A/N: Finally! This is the sequel to A Series of Bizarre and Mildly Humourous Events! I apologize for taking so long to come out with it. In my defense, the story developed sentience and tried to kill me. Anyway, I hope you enjoy this story, and do remember to leave a review at the end! I'm trying to update the story one chapter a week, hopefully during the weekends when people have time to read it.

Hunter X Hunter does not belong to me. I do not own the copyright to any of these materials. This is a fanfiction written solely for the purposes of entertainment, and the views stated by the characters do not necessarily reflect the views of the author. If you wish to host this story on a site outside of fanfiction (dot) net, please contact the author for permission first.

Ruining the Fort

The room was a sterile white, brightly lit by glaring fluorescent lights. The odour of formaldehyde and strong antiseptics permeated the room, sinking into fabric and skin alike. In the centre of the room, on top of a metal gurney lay a body, dyed a disturbing bluish white by the harsh overhead lights focused on it. A group of scientists, dressed in yellow-stained white leaned over it. One in particular, an old man with wispy white hair, held out a hand.

"Scalpel," he demanded, his voice muffled by the mask he was wearing. One of the other faceless scientists handed a scalpel over and the old man leaned back over the body, his face close to the torso, which had been opened up to reveal the internal organs. It was impossible to see the old man's face, covered as it was, but his body language was relaxed; he obviously had no trouble with his close proximity to dead flesh.

If Moonshine hadn't been a similarly hard-hearted bastard, he would have lost his lunch a long time ago.

Leaning against the back of the room, Moonshine watched the scientists go about their wet work with a deep frown. Earlier, some of them had tried to chase him out, but a scowl and a threat to blow the body to pieces had been enough to chase them away. He didn't know why he had done that. It was not like he particularly wanted to see the innards of Midoya Kito. Yet here he was, watching with narrowed eyes as the scientists cheerfully opened up her body and prodded at all the squishy bits inside.

Perhaps he was sorry he hadn't gotten a chance to fight her. By the time he heard that she was coming to the Fort, she had already been fighting the Zodiac, the whole bunch of them tearing up and down the entire mountainside as she led them on a merry dance through the dense forests. Moonshine had been incapable of doing anything but watch from a distance as the fight ended when Gell's snakes lashed out and through Kito's body. Then Pariston had been there, straddling the writhing woman before slipping a knife through her ribs, just as Moonshine had always wanted to – and it was over.

But it wasn't that. Not really. He was pissed off that he hadn't had a chance to take a crack at that woman, but after watching her fight… damn if he hadn't already known he would lose. It was not that she was so overwhelmingly powerful that she could hold off all twelve Zodiacs. It was nothing like that, far from that in fact; as powerful as Midoya was, the Zodiacs as a group were infinitely more powerful. It was how she had recognised that she couldn't take on more than one or two Zodiacs at one time, and had chosen to fight a guerrilla war instead. Rather than fighting head-on, powering through the Zodiac with her ridiculous Nen, she had ran, forcing the Zodiac members to disperse as they scrambled after her. She had struck back only when there was a chance, actually managing to injure several of the Zodiacs as she danced through the forests, hiding and creeping, running and leaping. Moonshine was pretty darn certain she would have gotten away too if there hadn't been another factor.

Her disciple.

Timbal hadn't been stupid. When she told him to run, he had run, never even looking back to check on his sensei. But as fast as he was, the boy was still a greenhorn in many ways, and he just hadn't been fucking fast enough. Ging had caught the boy, crushing him to the earth with his Nen. The boy had tried to fight back, but there was no way he could have defeated Ging Freecs of all people, even if the man was only trying to restrain him, not kill him.

So Midoya had abandoned her hiding place, moved out into the open even though all the Zodiacs were near the boy and ready for her. She hadn't wasted effort protecting herself. She had gone right for Ging, hitting him so hard the man actually flew a good ten feet away. Then she had picked her disciple up and flung him as far as she could, shouting at him to run. The boy had literally flew down the mountainside and Midoya had turned back to face the Zodiac – but it was too late. The Zodiacs were good people most of the time, but they weren't above ignoring an exposed back during a fight.

Swords, spears, Nen-blades – all manners of sharp weapons had gone through her body, and Kito's pale skin had turned a horrifyingly beautiful red. Even so, Kito had fought back, turning into a strange white mist before reappearing elsewhere. But the wounds eventually took their toll. She bled out, lost enough blood that she slowed. It only took one mistake, one moment of dizziness, one fucking distraction and that was it for her. Once that happened, it had been over and now…

Moonshine glared at the scientists surrounding the table. It wasn't fucking fair. Okay, Moonshine knew that in a fight, all was equal. Only thing that mattered was who won, screw the method used. But… that fight… there was something about it that just rubbed him wrong. It had been twelve people against one, for one. And, if rumours be trusted, Kito had been lured here with promises of safety (god knew why the fuck she actually believed any of that).

And that was the problem, wasn't it? Moonshine always believed whoever hit the hardest laughed the hardest. This fight hadn't been about strength though. It had been about lies and trickery and ganging up on the underdog. It hadn't been a fight at all. It had been a bunch of bullies ganging up on an isolated person. And… oh, fucking bastard shit fuck goddamn it, that was the fucking problem: it kept making Moonshine remember stuff from school… from those fucking frat boys and their fucking tendency to move in fucking packs and…

Moonshine growled and the scientists nearest to him glanced at him warily before looking away quickly when he glared. What right did these scientists have to Kito's body anyway? They hadn't hunted her down with their own strength. They had waited till the Zodiacs had brought her down before hovering around her still body and chopping into her with their puny little knives and… What the fuck was wrong with him? Hadn't he been waiting for her downfall for a long time?

Yes. Yes, but not like this. Not hunted down like a wild animal. Not fleeing the person who had betrayed her trust. Not laid out under a spotlight and chopped up like a piece of meat. Because fuck it if Moonshine would admit it now, but even if he believed in strength, in power, in brutal pre-emptive action against the enemy… he fucking hated bullies and the Zodiacs, these scientists, these fucking hunters were all fucking bullies.

Slowly, as if in a dream, Moonshine pushed himself off the wall and regarded the scientists with a wild, intense glare. He watched their greedy expressions as they sifted through the meat on the table. Oh yeah, they were bullies alright, and Kito, for all her bitchiness and downright… bloody irritating-ness, wasn't. If anything, she always got what she wanted through her own damn strength. If she had more of that than others, it wasn't her goddamn fault either.

Moonshine took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. Now he knew what the fuck was making him so pissed. Now he knew what the fuck he should do.

It was Quincy's head who snapped up to look at him first, but one by one, the other scientists turned away from the body to stare at him too.

Moonie grinned a feral, wild grin. "Okay, doctors, who wants to be the first to join Kito on the platter?"

And hey, what do you know? They couldn't run fast enough either.

The neck between his hands made a satisfying crack and the body slumped to the dirt beneath his feet. Phinx grinned and flexed his fingers, looking around at the dead corpses littering the ground. Luxuriously, he stretched, smile widening with pleasure as he felt his muscles flex. "Damn, I know I shouldn't be saying this, but there's nothing like a good vengeance mission, you know? It's practically the only time Dancho lets us go full out and kill every living creature we come across."

A cold voice snorted in reply. "I dare you to try saying that in front of Dancho," Feitan said, strolling up to stand next to him, casually flicking blood off his katana. "Dancho will have your hide for making light of Kito's death. Not that I care what happens to Kito and her disciple."

Phinx snorted back. "No one would dare say something like that in front of Dancho," he said. "But I'm surprised you didn't agree with me about how fucking awesome killing everything here is. Hell, you barely kept up with me when I was killing those buggers. Ah, I knew we shouldn't have let you torture that mayor so much. You vented too much of your bloodlust there, man."

"Phinx, I assure you I have plenty of bloodlust left," Feitan said coldly, but his eyes were alight with humour. "Torturing a fat pig like that could hardly satisfy me. His innards yielded too easily to my blade. I prefer prey that fights back; they always last the longest… and scream the loudest."

"Yeah, well," Phinx looked around at the forests they were in. "We'll have plenty of prey for you to mess around with here."

Shortly after leaving the tunnel, Dancho had gathered them around and given them orders. Phinx, Feitan, Shalnark and Nobunaga were to sweep the outside of the Fort, the mountain sides of Hun-ein, eliminating any Hunters they found. Then, while Phinx and Feitan stood guard on the outside, they were to enter the Fort itself, which was situated inside Hun-ein, and join Kuroro and Machi in cleaning up the rest of the Hunters. At the moment, Phinx and Feitan were sweeping the west-side of the mountain, while Shalnark and Nobunaga had went to the east-side. They had already cleared the south-side, and were supposed to make their way towards the north-side where the entrance to the Fort was. As it was, with how weak the hunters were, the work was boring, barely enough to warm them up.

"Prey," Feitan sneered in response to Phinx's earlier comment. "This trash hardly proved much of a challenge for us. The Hunter Association might as well just hang out bags of sand for us to slash at for all the good these so-called 'guards' do. I swear, even the mafia put up a much better show than these hunters. I really don't see how valued a Hunter License can be if the people holding them are so weak."

"Heh, I bet you the really powerful Hunters want nothing to do with the association. They're probably like Kito or Shalnark, looking for funsies elsewhere."

"And they all gravitated towards the Ryodan." Feitan eyed Phinx's broad back as they continued their track towards the north. "I'm starting to agree with Machi."

"Huh?" Phinx asked. "Agree with what?"

"Her opinion that Dancho wanted Kito to join the Ryodan. Don't you remember? Nobu thinks Dancho actually loves her. Machi thought Dancho wanted her to join the Ryodan. We thought he was just making use of her. I think now that Machi is right. Dancho obviously likes Kito more than he would any old mark. But Dancho isn't weak enough to fall in love. He wants her to join the Ryodan – wanted her to join the Ryodan."

"Huh. Makes sense. Dancho's got some balls, I must say." Almost casually, Phinx grabbed a man hiding in the trees and crushed his skull. "Not like I know Kito that well, but she strikes me as the kind of person that isn't easily tamed. I mean, those rumours that she took Dancho's balls? People believed it because everyone knows Kito is totally up to doing something like that. She's a fucking beast, man."

"All of us are, Phinx. Dancho has had plenty of experience dealing with people like that." Feitan's arms flashed gracefully and another hunter tumbled dead to the ground.

"True." Phinx sighed as Feitan's sword flashed again and took the hunter Phinx had been eyeing for some time now. "Damn if you're right, Feitan. These buggers are so fucking worthless. If I didn't like the feel of breaking their necks so much, I might just walk off the mountain and be done with it."

"I told you," Feitan replied bluntly. "Dancho was right to say we could take the entire Fort with just the six of us, seven if we can actually locate Timbal. This entire Fort is a joke."

And of course, it was at that exact moment that the entire mountainside erupted in flames.

The sound of the explosion was loud enough to rock the ground they were standing on. Roaring, it thundered through them, shaking trees and bushes until dead leaves fell to the ground like a swarm of dying insects. Nobunaga flicked blood and guts off his sword and turned to watch as an entire pillar of fire lit up the sky.

"That's where Phinx and Feitan are," Shalnark said from behind him.

"They'll be fine," Nobunaga replied brusquely.

"I know. I'm more worried about what that explosion indicated: the nature of the booby traps on our side," Shalnark replied, dodging a hunter then breaking the hunter's nose. "Ooh, close."

"You're just slow," Nobunaga grumbled. "Damn, I wish I could have gone with Dancho into the Fort first. I fucking hate trees." He glared accusingly at the foliage around them as if he could set them on fire too.

"Can't be helped," Shalnark said with a shrug. "Dancho probably figured Machi's threads would work better in the cramped conditions inside than your sword."

"I know that," Nobunaga complained. "I just… Argh, damn it, will you idiots go away?" Scowling, he swept his katana in a wide arc, slicing several hunters into half.

"It's no use telling them to go away, Nobu. We're supposed to kill them anyway. If they run away, we'll have to go after them, which will be a lot more…"

"I get it! I get it!" Nobunaga shouted. "I'm not an idiot, damn it!" Howling with rage, he leapt into a crowd of hunters, katana swinging back and forth.

Following behind at a more subdued pace, Shalnark frowned at Nobunaga. "What are you so upset about?" he asked.

"This whole fucking mission," Nobunaga grumbled, stomping obliviously on a corpse which squished under his foot. "Damn. I mean. Damn. Dancho's finally got a girlfriend and she ends up dead. Damn."

"What's so bad about that? I mean, okay, death is not that great a thing I guess, but Kito is a Hunter, she knew the risks. And Dancho knew the kind of life Kito led. It's not like he didn't figure she might get killed one day."

"That's not the point!" Nobunaga shouted stubbornly. "Damn it! She shouldn't have died! I bet you anything they used some fucking underhanded manner to fucking kill her!"

"Oh god, you're going back into your 'Ubo phrase'."

"What the fuck do you mean?"

"You know… after Ubo died, you want insane trying to kill everyone who so much as had anything to do with his death? And you were so stubborn about it. No one could dissuade you from doing it."

"And what's wrong with that? Ubo was my friend!"

"I know, it's just the way you were…"

"What fucking way, nerd?"

"The one where you…" Shalnark stopped and raised a finger to quieten Nobunaga's heated comment. "Hear that?"

Still scowling, Nobunaga frowned in concentration. There was a… rumbling sound and… was that…

"Hooves?" Nobunaga asked hesitantly.

Then without warning, from deep within the forest, a knight in full medieval armour, glowing red hot, exploded into the open.

After having been deprived of his Nen for so long, Kuroro would have thought that being able to use Nen again in a deadly fight would have been a great joy for him. And it was in a way, he mused, as he strode down the corridor, Benz knife flickering left and right, neatly slitting the throats of hunters as he passed them. It was extremely delightful to be able to march into battle with the knowledge that he could probably hold his own against most of the fighters here. That he was no longer reliant on anyone to defend him was also a big boost for his ego too. It was just unsatisfying somehow. Perhaps it was because the hunters here were so weak he hardly had to use any Nen at all. Or perhaps…

"I would have liked to see how well Midoya and I work together when we're both in full fighting form," he said wistfully as he decapitated a hunter. "If there's one thing we've never really done together before; it's fight together against others with Nen. I imagine it would have been quite a sight to see. Midoya is a fantastic, beautiful fighter. You will never guess how graceful she can be with the way she looks. Ah, but you know that already, Machi. You have seen her fight Ubo, Nobu and Shizuku."

"Um. Yeah," Machi said awkwardly from somewhere ahead of him, where she had been strangling a group of hunters.

"I asked her to join the Ryodan, you know? She didn't give a reply straightaway though. I respect her for that; not many people understand how big a commitment it is, joining the Ryodan."

"Hah! I knew it," Machi muttered.

"Still, I don't suppose she would have enjoyed the fight now. These hunters are so infinitely weak it's rather a shame wasting our talents on killing them. Still, a promise is a promise, and I would like to see Midoya's last wish come true. I appreciate the help you have provided, Machi. It is very nice of you to assist me in my vengeance even though Midoya is not technically Ryodan and is thus, not really your business."

"Uh. Well… she helped you the last time, I guess, so it's fine us taking revenge for her."

"Oh yes, she did help me. I am still very grateful for the ability to use my Nen again. Look, I can just teleport this hunter here… and… presto, he's dead. Ah, it is a pleasure to be able to use my Nen again. She, that is, Midoya took me alligator hunting, did I ever mention that?"

"Um, no? You went alligator hunting? I thought you liked alligators."

"Well, she did and I do. She took me to the Lori Swamps. I killed a rather hefty alligator. It tried to eat me when I petted it, you see, which was incredibly rude of it. I, in turn, almost got eaten by a Juwasi. It means 'looks like granddad's bottom' and it did too. And we killed a giant spider with fireworks. I think doing that quite cured me of my fear of spiders. Nowadays, I can look at my tattoo without wanting to rip my own skin off."

"Uh huh…" Machi muttered, giving him a look which told Kuroro that he was exposing a little too much of his heavily disturbed psyche for her to handle. So he smiled apologetically and concentrated on killing the hunters running at him.

During a brief pause, Kuroro whipped out a clicker and counted out the number of people they had killed so far. "Thirty exactly," he told Machi. "That would hardly be enough to line one end of a typical Meteor City funeral pyre."

"Yeah. We need quite a bit more, especially in this case."

"Yes, treachery is the worst of all crimes, which means we need a bigger pyre." The hunter Kuroro had been advancing on turned and fled, and Kuroro put a throwing knife through the back of his head.

"Uh huh. Say, Dancho?"

"Yes Machi?"

"When you mentioned those Juwasi things…"

"Yes?"

"Did they kind of look like a giant beetle with the head of a rat and the arms and legs of a human?"

"Some of them probably did, not that I noticed. Why do you ask?"

"Because there's one hiding in the ventilation shaft above us."

Kuroro's head snapped up so hard he heard something click in his neck. Ignoring the hunters that were fleeing before him, he scanned the shaft above them carefully. Directly above them was the opening to a ventilation shaft. Peering down at them was the head of a gigantic rat, attached to some kind of insect-like body. Human hands, almost grotesquely slender and pale gripped the grilles of the opening - and shoved.

They barely managed to get out of the way as the bizarre creature scuttled through the opening like a giant cockroach, human hands sticking to the walls easily. More followed. Creatures that looked like someone had taken Noah's Ark, threw it into a blender and then got a deranged child to stick everything back together with glue. And right after that, Doctor Frankenstein sent a nice jolt of electricity through them, brought them to life, and taught each and every one of them how to use Nen.

"Curious that they are here given that the Hunter Association was the one who ordered the extermination of the species," Kuroro noted nonchalantly as the ants started to surround them.

"Dancho," Machi said, her eyes glowing with Gyo. "Is it just me or do those things know Nen?"

"They know Nen," Kuroro said, calmly summoning his book. "They are also very fast, very strong and appallingly good at throwing their bodily fluids at others."

"And there are ten of them."

"And there are ten of them. Yes, I noticed." Kuroro smiled faintly. "Given the odds against us, I think it shouldn't take us more than five minutes to finish them off."

Machi snorted. "Five minutes? If it takes us that long, Ubo and Paku will laugh at us from their graves."

"Very true," Kuroro acknowledged then summoned a katana, slightly slimmer than a standard one, which glowed green. Casually, he raised it and pointed it at the nearest creature. "Come," he said to it. "I have more important prey to hunt and you are in my way."

Quite obligingly, the creature (a strange mixture of a collie, an elephant and a dolphin) launched itself at him. Kuroro showed his appreciation for its enthusiasm by lopping its head off.

Nearby, Machi was weaving through the creatures, seemingly just dodging the attacks coming her way instead of engaging her opponents. That was until she reached the other side of the creature where she held up a hand, glowing with Nen threads that were wrapped around various limbs and appendages. The creatures made strange squawking sounds as a powerful tug from Machi dragged some of them to the ground. Swiftly, Kuroro moved in, katana flickering back and forth as he struck the creatures. Immediately, the rot set in, and the creatures started to decay rapidly, howling horrible as they did.

"Less than a minute," Machi snorted derisively. "You made them sound more impressive than they really are."

"Or we are more powerful than I ever imagined," Kuroro countered. "Which would be useful," he added, nodding towards one end of the corridor, "since there are more of them."

"Huh," Machi commented as she turned to face the corridor, now practically teaming with the creatures. "That's a lot of them."

"Thirty or so."

"Alright," Machi said grudgingly, as both she and Kuroro slid into fighting positions. "We can take five minutes this time, and if Ubo or Paku have anything to say to that, fuck them."

As the horse, bearing a knight in full medieval armour, crashed towards them, Shalnark and Nobunaga flung themselves to the side, barely missing being hit by red-hot horse shoes. The horse tossed its head, neighed loudly, and turned around to meet them. Nobunaga immediately put one hand protectively around a very vulnerable area of his anatomy, having had extremely bad experiences with horses before.

"Hieee," the rider said comfortingly and the horse stomped on the spot instead of kicking Nobunaga in a very precious area. "Sorry about that," the rider added to them.

"No problem," Shalnark said, climbing cautiously to his feet.

"Not much of a problem," Nobunaga growled, still gripping his katana. The only reason why his katana hadn't greeted the newcomer's head yet was simply because Phinx and Feitan were perched, quite precariously, on the back of the horse. What with how big the rider was in the first place, there wasn't much space on the horse, and Phinx and Feitan had ended up squashed together more closely than either of them must be comfortable with. Nobunaga fought a smile that threatened to surface when he saw the slightly disgruntled looks on their faces. "What's up, Feitan, Phinx."

Feitan slid off the rump off the horse with a great deal more dignity than most people could have managed in the situation. "Not much," he said dismissively as Phinx landed on the ground next to him. "The mountain caught fire. We escaped. The rest of the hunters camped there probably did not."

"You got all of them," the knight confirmed, sliding off the horse too. Immediately, the horse and the armour vanished to reveal Kito's beefy disciple. "Hey," he greeted, sounding uncharacteristically subdued. There was mud and blood on his face, and he looked like he had spent the last ten hours crying. The Ryodan members promptly made it a point of not noticing how red his eyes were.

"You're not Reinforcement?" Nobunaga exclaimed instead, looking disappointed. "Damn, I thought for sure you were Reinforcement."

"No, I'm Materialization," Pepeka said with a look on his face which would have been 'puzzled' if it didn't look so half-hearted. "What's wrong with that?"

"Uh, nothing," Nobunaga mumbled, giving an almost-too-innocent-looking Shalnark a warning glare.

"Nice save though," Phinx said, giving the young man a clap on the back. "When the mountain exploded, Feitan and I jumped off a nearby cliff and landed right on top of his horse."

"It was actually an accident," Pepeka said with a tired shrug. "I was waiting for you guys to finish your fight before I came out. I didn't expect the mountain side to explode or for the two of you to jump onto me."

"Ah, you wouldn't have waited long then. Those hunters we encountered were really bad fighters."

"They were probably just part-time hunters; just weak losers. There're not that many true hunters actually." Pepeka looked around listlessly. "Where's Lucifer?" he asked.

"In the Fort," Shalnark replied. "We were supposed to meet Dancho in there once we cleaned up the trash outside."

Pepeka's forehead creased with confusion. "What's he doing in the Fort?" he asked, panic lifting his face. "I thought I told him to get away? The Zodiacs are hunting him!"

"He's avenging your sensei of course," Feitan said as if that should have been obvious. "How many have you guys got so far? We've got fifteen."

"Same," Shalnark agreed. "That makes thirty. Huh. I hope we find more along the way; thirty's hardly enough to line one side of a funeral pyre."

"Whoa," Pepeka said, holding up his hands which were torn and covered with dirt. "Whoa, whoa, whoa. Hold on a minute. Revenge? Funeral pyre?"

"Yeah," Nobunaga said slowly in deference to Timbal's obviously slow and distressed state of mind. "Kito was Dancho's woman, right? Well, that makes her part of Meteor City. She deserves a proper Meteor City burial. That includes the death of all who wronged her, which is the whole Hunter Association. Largely because we couldn't figure out who to put the blame on. Anyway, it is just as well since we want to make a huge pyre for Kito. We'll probably use the bodies to line the funeral pyre if we can find her corpse. If we can't, we'll still build a funeral pyre anyway, maybe use some of her belongings as a substitute for the body."

"We need a couple of bodies for the wicker man too."

"Oh right. I like them wicker men. If we can, we should use lives ones in those. It's always a sight to see once the flames go up. The kids back home will like it."

"Yeah, it's always a treat having a wicker man. Remember when we were kids and there this one time when…"

"Whoa!" Pepeka exclaimed desperately. "Hold on! Firstly, Sensei is not Lucifer's woman, okay? If she were here, she would take offense to being called that, and you don't want to see sensei take offense ever. Like, bad things happen. And even if she's not here, it's not nice to make dead people angry. She may come back to haunt you just for kicks, because that's the sensei I know. She's just his… erm… well… lover, I guess? Secondly, when the fuck did sensei become part of Meteor City? You mean it isn't enough she's part of the Mafia? Now, she has to be part of another group of fucking weird people?"

"Hey, don't compare Meteor City to the Mafia."

"Yeah, the Mafia has nothing on Meteor City when it comes to weirdness. 'Weird' is in our blood, okay?"

"Thirdly," Pepeka went on, deeply aggrieved. "Sensei left strict orders about how her funeral is going to be like, okay? She told me before. She wants us to make a party of her funeral. Like… she suggested a dance floor and some form of music band. She also suggested a stand-up comedian or possibly a re-enactment of Hamlet because she thinks that's the funniest play Shakespeare ever wrote."

"Huh."

"A music band, huh?"

"Perhaps it would fit between the wicker man and the funeral pyre."

Pepeka opened his mouth to protest then shut it with an unhappy sigh. "It's not like I can fault you guys for wanting to give sensei a proper farewell," he said miserably.

Nobunaga glanced at the sad face the young man was wearing and gave him a friendly pat. "Cheer up," he said, grinning. "We could make the burning of the human sacrifices a huge party. We'll invite all her friends and have plenty of beer or something. Or does Kito not drink beer because she wasn't born in shit and dirt? What's classier than beer?"

"Red beer?"

"That's called wine, Phinx."

"Yeah, anyway, we can have Kito's friends come over and drink wine. It'll be cool." Nobunaga grinned with pride at his own brilliant idea.

Pepeka shook his head mournfully. "I think sensei doesn't have a lot of friends actually, and most of sensei's friends are hunters."

"Ah, even better. They'll get the best seats in the wicker man."

Pepeka sighed again, looking exhausted. "I am so disturbed I can't even tell you how disturbed I am."

"Rubbish. This is nowhere near as disturbing as we can get. You should see Shalnark trying to pick up chicks. Now that's disturbing."

"What? Why is that disturbing?" Shalnark, who had been quiet so far, interrupted angrily.

"How is a pick-up line like 'Would you like to be the USB port to my thumb-drive" not disturbing?"

"It's not! It's just called being myself!"

"Which is downright fucking disturbing in its own right. This is why you're still a virgin."

"Nobu!"

Ignoring the bickering pair, Pepeka turned to the slightly saner-looking people. "So erm… what are we doing now?" he asked hesitantly.

Feitan gave him a look that told Pepeka exactly what Feitan thought of his intellectual level, his level of maturity and the size of his manhood. "Continue taking revenge for Kito, of course," Feitan told him. "Once we're done with those in the Fort, there're still all those hunters out there to kill."

"Are you serious? Why?"

"Because Dancho wants it of course."

"Only because Lucifer wants it?"

"Is there any other better reason?" Feitan eyed Pepeka's dubious look over his mask. "Okay, I'll give you a better reason. You saw Kito die. Do you remember?"

Pepeka's jaw clenched. "Of course. Her against the Zodiacs. Damn it." He sniffed like he was going to cry, but, much to Feitan's relief, didn't.

"Then you saw how that Pariston guy betrayed her and how they ganged up on her to kill her." Feitan smiled chillingly. "Now tell me you don't want revenge, Timbal."

Something ugly flashed in Pepeka's eyes and his face darkened. For a moment, Feitan caught a glimpse of a far more dangerous man than the inexperienced, annoyingly moralistic pushover they've become accustomed to. It hinted at the potential of this young man to grow into quite a fearsome hunter, if given the chance. "Revenge, huh?" Pepeka muttered.

"Yes. What do you say, rookie?"

"What do I say?" Pepeka looked around, scowling. "I say let's torch the fucking association to the ground."

…80… 81… 82… 83…

Kuroro came to a skidding halt as the last Juwasi fell, tumbling to his feet in a pile of rotting flesh. Stepping carefully around the rot and decay, Kuroro looked around for Machi and caught sight of her standing over her own pile of bodies, counting off on her own clicker. "How many?" he asked.

"Seventy-four," she said, looking pleased.

"Excellent," Kuroro said happily. He had no idea what the Juwasi were doing in the Fort, but he was extremely grateful for their presence. With them, there was a high enough body count to justify at least two wicker men. Midoya would be pleased, he thought, if she was into things like that. He had no idea really, and would never know now, thanks to the Zodiac. Glancing at his watch, he added, "The Ryodan on the outside should be done soon. My guess is that most of the hunters are actually in the building so it shouldn't take them too long to sweep the entire mountain."

"Yeah. Unless those idiots got killed by the explosion we heard."

"Ah, you are as humourous as ever, Machi."

"Thanks. I was trying to lighten the mood."

Nodding, Kuroro moved further down the corridor to where the single corridor they have been on so far split into two opposing directions. Cautiously, he glanced first to the left then to the right. As far as he could tell, both corridors looked identical: plain, white corridors with doors here and there. He pulled out his phone and looked at the map Pepeka had sent him. The left side led to the medical facilities and the right side led deeper into the Fort where the offices were.

"Left?" Machi asked from behind him.

"Your instincts are as sharp as ever," Kuroro said. "Left it is. Once we clean out the trash in that area, we can double back and go further into the Fort."

"Sounds good."

Satisfied, Kuroro turned left and started the long walk towards the medical facilities. Along the way, he glanced into various doors curiously. Most of the rooms he checked out looked like science laboratories, with beakers bubbling on metal tables and strange animal parts in containers. It seemed that the people in the Fort were very interested in scientific research. It would account for the presence of the Juwasi. Those creatures were so strange even Kuroro had been interested in learning more about them. Surely the Hunter Association would have taken the opportunity to learn as much about the species as they could; if only so they can better defend against it should it become a threat again in the future.

"Dancho," Machi suddenly said from behind him. "Take a look at this."

Backtracking, Kuroro looked through a door that he had skipped but Machi hadn't. When he saw what had caught her attention, his eyebrows went up and he stepped into the room.

Like the rest of the rooms, this one was a laboratory, filled with all the equipment and paraphilia of a standard one. Like the rest of the rooms, it sported glass containers holding body parts.

In this case, the body parts were human.

"Midoya mentioned once that this scientist… Quincy, was doing experiments on Nen-users," Kuroro said thoughtfully. "I did not consider the implications of that then, but I suddenly see it now."

"Human experiments?" Machi asked and, uncharacteristically, shuddered. Kuroro did not blame her. Meteor City collected all sorts of rubbish, including escaped experimental subjects. Most of them were so far gone the other residents, usually indifferent to the fates of others, actually took the trouble to actively put them down. When they had still been children, they had encountered one of those subjects. They had been friends, until the subject inexplicably started to swell up like a balloon until he exploded, splattering the children, who would later grow up to be the Ryodan, with all manners of body parts. Even after years of seeing much more brutal things, it was still a memory Kuroro did not particularly enjoy.

"Indeed," Kuroro said finally in reply to Machi's question. "Of course, not all the subjects would be willing or have the legal protection granted to most people. I wouldn't be surprised to find some Met…" What he was going to say died on his lips as he stared at the image projected onto a screen at the far end of the wall by a projector.

Midoya.

She was naked, on a metal gurney, her skin paler than usual with a greenish cast. Her eyes were half-opened but unfocused, soulless. Her lips were blue and purple, like a bruise. Her body was battered with wounds that could not bleed without a beating heart. She looked empty, hollow, a mere mockery of the Midoya Kuroro knew, the Midoya who had so much grace and poise, so much humour and wit, so much life.

That wasn't the worst of it. He had seen dead people before; he had known what to expect should he happen on her corpse. What had driven him to speechlessness was her torso, which had been opened up from collar-bone to naval, revealing the organs below. Yellow tags were placed at certain places, indicating through some code what the areas those tags marked were.

An experiment, he realised with a shock. They were now experimenting on her dead body.

"Damn, they really have no respect for the dead," Machi said with disgust.

"She's dead," Kuroro said calmly. "She doesn't care what's being done to her remains."

"Yeah?"

"Yes." Kuroro's eyes narrowed. "But I do." He took a deep breath and regarded the image on the screen again. "We need to find her corpse."

"Got that," Machi agreed. "It's probably in one of the rooms along this corridor. We need to search all of them."

"It is a place to start." Kuroro turned his back on the image and looked around the room again. " And Machi?"

"Yeah?"

"Remind me to set this whole place on fire before we go."

A/N: Leave a review and let me know what you think!

Trivial: Despite Nobunaga's ribbing of Shalnark's pickup techniques, the truth was, many of the members of the Ryodan were very bad at picking up 'normal' people. Once, just for the sake of it, Machi, Phinx, Shalnark and Kuroro had decided to go to a nice club in York Shin City. The plan, they had all decided, was to finally get Shalnark laid.

At the end of the half hour they were there, the police were swarming the club, many fashionably-dressed people were dead, the club-owner was in hysterics, and Machi was making out with the bartender in the bathroom of a different club while Shalnark, Nobunaga and Kuroro ran through the city trying to lose the sirens closing in on them. At least the club was still mostly intact, except for a hole in a wall, the bursting of several water pipes and the destruction of all the furniture there.

Later, during post-coital cuddling, Kuroro had told Midoya what had happened that had inspired such chaos. Midoya ended up laughing so hard she couldn't breathe. From that time on, every time Midoya saw Shalnark holding a GPS, she would break out into hysterical laughter. Kuroro told Shalnark that it was simply because Midoya was very glad to see an intelligent human being so like herself. It was, Kuroro thought, as he watched a very pleased Shalnark join Midoya in laughing, the kind thing to do.