Chapter Text
Golden eyes. An earnest smile. Freckles that mark a childhood spent in sunlight.
Killua shakes out his hands, hoping to flick away heart fluttering memories and dread that sinks through his gut like ink in water.
“I need you tomorrow,” says Illumi. His hands drag across the spines of the books, fingers knobby and nails sharp. He eyes the titles with the same vacant, disinterested scowl he has for everything.
Iron supports hold aloft the domed glass ceiling and cast sweeping shadows like eagle’s wings. Fading dusk sky snatches away scarce warmth from the city below.
Killua shrugs off his suit jacket and drapes it over the back of one of the few couches clustered by the unlit fireplace. He walks past the table stacked high with stolen documents awaiting review by himself, his parents, or senior staff.
As Illumi browses through the children’s books—Killua suppresses a disgusted sneer—he slides a brass ladder along the wall of the circular library. Its wobbly wheels scream in the otherwise silent air. He swallows hard and hopes that he hasn’t awoken Kikyo.
Body sluggish and aching for sleep, he climbs up and finds what he’s looking for by the marks he left in the dust a few days prior. It’s an old farmer’s almanac with folklore stories scattered throughout, factual and fantastical in equal measure.
Killua hops to the floor and runs his thumb along the scarlet cover.
It’s an illustration of a humanoid goat standing over a river of blood. Her apron flies in a vicious wind, and the scissors she holds over her head are open around a crescent moon. She stares straight out at the viewer, defiant and oozing with fury.
Killua passes the book to Illumi and Illumi looks up at him, unblinking. For a moment, Killua thinks he’s going to make him pick out something else, but then he adds it to the small stack balanced in the crook of his elbow.
Illumi fades towards one of the arched entrances, which gapes wide like a jaw.
Killua bites his lip.
“Can I give them to her?”
Illumi pauses, a hand gracefully posed on the archway. He smiles, but it doesn’t reach his eyes.
“Was there any trouble tonight?”
“Will I see you again?”
Killua can hardly keep himself standing. He rubs the side of his temple with the heel of his palm, before forcing himself to open his eyes as wide as he can manage.
“I’m fine.”
Illumi tut-tuts, sickeningly similar to their mother. “Oh Kil, you must be falling ill. Go rest. I don’t want to lose my best spotter.”
Killua is going to vomit.
He hisses in a breath to argue, but something about the way Illumi raises an eyebrow stops him. For a moment he’s pulled into his brother’s dense orbit. A cold sweat runs down his neck.
Killua’s legs itch, screaming both to run and freeze like ice.
Illumi breaks the stare, and Killua gasps, his breathing heavy.
“Goodnight, Kil,” he says, before vanishing with steps so smooth he may as well have been a ghost.
Killua raises a hand to the base of his neck and rubs his skin in a fruitless attempt to self-soothe.
Illumi is far from good company, but he leaves a vacuum in his wake.
Killua does not enjoy solitude. Loneliness, he has learned to live with; solitude, he abhors.
The library is gray and old. It’s a room that hasn’t seen proper use in years, a forgotten corner of the Zoldyck estate with mildew air that itches Killua’s nose and tastes like dust on his tongue. The books are no more than lifeless stacks of paper, ripped apart from the one who loved—loves—them most. The reading chair in the corner, undisturbed even by the housekeepers, calls out for company.
“Will I see you again?”
Killua grabs the hair at his temples and tries not to scream. For a moment, grief compresses him so hard he’s knocked to his knees.
There are translucent hands wrapped around his arms, grabbing at his neck, twisting the flesh of his thighs. His chest bubbles with panic that wants to spill over into sobs. A reckless desire he’s kept in check for years torrents through his heart, and he wants nothing more than to give in and let it ruin him.
Killua has survived through routine and a lace veil of iron between himself and the world beyond his fingertips, but now the walls are crashing down around him.
A thousand deaths on his hands, and he is going to crack for just one person.
There’s a chance, a risk, so stupidly foolish he hates himself for even considering the possibility.
Killua is a professional murderer. He has the heart of a killer, and the drying blood under his fingertips to prove it. He has never shown mercy, and tonight has yet to become an exception. His record is flawless, and his legacy, should he choose to embrace it, will be unparalleled.
Life stretches out before him, every cranny of it predetermined, and he has learned to accept that, to swallow it, for the sake of his sister.
It’s been months since he was allowed to see her, to rest her head in his lap and answer her questions about the outside. Even the polish on his toes has chipped away.
What do they have left to lose? Pain does not scare him, and they dare not touch her.
***
There are pinup posters on the walls of Milluki’s room, and a strip of lights wrapped around the ceiling that flash green and purple. Monitors are mounted to the walls, and boxes of cables in tangled knots are stored under the desk.
Milluki doesn’t even look up when Killua closes the door.
“What do you want?” he asks, tapping his finger on the mouse. A loading bar ticks slowly on one screen, and a jumble of code Killua has never cared to understand lights up another. Milluki continues working, used to more hysterical interrupters than Killua.
What does he want? Killua pauses for a moment, and then he almost laughs, because any answer even close to honest is surreal.
“Can you do me a favour?”
Milluki chokes at that, before spinning his chair around. There’s a glowing smile on his face, though he’s trying to hide it and failing poorly. A flash of irritation burns on Killua’s cheeks.
“Sorry, can you repeat that?”
Killua grinds his teeth and swallows his pride. “I need a favour.”
Milluki claps his hands together and rocks back in his chair. His eyes sparkle with delight. “Anything for my most darling little brother.”
“Shut up,” says Killua, his nose wrinkling.
Milluki’s enthusiasm is undeterred. “What do you need?”
Killua plunges over the point of no return before he can convince himself of reason. Hesitation, his grandfather always said, is the antidote to good fortune. “I need you to leak the outgoing messages from Zenji’s phone over the past two weeks. It can’t be tied back to us, and no one can find out about it.”
Milluki nods happily, and he’s already closed out one screen for another when he stills. “Wait—does anyone know about this?”
Killua shakes his head, frustrated and impatient. Kikyo could wake at any moment, Silva should be home soon, and Illumi has a knack for appearing when he is least wanted. Which is always.
Milluki sobers and worries his lip with his teeth. “I mean, yeah, I can do it, but…” His eyes slide up to the monitors and then down to Killua’s feet. “It isn’t a good idea.”
“I’ll owe you. Seriously.” Killua watches the door, his palms sweaty and his mouth dry.
Milluki sneers at that. “Obviously, idiot. But if they find out—”
“They won’t. You’re good at what you do.”
Milluki rubs the back of his neck, unconvinced. Killua can’t blame him, but he needs Milluki to help him.
Anxiety rises in his chest and he has to slide his hands into his pockets to keep from running them through his hair.
“Milluki, please.”
Milluki’s eyes shoot up to his. Killua doesn’t know what does it, but something about his voice, or maybe his expression, makes Milluki bite his cheek and shake his head.
He licks his lips, and then huffs a laugh. “Tell you what, Kil,” he says, turning back to his keyboard. “It’ll be one hell of a favour.”