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Chapter 27
He didn't leave my side. Which was odd since he also didn't seem to be particularly invested in my well-being either. No. His interest came from a deeper-rooted obsession. He enjoyed his things. He enjoyed seeing them break because it reminded him that they could break. And even though that seemed to cause him annoyance as well, it also intrigued him.
"Broken blood vessels along your eye, gash inside your mouth, trauma to not only the shoulder but both hands as well culminating in a rather nasty wound running the length of your palms. Fatigue to the legs. Broken ribs. Punctured lung and internal trauma around the affected area." Golden eyes ran over me in consideration and mild, feline-esque interest. He stared at me like I was a wonder, something to be admired behind clear glass and caution tape. His long, elegant fingers traveled over my bottom lip, noting the split and chapping with a slow, small smile. His eyes crinkled before closing. "Could you get any more fucked up, my little mouse?"
I stared at him, already bored and hollowed out from the examination. Or was it that I had remained hollowed out? My eyes traveled to the silver urns once more, all of the emotions draining out of me with a swiftness that still startled me. Compartmentalize. Sure my brothers were dead and they were never coming back and that made me want to tear open my stomach and fish around until I could yank out my own heart but - and here was the kicker - I had revenge. I had the raw animal urge to hunt down that slimy good-for-nothing and tear out his spleen before making him beg for his mom or dad or whatever creton had given birth to that abomination. Compartmentalize.
I let the doctors finish wrapping my chest, their eyes firmly on the work in front of them and not the looming beast that was taking up the space just in front of the window. They were compartmentalizing too. Don't look at it. Look at this. Keep your head down and maybe it won't get ripped off by the big bad.
Maybe all of these facts should have terrified me. I glanced over at Minoru just as his chest expanded on a deep breath, a snore escaping quickly after. I wasn't afraid though. Hisoka and I had mutual interests now. At my current level, I don't know if I can beat Ichihiro - not in the way that he deserves. Not in a way that will make me feel whole again. I'm betting on it like one would bet on the lottery - wishful, half-mad. Like if I just break his scrawny little neck my body will stop feeling like it's being dragged along by a freight train.
I flex my hands once more, feeling the tug of agony at the raw tissue and bruises physically but not mentally docking it. It's been like that for a while - I feel the world moving around me but can't really comprehend it. I glance over at Minoru again, his eyes opening to meet mine as the doctors scurry out. He's been looking less… just less. Less human? Less living? I can't entirely tell.
But looking into his eyes right now I can see the edges of me, the madness that's taken over me starting to reflect in him. It's there in the rabid edge to his gaze that is barely there. The rest is just dull. Bland. I flex my hands again. Nothing.
"Come on." Hisoka again. I keep my eyes on the wiggling fingers, white mummified sausages. He's packing up my stuff. In the night, he went out and got me new shoes which I was surprised to find were sturdy, black boots matched with high, thick socks. They would be good for walking and running - two things that I hadn't imagined that he would consider. The too-tight black shorts and shirt bounced onto the bed right after. The material looked softer and warmer than anything I had ever had. I reached out, hesitantly. Definitely more expensive than anything I had had.
The underwear that he had gotten me…
"How did you know my sizes?" I murmured, running a finger along the lacy red bra and underwear. He smirked, his eyes lighting devilishly as his lean body unfurls from his resting spot in the window.
He has the elegance of a cat, languid and lethal all at once. His eyes traveled over me with the same awareness, noting the way I leaned to the side, the heavy pants that were coming from me, the way I couldn't lean on my palms to alleviate some of the strain on my ribs. He noted this the way that an animal would - taking in the weaknesses so that it would be easier to devour anything in a given moment.
"I pay attention," he said slowly, his eyes finally slipping to my own once more. His eyes snapped with awareness, the gold flecks in his eyes dancing in the sunlight spilling in from the curtains. "It's not a hard jump to understand sizes when you're constantly measuring how quickly you could take another person to the ground."
"Size matters," I murmured, remembering my constant weight assessments. Fighting - always about fighting. How much one hit would affect you. How long you could go in close quarters.
He winked, nodding. "Put the clothes on, pet. I have somewhere fun to take you."
Hisoka's possible idea of fun made me wary.
I didn't move, staring at him blankly as he gave me an impatient jerk of his chin. I flicked my eyes to the door and then back to him. He jerked his chin again. My gaze narrowed into a glare.
"I just want you to know that this is nothing I haven't seen before," he stated blandly as he swung open the door.
I toed off my ruined socks. "Since you haven't seen me naked before, I would say that it is."
"Oh, but how I dream~" he sang lowly as the door shut behind him.
The whole act of changing with my injuries was one of religious torture. It hurt but it also… At least, I was feeling something. Even though most everything was a size smaller than I would have usually gotten it, it all fit well enough. If not for the overwhelming urge to kill, Hisoka would have made an admirable personal shopper.
I couldn't put my shoes on. I stared at where they lay in their perfect, tissue paper container. Did I even want them? My eyes drifted to the dirty converse, my skin prickling as I remembered Amori. So proud. So self-indulging. We had saved up for so long to get those…
"When you spend time without me I get jealous~" He stopped, his eyes immediately zeroing in on where my own were caught. The converses seemed like a forgotten relic, something left over from a time before today or this decade. They had that feel - lonely, worn. His lips tightened, the strangest glow of amber softening his eyes. "Do you want to keep them?"
I startled. This was the last reaction that I would have expected from him. If anything, I could imagine him tossing them out while I slept. Maybe even lighting them on fire in front of me. I stared at him, trying to find anything but the handsomely smooth lines of his face. He met that stare head-on, unafraid in the aftermath of such an alarming question. The last thing I expected was...kindness. Not from him.
I ran from it, breaking his gaze. "I can't bend to get the boots on. My ribs."
He didn't answer for a moment, seeming to deliberate something or another. Maybe the idea to call someone else to do the job for me. Or yell at me to do it myself. His honeycomb eyes flicked down the hallway, his jaw tensing before he was slowly moving into the room, the door swinigng shut quietly behind him.
Hisoka didn't say anything as he sauntered over. He didn't say anything as he stood before, rigidly, for a moment or two. He didn't say anything as a card danced from finger to finger, appearing out of thin air.
And he didn't say anything when he knelt down before me, his shoulders tense, every muscle in his body cramping together as if he were holding down some sort of visceral reaction.
His fingers were swift as they tugged on the sock, rough against the vulnerable skin there. I didn't know how to take this moment - this side. With his harshness, his open cruelty, there was a side of such unexpected gentleness that he showed me.
"Will it always be like this?" I don't know where the question came from. I had decided to compartmentalize. Compartmentalizing meant that there would be no more questions or talk of the past - or even the present. I would keep it to the plan - to my hatred. And in this way, I would be able to survive.
This wasn't compartmentalizing. This was digging up the pitiless reality. This was living in the tragedy.
Slowly, Hisoka's eyes slipped to mine, his fingers still working on my shoelaces. His whole body went even stiller than before. I could see the tension starting to return to him, even as he tried to push it behind a slim mask. His mouth tipped up in a quick play for nonchalance before stilling, seeing the blank devastation on my face. The smirk slipped.
"Some days it will be worse." The raw honesty to his voice nearly shattered me. It would be worse than this? Worse than this hollowness. His eyes glittered like lost gold. He seemed too big, too bulky to be kneeling in front of me like this. Tying my shoes like a friend would do for another. We weren't friends. We were both too broken for that. But with him here, staring up at me like this, speaking to me like this - well, maybe I could fool myself into believing that we were. "Some days you'll wake up thinking that they're still alive. Some days you'll look around you and realize that no one knows a single thing about the people that you cared about."
His gaze went hard, his fingers tightening on my shoelaces. "But then you're going to remember that you're not powerless anymore. You're going to think about how it will feel to finally see the light flicker and then die in his eyes. And you'll realize, that with him went the last of your weakness. And then the loss won't feel so horrible."
Hisoka's smile was a thin, cruel thing, his movements sharp as he finished the loop with a finality that made me think that he had lost just as much as me. Maybe even more. He rolled to his feet with uncanny grace and Minoru roused, his maw gaping open with a yawn.
"One more thing." He stalked over to a nearby chair, riffling through a large shopping bag. His smile was crooked as he pulled out a blood red coat, the material thick and long. "You've always looked ravishing in red."
I took the coat gingerly, stunned at the heavy material, the many pockets and bright scarlet hue. "I never wore red," I murmured abesntly.
It slipped on like whisper, cool against my skin. The hood was lined with fur, the collar high enough to graze my ears. I glanced back up, meeting his slim smirk and then following his gaze to the discarded clothes and bandages, all stained… I frowned, turning a glare to Hisoka. All stained with my blood.
He gave me a wink, chucking me under the chin. "Don't get torn up so badly and maybe I'll change that color, pet."
I resisted the urge to snap at him, patting Minoru's head as he lumbered over warily. I never intended to bleed like that ever again. My eyes darted to the three silent urns. Never again.
The sea air was salty and thick against my skin. The ocean was endless, I realized, staring across the limitless horizon. Blue. Blue as far as the eye could see. The sea and sky mixed at the farthest reaches of my vision, tangling in an intimate embrace that made it hard to differentiate one from the other. I took in another sweltering breath. And then another.
I hadn't cried. Not as I had opened up one urn at a time. Not as I had watched the last physical piece of my brothers drift away into that limitless space between sky and sea. Not as they had disappeared, leaving me standing at the cliff's edge, unsure what to do with the leftover silver.
Is this what they wanted? We had never talked about death. We were too young. Nothing would be able to kill us - not soon enough to speak about what should happen if… They had mentioned the sea once. Mentioned how much they loved the sand and waves and chaos of a tide coming in. This was the best I could do. This was the only thing I could do - all of us orphans with a home that wasn't really ours.
I wish I could offer them more. I wish… I let out a breath, the sun blinding as it bounces off of the water's edge.
We should go. Minoru's right, of course. Hisoka has been accommodating, oddly quiet as I silently wished each of my brothers farewell. It was… unnerving. Completely unexpected. After three hours of staring off, not moving, the wind growing harsher and harsher as we stood, Minoru and I pressed to each other's side, Hisoka standing awkwardly off to the side, crouched at the very edge of the cliff.
It is time to go. Time to move on. I forced my legs back, moving away from the sea. Move on as best I could.
"Where are we going?" The question came out rough like a metal contraption that hadn't been moved or greased in a while.
Hisoka straightened, stretching out in a long, lean line. His hair turned a startling shade of blood-red in the light. He gave a yawn, spinning to face me. "Wwwweeeee are going to the Surgeon."
I blanched. "That sounds like a horror film."
"Mm," he murmured, a bemused smile curling his lips. "It could easily turn into something exactly like that." His eyes lit as he turned to stare down at me, that smile turning into a full smirk, his eyes slipping shut. "That's why you-" He tapped me on the nose. "Will let me do all the talking."
"And you won't get me killed?" I couldn't help clarifying, climbing onto Minoru's back as Hisoka strolled away, his hands in his pocket.
His eyes caught me sidelong. "Oh, pet. That's for later~"
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