You panted harshly, your breath shaky, and a piercing, burning pain in your side, but you pushed on. You had finally run away from your trashy house. Your mother died years ago in a car accident, and your father had become super controlling after that. He never drank, but if you didn't do exactly as he told you to, he would hit you, throw things at you, etc. Once he smashed your head against a wall, cracking it, and said you had "gotten drunk and fell off the roof" once he took you to the hospital. You had been planning on running away for a long time, but yesterday was the last straw. You had found out that he was the reason that your mother was dead.

A day before she had died, she found a notebook with plans. Terrible plans of things he wanted to do to your mother and you, and she threatened to call the cops if he didn't leave there house, as she had bought the house and she could get him in jail for trespassing if he didn't. After they fought for a while, he lied and said that he would leave in the morning. That name he hired a hitman to kill her in the morning. Once they woke up, and your mother had found out that he hadn't left, they fought some more. He refused to leave, so she called the police, but the night before he had cut the line, so she had to drive to the station, but luckily it was close. But then... she died. It was all over the state. The crash was horrible, but no one knew exactly how it had happened, as there was no trace of another car. They suspected a Nen user, but they could find no traces of Nen, and no traces of another human or whatever had happened.

You started to cry, remembering what had happened. You found it all out after going through your father's computer and finding a file on everything that had happened. He walked in and started to brag about how smart he was, and how no one would ever believe you, and how she had deserved it. That night you packed up as much as you could, clothes, food, water, money, and a few extra things, and ran. You had been running for about a whole day by this point, with only a few breaks. Everything hurt, but you couldn't stand being near him anymore, and the fear of him catching you was immense and too much to handle. You suspected that you were far enough by this point. You knew you were at least in a completely different city. Now the only problem was actually finding a place to stay.

You searched around for a while, and you decided to climb up a tree to get a better look. Luckily, as it had started to get dark, you noticed an abandoned and crumbling building a little ways away. You quickly scurried down the tall tree, running in that direction, ignoring the sharp pain and burning sensations all over your body. Once you got there, you climbed over a crumbling wall on the bottom floor, and walked in, finding a pair of stairs and climbing up them. You cautiously walked around, looking in all of the abandoned rooms, and eventually decided it was safe. You pushed away debris to make a smooth spot, and sat down next to a pillar, underneath one of the pieces of unbroken pieces of ceiling, and opened up your bag, pulling out a water bottle, a small blanket, and a small packet of trail mix, resting your sore muscles.

You chugged some of the water, and ate a little bit of the trail mix, rested your head against the pillar, wrapped the blanket around you, and closed your eyes, dozing off.

What woke you up was the sound of a voice. No, multiple voices. You thought it was safe! But voices meant people. Luckily, they sounded like they came from downstairs, but you didn't want to risk anything, so you slowly and carefully folded up your blanket and slipped it into your backpack, being ever so careful not to crinkle anything or make a noise. You slowly closed it up, and walked to the opposite side of where you heard the voices. You were more scared than curious, and you didn't want to know who they belonged to.

The only thing you could tell from them was there were maybe, 6 or more people, most of them male. There were two feminine voices, one was a soft, sultry voice, and the other sounded like a kids voice, but more grown-up. She sounded maybe 16. One of the males had a deep gruff voice, one had a higher ranged voice, one seemed somewhat familiar, one had a smooth, serious tone, and the last voice was calm and collected. He sounded dangerous. You couldn't quite place your finger on why, but you knew that you did not want to meet with them.

You couldn't tell exactly what they were talking about, but that was probably for the best. You tiptoed to the other side, almost making it to the other set of stairs when you messed up.

You tripped. A pebble had gotten itself lodged underneath your shoe, and it threw you off balance. you braced yourself for impact and fell with a loud thud onto the concrete floor. It hurt like hell, as it had scraped up your side, and your cheek had gotten cut and was bleeding quite a bit, as it had hit a hard rock. You clenched your hands and teeth, trying not to let out a sound, but that was not the worst of it.

The voices had stopped. Then the sultry women said something, and you could hear them start to make their way over to your side. You whispered "Damn it, damn it, damn it" over and over to yourself, quickly collecting yourself, and going as quickly and quietly as you could to one of the pillars. Luckily they were thick enough for you to hide entirely behind one without being seen. The sound of feet hitting concrete could be heard as the group started upstairs, and you covered your mouth with your hands, hoping that they would just give up and go back downstairs if they couldn't hear you.

"I'm surprised you smell blood in here." The childlike feminine voice said, "It's probably just a bird or a squirrel or something."

"Possibly, but it sounded way to loud to not be human." The other feminine voice said."Oh come on, so what if its another human!" the high-pitched male complained. "We were almost done with our game!"

"Yeah Pakunoda!" The gruff voice chimed in."Well if it is another human there is a possibility that they saw 

us, and we can't have them going around and telling everyone where we are!" The sultry woman, who you presumed to be Pakunoda, grumped.

"Shes right Uvogin." The dangerous sounding man said. "Now come on out or we'll have to do this the hard way. I dont think you would like to go up against seven powerful Nen users, would you?"

You gulped, trying to keep your heart from beating to hard. These people were much more than you thought.

"Cmon! We won't hurt you that bad!" The one you guessed to be Uvogin chuckled.

One of them sighed, and then started walking towards your direction.

Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck" You thought. "This is going to be how I die."

The steps grew closer, until they stopped, almost right next to you.

"Hello there." The dangerous sounding man said, putting his hand right above your head, and swinging around, staring you down.

He was tall with slicked-back black hair and piercing grey eyes, with a sharp nose, and an in the general well-defined face. He had a dark grey coat with big golden buttons and white fluff at the top. We wore a pair of earrings that had an odd bluish orb on them, and he had a strange symbol on his forehead.

Your heart pounded. You were screwed. They were going to kill you. You had finally gotten away from your terrible life, just to die two days later.

He ran his other hand along your jaw, and pushed up your head, forcing you to look at him.

"Well, well, well. what do we have here?"He said, smirking, leaning closer to you. "Whats a little one like you doing out here on your own?"

You gulped, trying to look away, but he just gripped your chin tighter.

"Ah. Looks like you probably know of us. Well, we can't have you going and ratting us out, can we?"

You nodded, trying to tell him you had no clue who he was, but no sound came out.

"Pakunoda, Nobunaga, watch this little one. Uvogin, tie them up." He said, moving away. A tall woman with short brunette hair and a tall, older-looking male in traditional samurai clothing walked around, closing you in on either side. An extremely muscular male walked in front of you, holding a long chain, chuckled. The tall woman told you to sit, and you complied, taking off your backpack and sitting down with your legs out, as Uvogin wrapped the chain tightly around you, and eventually nailing it down onto the concrete. You never saw the other two, but they seemed to have gone downstairs with the tall black-haired man. Uvogin went back downstairs as well, leaving just you and the two tall people.

The lady stretched out her hand, but then pulled it back, remember you couldn't move. The man grabbed your bag and started pulling things out, examining them.

"Were going to be doing some questioning." The woman said, "You must answer correctly, and if you dont there will be consequences. Now, What is your name?"

"Y/N" You answered shakily, trying not to bust out in tears. the wound on your cheek still was bleeding, and the chains were pressing tightly against other cuts and bruises.

"What are you doing all the way out here?"

"I- I... I ran away."

"What exactly are you doing here? And how did you find it?"

"I was looking for a place to stay. I had climbed a tree and saw this and I thought it was empty."How old are you?"

"20"

"Why didn't you just move out sooner?"

"He wouldn't let me get a job."

"Do you know who we are?"

"N... no I dont know who you are. Please just let me go I wo-"

She cut you off.

"Why did you run away?"

"I... I dont want to talk about it."

Pakunoda stared directly into your eyes, resting her hand on your leg. For a while, she looked like she was picking through your thoughts, and then her expression changed to a more worried, and almost sympathetic expression.

"Oh, dear..." She mumbled. You looked at her confused, but she quickly straightened herself, her expression changing back to normal.

"That should be it. Nobunaga, you watch over them. they aren't lying. I must go speak with Chrollo" She said, going down the stairs behind you.

Nobunaga reput everything nicely back into your pack and sat next to you.

"Paku's taken a liking to you. Probably see's something of herself in you."

You nodded, staring at the floor, still wondering what was going to happen. Who were these people? Why were they here? You're head was racing with thoughts.

"Dont worry too much about it," Nobunaga said. "You'll either understand everything soon, or you'll be dead. Or both."

That did not help you to "not worry you".

Someone came up the stairs, and Nobunaga chuckled.

"Looks like you going to live." He joked.

Uvogin came around the other side with an annoyed look on his face as he uprooted the nail holding down the chain and unwrapped you.

"There you go." He said grumpily, rolling his eyes when you said thank you. Nobunaga snickered and Uvogin sent him a death glare.

"Chrollo wants to see you. Your lucky Hisoka has kicked out a while ago. I'd go quickly before he decides to kill you. Or dont. I'd prefer that." Uvogin exclaimed.

'Hisoka?' You wondered

"You do know they most likely have absolutely no clue where he is or who he is you big bumbling idiot," Nobunaga said.

"Ughhhhh." Uvogin groaned. "Downstairs at the very opposite end of here. He's the one who caught you. Just get outta my sight."

You quickly stood up and nodded, thanking him again, and racing to the other side."We finally get someone and I'm not even allowed to kill them." You could hear Uvogin complaining to Nobunaga before you slipped out of earshot, running down the stairs. You just wanted o get out of here as soon as possible. 

You looked around once you had reached the bottom and saw him sitting in a small room off to the side, staring off. You walked in, staying close to the entrance, holding your hands behind your back and rocking on your toes, trying to keep from running, because you knew that if you did, they would kill you,. They were obviously much faster and much more dangerous than any normal person or even most Nen users.

"Come closer. I'm not gonna kill you yet." He said, looking in your direction and smirking. You cautiously walked closer.

"What do you think about joining us?"

"J.. joining you?!" You exclaimed, confused.

"Yes. I'm pretty sure that's what I said."

"I dont even know who you are, You just chained me up, question me, you dont tell me anything about you, and you just expect me to join you with a drop of the hat?"

"Well, when you put it that way... Anyways, Pakunoda told me everything. Well, not exactly everything, but everything that she deemed important. You're a runaway. A misfit like us."What do you even do? Do you just hide in abandoned places and threaten any person that comes by?" You spat out, starting to get a bit angry.

"No. Where a group. People tend to say that we're evil and we do bad things, but everything is for a reason. We kill and steal, but everything is justified. So are you going to join us? We can protect you and keep you safe from whoever or whatever you running from."

"Just... just give me a bit to think about." You stuttered out, leaving the small rumbling room, and exiting the building. Once you got out the entrance, you slipped around and leaned against the wall, panting, trying to calm down.

"I didn't tell him anything." You heard Pakunoda say as she walked outside as well.

"Wh.. what do you mean?" You stammered.

"About why you ran away. Your past. All those things. It's safe with me. I understand."

You nodded, silently happy that she didn't tell Chrollo.

"Wait-" you said, "How do you know that stuff in the first place?

"My Nen." She said. "I'm able to search through people's memories. That's just part of it."

"Oh. So that's how you knew."

"Yep. So are you going to join us? IF you dont there is a high chance that we'll have to kill you and I'd... really hate to do that..."

You looked down at the ground, confused. Why did she sound genuine?

"Yeah, that would kind of suck." You said, breaking the awkward silence.

She laughed, sitting down next to you.

"It's really not as bad as it seems. Yeah, we're pictured as ruthless killers but that's the thing. People only really hear what they want to. We all hate the world for doing whatever it has done to us in the past. So we take action on it. But people only see the bad parts, you know?

"Yeah..."

"I remember first coming to them. I had previously heard of them, and I wanted to join. I mean, it's a group of misfits who do what they want, and no one can stop them. That's what brought me here. But it was very different from what I thought. I think we can both agree on the being terrified of Uvogin part." She laughed.

"Yeah. I'm sort of starting to understand. But, what if you get caught or hurt? Being that so attached to everyone and having it ripped apart..."

"Yeah, that's really the only problem. But were the Phantom Troupe. We'll make it through, even if some of us dont make it..."

"Phantom Troupe huh? Sounds pretty cool."

"Yeah." She smiled. "Off-topic question, but how are you with needles? Or tattoos for that matter."

"Uhmm... Needles are okay, but I've only ever had a stick and poke tattoos before. Why?

"Its tradition for you to get a Spider tattoo with your number." She showed you her tattoo.

"Oh wow, that's so, intricate."

"Yeah. Its beautiful isn't it?"You nodded, brushing your finger against it.

"You have pretty strong Nen. I can feel it when you touch me." Pakunoda said."I do?"

"Well, yeah I thought you would have known this. That's another reason Chrollo decided to let you stay. You could be super useful to us."

"Huh." You said a bit pissed that that was one of the few reasons Chrollo let you live.

"I could teach you how to use it. Or probably Nobunaga, he would be the best to teach you."

 "Seriously? Thanks"

"Anyways, you should go and think about it. Tell Chrollo if you want to join or not. And just for the best, dont try and run. It'll hurt more." She said, standing up, and walking back in.

You stared up at the morning sun, thinking about what you should do. Join the troupe? Or perish at the hands of someone you were starting to get attached to.

(2986 words)

Writers Note- aghhh i cant wait to keep writing this! I really like hxh, so expect probably, once a week updates on this, and a bunch more stories with a lot of different characters!