The Legion of International Governments' Hunter Troops…
"Conspiracy Hunters…" Misaki pondered aloud, swishing her head to deflect the sweaty strand of flattened plum hair out of her eyes. "So the stories are true then; they do exist."
"If you try to move around me," the woman that had once introduced herself as 'Mei' said to the silver haired boy a few meters before her (ignoring Misaki's words altogether), "it will take little effort for me to stop you. In the best case scenario, you might manage to fake me out, but I have five more allies just there. I'd say that gives you less than a one percent chance of actually escaping, assuming there is a one percent margin of error in my calculations, of course."
The woman's eyes deceived her for a moment and flashed with a sickening expression of glee at Killua's predicament. She flicked the back of her upper, front teeth with the tip of her tongue.
"If you surrender, I will ensure that your death is quick and painless, but if you struggle I cannot make amends for you. Keep in mind that even if you defied logic and reason and miraculously did manage to escape, I would then simply torture your friends. That's the way it is, kid. Make your choice."
The boy could feel his body gripped by paralysis. The conviction in her voice believably backed up the probability of her intended actions. His muscles were tight, and in result there was a light tremble to his otherwise lack of movement. The likelihood of defeating her in battle, not even considering her remaining five colleagues lingering in the background, was slim to none. She was more powerful, he was certain, and his mind urged him to escape despite the rigid reaction of his body.
"Killua!" Gon suddenly burst out. "Don't just give up, I believe you can win!"
"Gon…"
"Don't worry about us!" the tanned boy insisted.
"What?" Haku gasped incredulously. "No, forget that! Give up! I don't want to be tortured!"
"Make your choice," the woman repeated again, louder this time.
"I…" Killua started, scrambling inwardly to organize his whirling mass of conflicted thoughts.
Her brows rose expectedly and her head shifted slightly to the right, as though to motivate him to finish the sentence.
"I…"
Now she was drawing slow, deliberate steps toward him, her aura extending further than twice her arms' reach around her in the tiny room.
"I… surrender," he finally said, lowering his head to face the ground with a mixture of guilt and damaged pride coursing through his veins.
"You made the right decision, kid," the woman assured him, stepping behind him to tie his wrists together.
Killua wasn't at all convinced of the validity of that statement.
"Hey, Misaki-san?" Gon started, breaking the silence. When she nodded her head, he continued with, "When an item is conjured, does that mean it can't disappear?"
The question had come to the spiky haired boy during the awkward quiet that had fallen over the group, all bound now in nen-infused rope, while he had been staring fixedly at the bars to the cage they were presently contained in on the basement floor. The cell had been conjured by 'Bao' as a place to store the four until apparently another L.I.G.H.T. member with an ability that was deemed ideal for transporting bodies inconspicuously would arrive to assist them. He remembered Kurapika's chains, which had always seemed visible to him, in his search to discover a weakness that might aid in their outbreak.
"Not exactly," Misaki replied. "Conjurers don't necessarily need to be in a specific range of the objects they create to keep them tangible, but if someone has a condition set on something like that to strengthen it, I guess the item could theoretically stay materialized forever. Assuming the condition is met and the user is very practiced at conjuring, that is."
"Do you think there is a condition set on these bars?" he pursued.
Tilting her head thoughtfully, she admitted, "I'm quite positive there must be. Conjured items are never as strong as the actual items they mirror on their own, so in order to create a cage that can't be broken easily by nen he would definitely need a restriction in place."
"So we need to find out what the restriction is in order to weaken the bars to the execution of a nen attack," Haku reasoned out somewhat optimistically from the back corner of the tiny prison.
"It doesn't matter if we figure out the restriction," Killua announced sullenly, his knees curled up pitifully in to his chest and chin.
The blue eyed boy, now stripped of his wig like the rest, was still experiencing an overwhelming bout of self-loathing at his inability to stand up to 'Mei' earlier. Submerged deeply in a pool of shame and insecurity, he was hardly apt toward any sort of enthusiasm for the time being.
"Of course it does," Haku argued.
"No, it doesn't," the boy reiterated.
"Oh? Why is that, Killua?" Gon questioned sincerely.
"Even if we figured out the restriction on the bars and managed to use it to our advantage, we can't use nen to attack, anyway."
"Huh?" Gon and Haku responded together.
"Ah," Misaki said, now understanding, "I see now."
Haku forced out an undignified grunting sound.
"Well would you two be so kind as to let us in the loop?"
"The ropes," Killua explained, "are forcing us in to Zetsu, so as long as they're tied around us we can't use nen."
Gon's face scrunched in confusion.
"If the restriction on the bars makes it so that nen won't break them, why did they use ropes to force us in to Zetsu? Isn't that kind of wasting aura?"
Despite the legitimate and innocent perplexity to the inquiry, Gon had inadvertently sparked a ray of hope in the remaining three. Misaki's facial features lengthened slightly, Haku's body jolted, and Killua raised his chin with his mouth partially agape.
"Of course!" Killua cried out, nearly forgetting his inner turmoil in the excitement of the discovery.
"Did you figure something out?" Gon asked.
"If the purpose of the ropes is to stop us from using nen inside the cage…" the former assassin began.
"…And the cage would be capable of being almost indestructible with the right set of conditions on the ability…" Haku piped up.
"…Then the bars are not likely under limitations to enhance their strength, which is why the ropes are being used in the first place," Misaki finished.
"Oh!" Gon called out after a moment's consideration. "…But then, why use the cage at all?"
"Either to confuse us, to contain us in one place without the need for supervision, or both," she explained.
Grinning widely, Gon said, "Then that means we just need to figure out how to remove these ropes and we can escape!"
"Not even all of the ropes," the girl corrected him slyly.
"What do you mean, Misaki-san?"
"New plan," she announced, using her bound legs to shift her seated body around to face the others. "First we need to decide who among us is the best at utilizing Enhancer abilities."
"Gon is an Enhancer," Killua chimed in.
The girl's amber eyes scanned the determined island boy carefully, and she drew in a long, steadying breath before continuing.
"Okay, the plan is to focus on removing Gon's ropes then…" she explained, and the trio of males leaned in close as she whispered to them the basics of their newfound strategy.