Itsy Bitsy Spider

75. Jewels Glistening Scarlet

It took her a moment to recollect her memories, but suddenly: "Ah." Rein wrapped her arms around her knees. "You noticed?"

"How could I not? After all," he reasoned, "you and I were the only ones there who knew that gun was empty. I'd unloaded it as a precaution."

"Why were you carrying around an empty gun anyway? It'd be practically useless for you with your even faster chains, so..." She took a moment here to pause, and her eyes narrowed at him against her will. "A trap? Bait?"

There was a brief but stiffening silence before he answered, and the hand of his injured arm twitched upon the soft green moss, with a dull sheen almost too bright for his eyes as he tried not to look elsewhere. "It wasn't a trap, I think," he said, disclosing the rare sight of uncertainty on his face. "I wouldn't have held a firearm in the first place had it not been a requirement for the job. It was a part of the suit as a uniform, a set, and the only other set of clothes I possess are tribal wear my mother made for me in advance, before my departure from the Clan." Here, he gazed upon the blue cloth draping across his lap. "You are already rejecting your past. I simply didn't need you associating this outfit with any more negative things. So I wore my work uniform, including the gun within the holster."

"...I expected something better."

"B-better!?"

"N-not better, but, I mean...!" There was heat lighting her face aflame, and she told herself this was stupid because her words hadn't been that embarrassing. Annoyed at herself, she make a small "tch", and instantly feeling a tad more stable, turned her face and continued. "Something along the lines of having done it for my own safety, to win me over. A crafted story that would have put yourself in a better light."

"So lying would have improved my image?" he inquired, his tone hypothetical.

"There were tons of excuses you could have made. I already hate you, so you should have gotten on my good side as to why your already meaningless gun was emptied." Her hands unsure of how to neatly fold on her lap, she gave up and leaned back upon the thick moss, appearing to observe the sky above but with a glassy gaze. "You should have lied," Rein said. "It would have helped your case."

There was another pause. These silences seemed reoccurring, Kurapika noted, but somehow it was different. Before it had been agonizing to talk to each other, and for her he was sure it must have been difficult to even look at him, at the one responsible for the majority of her suffering. He knew he would respond the same way if confronted with the one responsible for orchestrating the horrific extermination of the Kurta. He, at least, wouldn't be able to stay sane like she was right now. So before, mere moments before, everything had been difficult, awkward, and stifling.

But this time, the silence was secure. It wasn't a comfort, but he did understand the air was clear now, without harbored feelings of hatred. In this quiet, they knew they could stop talking, and things would still be okay. And it was a mutual understanding, a mutual silence where they both knew it was what they needed. It would be fine.

They weren't great, but in that moment, they were feeling just fine.

His head tipped forward; a prodding question.

She clasped her hands together, and with an accumulating concentration of Nen in her palms, she gave her answer.

Taking away her top hand, Rein revealed a molded lump of lead. "I can make bullets. Usually it's the type you put in a slingshot, but with a gun already at hand, conjuring the slingshot after would have been a waste of time. I can't conjure that fast, not yet. It's still a rough Hatsu."

He waited for her permission before taking the crafted bullet from her hand, and shaded it to get a better look. "It looks a little different," Kurapika remarked. "This one is closer to what my employer supplied me with, but the bullet I drew out from my wound when I treated it was," he paused for wording, but when he couldn't find a suitable alternative, he settled with, "impure. The material was mixed, more of an actual slingshot stone than a bullet."