(A/N: Hello peeps! Thanks to all the people who reviewed, favorite, and followed! Special thanks to those who reviewed to tell me that they understood my issues and exhaustion. It greatly encouraged me. ^^ Enjoy the chapter, I own nothing!)
Chapter 5: Come Out Swinging
The next day, Sam was practically vibrating in the hospital bed. She couldn't wait to leave this antiseptic mixed with flowers smelling place! She needed to DO something! And being laid up in a hospital bed just made her a sitting duck for KNIFE. Before she could work herself up even more, the cavalry of insanity arrived. (Read: the host club)
"SAM-CHAN!" She felt her small sempai latch onto her good side. "Are you ready to leave? We can all go get some cake together!"
Sam heard Kyoya clear his throat. "Actually, there are some things we should discuss before Sam gets discharged." He gave her a significant look. She sighed, and knew he was right.
Gathering her courage and hoping she wouldn't lose any friends for this, she began, "So, you all know my father's company designs and manufactures weapons, correct? Well if you didn't, you do now….Anyway, being in such a business means that we have enemies. Well, my parents do and I'm a lovely little target. It came to the attention of KNIFE that I'm currently in Japan and not in that cold, lonely fortress my parents called our mansion in California. I'm guessing they're the ones who sent the idiot with crap aim to shoot me. By the way, Kyoya, did anyone ever catch the bastard?"
Every single one of the hosts that didn't know before now, had a dark expression on their faces. They seemed to be in shock.
Kyoya adjusted his glasses and frowned responding, "We did find the weapon which was sent off to the lab for some forensic work, but the perpetrator themselves escaped. The Black Onion Squad is currently combing the area for suspicious characters, but-"
"Why didn't you tell us?" To Sam's shock, it was Mori who asked this. He was looking at her intently, along with the rest of the club barring Kyoya.
"For one, I thought that I could handle it on my own. That got disproven with the lovely bullet wound I now sport. For another, I thought you all would freak out and worry. That is partially proven to be a stupid notion as all of you are taking this rather well. Lastly, I thought if I told you all…you wouldn't want to be my friends anymore. You all are my first friends…ever. I didn't and don't want to lose you all." She was fighting tears at this point; she had NEVER expressed something so personal because she had no one to express it to. Her parents had pretty much scoffed at any expression of her caring for them when she was younger, so they didn't count. But somehow, in just the past month these boys and Haruhi had come to mean the world to her.
"Well, that's stupid." Sam looked up, to see Haruhi speaking. "These rich bastards all have their own security, apparently Kyoya-sempai has his own police force, and you think we'll just abandon you when you need us the most?!"
Sam may have had something in her eye….yeah, that's why tears were falling down her face.
"Takashi's and my families are renowned for our martial arts, so we'll definitely make sure no one hurt's you again, Sam-chan." Honey spoke in a serious voice.
Mori nodded from behind his cousin and said, "Yeah."
"Why would-" Hikaru started.
"-we abandon-" Kaoru continued.
"-one of our toys?" Hikaru finished and they both smiled instead of their usual smirks.
"You're family." Tamaki said simply.
"It appears as though you are stuck with us." Kyoya smiled.
That smile damn near took Sam's breath away. Who am I kidding? I'm definitely crying. Oh well, I've had surgery and was unconscious for several hours. I'm allowed to be emotional... She wiped her eyes and looked for something matter-of-fact to ask. "So am I getting out of this place or what?" …for a moment.
Kyoya opened HER notebook and answered, "Yes you're being released today, but I thought it best not to give you your street clothes before reading the rules you'll have to follow until you recover. "
Sam raised an eyebrow at that. That just asked for a comment. "You're holding my clothes hostage?"
Haruhi was looking at Kyoya accusatorily, the twins were looking at him approvingly, Tamaki looked scandalized, and the cousins didn't look surprised.
"I am. You will be getting your stiches out in two weeks, but until then you are not to: lift anything weighing more than 7 kilograms….15 American pounds, you are not to strain yourself, you are not to drive your motorcycle until you are off of your pain medication, and you may not resume your martial arts training until the doctor says it's alright. Will you stick with that willingly?" He gave her a look.
Sam weighed her options; she could either: walk out of this hospital in a very breezy hospital gown and likely open her stitches OR she could take it easy and get to hang out with her friends in her normal boy clothes. This was a no brainer. "Sure, I'm not a complete idiot y'know."
"Oh, I know that." He definitely went through my notes…ass. Buuuuuuut I did the same. Oh well. "While I have your ear-"
"More like my clothes." Sam grumbled.
"-we need to set up your security." He finished, with a slight grin at her interruption.
Sam sighed, but at this point just wanted to get out of the damn hospital. "As long as it is discrete, I'll trust your judgment. Now may I PLEASE have my clothes?!"
Kyoya looked mildly surprised and pleased at her acquiescence of his demands and grabbed the bag full of clothing gathered from Sam's apartment and handed it to the girl. Sam looked in to see what they had grabbed and actually blushed when she saw her underwear and fresh bindings included in the outfit. She looked up at Kyoya with raised brows.
A faint flush appeared on his face, he coughed into his hand before explaining. "Of course Haruhi was the one to gather your clothing; she's the only one with a spare key."
Sam breathed a sigh of relief while the other hosts were shocked—was the supremely unflappable Kyoya embarrassed? The twins were quivering in delight over having something on the Shadow King and light bulbs seemed to flicker on above the heads of Haruhi, Honey, and Mori.
Sam cleared her throat, "Now boys, it's just been covered that I care for you very dearly. That being said, if you don't leave so that I can change I will not hesitate to kick you all in some very uncomfortable areas. Haruhi, I may need some help…could you please stay?"
Haruhi smiled kindly and said, "Sure, Sempai."
The rest of the hosts (including Kyoya, though he would insist that he merely 'walked with purpose') scurried out of the room.
####
Whilst Haruhi helped her make sure she didn't stretch herself in such a way that would mess with her stitches and bind her chest in such a way that wouldn't interfere with her bandaging, Sam decided to talk to Haruhi about a few things.
"Haruhi-chan, you can tell your dad about the situation if you want. In fact, it's probably better that you do. He needs to be careful, and he seems like the type of parent who would like to know such things." Sam stated this very carefully, she didn't want to sound insulting or arrogant.
Haruhi, for her part, was astounded by the level of trust her Sempai was showing in her. She knew that her Sempai was a highly defensive person because of her poor relationship with her parents. (She'd never asked about it, but it was apparent just in the passing comments that Sam made.) "I don't know if I would want to do that; but I appreciate the amount of trust that showed, Sempai."
Sam was apprehensive about what her younger friend was saying. "Haruhi-chan, I will respect your wishes…but this is a possibly life-threatening situation for the both of you and I feel that he should know. I care about you (and by extension your father) too much to not have both of you on the look-out for suspicious people and willing to call for back up. I don't want to lose my very first friend because of a situation that I brought upon her family and everyone else who is associated with me because of my presence here!" She was once again battling tears. What is in those pain meds?
Haruhi was incredibly touched by her Sempai's words. (If a little irritated at the thought that she couldn't look after herself.) All in all, she felt that right now what her shaking Sempai needed was comfort; and though she wasn't a particular fan of physical affection in public places, she drew Sam in for a hug.
##Kyoya's POV##
"So what's the plan, Stan?" he heard the distinctive "male" version of Sam's voice behind him.
He turned and saw his cr-classmate; yes- classmate was the word he was looking for… He adjusted his glasses to center himself. He turned to see her in male bright red skinny jeans, a dark grey t-shirt, a loose leather jacket, and boots. All in all, it was your typical "punk" look that he typically despised. So why did it make him have to hide his blush and wish to remove it from her person…personally? Perhaps it's the fact that he knew more than most about what was hidden underneath them? Or the fact that her mind was just as attractive?...
He was brought out of this dangerous train of thought by its cause; she had tapped on his shoulder tentatively, an eyebrow raised but concern overshadowed the mirth that was usually dancing in those eyes.
"Did I lose you with my American idioms again? I thought that one was fairly obvious…." She asked, with only a hint of sarcasm.
Well, he couldn't let her think that he was an idiot, so he said, "I was still trying to figure out how you were able to hide your gender so well." What on earth possessed me to say that?! I have been a host for almost two years and an Ootori all my life. That can be taken in entirely too many poor ways. On top of that, the blush he had been fighting might actually be winning….for the second time today. Damn.
Sam looked at him at first offended, then calculating, and then spontaneously that smile that made him incredibly reckless appeared on her beautiful face with an intensity that took his breath away. "You know what, knowing you….you've probably written in my notebook. So, I'll read it after all of you pick one flower each for me to take home and then donate the rest of them to the other patients here. So let's switch them back now, please?"
"That sounds reasonable." How. The. HELL. Did. He. Forget. The. Others. Were. Watching this?! Oh no. Those looks….he had memorized all of the hosts' important and "dangerous" expressions so that he could know when to help them out of sticky situations. Which they always seemed to find. Right now, all of them were looking at him with a mixture of the same three expressions: surprise, amusement, and most dangerous of all….knowing.
##And back to Sam's POV now that I've had the unholy glee of making Kyoya act so un-Kyoya##
Sam could not hold back a grin. The way that Kyoya had been looking at her just made her incredibly hopeful and she now had a family. Who couldn't seem to decide on the flowers they wanted to give her.
"You all do know that the fact that these flowers are coming from you negates what they look like, right?" She just wanted to be at her apartment where she could smell the familiar scent of paper, ink, and her body wash with just a hint of coffee.
Tamaki gave her that dangerous sparkly look. "Tamaki, just this once you may hug me. But only if you do so extremely gently. I rather like having my stitches…stitched."
Tamaki's grin made it totally worth it; he had completely grown on her like a little brother of sorts. As he rushed over and for once was not attempting to crush all her ribs simultaneously, Hikaru started to pull out his phone to take a picture. "Hikaru, if you proceed to snap that picture I will be forced to snap your fingers." Just because she was allowing this, didn't mean that she wanted the entire fan base of the club writing yaoi about her and Tamaki…..that would be incestuous, confusing, and just plain wrong.
"…you can let go of me now, idiot."
Everyone in the room wore a smile, but her eyes kept straying to one in particular.
##Haruhi POV##
Haruhi was angry. Very angry. Why? Sam's apartment. There was almost no furniture, none of that furniture was of high quality, and Sam's parents were the bastards that furnished it! Her wealthy parents! It was—Haruhi couldn't think of a bad enough word for it!
The worst part was Sam's acceptance that this was to be expected from her parents!
Haruhi didn't like this, and she knew just the livid Shadow King to ask for help digging up dirt on those cretins.
##On the other Side of the Room Sam POV##
She didn't know what Haruhi and Kyoya were brooding and plotting about, but the idea of such an alliance terrified her so she looked back to the twins.
"You guys….that's a terrible idea. You may want to irritate Tamaki, and I get that….it's really fun! But did you ever think that if you altered a photo of a shirtless male Haruhi and posted it online, that Haruhi would likely kill you? Or that any future job that she might have could be ruined by THAT photo coming up under her name?" Sam would absolutely NOT stand for them to upset Haruhi in that fashion or ruin her dreams.
The twins looked completely blindsided by her taking a no-nonsense stance on this instead of encouraging the chaos like normal. "Why are you both so surprised by this? I'm cool with pranks and teasing as long as it doesn't hurt any of you guys or Haruhi."
"Why are you-" Hikaru started.
"-addressing us-" Kaoru continued.
"-like that?" Hikaru finished and they both tilted their heads.
"What? Like you're two separate people capable of independent thoughts? You are. You might be identical, but your voices have minutely different pitches and your behaviors are different when you're not trying to be simultaneous to confuse the guests. I do admit that it's pretty funny, but it's also very harmful for you two to be doing that to yourselves. Haruhi can also tell you apart. If you let anyone else try or wanted them to, they could. But they also have to want to tell you apart and care enough to do so. And that is a frightening thought, I get it. My parents wanted a boy so much that they did everything to hide that I'm a girl. They encouraged 'manly' hobbies and pretended. They saw what they wanted to see. Hell, they are forcing me to cross-dress against my will with the threat of disowning me! But you know what? I have thought and planned and I am going to follow my dream! What you need to do is to discuss what you both want in life honestly and then figure out a way to bother Tamaki whilst including Haruhi and I in the fun!" Sam could spot a scheme from a mile away and had been observing the twins grow restless recently. She knew what they wanted, but what they needed was completely different! And she wasn't going to let her little brothers do that to themselves!
This time, it was she herself that had forgotten that the other hosts were there. Until Tamaki started clapping and yelling flowery things about her speech (which she admitted was a bit dramatic for even her). The twins were looking completely dumbstruck. Mori and Honey were looking at her with respect. Haruhi was looking at her with respect mixed with exasperation and amusement at the last part about bugging Tamaki.
Kyoya was looking at her with something burning in his eyes that sent a shiver down her spine.
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(A/N: So I seriously deviated from plot and wrote Kyoya OOC for multiple reasons: I honestly think that Kyoya would be THAT wrong footed by figuring out that he even has a crush, Sam is very observant because she hasn't had that many people to observe and her martial arts training…that combined is powerful and shows just how alone she's been, Sam tolerates very little bullshit when it comes to the health and happiness of her newly realized family, and she also has finally broken down a bit now that she's been through something so traumatic as being shot and that shot almost hitting her also newly realized crush. *Plus, it made me cackle to write Kyoya NOT ONLY not having a witty comeback BUT ALSO saying something without much tact.* This has been one of my most favorite chapters to write of anything thus far. I hope you all enjoyed my efforts and thanks for sticking with this!)