Disclaimer: I do not own HunterxHunter, nor do I profit commercially from these writings.
ABC Series
J is for Justice
They didn't know what just happened. For all they knew, one moment they were standing in one of the Hunters Lounge in the Hunters Association building while discussing their latest missions, the next moment the ground beneath them just suddenly collapsed and they fell into a heap into a hole deep, deep, deeeeeep into the deep, dank, dark Earth. Kurapika knew that this had to be a prank done by someone she knew very very well because this kind of trick could only be done by that 'someone'…Or rather, she would have realised that sooner if she hadn't realised first that she was in a very very compromising situation. I mean, position…
"CASH! Get off me!"
"I'm trying! But my feet are stuck!"
"Then unstuck them, you buffoon!"
"I'm trying!"
"TRY HARDER!"
"Oh sweet mother—Kurapika, stop screaming bloody murder!"
"I wouldn't be screaming if—GAH! STOP GROPING ME!"
"What?! I'm not!"
"YOU ARE GRABBING MY BREASTS!"
"Oh. These lumps are your boobs?"
"STOP SQUEEZING THEM!"
Before Kurapika could sock Cash in the face and proceeded to maim him where-the-sun-doesn't-shine and making sure that there would be no Father's Day for him, the massively muscular Hunter was bodily hauled off Kurapika's nearly squished body. Kurapika could hear the sound of him being beautifully manhandled across the room, and she immediately knew who her 'saviour' was. The Nen signature was unmistakable. Kurapika didn't know whether she should be grateful—the man wasn't even supposed to be here in the Hunters Association building, but Kurapika's mind was too preoccupied to notice that tiny little detail—or whether she should just dig deeper into the Earth and bury herself alive.
CRASH!
…Then again, by the sound of it, he was probably too furious to notice her embarrassment.
…Hold on a second. Backtrack, backtrack. Him? Furious?
Deciding that she could NOT miss this spectacle of the year, Kurapika quickly made her way up the hole and managed to poke her head out of the hole just as Kuroro lifted have-seen-much-better-days-before Cash in one hand by the man's collar, with his other hand in his pocket. Kuroro then proceeded to tell the hulking mass of a Hunter in a very gentle voice that made Kurapika shudder; because she didn't miss the delightfully sadistic undertone:
"You would make a fine target practice for the children's knife-throwing practice."
Said children—who were currently huddling close together under one of the desks in the lounge—gulped hard. They could oh so feel their father's gaze targeted towards them, penetrating through the thick wooden desk. They quickly came to the conclusion that they were in deep deep deepshit because they knew that their father knew that they were the cause of their mother getting groped by her male colleague.
"Is it just me, or Papa found out about us?" Sarai whispered anxiously at her siblings the moment their father exited the room with the poor unfortunate Hunter in tow, undoubtedly to arrange for said practice.
"He does." Noah replied evenly and softly, completely unperturbed.
{I told you that it IS a bad idea, you imbecile!} Bia elbowed Meta in the ribs, hard.
"But you have to admit that it's fun!"
{It is NOT fun when we will have to practice our knife-throwing every single bloody day for the next four weeks because of your idiocy!} If Bia could speak, she would be hissing like an angry cat at Meta.
"You said you want to see Dad gets jealous!" Meta hissed back at her.
"Jealous over WHAT, exactly?"
The reactions varied among the children the moment they heard their mother's ominous voice. Bia mouthed 'shit!' and automatically smacked Meta in the arm (out of habit because Meta always did stupid things), Sarai yipped like a puppy whose tail was stepped on, Noah's shoulders twitched slightly, while Meta...
"YEAAAAAAAAAHAHAHAHAHANothing."
…jumped almost a foot high and hit his head against the desk as he laughed like a maniac, before finishing it up lamely. The boy then quickly clamped his mouth shut and stared down at the floor. He suddenly found the ceramic very very intriguing, with their exquisite shininess and glossiness and—
"Metatron Lucifer Kuruta."
"…Yes…"
"Out with it."
"….Weeeell…." Twiddle-dee, twiddle-dum, twiddle-thumbs…
"Well?" Foot tapping impatiently against the ceramic floor.
"Well…Dadalwayslookscoolandcalmsowewonderedifwecan gethimallworkedupsowetriedtogethimjealousandseehow hereactsbecausewehonestlyneversawhimgetjealousover anything."
Bia elbowed Meta hard in the ribs again, Sarai (who apparently understood perfectly what Meta was belching out in bullet-train speed) nodded sheepishly, while Noah kept his stoic impassive face while mentally counting one, two, tree…
"Three months of kitchen duty for you."
"WHAT?! Not fair! This wasn't my ide—!" Meta attempted to jump in protest, but hit his head on the desk again. "—owww!"
"I wasn't finished." Kurapika said with even voice, although her lips were twitching as she tried to hold back an amused grin. Her eldest son could be so silly sometimes, for all his awesome Nen.
"There's more?" The ten-years-old boy whined. Another elbow in the rib and another "Oomph!"
"Library duty for Sarai, bathroom duty for Bia, and laundry duty for Noah. Three months. No Nen allowed. No duty-switching allowed."
The reactions were as expected. Meta looked like he wanted to beat himself up for his own stupidity and for not planning a more foolproof plan. Bia looked like she was going to barbeque Meta because she obviously was roped into the scheming unwillingly (but still couldn't resist the temptation of a good sport). Sarai was gawking at her in horror, as if her mother had just given her the death sentence (which was probably as good as being true in this case). Even Noah looked mortified; Kurapika could even swear that he was begging her to reconsider his punishment through his soulful Kuroro-alike eyes—which obviously didn't work on her because she had had practice with Kuroro, that cunning bastard.
"Duty starts tomorrow, and don't think that you can cheat because your father and I will know."
"Does Dad even know of this?" Meta said pitifully, as if trying to find a loophole in the punishment. He'd be damned if he had to do kitchen duty for three months. The kitchen hated him!
"Oh, believe me, he would've given you worse punishment than this if it's him who's passing the judgement." Kurapika rolled her eyes. She could see him marooning them in some uninhibited island full of carnivorous beasts and plants as punishment, with the excuse of training them. He'd done that before. Well at least now Kurapika knew that their children would undoubtedly survive any Armageddon or apocalypse.
"Why are you two making such a big deal over this?" Sarai whined. "It's just a joke."
"I do not appreciate being manhandled inappropriately, young lady, joke or not. Now out of the desk and off to home." Kurapika said sternly with her arms akimbo.
"Dad does that to you all the time…" Meta grouched.
Unfortunately for him, Kurapika oh SO heard that.
"Five months of duty for you, Meta."
"WHAT?! NO, I WAS JUST JOKING!"
{Idiot…} Bia rolled her eyes.
"I know, right." Sarai giggled, while Noah simply snickered.
Kurapika watched them as they dragged themselves out of the desk and towards the door. Just as they were closing the door, she reminded them:
"Oh, and don't forget the knife-throwing practice."
Loud groans and complaints erupted from behind the closing door, as well as the sound of Meta being violently mobbed by Sarai and Bia. Noah didn't seem to mind the knife-throwing punishment; he loved throwing shiny pointy objects around, much like his father.
Kurapika couldn't help but to pat herself on the back. It amused her to no end how each children had their own aversion to different cleaning duties, as if they had assigned each other which duty they should hate.
Meta utterly abhorred kitchen duty for reasons that she never understood why. He kept claiming that the kitchen hated him, but Kurapika thought perhaps it was because he almost got impaled by kitchen knives at one point of time. Well that was his own fault for messing around in the kitchen without minding the shiny pointy stuffs. Bia didn't like cleaning bathroom because she simply thought bathrooms are generally gross. Noah didn't mind doing chores around the house, but Kurapika had noticed that he was the least willing about doing laundry. She didn't know why, but would probably find out soon enough. Three months of getting stuck in the laundry room was bound to make the boy talk about why he didn't like it. As for Sarai… Well, it was quite obvious why she didn't like the library. It was all books and books and books and books… And the thought of sorting out and cleaning them at the same time was just overwhelmingly insane for that I'm-allergic-to-books girl.
She didn't see what was so horrifying about all those duties. The family was clean—Kuroro was clean freak, and he generally made sure that the children were also adhering to his standard of cleanliness, which generally made them clean freaks as well—so it was not like they would encounter all gross things in the kitchen, bathroom, laundry or the library. Especially the library, because Kurapika and Kuroro religiously made sure the room was clean and free of mites.
Well, she supposed they were just kids being kids.
Well, that was entertaining… A voice purred from somewhere around Kurapika's feet.
Out of reflex, Kurapika almost kicked whatever was talking down there but fortunately she managed to rein in her leg before she kicked the bejesus out of her son's daemon cat.
"You have been watching the entire time?"
Indeed. It was most amusing, although I believed it was not very wise of them to pull off that trick. They could have done better than that.
Kurapika decided to ignore the last part for now. She just had to thank her lucky star that she didn't have to endure an even worse prank that the latest one. Although she still had to know…
"Why is Kuroro here in this building? He's not even supposed to be here." Kurapika tried asking the cat because she was usually privy to whatever pranks that Meta concocted.
I believe your children told him that there was something really interesting that he should check out himself. The glee wasn't subtle in the black cat's voice.
"That's flat-out giving away that they are the one behind the scene." Kurapika scowled. The cat was right; they could have done a better job than that.
Indeed.
"If you think it's not wise, then why didn't you stop them?"
Well, it's just as the boy said: it's a good sport. The cat sniggered as she licked her paw and cleaned her face.
"It's a good sport when you're not the one in the receiving end." Kurapika groused as she adjusted her collar uneasily. She still felt wrong from being groped there.
Agreed. But it's quite amusing to see Kuroro Lucifer getting all worked up just because someone else groped your assets. Possessive, isn't he?
Kurapika tried to step on the damn cat, and said cat leapt away and out of the window while laughing creepily, undoubtedly to catch up with her master/student. The Kuruta woman swore that one of these days she was going to serve the family certain cat-kebab.
Author's Note: Another comedy chapter. How I love putting Kurapika into awkward situations (*me gutted by an angry PMS-ing behemoth of a Kuruta*) And I trolled you guys! Muhahaha Title is Justice but this has got nothing to do with justice. Well… Aside from the fact that Kuroro and Kurapika self-righteously passed their self-perceived justice against Cash and the guilty children.
Public announcement: Kuroro Lucifer does NOT appreciate his woman being groped by any other males…. Although he does that to Kurapika all the time, as Meta has testified. Which I must say that Kuroro doesn't do it in the public, but Meta has his own way to know things about his parents, what with his wonderfully useful daemons...Who are also good for sneak-peeking... Marvelously so.
Oh, and check out my profile page. I've posted new link on the fanart I did for Kuroro. It's ink profile of Kuroro, with certain art style that I've been experimenting on lately.