#hunterhunter

It’d taken three months to even get the form to request the form for being let loose on the world, which you’d chalked up to the Hunters Association wanting more time to see what kind of monster you were. You didn’t mind it, but would have preferred just the transparent slap in the face instead of the gruelling wait to be given this much free roam.

Their reluctance in setting you free, being followed by about thirty rules to keep to, was just another one of their brands of bureaucratic nonsense. It wouldn’t change your behaviour per se, but in case you went rogue, they could point to those rules in court and prove they’d done their due in protecting civilians. 

Or maybe you’d been watching too many legal dramas.

Morel had been much more clear when he’d escorted you to the mansion.

Mess up and get hunted. 

“I wonder if someone is just paid to listen to this twenty-four seven.” You questioned, remembering looking through the brochures you’d been given. “It’d be much more cost-effective to just give me a bomb collar or something like that.”

Kolt sighed, the familiar, long-suffering sound you’d come to associate exclusively with him. “Don’t give anyone ideas. And remember, you can still back out. Wait a few more years. Kite, Ikalgo, Palm. They’ll all be in better positions to vouch for you properly.”

You tilted your head back, staring at the ceiling. “Hm.”

He glanced at you then, just briefly, but you said nothing more. Every time this conversation resurfaced, you found yourself unable to explain it. Kolt probably chalked it up to restlessness. Over a year confined to the house would do that to anyone. But it wasn’t that simple.

It wasn’t the constant checks. The careful phrasing. The way every decision had to pass through someone else’s hands first. Something within you found living here to feel like your soul was being grated and you couldn’t really figure out why.  

There was probably a memory buried at the center of it all, something that you couldn’t quite reach, or didn’t want to. All you knew was this: the walls felt closer every day, and the weight of being watched and contained pressed in on your chest.

You couldn’t stand this place for even a second longer.

And so Dark Continent it was.

The garden is quiet in that soft, listening way it gets near dusk. The grass is cool beneath your fingers, still damp from watering, and Kite sits next to you with his legs folded awkwardly, hands resting in his lap like he’s not entirely sure what to do with them yet. He’d gotten another growth spurt, and was nearly as tall as you, though the chubbiness of his cheeks still marked him as a youngster.

You watch him for a second longer than necessary.

He’s still getting used to his body, finding it uncomfortable in many ways. You wonder if he feels jealousy towards you, but find that you would never be able to articulate that aloud. Instead you say the other hard thing.

“So,” you say lightly, breaking the silence. “I’m going to leave.”

Kite blinks. Once. Then again.

“Leave?” he repeats, voice forcefully lower than it actually is. He’s done that since his vocal chords started working, training them to sound more masculine. “You’ve received permission?”

You nod. “Into the world. Properly. A delegation of hunters is going to the edge of the world, and I’ve been asked to come with, for one reason or the other. Probably bad news, but it’ll be a change of pace.”

As you say it, your face shifts without you thinking about it.

Your jaw sharpens, eyes narrowing into something familiar, something stern. Silver hair spills down your back. For a moment, you’re tall, broad-shouldered and old.

Then it slips again.

Your features soften, rounding out. Dark hair replaces silver. Your gaze grows quieter, steadier, warm in a way that aches just a little. Then another change. A sharp intensity flashes through you, eyes bright and protective, posture angled like you’re ready to bite anyone who gets too close.

You don’t stop talking as it happens.

“I’ve been here long enough,” you continue, voice adjusting with each shift, never quite matching the face it comes from. “I know how to move around without causing problems. I know what I am now, not like at the start. I can take care of myself. I even get a few months to myself before departure, which could be fun.”

You settle into a final shape without realizing it. A woman’s face.

“I don’t want to feel like I’m abandoning you.” You suddenly whisper. “But I am going. No matter what.”

You exhale.

Kite has gone very still.

“You don’t have to be so apologetic,” he says.

You glance at him with green- blue- grey eyes. “Huh?”

He tilts his head, studying you with unsettling seriousness for someone who still looks like he should be chasing bugs through the grass. “You’re shifting constantly.” His eyes track your face carefully. “Those are… important people, aren’t they?”

Your throat tightens. Just a little.

“…I think so,” you admit. You remember nothing, but some faces come much more easily than others.

He hesitates, then adds, gently, “Maybe they’re your parents?”

The word lands softer than you expect, and still knocks the air out of you.

You let the borrowed face melt away completely. No disguise. No performance. Just you, sitting there with your hands curled loosely in your sleeves, pupils faintly narrow in the fading light.

“I don’t remember,” you say after a moment. “Not really. But you were so small in the beginning, and Kolt didn’t know what to do with you most days. I think I might’ve picked up a thing or two in a past life, though.” You give a small, crooked smile. “I guess that’s why I feel guilty about leaving.”

Kite looks down at his hands, thinking. Then he looks back up.

“Does it frighten you?” he asks. “Going out?”

You consider it honestly.

“No,” you say. “If I wouldn’t worry about you two, I’d probably already roam the world, but I didn’t want to disappear without explaining.”

He nods slowly, then surprises you by scooting closer, bumping his shoulder lightly against your arm. It’s earnest, and you feel warmed by it.

“You’ll come back someday,” he says. Not asking, since that would be childish of him, and Kite abhors acting his new age. “And I’ll want to hear all about it.”

You smile in a way that doesn’t belong to anyone else.

“Yeah,” you say. “I will.”

He doesn’t break eye contact.

“So make it a story you’ll be able to tell me proudly.”

Your smile turns a bit more forced.

You sit in the stopped car with the engine quiet, hands resting loosely on the wheel. Outside, the supermarket’s automatic doors repeat their steady glide. Open, close, open. Movement in predictable patterns.

Your fingers turn the radio dial.

click.

Morning hosts talk over each other, filling airtime with weather jokes and traffic reminders. Their voices echo inside the small cabin like a conversation you aren’t part of.

A couple walks past the hood of the car, one pushing an empty cart. Their breath fogs in the cold air. They don’t look inside.

It’s been a week or two, you reckon. 

So far, you’ve done nothing with your newfound freedom. 

Sure, you’ve gone to dinner at fancy places, acted the tourist, and spent entire days watching tv in new and exciting locations like the motels on the outskirts of Zaban city. You’re unsure what you’re doing exactly, just moving without purpose. 

click.

A song only half familiar slips into the speakers, soft guitar and steady percussion. A truck pulls into the space across from you and idles. Headlights reflect off your windshield. A kid jumps out of the passenger side and runs toward the store, jacket unzipped and dragging. An old man looks through your windshield and noticeably brightens at you.

That lifts your spirits a little, and you smile back. You’ve chosen the face of an old vintage pop star, one with perfectly maintained curls and a cute pink petticoat dress that feels stuffy in the car. So far, surprising people with odd appearances has been your favourite pastime, though you’re not sure whether you can fill the full three months of waiting before your assignment like that without dying of boredom. 

click.

A stray flyer skitters across the pavement.

The radio keeps changing, music, talk, static, one station bleeding into another.

You turn the dial again.

“-Heaven’s Arena! Tonight’s long-awaited match has ended in absolute catastrophe—”

The commentator’s voice floods the speakers with a strained crackle, the usual polish stripped away. Hisoka’s name comes first, then Chrollo Lucilfer, both familiar names. The broadcast stumbles as it tries to frame what was supposed to be a spectacle: a historic bout, a clash of legends.

Back in the mansion, you watched a lot of Heaven’s Arena matches. A lot. There’d been a rerun on the television one day (you watched a bunch of television regardless since there wasn’t a lot to do, and you weren’t one to create work for yourself) and you’d been delighted at the costumes, the showmanship and the over-the-top introductions.

Not a lot of the fights were interesting, but as soon as you’d found your favourite, that all changed.

Hisoka.

His outfits! His flair! His skill!

For someone like you who thrived on optics and style, he was like a honey pot beckoning you. What a man!

You’d expressed your interest to Kite at one point, who’d pulled a slightly disgusted face and told you not to be too loud in your appreciation. Apparently, Hisoka wasn’t known positively among hunters.

For the first time since you started browsing through the stations, you stop turning the dial, your hand hovering as you listen more intently.

Now the details spill out unevenly. Emergency sirens. Collapsed floors. Unconfirmed casualties. Witnesses describing bodies in the stands, and the unimaginable footage of entire sections of the arena jumping from the bleachers into the fray. The blunt voice of the commentator replays fragments of earlier hype, excited predictions, cheerful promos, now jarringly out of place beneath the grim updates.

“This was meant to be entertainment,” the commentator says, voice tight. “Security is urging all remaining spectators to evacuate immediately. We repeat: do not return to Heaven’s Arena. We’ve just been informed there will be a press conference in about-”

You turn the car on, and leave the parking lot, taking one final look at a woman with the sedan, now calling someone while leaning against her car. What an expressive face. 

As someone who has nothing to do, you feel up for a little disaster tourism.

You slip into the market with a bounce in your step, already smiling to yourself while you move your way towards the high tower of Heaven’s Arena. You aren’t sure what you want to do there, only having heard the business of the site on the radio, but you want to be where the action is, and according to all the news channels, that place housed some real action yesterday. 

It’s busy; the air of the busy market is alive: spices, smoke, sweat, sugar. A thousand overlapping scents brush your tongue, and you savor them instead of filtering them out. Despite it, you can tell it’s less chaotic than usual. Several stalls are unmanned. Police are walking around handing out flyers. There’s a slight layer of unease over the usual market.

You start simple.

The fluorescent scales on your arms fade into smooth skin. Hair spills down your back in a glossy sheet, dark and ordinary. By the time you reach the first row of stalls, you’re a perfectly average woman, the one from the parking lot. You touch her face with slight adoration, imagining how you are looking at this moment.

Despite your infatuation with the face, others don’t pay her nearly as much attention as you want.

You let it last exactly five seconds.

A merchant shouts a deal far too loudly, red-faced and theatrical. You like his confidence, so you borrow some of it. Your shoulders broaden, your frame stretching taller, heavier. Your voice roughens as you laugh at something he says, deep and booming. He beams, mistaking you for a fellow loudmouth, and knocks a few jenny off the price of his baklava without even realizing why.

You grin and move on.

A group of children darts past, nearly colliding with you. You shrink as you walk, limbs lightening, features softening. Suddenly you’re one of them. Small, sharp-eyed, quick-footed. You dart between adults with ease, slipping through gaps that didn’t exist a moment ago. Someone scolds you halfheartedly; you stick your tongue out at them and vanish into the crowd.

Like usual when you’re merging with a crowd like this, the few times you’ve been able to anyways, you feel free and ecstatic. A small pinprick in the back of your mind reminds you that you do this to hunt and eat. To lure people away with a familiar face and devour them like your chimera ant blood wishes you to. 

It’s a biological imperative, one you can ignore if you distract yourself enough. 

It’s the reason you survived the whole ordeal back at NGL. You managed to beg your way out of it, promising you’d never eaten humans on purpose and that you’d never do so again. Your urge to survive was stronger than any violent urges, so it sort of worked out in the end. 

And so you’d traded in death for perpetual hunger and boredom.

A woman selling jewelry catches your attention, so you change again. This time into someone elegant, poised, long-necked and striking. Heads turn. The vendor straightens, suddenly eager to please.

You admire yourself reflected faintly in polished metal. Nice cheekbones. Might reuse those later.

Something bristles at the back of your neck, and you realize some Nen-users are in the crowd. They seem a bit confused, probably feeling how you're using Nen to shift and change through the crowd, but unable to spot you.

The hunters, or you assume them to be for how nosy they’re being, pass nearby, their presence heavy, serious, and so chock full of Nen you feel your mouth salivate. You slide into a new shape mid-step, scent shifting, posture loosening, presence blurring. By the time you cross their path, you’re forgettable incarnate, and it’s hilarious that they never notice.

You wander, change, wander again.

Old man. Young woman. Traveler with sunburned skin. Merchant’s assistant with ink-stained fingers. Each form clicks into place like a game piece, each reaction from the crowd a small, delightful reward.

Underneath it all, your true body hums with contentment, coils loose and relaxed. No fear. No pressure. The world as open to you as you’d need it to be. You wash the earlier dark thoughts from your mind.

Just motion, noise, color and the simple joy of being whoever you feel like being, as many times as you wanted.

But being a passerby is only fun for so long, and you have come to realize you bore quickly, which is a dangerous game for someone like you. You want to be named, recognized and spoken to! Playing this game with Kolt got boring so fast, since he seemed uninterested in most of your attempts to play someone else and always tried to encourage you to be ‘yourself’ instead. 

Your following explanations that being so plural was you being yourself didn’t garner much sympathy, though Kite did still love your impressions, despite thinking himself too adult already for them. They grow up so fast.

By the time you reach Heaven’s Arena, it’s already completely set off. The entire block is surrounded in yellow tape, and though that requires only the disguise of a policeman to get through, the excitement that you’d wished to see is already long gone from the location. There’s remnants, sure, of a large fight. Parts of the tower, damaged and crumbling, people crying and laying down flowers for those who didn’t survive the ordeal. 

But there isn’t anything to do.

You aren’t sure what you wanted when you came here. Part of you just wanted to see Heaven’s Arena, maybe to score some Hisoka merch and watch some matches, but with the tower in this state, there wouldn’t be much of anything in the coming time. 

Now, with the tower damaged and closed indefinitely, that future feels distant, if not impossible. Signs posted outside apologize for the inconvenience and strictly prohibit civilians from entering.

You’re bored.

You traveled all this way on a whim, out of mild stupidity, and now you’re left with nothing but time. Your gaze drifts to a wanted poster of Hisoka, and you let out a sigh.

What would he do? you wonder, convinced he’d never known boredom a day in his life.

The thought sparks something. Before you can second-guess yourself, you’re already changing.

Your bones stretch, posture loosening into something elastic and careless. Hair floods pink down your back, wild and unmistakable. Your face reshapes with theatrical precision: sharp eyes, a grin that feels permaNently amused by the world. A star blooms on one cheek, a teardrop on the other, skin pale and polished like porcelain.

Hisoka.

You feel your face buzzing and decide that being impulsive in this moment is not only very fun, but very necessary. The Hunters Association would understand! You needed some adrenaline, something to excite you! If you didn’t, you’d surely go mad with boredom and act like the chimera ant they thought of you as. 

You don’t even try to hide it. You step out into the restricted part of the tower you’d sneaked into out into an open stretch of the market, hands relaxed by your side, humming softly. The reactions are instant and delicious, how could they not be when his picture is spread all over the city after the massacre of last night?! Gasps, sharp intakes of breath, the sound of stalls slamming shut as people scramble away.

Someone screams his name.

You feign ignoring them and saunter on.

“That’s not…wait, no, it is-”

Nen flares nearby, sudden and alarmed. You feel it spike like a struck nerve. Authorities, Hunters, security, something official, locking onto you all at once.

You grin wider, baring teeth that aren’t quite right but look convincing enough, you haven’t seen his teeth yet after all. “My, my,” you murmur in his voice, lilting and amused. “Keep it down, why don’t you~”

That’s all it takes.

“THERE—DON’T LET HIM MOVE!”

You bolt.

The crowd parts in chaos as you spring forward, movements exaggerated and playful, deliberately Hisoka. You leap onto a stall, kick off a canopy, spin midair just because you can. Gasps trail behind you like confetti.

Nen lashes past your shoulder- testing shots, not lethal for someone of your calibre, but sharp enough to be thrilling. You laugh aloud, unable to stop yourself, voice ringing bright and wrong in your borrowed throat.

“This is so flattering!” you call back, hopping onto a rooftop. “I didn’t know I still had fans!”

You aren’t sure if that’s what he’d say, but he seemed to like theatrics, so it wouldn’t be too out of character, right? They chase hard now. Footsteps pound. A net of intent tightens around you. 

At the last second, you shed him.

Pink hair darkens mid-leap. Face softens, markings vanishing like spilled paint wiped clean. You land as someone else entirely- shorter, nondescript, breathless in a way that reads as normal. You stumble into an alley, clutching your side, eyes wide with fake panic.

The authorities rush past you without a glance, eyes locked ahead, hunting a phantom that no longer exists.

You wait three seconds.

Then you slip out the other end of the alley, scales shimmering happily beneath your skin, laughter bubbling up as you melt back into the crowd.

God.

You should do that again sometime.

A few hours later you get a very angry phone call of the person in charge of supervising your location and actions. Apparently, a reported criminal sighting combined with a known shapeshifter being in the exact same area wasn’t really a mystery to solve.

You try to explain that no one was hurt, that it was just a bit of harmless mischief. She doesn’t budge. In a clipped, unwavering tone, she reminds you that the families of the deceased of Heaven’s Arena’s incident wouldn’t see it that way, and that you’re down to your last two strikes.

Way to ruin the fun.

You decide to lay low for the next two months, keeping your head down and your presence quiet while the world prepares for the massive operation bound for the Dark Continent. No disguises, no mischief. You bounce between safe houses and unfamiliar streets, watching news updates and rumors roll in, counting the days as if they might hurry themselves along. 

It isn’t necessarily fear that keeps you from misbehaving, but you do worry about the people you’ve left behind being confronted with your real nature if it ever gets that far. 

Just a bit more, and you’ll be too busy to even get hungry. 

Just a bit more, and you won’t have to rely on television and busy streets to keep you from doing anything regrettable.

You tell yourself the excitement will arrive eventually, that all you have to do is stay calm and let it come to you. You repeat it like a mantra on the quiet days, when boredom creeps in and settles heavy in your chest and stomach. Two months isn’t that long, you insist. Plenty of people live entire lives without constant stimulation. 

But there aren’t plenty of people inches away from violence continually.

If you can just endure the waiting, just keep yourself steady, you won’t lose your mind before the real adventure finally begins.

You feel him before you see him.

It’s subtle at first, like the air has decided to lean closer, like the world has tilted just enough to be interested. Your tongue flicks unconsciously, tasting Nen that is sharp, sweet, and weirdly cloying.

Oh.

You don’t bother turning around right away. You keep walking, hands tucked into your sleeves, wearing a perfectly pleasant face you picked this morning. Brown hair, unremarkable eyes, posture loose and easy. This face had caught your attention because despite being quite normal, you’d spotted a little face tattoo right by the jaw. Just a little bit of spice! How quaint.

Behind you, footsteps stop.

“Hmm~”

The sound curls down your spine, a voice you’d imitated so often you were put off just from hearing it come from another.

“I’m quite sure it is you, is it not?”

You sigh, stopping at last and glancing over your shoulder, subduing every bit of fanatical excitement inside you to push out a blunt: “Sorry, I don’t carry change.”

Hisoka Morow is exactly where he shouldn’t be, leaning against a lamppost like it’s a stage prop, pink hair bright against the dull street, eyes glittering with delighted accusation. He looks… pleased and about twice as theatrical as you’d always imagined him. It takes more than a little self-control to not have your eyes glitter and ask for an autograph.

“Funny, but I’m absolutely certain now,” he continues, pushing off the post and circling you slowly. His gaze drags over your borrowed face with open curiosity. “Imagine my surprise~ When I hear I caused a public panic in a city I wasn’t even in.”

You stop walking and just follow his movements. It doesn’t matter how he figured out who you were, or even where you were. 

You were carrying a tracker on your wrist and probably had a file containing your actions the size of a bedroom. Added to that you had a very distinct feel of Nen, and you knew that currently it wasn’t that difficult to track you down. You simply had assumed he wouldn’t have bothered. 

You stop walking and turn towards him, ready to bolt if things go awry. “Do you want an apology?”

He laughs, soft and dangerous. “Oh, not at all. I even heard some people that are… interested in me travelled all that way, just to be disappointed by the truth. The hair, the posture, the timing-” He claps once, sharp. “Almost flattering.”

You can’t help it. “Almost?”

He stops directly in front of you. Too close. Deliberately so.

“But,” Hisoka continues lightly, eyes narrowing just a fraction, “I don’t recall lending out my face.”

You consider apologizing anyway, but decide that the version of him you’ve seen wants a show, a trick, not a boring apology.

Your features ripple, skin flowing like water, as you let the disguise melt away. For just a second, you show him something closer to the truth: pupils thinning, posture shifting, something distinctly not human coiling beneath your skin, though you’ve been told your quote unquote real face looks pretty normal. Your hair has a slightly unnatural texture, and the scales glitter when light hits them, but it’s not too shocking.

Then, because you’re petty and find his focus on your ‘real face’ uncomfortable, you change again.

Pink hair blooms. The star and teardrop return. Hisoka stares at himself.

“Oh come on,” you say, perfectly mimicking his voice now, even doing a little pose. “I didn’t peg you for a materialistic type… learn to share.”

There is a long, electric pause.

Then Hisoka laughs. Full-bodied, delighted, hands coming together as if he’s just been given the best gift imaginable.

“Ahh~!” He leans in, eyes shining. “That is uncanny.”

You drop the form immediately, returning to your previous face, knowing people didn’t pay a lot of attention to your words once they were looking at themselves. Even Kolt got lost in his reflection. “I gave it back. No damage.”

“No,” he agrees cheerfully. “Just a few angry phone calls and a very confused news article.”

He tilts his head, studying you with open fascination now, no pretense of subtlety. “You know,” he says, voice lowering, “wearing someone else’s skin is terribly intimate.”

You tilt your head, memorizing the tilt of his drawl, and absolutely not understanding what he tries to convey with his words. You hazard a guess. “I’m not trying to steal your identity. I was just bored and you have a very interesting appearance. If you find it distasteful, I’ll try to refrain.”

That was a lie and you both knew it, but it felt polite to say.

For a moment, his aura presses closer, not threatening, just curious, testing the edges of what you are. You meet it easily, unbothered, amused.

Finally, he straightens and just attacks you.

In retaliation, you jump back and alter your shape, mimicking his behaviour.

To an outside eye it would look absurd- two Hisokas circling, lunging, rebounding off walls and floor. You trade blows that should land, feint with the same tells, dodge with the same rhythm. Every trick he tries, you try to pretend you already knew. Every pause, you match. He refrains from using Nen, to make it more interesting, you wager.

He laughs as he takes a kick to the ribs, your kick, rolling with it, springing back up.

“How thoughtful,” he says, wiping blood from his lip. “Practicing with myself.”

“That was the idea,” you say, voice identical, cadence flawless. “You don’t get this often.”

He rushes you again, faster this time, pushing, testing, trying to outpace his own reflection. Nen flares brighter. The floor cracks. For a moment, it’s exhilarating, pure symmetry, violence folding in on itself.

Then…

He stops.

Straightens.

Sighs.

“Well,” Hisoka says, deflating slightly, “this is becoming predictable.”

Your shared grin falters. “Already?”

He waves a hand dismissively. “I know exactly how I’ll respond to every move. How dreadfully narcissistic.” His eyes flick over you, bored now, sharp edge dulled. “Do something else.”

You blink.

Then your body shifts.

Bones compress. Height shrinks. Your spine curves, then settles into impossible balance. Wrinkles etch deep lines into your skin, not with age but intent. Your hands come together in prayer.

When you open your eyes again, they are bright, bottomless.

Hisoka stiffens.

The air changes.

“Ho ho,” you say warmly, voice gentle, amused. “Shall we continue?”

For the first time since you met him, Hisoka doesn’t smile right away.

“…Netero,” he murmurs. “How do you know him?”

Ah! He knew the man!

“Saw him from a distance when I was… younger, sorta.” You bow slightly. It’d made quite an impression, seeing the golden man from afar. You’d not copied him before, out of respect, but you wanted to impress Hisoka, and this felt fitting. “It’ll be a weak copy, I can assure you, but I thought you’d like it.”

His pulse spikes, you can feel it. His Nen flares sharp and eager, excitement snapping back into place like a blade clicking home.

“Oh, how considerate,” he breathes, grin returning, wider than before. “That’s much better.”

Your hands blur.

The floor explodes beneath you both as the first strike lands.

In the end, you fight as a dozen people, keeping only Kolt and Kite’s combat locked away. You wouldn’t betray them like that, endangering them just for your kicks, but luckily your assortment carries enough to entertain the both of you for a while. When you’re battered, coughing up blood against the rubble Hisoka and you’ve left behind (he’s a much better fighter, even if you can keep up for short bits), the fighting ends and you’re surprised to still be alive. 

“Well,” Hisoka says brightly, turning to your mangled body, “If you still feel like impersonating me…”

He hands you a slip with a phone number on it and presses it firmly inside your broken palm. You mumble a thanks, but it’s not very audible.

“I need a plus one for a trip… and I hate being underrepresented.”

And just like that, he’s gone, leaving the distinct feeling that you’ve just been added to a very short, very dangerous list of people who have caught Hisoka Morow’s interest without immediately dying after.

Also, you realize, as you look at the phone number, you don’t own a phone.

“Plus one,” you murmur, tasting the words as you sit and heal for a few hours. You try them in Hisoka’s voice. You decide you like his voice, a decision you’ve made tenfold already. Everything sounds conniving and sneaky when he says it. You kind of want to order a sandwich in his guise.

You don’t own a phone. You don’t own much of anything.

Your mind drifts back to the mansion and the walls closing in on you. Back to looking at a screen and begging to be distracted, and back to the way Hisoka had just looked at you like you were a trick he wanted to see performed again. How he’d wanted you to use everything, not just that which was convenient.

“Okay,” you decide suddenly. Aloud. “We can work with this.”

A few hours later you straighten up, energy returning, and pick a new face, someone sharp-eyed and clever-looking, if only because they’re wearing thick rimmed glasses. You head toward the denser part of the city, where pawnshops sit beside electronics stores and no one asks where the money came from. 

By the time the sun dips lower, you’ve acquired some new stitches, a secondhand device with a cracked screen, three stolen coins left in your pocket, and the new knowledge that your eyesight is pretty shit since the little apps are unreadable. You stand in a narrow alley, thumb hovering over the keypad.

You pause.

You type the number in.

This is your plus one.

After some hesitation you send another message. Also how do you zoom in i can’t read the letters.

The boat rocks gently beneath your feet, sunlight sliding across the polished deck, but you barely notice. You’re too busy leaning against the railing, green-blue-grey eyes sparkling with amusement as you shift into your next persona. Hair darkens, curls bounce just so, posture tilts with an exaggerated elegance, lips curved into a subtle, teasing smile.

Hisoka squints at you, fingering his Bungee Gum idly, the pink elastic stretching and snapping between his fingers.

“Audrey Hepburn?” he drawls, voice slow and teasing.

You shake your head, laughter curling through the borrowed voice. “You’ve guessed her name thrice now. Still incorrect. It’s Vogue woman, number four, April 2003.”

“That’s not a name,” he says.

“Whatever,” you shrug, knowing you’re right. You’d read that magazine a million times. “Now you.”

His bungee gum stretches and slowly forms something akin to a face. High arch… big nose… birth mark right over the lip…

You give your best effort. “2007… Bake-off winner?”

He drops the Nen. “This game makes no sense if we both do not bother remembering anyone’s name.”

“You’re worse in that regard.”

“How so?”

“Do you even know my name?”

“You already hardly matter,” he says, too easily, making you smile. “Your name? Even less so.”

You snort. “Has anyone ever told you you’re not a very comforting person?”

“It’s honest.” He straightens, grin returning, theatrical as ever. 

“And you’re so unbelievably honest.” You glance at the pink strand still wrapped around his finger. “Figures.”

It’s been a while since your first meeting. Since then, you’ve tagged along with a bunch of activities Hisoka needed a body double for. 

Unsurprisingly, Hisoka had a lot of enemies, and he’d basically been using you as bait to pick off the majority of them. You’d been a bit conflicted about killing people after promising the Hunters Association you wouldn’t, but Hisoka had pulled off your tracker and assured you that no future with them could ever be as exciting as the plans he had.

He might as well have asked you to commit lover’s suicide, but your answer would have been the same. 

Now on the boat, where things had only got more complicated. There were a thousand different players, and most of them were either out for Hisoka’s blood, or out for yours, having been warned of the rogue chimera ant loose on the ship. It’d all been dreadfully exciting, and you were having the time of your life.

There’s a beat of silence. Then, unexpectedly, Hisoka asks, “Do you remember my name?”

You don’t answer right away.

“Yes,” you say finally, finding it kind of touching he even cares enough to ask. “But you only have one, so I might as well.”

Hisoka laughs, sharp and delighted, and the Bungee Gum snaps free of his finger with a quiet twang.

“You know,” he says, almost idly, “your disguises are very effective.”

You glance up. “Thank you.”

“But,” he continues, eyes lifting to meet yours, sharp and intent, “it’s also terribly inconvenient.”

You tilt your head. “For who?”

“For me,” he says simply.

The corner of his mouth twitches. He leans forward, elbows on the railing of the ship, lowering his voice so it barely carries past.

“I want to kiss you.”

You blink.

Once.

“…You’re very direct,” you say, stifling many explanations of how you’re a different species, how you’re not supposed to want anything in this regard, how on most days you’re unsure whether you love him or want to eat him. You stifle them all, since he’s all that and more, as well.

“Mmm. I find it saves time.” His gaze drifts over your borrowed face, not unkind, just dissatisfied. “But not like this.”

You don’t answer immediately.

Hisoka doesn’t rush you. He watches, patient in that unsettling way- like a cat that already knows the mouse isn’t going to run.

Finally, you sigh. “What kind of trick are you trying to play on me this time?”

“An unfair one, which you know. And yet,” he murmurs, “you’re still here.”

You reach up, fingers brushing your own cheek.

The shift is subtle but unmistakable, features softening, bones adjusting, posture settling back into something that feels like home. Your real face emerges, familiar to him now: the one that doesn’t disappear.

“There you are,” he says, pleased.

You barely have time to roll your eyes before he reaches across to you, fingers light against your jaw. He pauses just a fraction of a second, giving you time to think better of it, perhaps.

You don’t.

He leans in and kisses you.

It’s brief. Like he’s confirming something he already knew.

When he pulls back, his grin is dangerous still, but quieter.

“…Much better,” he says.

You prop your chin in your hand and change faces once more, refusing to let on that this was very much your first kiss in this life. “Satisfied?”