29. The Hidden Revealed

He hated being in a room with only one door. This was a serious limitation to one's options for escape; and that, in Illumi's opinion, negated any advantage gained by the smaller area that required defending. So he was very leery of her choice of refuge. He supposed he should have expected it though. He had seen how comfortable she had looked, sprawled on the rug by the desk. She had probably spent many hours as a child like that with her father, and she felt safe there. Even the memory of a father had that kind of power, Illumi knew.

His opinion changed when they entered though; there was his target in his sights, a brace of pins could end this now. But no sooner had he shut the door than something pushed against it, hard. If he removed his hands, and his Nen from it, it would be blown in. The force on the other side was increasing, but slowly, steadily. Illumi's anger began to burn. His adversary knew Illumi was there and he was testing him, seeing just how hard he could push, and how long Illumi could hold out--toying with him. Illumi redoubled his efforts, he was one with this door, and it was not going to move. And hopefully, Lucia would find a letter opener on the desk and dispatch her father, although, just like everything else he had wanted since this foolish job began, he knew that was too much to ask.

The end was coming. He could feel it. The near limitless power on the other side continued unabated, but Illumi felt his own energy burning through like an accelerant. Soon nothing would remain. He would have to release the door early, draw, turn, and throw his pins at the Minister, before his opponent could stop him. It wasn't a good plan, but it might work. At least he knew he was a little faster than the opposition. Pulling his left hand from the door, he shoved it under Petersen's jacket, grabbing a handful of pins from his vest beneath, even as he was pivoting on his right foot to face VerHoffen. But it was the wrong VerHoffen. Standing directly in his line of fire, Lucia, eyes wide and questioning. And that was all he saw before he was backhanded across the room, head connecting hard with the dark wood paneling, and the world, winking out.

It was the strangest thing. Karl turned to look at her, with his hand raised, as if to wave goodbye, and then the door almost flew in. Lucia's eyes having adjusted to the dark of the study, the light from the hall outside the room made it difficult to see to whom that large silhouette belonged, but she could hazard a guess, Illumi's father, Silva. Faster than she could see, he sent Karl slamming against the wall. Then Karl's head began to undulate, swell, and stretch, and…suddenly it wasn't Karl. It was Illumi. Of course it was Illumi! Who else but he could have saved her thus far, always interposing himself between herself and danger? He hadn't abandoned her; he had been with her all this time!

She hoped he was all right. She wanted to run to him and check to see, but it looked like his father was already doing that. Afterward, he picked up Illumi's left arm and did something. Lucia couldn't see what. But she could see Silva turn around then and begin to walk toward her.

When Lucia had been a little girl, around nine or ten, her father had insisted she learn the basics of Nen. He had stressed that it was a very important power, and that everybody should at least be able to recognize it in themselves and others. He himself did not know how to use it, and had felt that a great shortcoming of his. So she had dutifully studied with a tutor for a couple of years, practicing the basics and finding it very boring, like the martial arts boys played at. But when she had done a little experimenting on her own, she found that if she concentrated very hard, she could use it to do something that was a lot of fun, at least to her, an only child with very few playmates. Even after she no longer studied with the tutor, she had continued to practice this, and now years later, she was still pretty good at it. It was useless of course, no fighting potential at all, though you could sometimes distract or startle someone with it, but with all this power being thrown about, if she was to die from this arcane art, she wanted to at least do the one thing she could do with it. And so she raised her left hand.