Chapter Text
Childhood wishes and midnight flights of fancy, Gon believes, are the stuff of legends.
Sure, they aren’t all realistic.
Nor can all of them count as attainable goals.
For example, if a child says they want to fly over the clouds someday— well, the adults might ask, indulgent, how can that be?
Of course, that child almost surely has an answer: they know it can’t.
But impossibilities can’t hold back a child’s imagination.
A child will tell you how it can be. That they’ll find a way to make it happen, that, somehow, they’ll borrow a set of wings and soar like a bird past the boundary of clouds hanging over the mountain peaks.
That same child will turn around and remember what you told them at least three months ago: they know not all dreams come true.
But impossibilities can’t stop a child from dreaming.
They can’t stop Gon, either.
It’s a big, big world out there.
Gon’s been dreaming of it, dreaming of seeing every corner of it since he was old enough to walk.
Old enough to run, to traverse the crisscrossing docks of Whale Island without accompaniment, to chance a running leap from slippery river rock to moss-laden forest ground, to spend several days at a time camping and exploring the connected isles through bridges and borrowed boats.
Old enough to put a name the feeling which swelled all the more in his heart at every mention of his father, every whisper of the burdened title Ging carried with him far and away from here.
Wanderlust.
He would go, someday, to the sprawling continents that stretched beyond these comparatively small shores.
Because as glad as he was for the atlases, the almanacs, the history books and travel guides, Gon knew.
They couldn’t divulge to him what his senses, what his experiences, could.
He would go, someday, bringing invaluable tales and souvenirs of his travels back to Granny and Mito-san both.
Because as grateful as he was for their protection, for their care, for their kindness, Gon knew.
He could look after himself, if he had to, as he learned how to thanks to their support all along.
He would go, someday, to the lands that called and beckoned for him.
Because as wishful thinking as it was, hopeful rather than probable, Gon refused to give up.
Earning his Hunter’s license was the one and only dream to ever make his heart swell like this.
Wishes.
Hopes.
Dreams.
All powerful things.
All miraculous things, moldable things.
Far more tangible, too, than adults allow themselves to believe they are.
And if there was one thing that Gon had learned over the past twelve years, it was that his beliefs had yet to lead him astray.
Not his greatest dreams, his greatest hopes, or his greatest wishes.
Certainly not his greatest found treasure on the journey to self-actualization — someone with whom to share all those dreams, hopes, and wishes.
Gon is more agile than most boys his age, knows more about nature than some twice his age ever learned in school.
But if there’s one thing Gon wants to understand more than anything else, it’s why people and animals are always compared.
He has a few guesses why.
No one person’s the same as another. It’s similar for animals, because just like humans wear different clothes and have different nose shapes, the animal world has its chosen adaptations.
He gets it — the differences in diversity — but is that really all there is?
No one person can do as much as a group. That’s why animals and humans form social groups, why so many gather together to protect and work together to increase their chances to survive.
He gets it — only the fit will make it — but is that the fairest way there is?
No one person’s contribution is the same. It’s not quite the same for animals, but even when you know how an animal usually behaves, that doesn’t mean it’ll always act that way.
But he understands, now, why people hold onto those ideals.
He understands why people long for stability, for constancy.
He understands why people — like animals — seek that stability in one another.
But before one encounter leads to another, there are three.
Gon, Kurapika, and Leorio.
As much strangers as they are like long-forgotten storybook characters, Gon learns of them in scattered pages of rewritten histories twined. Afraid of departures untimely, afraid of misunderstandings unsightly.
Soon, they are a trio who start down the beginning of their journey and learn of one another — learn to be friends as much as companions — through watching and walking down the path ahead in bounding strides.
Gon, most of all, is surest and steadiest on his feet with the comfort of company at either side of him.
(“What would we do,” chides the cluck of Leorio’s tongue and the chime of Kurapika’s vague laughter, “without you, Gon?”
The answer, Gon finds in the ensuing months to follow, is that they’d do just fine without him.
But he, without them, just won’t do.)
Because he is.
They’re the same age but they’re far from similar.
Nowhere close to being the same, no matter their synchronicity and actions in tandem.
He learns that from the moment they meet, from the moment the other boy rolls up on his skateboard next to him, introduces himself and notes that we're the same age and decides maybe running’s not so bad and matches his near silent footfalls to Gon’s momentum.
Still, there’s little to nothing about their brief interactions during the examination’s first phase that should make Killua think him strange.
If anything, Gon comes to realize in the weeks and months and years spent in camaraderie in their company of four, Killua’s the strange one.
He’s not. Shy. No, even if he’s not exactly conversational, shy isn’t the word Gon would use to describe Killua.
Killua does like to keep to himself, though.
Likes to keep things to himself.
Thinks constantly of the value and virtue to solitary living.
Unlike Gon, who doesn’t like to think about future prospects indeterminate, Killua carries the weight of what ifs and how fars and till whens and never lets go.
Unlike Gon, who doesn’t like to think about separations in momentary encounters, Killua chooses detachment because it hurts less in the long run.
Unlike Gon, who doesn’t act “courageous” or “childish” or “charming” or any of the words people use to describe him on purpose, doesn’t make an effort to befriend and bestow kindness onto others because he’s learned how to trust — he simply does — Killua does not grant his trust or his truths or his too-few toothy smiles to everyone who crosses his path.
But strange as Killua can be — strange as he is — he gives Gon the one thing that Gon’s never known he needed:
A friend.