eyes. "Yes," he said, hesitantly. "Two."

"A brother or a sister?"

"A brother and a sister. But...I'm...closer with my little sister."

"I see. I think I may have read about her – "

"You haven't," Killua cut in, coldly. The kitten hissed weakly, reacting to his outburst, and he forced himself to relax. "My sister is not – she's not – allowed..." He trailed off, unable to choose the right words. "Alluka isn't...the most favored offspring... Mother would die before any news of her leaks out."

Mito's brows knitted together slightly. "Black sheep?"

Killua shrugged. "Not exactly. She...has a condition..." He paused. "She's not always...the same."

Mito looked at him for a moment before she resumed dabbing a cloth soaked in iodine gently around the kitten's wound. "You mean like...schizophrenia?" she asked, cautiously, gently.

Killua didn't answer, but Mito could tell that the heir's thoughts had become stormy as the kitten began to purr and shift uneasily under his gaze. She imagined that the taboos surrounding psychological instability remained strong in certain circles, especially amongst the rich and powerful, who took pride in the quality of their stock and purity of bloodline.

"I envy her sometimes," Killua whispered, vaguely. "To be who I am and yet not. To understand so little and to remain...innocent...even as I..." He shook his head, cutting himself off. "Gomen... I didn't mean to say too much."

Mito decided not to comment, sensing that the apology meant the information she had been given was delicate enough to warrant the Zoldycks' unwanted attention, and she continued working in silence for some moments. "Won't she be missing you about now?"

The sadness that had cast a shadow in Killua's ice blue eyes seemed to deepen. "Possibly," he said, quietly, guiltily. "I'm sorry."

"Well," Mito said, brightly, without a trace of condescension. "You should bring Alluka here sometime to meet us, ne?"

Killua blinked, surprised, and the kitten purred what sounded almost like an expression of relief. "I...I'd like that –"

"Tadaima!"

Gon entered the shop with a tinkling of the chimes. He started upon seeing the Zoldyck heir tending to a kitten with his guardian, and his face broke into a wide grin. "Killua! Did you save that cat? It looks like you!"

"Baka," Killua said, automatically. Although, true enough, the kitten did look a lot like the silver-haired heir – white-furred, blue-eyed, and tousle-haired.

And wounded but healing, Gon added, in his thoughts, though he would never say it out loud. "It's true!"

"Killua," Mito said, meaningfully, "is about to get paid overtime for doing your work. Come over here and finish this while I prepare for school. Dinner's already on the table. You can close up by seven. Killua-kun, arigato." Fondly, she planted a swift kiss on his forehead – leaving him frozen in shock – then Gon's, before she retreated into the house to fetch her things.

Gon laughed at the expression on the heir's face. "I take it that's your first kiss?" he said, teasingly.

Killua blushed. "What took you so long?" he retorted, sounding almost petulant. "You owe me Choco Robots."

Gon grinned. "I knew you'd say that. Already covered."

"Eh?"

Killua watched as Gon fished into the inner pocket of his school coat, producing, from therein, a small bag full of chocolate robots, the smaller variety. He dropped it into Killua's hands, beaming proudly. "You bought out the school stock again so I had to get these from a candy shop on the way here. Ah – " He fished into his back pocket and pulled out three more lollipops " – I got these too. They don't have nicotine, but they could help the cravings. You've...quit, right?" He pushed the candies into the heir's shock-slackened fingers. "Arigato, Killua, for covering for me."

Killua floundered for something to say in return, but Gon had already snapped on his surgical gloves to resume work on the wounded cat.

And as the silver-haired Zoldyck heir watched the humble working student finish cleaning and dressing the kitten's wounds, he did his best not to recognize himself, just as Gon had said, in the quiet peace that soon took over the small animal's body, as it found relief in the steadiness of Gon's hands and fell asleep in the warmth of the quiet clinic.

Iie...

Arigato, Gon.

- x -

Kurapika watched the uncanny combination of the two boys from the window of the school infirmary – one the heir of an almost mythical empire and the other a free spirit without a clear history. He studied them, Killua holding his skateboard calmly to his side rather than riding it recklessly through the school grounds and Gon looking at the heir with abandoned joy, fearless and uninhibited. It was remarkable, how well the two took to each other, especially after the ridiculous conditions of their first encounter.

Kurapika dropped the white curtains and sat on the seat opposite Leorio's across the table. He enjoyed coming to the infirmary for various reasons, the foremost being that it gave him time away from Neon, who hated hospitals and clinics. Other than that though, the school doctor was immensely enjoyable company, and his perspectives were a refreshing change from the drab superficiality of everyone else in school.

Leorio had been born to a poor family and thus had needed to work harder than anyone else to work through school and finish medicine. The resultant familiarity with struggle and pain gave the doctor a deep sense of compassion and empathy, a greater valuation for others outside himself than anyone in the school who have never had to work for anything at all. Leorio's socio-economic standing was also likely what fueled his resilience to stay on at Nostrade High School, in spite of the frustrating elitism of his current clientele.

"That's quite a sight, isn't it?" Leorio said, his eyes locked to a remaining gap between the curtains where the two boys were still visible through the glass. "That Gon Freecss is really something else."

"Yeah," Kurapika said. "I was surprised myself. There's no scaring that boy." He broke into a small smile that looked almost fond. "What an idiot."

Leorio grinned back at Kurapika. "You've been hard on him," he said. "You didn't have to be."

Kurapika's deep blue eyes looked murky as he lowered his head. "I was trying to protect him," he said.

"From whom? Killua?"

"Iie. Everyone else." Kurapika sighed. "This school is rotten to the core, Leorio. You know that. You've seen how sick it is, literally."

Leorio pursed his lips and nodded. It was easy to gauge the psychological scape of his clientele based on the unique problems the students brought to his office. Where other school doctors nursed scrapes and fractures from games, he had to deal with bruises from fraternity wars spurned by family feuds, cut wrists from suicide attempts because of parental pressures, once even a suspicious case of food poisoning that happened to only one person, but the cafeteria concessionaire was fired anyway, replaced within a day, and that was that.

Still, none of that explained why Gon needed protection.

"Gon Freecss lives with his aunt in a small house bought on a government loan," Kurapika said. "They're getting by on their earnings from a little vet clinic attached to their house. The aunt has yet to get a license until she finishes her studies on vet med, so they don't charge much and stick mainly with more basic cases like wounds, sprains, fractures. Sometimes, they rent out a room in the house for extra cash – the one that used to belong to his grandmother, who had passed on the other year. He has no father, no mother, no brothers or sisters, but he pretty much loves everything that he has left...although there's not much to speak of."

Leorio gaped at Kurapika, wide-eyed, the shock on his face vivid through his small, round glasses. Up to this point, everyone still pretty much assumed that Gon was the son of a nouveau riche businessman trying to climb the social ladder. It was the most logical and realistic assumption, because, honestly, to imagine someone of humble ranks in Nostrade High was absolutely absurd. The very fabric for the school uniform, a specifically engineered and patented cotton, was already several thousand jennies a yard!

When Leorio spoke, his words sounded strangled. "What's a kid like that doing in this school? Does anyone else know about this?" They'll devour him within seconds if they know.

Kurapika shook his head, calming Leorio's blood pressure a fraction. "I don't think anyone has really bothered to know," he said. "Gon's been pretty harmless until now. But..." His eyes strayed to the curtained window.

Leorio again looked through the gap between the curtains, where he could see Killua telling off someone who had approached the two with a signature campaign (probably the son of a politician with an advocacy). Gon appeared to be trying to calm him down. Leorio felt his stomach churn as the realization dawned on him slowly.

"The Zoldycks will be on to this soon."

The words did not sound as if they came from his own throat.

Kurapika nodded, solemnly.

Leorio closed the gap between the curtains with a frustrated huff. His fingers rested on his temples and he felt the veins beneath the skin begin to throb. "Fuck, I don't want to deal with that again."

Kurapika looked at him, piercing amber eyes unwavering. "So the stories are true?" he asked, quietly.

"I wouldn't race anyone to say yes."

Leorio recalled the series of news, several years ago, about a police general who suddenly fell from grace. First he lost his position, then his holdings, then his properties, and, finally, his family, in a series of accidents and suicides that everyone found fishy, but no one could draw any evidence that they were linked events. The police dismissed it as an unfortunate genetic psychological weakness that made the family incapable of putting up with their patriarch's fall from power.

The daughter of the general had been enrolled in the school, a feisty girl who was obsessed with investigating the secrets of the rich and powerful by studying the lives of her classmates under the protection of her father's name. She got a kick out of earning cash by feeding information on rival families to tabloids and magazines. One of the Zoldyck sons was enrolled at that time, and when the media tried to get her on the trail of the legendary family, everyone in school rapidly turned on her and the most powerful families bore down on her father. The son was pulled out of school, her father's covert drug ring was exposed, and the series of deaths commenced.

After the controversies, the general's daughter slashed her wrists while her neck was tied to the ceiling fan in one of the Nostrade High classrooms. Her neck snapped as she came down collapsing from the blood loss. The building where it happened was promptly razed down and a pretty greenhouse built over it. The media was silent on everything, turning the wipeout of the general's family into an example of bad business practice and a cautionary tale against drugs.

Leorio imagined that an accident concerning an orphan and his aunt in a small clinic full of rabid animals would not even make the late night news.

"But Gon doesn't seem the type to trigger so much intrigue..." Leorio said. "Perhaps they wouldn't..."

Kurapika went to the window and pulled the curtains open again. "That kid is gold," he said, his words softened by worry. "It's true he has nothing but good intentions, but – eh?"

The sudden alarm in Kurapika's voice did not escape Leorio. "What? What's wrong?" he asked. "Kurapika?" Leorio felt his heart begin to pound uneasily. He rushed to the window beside the blond teen, jerking his own side of the curtain open. "Is there something..."

He wasn't even able to finish his sentence. Kurapika rushed out of the room, speeding for the rapidly thickening crowd that had suddenly formed in the space where the two boys were.

- x -

It had been a long time since Killua felt fear. The sudden surge of it in his chest after days of abandoned joy with Gon only made the emotion run more coldly in his blood.

Vaguely, he could hear the whispers begin to accumulate around him as the crowd thickened:

He's back. Is it really him? It can't be...

Gon, too, was speaking beside him, but Killua couldn't make out any of the words through the pounding of his heartbeat. His brain reeled in an uncontrollable frenzy, unable to latch onto anything solid. All he could see were the wide, black eyes in front of him, an abyss into which all of his senses seemed to drain and diffuse into nothing.

"A – aniki..." The words sounded like they were ripped out of his throat. "Wh – why are you here?"

Illumi Zoldyck regarded his younger brother with blank, unrecognizing eyes, depthless black orbs set on a pale face and framed by a flood of black hair that spilled down his back from a loosely tied ponytail. "That's no way to welcome your brother, Kil," he said, in an eerily flat monotone. "I thought you would be at the airport when I land." He paused and placed a finger to his chin, in a questioning gesture that nobody could understand because nothing on his face changed at all. "Oh. That's right," he intoned. "You've run away."

Killua's fists tightened. "Did mother send you?"

"Iie." Illumi closed the gap between them and Killua took an involuntary step backward. Everything inside him wanted to grab Gon by the hand and drag them both to the safety of the rooftop sanctuary. But his gut protested, arguing the sad, inevitable truth that, so long as he was in the blasted school, there would be no sanctuary from his family.

"Oi! Who are you?"

Gon's voice shattered the rapidly contracting shell of Killua's mind. The boy had managed to place himself firmly between Killua and Illumi, using his shoulder to protectively cover the silver-haired heir and force Illumi's attention to himself.

Illumi blinked. "Gon Freecss."

Gon's scowl deepened. "Yeah, what about it?"

Illumi blinked again. "So, you're the one who has taken Kil from us."

"Taken? I wasn't the one who – "

"Aniki..." Killua's whisper, a thin shard of ice that threatened vaguely to crack, broke through Gon's defense, startling him into looking at the heir and his suddenly, awfully empty eyes. Killua lowered his head and shoved his hands deep into his pocket, in the same way that he had all those weeks ago when Gon barely knew him.

"Killua..." Gon's whisper was tight, audible only to the heir, defying refusal. "Don't go."

Killua seemed to pause, and for a moment, Gon readied his body to run somewhere, anywhere with the heir, to the rooftop or the woods where, only the day before, Killua had looked up silently into the night sky, the stars reflected in his clear eyes, and dreamed, as all boys should, of a life he could live by his own choices.

Then, with a disturbing decisiveness, Killa stepped toward Illumi, moving past Gon without another word.

"Killua!"

Halfway toward his older brother, Killua turned and offered Gon a smile that somehow, against all odds, managed to be real. "Daijobu, Gon," he said. "I'll see you tonight."

And Gon knew, as he watched Killua turn his back and Illumi's hand close possessively on his brother's shoulder, that he wouldn't.

- tbc -

A/N: Okay, so some of you may have expected that. What. I love that Zoldyck standoff at the end of the Hunter exam. Don't worry though, I won't turn it into a total rip-off the Zoldyck Family Arc and have Gon chase Killua into Kukuroo Mountain (or should I...). In any case, I'm actually rarin' to write a scene I already have in mind after this unfortunate incident, so I hope you guys stick around for it. Also, I'm making no promises about giving Alluka a bigger role here, though you never know…

I'd love your ideas now more than ever as to how this will progress. Let me know if you have stuff you think the story could use more of.

Til next time!