AN: Hey everyone, after doing a metric fuckton of wiki scrubbing I realized I got a few key timeline points messed up which would catapult the current timeframe a few days forward. Knowing this I made an executive decision to… do nothing.
Rewrites are time-consuming and bothersome and the story still develops well enough, it's just not going to follow how the cannon events played out. And If you hate that then what's the point of reading a fanfic? Like just go read the source lmao.
If anyone is wondering what I got messed up it was the time frame of Gon and Killuas Spider hunt. It only happens after Uvogin escapes confinement and kills the Nostrade head bodyguard. But Nobunaga looking for Uvogin in a previous chapter contradicts that.
So to clarify, On the day after the Shadow beasts get killed along with auction attendees Gon and Killua look for the Troupe as the bounties got pushed out earlier. (which makes more sense if you ask me) and they get caught while Uvogin is still being interrogated by the Nostrades. Magenta then finds out they were captured, goes with Leorio to rescue them, only gets Gon out, and they are currently recuperating. And as you are about to find out in this chapter Uvogin simultaneously escaped the same night but wishes for revenge against the 'chain user'. A few other things will be explained in the following chapters if it is still unclear.
- - - - - End of Author Note - - - - -
"Hello, may I ask who is calling?" Over the phone, we heard a practiced and courteous professional greeting in the voice of our shared friend. Quickly switching it over to the speaker, I lowered my phone to allow the other two to hear the following conversation.
" Hey Kurapika, it's the time skip versions of your friends!" with a small smile on my face that wasn't translated through my tired inflection of voice. Though, seeing the slight confusion and bewilderment on both of their faces was a sight for sure.
"What?... *sigh* Is that you? I'm currently working right now so I can't talk right now, so I'll call you back later?" Trying to quickly suppress his surprise, he went right back to his customer service voice as he tried to hang up on us immediately. Most likely due to him being well… working right now.
"Woah there, wait a minute, will you? I was calling for an important reason, A reason that involves the whereabouts of the spiders!" Panicking for a smidge, I quickly grabbed his attention as I raised my voice a few levels, getting more than a few annoyed looks from the still drowsy morning commuters on the sidewalks.
"That… okay, give me a minute to get someone to cover for me before calling you back… we have a situation here after all." Ending the conversation the three of us gave short goodbyes to Kurapika as we went back to waiting around for a while. Something I was starting to hate…
*Ring* *Ring* *Beep* roughly twenty minutes later we got a call from Kurapika which I subsequently picked up. I mean, we were ready to pick up the call as we did next to nothing the whole time. It wasn't the greatest idea as we coil at least have looked for a bench or done anything else with that time.
"Hello, Is this Magenta on the phone?" quickly switching back into speaker mode, I went over and smacked Leorio on the shoulder as he fell asleep leaning against the wall. We were all dead tired and it showed, Gon was currently yawning as he snapped back into attention as the call began.
"yeah, thats my number but you are on speaker and I am with Gon and Leorio as well." with that a small chorus of 'hellos' as we began to communicate our whereabouts so we could meet in person before discussing anything that could be considered confidential. So in the meanwhile, we talked about what we all did during our time apart as we made our way to a nearby building appointed by Kurapika as our meeting spot.
"By the way, where is Killua at? I figured he would be with Gon, Is he doing something else currently?" suddenly broaching a sore topic during our conversation. We all somewhat recoiled at the question. And seeing as how Leorio and Gon were staring at me as they were uncomfortable ripping the metaphorical band-aid off.
*Sigh* "yesterday, after the Mob Families started rolling out bounties after the mess the Troupe caused our 'Terrific Trio' of Leorio, Gon, and… Killua to go search for the Spiders as their previous attempts at raising money have been well, awful." priming Kurapika with the context of our current situation, I began to pick up our shared pace as I figured it would be best to be in person if this conversation was going the way it was.
" "Hey!" " giving me a pointed look and scowl respectively, Gon and Leorio voiced their frustrations with me. Apparently, they didn't take it well that I thought their get-rich-quick scheme actually sucked.
"They ended up finding and trailing two members and then got jumped by other additional members. We can talk about their general appearances later but you need to know that they got into a confrontation but I managed to arrive on time. I ended up being able to save only one person at the time and I got pretty roughed up. So to answer your question, he is being held prisoner by the troupe." Finishing off my explanation, we made it to the outside of the appointed building.
"!!!" And whilst we hurried into the lobby, there was a deafening silence over the phone accompanied by a surge of aura infused with anger that leaked out for the slightest moment. Though, looking at either the staff or my friends I noticed everyone seemed unfazed and hadn't noticed.
"God, don't freak out so much. The situation is not as grim as it sounds… I think. Regardless, Killua is going to be a lot more suited to surviving in this situation than Gon would. Also, we made it here in the lobby where are you?"
*Beep* *beep* *Beep* Without any notice the call was hung and ended unexpectedly in a show of behavior I hadn't really seen in Kurapika before. Frowning I turned to look around the room as I pocketed the phone, having both 'hands' in my pockets as we three waited for a short moment as we saw a door open behind the staff counter as Kurapika walked out to us with an unreadable expression.
And with not really much of anything said, he gestured for us to follow him back to the door he came from. Which then lead to a back hallway with various staff facilities but also a cordoned-off stairwell that led to a private room that we were now situated inside of.
"So… we wanted to meet up with you because we figured you would want to know anything regarding the spiders but you would also be willing to help us out with saving Killua." The first to speak was surprisingly Leorio, who immediately began to steer the conversation towards the problem at hand for us.
"I see, I am definitely willing to help but I cannot do so without knowing anything about the circumstances. Can you please describe how you got into this situation?"
"Mn, before this we wanted to win a copy of Greed Island from the auctions as it contains a clue to finding my father. So when the bounties were posted we went to search for any leads. The rest of the story went just about the same as Magenta described it over the phone. I was surrounded by the man I was tailing who was in civilian clothes with a katana and a man in a tracksuit. There was also a woman with pink hair and there was a mention of another member named Pakunoda" Summarizing what he knew, Gon continued to maintain eye contact with Kurapika who was silently sitting and listening to his explanations. Eventually, though, he turned to me as he silently conveyed he wanted me to talk about the next part.
"I guess I am talking about the ensuing battle… well I did manage to escape with our lives but I wouldn't call it a victory considering our situation. I lost handily…" Beginning my explanation I began to compile my thoughts over the various shortcomings and failures of the battle that night, something I never had the time or desire to do up till now.
*groans* " You are having too much with this." cursing under his breath, Leorio laid his head on the table in exasperation.