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A/N: Sorry about the delay on this chapter. Had a busy weekend (not crazy busy like when I was writing Chapter 1, but still busy). Also had a little bit of writer's block while writing it. I hate writer's block, just saying that now.
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Chapter 6: Kitakura

"Oh wow," Gon said in amazement as the old man led us into his library, "Such a big room!"

"Go on," the man said, "take a look around, find something you like."

Gon ran straight ahead to a shelf full of books. The shelf ran from one wall to the other and there were countless more like it, leaving only a little space for walking in between them to get to the books on the ends. There was also a second level off to the right of the door with more rows of bookshelves, however, these weren't end-to-end. I decided to have a look up there.

"Have you read all of these books, Kitakura?" Gon asked

"Oh, no," Kitakura said, "I inherited this house from my father, who died a long time ago, and I never was much of a reader. Though, I do try and keep this place tidy, as a sort of memorial to my father."

Gon and I had met Kitakura after our plane had to make an unexpected landing. He was almost as tall as Kite, just a bit shorter, and had grey hair and dark brown eyes. I didn't exactly trust him, but he seemed nice. He invited us to stay at his house while our plane was landed.

As I made my way up to the second level, I could hear Gon talking about all the books he read at his home. I let out a snort, trying to hold in a laugh. Gon looked up at me and scowled. That made it difficult to hold in the laugh, but I barely managed.

"What's so funny, Killua?" Gon asked, still scowling at me.

"I've been to your house, Gon," I said, "And you have maybe two books in your room that don't have pictures in them."

"So?" Gon said, turning his scowl into a mock-pout, "The point is, I've read them."

"Yeah," I said, "Up until the book starts using too many big words. Then you put a bookmark in them and leave them for who knows how long."

"I-it's not like that, Killua!" Gon said, a little red, "It's that I get too tired to read any more of them, so I bookmark where I left off! And it's been a long time since I've read them because I was with you, so" he stuck his tongue out at me.

"Right." I said, continuing my ascent up the stairs leading to the second level.

To tell the truth, I never actually read what the books were. I only saw that he had them. However, I could tell by his reaction, that it wasn't 'big words' or that he was 'too tired', it was something else. Something that he probably didn't want his Aunt Mito finding out. I made a mental note to make sure to torture him about it later.

When I got up to the second level, I noticed that the books up here were bigger than normal books. I took one out of the shelf and read the title: Encyclopaedia of Human Anatomy. Oh, so these were books for gaining knowledge about certain things. I put the book back and continued to browse the second level. As I was walking around, something unusual caught my eye.

I went to the railing and said, "Hey, old man."

"Yes, Killua," he said glancing in my direction very briefly, "What is it?"

"You said that these books were organized in sections, right?"

"I did."

"Then what's this section over here?" I pointed to a section that was all dusty and covered in cobwebs. I figured it hadn't been cleaned for at least a few years.

"Oh," he said looking at a book he had pulled from the shelf, "That section isn't very important. It's about myths and legends. It wasn't my favorite section, or my father's for that matter. So, I really didn't see a need to keep it clean for his memorial."

"Huh." I said while walking back to the dirty section.

When I got there, I blew on the books to get some dust off. What I didn't expect was that the dust would gather up close to my face, forcing me to cough and wave my hand in front to get the dust away. Once the dust was clear, I ran my hand over them, reading their titles. My hand stopped on one particular book.

"Oh, you have got to kidding me." I said in disbelieving annoyance as I read the title of the book. "Stupid Kite. Stupid Natsuki. Stupid fortune teller. I hate them all."

The title of the book read: The Fountain of Eternal Youth. The book never would have peaked my interest if it weren't for Kite first telling me about the fountain. I could have just passed it up, even then. But then Natsuki had to say that it was real and then those stupid fortune cards telling me I'd go on some sort of quest to find this thing. I had to read this book now.

"'Whosoever drinketh from this fountain shall gain youth for ever and shall never die,'" I read, "'Yea, from this fountain springs forth the waters of life. Alas, the road to it shall be full of peril and danger that only the bravest of souls may venture forth. Though the challenges contain lies, deceit and murder, a strong will and a pure heart shall find destiny.'"

"What'cha reading, Killua?" Gon said from behind me.

I nearly jumped right out of my skin. I hated when people snuck up on me like that. I wasn't even sure how they could sneak up on me like that. Part of my training as an assassin had taught me to detect when people were behind me. Yet Gon had done it-twice no less!-and the fortune teller lady had done it. I was beginning to doubt I could sense when a bug had snuck up on me!

"Oh! Uh," I began, "I-it's nothing, Gon. Just a really boring book." I looked out the window to see the sun had already set. I faked a yawn and said, "Boy, I sure am getting tired, aren't you, Gon?"

As soon as I faked my yawn, Gon yawned for real. He started rubbing his eyes when he said, "Now that you mention it, I am getting kinda sleepy."

I put the book back and walked over to the rails again and said, "Hey, Old man. You said we could sleep here, right?" Kitakura nodded. "We're pretty tired now, so where are we sleeping?"

"Oh, follow me," he said, "I'll show you to your room. Unfortunately, I only have one room that's free to use. I have family staying in the other rooms."

Before we got to the stairs leading to the main floor of the library, Gon had fallen asleep so I carried him. I was carrying him like I was a few days ago, when we were running from the burning forest. However, with Gon being asleep, I couldn't really say I made him embarrassed. Kitakura stepped out of the library after me and closed the door.

"The bed is big enough for two people," he said continuing from where he left off, "especially for boys your age, but I can bring up a cot, if you'd like."

The last time somebody had said something was big enough for us, it was Kite's sleeping bag. And that was so tight, I was almost rubbing Gon whenever I moved. Thinking back on that made me blush slightly. I almost accepted Kitakura's offer to bring up a cot, when Gon whispered something in my ear.

I blushed at what he said and told Kitakura, "N-no, that's okay. We'll be fine with just the bed."

"Well, alright, then," he said as he opened a door, "Here's your room."

The room was big. Not as big as the library, but bigger than the hallway we walked down to get to it. The bed was facing the door, with the headboard up against the wall. There was a window on the right side of the door and another door on the opposite side.

"Goodnight, boys," Kitakura said, closing the door behind us.

I heard the door lock after it was closed. My suspicion of Kitakura was growing. Who locks their guests in their room, I thought. I walked over to the bed and sat down. I took Gon's arms from around me and he immediately plopped down.

After I straightened him out, I went to the other side of the bed and laid down next to him. I stared at him for a long time, watching his chest move in and out with every breath he took. I thought about the events of the past few days, after we had met Kite. It all seemed like such a blur to me, but I remembered the fortune teller lady using her Nen to show Gon that I would kill him. I wondered how he could sleep so peacefully after having been shown that.

Before I knew it, my eyes were closed and I was sleeping. And I was dreaming. But it wasn't the normal kind of dream, it was more like a nightmare. A nightmare that should never have found me in the first place.

In my dream, I saw Gon. He was all happy and Gon-like, running around trying to catch something with his bare hands. He stopped and turned to face me and waved, calling me over to him. I tried to run, but something was holding me back. I looked back and saw my brother, Illumi, with his hand on my shoulder.

"You don't deserve friends." His voice echoed through my mind, "The only reason you're with him is because you want to kill him."

I turned around to look at Gon again, who was still waving me over to him. I ran to him. He tackled me to the ground and we rolled around until I was sitting on top of him. I could see his eyes turn from joy to terror as my hand was raised above his head and then brought down right into his chest.

I shot up like a rocket, dripping in sweat. I looked over to see Gon still laying peacefully on the bed, his chest moving in and out with every breath. I sighed in relief and got out of bed. I walked over to the window and opened the curtain part way so, if the sun was shining, it wouldn't wake up Gon.

I shielded my eyes from the sun, that was burning bright in the sky, to let my eyes adjust. I saw a lot of people outside, going about their daily business. It wasn't anything too suspicious, but this thought just kept bugging me. I tried to remember what it was, as I remembered when the pilot said the plane had to make an unexpected landing in this town.

"Folks," the pilot said, "this is your pilot speaking. Unfortunately, it looks like our plane is having some technical issues. We ask that you not panic, as we will have be landing somewhere shortly to fix the problem."

The plane landed and everyone was asked to leave the plane. I heard somebody say that the town was abandoned because of the monsters that lived in the forest at the other edge of town. Another person said they heard the monsters ate flesh. I didn't believe that flesh-eating creatures could make an entire town abandon their homes.

I'd lost Gon somewhere in the crowd and started to look for him as the crowd thinned out. I didn't see him near the plane. I began to wonder where he went, when I saw him running through town. I ran to catch up to him and grabbed his legs, bringing him to the ground.

"Let go of me, Killua!" He shouted as he started to kick his feet.

"Calm down, Gon!" I yelled back.

He got one of his feet free and it started to kick my face. I grabbed it and pulled it down. Then, with one hand on his legs, I moved to the side of him and hit him on the head. He yelled at me and I yelled at him. Then he punched me in the face.

Pretty soon, we were rolling around on the ground, punching and kicking each other and calling each other names. We were stopped when somebody had grabbed our shirts and picked us up. We were still trying to get at each other, even though we were held on opposite sides of the man, who introduced himself as John Kitakura. He said his arms were getting tired from us "thrashing about", as he put it, and made us promise not to fight anymore after he put us down.

I explained our situation to him, by saying that our plane broke down and made an emergency landing in this town. I looked around and noticed that the other passengers on the plane were either wandering around town looking for a place to stay or camping by the plane hoping it'd be fixed and they'd be the first ones on. My guess was that they hadn't gotten the seats they wanted and were going to steal someone else's seats. It was fine with me, so long as they didn't take our seats. Then I noticed that there wasn't anybody around that live here.

"Where are all the people in this town?" I asked curiously.

He looked sad for a moment, which made his face wrinkle, and said, "I'm the only one left that lives in town. Everybody else either left or was eaten by the monsters."

"Monsters?" Gon asked.

"They live in the forest and only come out at night," Kitakura explained, "It's hard to tell them from regular humans because they look exactly like us."

"Why haven't you left?" I asked.

"I have my family to think of," he said, "My wife is sick and the only thing that keeps her in this world is our little grandchildren. I'd say they're about your age, maybe a little bit younger. But enough about my silly little troubles, you can stay at my house while your plane is getting repaired. Come."

We followed him to his house, which looked like it had three full levels to it. He said that his family had lived in that house his entire life and even before that. When we got closer, I noticed a faded gold plate of the door. A sign that said 'Library'. I questioned him about it.

"This was once the town library," he said, "When I was younger, my father would run books from his own personal library to the town. He said it helped keep the community strong. Of course, he was talking about the books. It was always about the books."

He said that last sentence in a spiteful tone, though he tried his best not to show it. He then cheered up and asked if we'd like to see his father's pride, the library. Gon immediately accepted before I could say anything else. I looked at him in a quizzical glance and he responded with a sheepish grin. I sighed and we walked in the front door.

I still didn't quite remember what was wrong about the townspeople out doing their daily routines. Gon stirred and I closed the curtain to turn and look at him. He stretched and yawned. He looked at me and smiled.

"Good morning, Killua!" He said with way too much excitement for having just woken up.

"Morning," I responded, "Sleep well?"

He nodded and said, "Yep! I had the best dream ever! What about you?"

"Oh yeah," I lied, "I slept great." I stretched and went back over to the bed. "So, tell me, what was your dream about, Gon?"

"It was about you." He said without even blushing. Normally when he admitted he dreamed about me, he blushed. Instead, he wore a big grin. That made me blush a bit and Gon laughed.

I grabbed his ears and pulled them. "Tell me what your dream was about or I'll pull harder!" I threatened.

"Ow, ow, ow! Okay!" He said. I let go of his ears. "I was walking through a forest somewhere when I saw something move in the bushes. I walked over to where it was and I was ambushed by dozens of creatures all snarling at me." He made snarling noises while he moved his hands the way a cat would when it played with yarn. "I took out a whole bunch of them, but more kept coming. I was about to give up, when I heard you call my name."

"Yeah?" I said, urging him to go on, "So I called your name and then what happened?"

"I woke up." Gon said bluntly.

I hit him on the head. I was going to say something about how he's an idiot, but the door unlocked and Kitakura came in. Something looked different about him, though. It looked like he had aged over night. I wondered how that was possible. However, before I could say anything, he spoke.

"Good morning, boys," He said in a raspier tone than what he spoke in yesterday, "I hope you enjoyed your sleep."

"Yeah," I said, "Why'd you lock the door?"

"Oh, I always lock every door at night," He explained, "That way, if the monsters somehow found their way into the house, they wouldn't attack anybody."

I was sceptical of his answer, but it satisfied my curiosity. He said that breakfast would be ready soon and that we should get ready. He then left down the hall. I noticed something different about his footsteps as he left, too. Yesterday, he walked perfectly upright, even on both feet. However, today, one foot was heavier than the other. I noticed Gon was getting out of bed and decided not to bring it up just yet.

I got out of bed and walked to the other door. Behind that door was the bathroom. I went to the sink and turned it on. Cupping some water in my hands, I splashed it on my face and rubbed. I found the towel and dried my face off then I ran to catch up to Gon, who had already left the room.

As we entered the dining room, we saw Kitakura's family. His grandsons were fighting over a piece of bacon, saying they each grabbed it first. They looked to be just younger than us. A woman, who I guessed to be their mother, was telling them that there was enough food for everybody and tore the bacon in half, giving one to each of them, before she sat down at one end of the table. Kitakura was sitting at the other end reading a newspaper.

We sat down on the opposite side of the table Kitakura's grandsons were at. Gon tried to make polite conversation with them, but they just ignored him and stuffed their faces. I thought it was kind of rude and was gonna say something, but Gon did it first, which surprised me. He didn't usually chew people out. I always figured it was my job.

"Aunt Mito always said," he began, "'When somebody talks to you, you should say something back to them!'"

Gon steamed until he saw the food on the table. He took some and I did the same. It had been so long since I've had a home cooked meal that my mouth was watering from the first bite. I was wrapped up in my meal when a thought came to me. A thought about the book I'd seen the day before and the fortune that was told to me before that.

"Gon," I whispered to him, "After we eat, let's go to the library. I want to show you a book I found."

"Okay," Gon said, nodding.

"Now, boys," Kitakura said from behind the newspaper, "after breakfast isn't the best time to be reading. After breakfast is the time to do chores."

"Chores?" I complained, "What kind of host makes their guests do chores?"

"The kind of host who can't afford to do everything." Kitakura said.

He explained that he didn't need us to do much, that his grandsons would do the most of it. He told us the he needed us to get some supplies for dinner tonight. We weren't even sure if we were gonna be staying for dinner, but Gon agreed. We finished up our breakfast and Kitakura gave us a list and some Jenny to get the stuff on the list.

We walked out of Kitakura's house into a busy market place. People were running everywhere and buying things. The whole scene just didn't seem right for some reason. It kept nagging at me the whole time we were out and I couldn't, for the life of me, remember why.

We asked around for places that sold the items on our list. Some of the people were helpful and some were non-respondent. I concluded that most of the people of the town were either busy with their own things that they couldn't help us or they were just plain rude. It took us about an hour to get everything on the list.

When we got back to Kitakura's house, the old man greeted us with a scowl. However, his tone was pleasant. When I looked again, the scowl had disappeared and replaced with a smile. I asked if we could go to the library now.

"Yes," Kitakura said, "sure. I'll let you read. It's like my father used to say, 'Reading builds relationships.' I'm not sure how he came up with that saying, though. He probably got it from a book or something."

He went on like that for a while and I decided to slip away and take Gon to where I found the book on the Fountain of Youth. On the way, I told him about what happened at the Fortune Teller's. Of course, I didn't tell him about The Lovers card and The Chariot card I had gotten previous to The Fountain card. I couldn't tell him about those. Especially not the first one.

We got to where the book was the day before and I pulled it out to show Gon. However, I found that there were only pictures in it today. I wondered how that was and Gon just eyed me suspiciously. He didn't need to say it because I knew what he was thinking.

"Do you think I would make something like that up?" I asked, "This book had words in it yesterday, I swear!"

"I believe you, Killua." Gon said, trustingly.

I hated that trusting tone right now. I just didn't understand how he could be so trusting of me. I basically told him that I was thinking of murdering him and yet, he was willing to put his trust in me. At times, I had wondered why I hadn't killed Gon yet, and right then, I think I found my answer.

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A/N: I'm sorry to do this to you, people, but the next chapter is going to be a little while. Yes, even longer than this chapter, but not as long as it took to get around to writing the story. GOSH no! I have something over a year in the making that I want to get done so I can upload it next month. I'm not saying what it is or what it's for, but it is Hunter X Hunter-related. So, make sure you're following me (as an author) for next month because it's going to be A-MAY-ZAAAAAH! However, the next chapter will probably be released before my special secret story. That's all I wanted to say. Thanks again for liking this story and look for the next chapter... uh... sometime next month. Hopefully it'll be sooner in the month, rather than later and enjoy my special secret story when it is released.

~Jay
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