Chapter One
"Tsuki hurry up or their ganna catch you!" Yoru shouted over her shoulder as she and Tsuki ran along the winding trail of the Ryunoke forest.
"You try getting shot in the leg by a spirit bullet and see how fast you run!" Tsuki shouted back trying to ignore the savior pain shooting through her leg.
Ever since three days ago, when their latest theft had gone soar, Tsuki and Yoru had been on the run from the spirit detectives who had been sent to capture them. The first day was spent mostly without fear. They had gloated over their prize; a spell book used by some of the most powerful mages in the Seiryu domain, and easily avoided the lower monkey brain spirit detectives. But by the second day things began to heat up. That was when they first laid eyes on the infamous spirit detective Yusuke Urameshi and his team. This story begins on that fateful morning.
It was dawn; the bright golden sun had just started to creep over the horizon sending its warm light through the dense branches of the Ryunoke forest. Tsuki and Yoru lay soundly on the limbs of the tree that had become their bed the night before. Yoru sleep with her back against the tree and her head slumped forwards.
She was a short girl standing only 5' 1" tall, with shoulder length blond hair that always fell in front of her face hiding her rosy cheeks and deep bluish green eyes. She wore baggy fighter style pants that, at one point, were red but were now brown from extended wear and neglect. Her shirt was once a tunic like the ones the ninjas of the royal order would wear but now was nothing more then a piece of cloth tied around her chest. Her one prized position was her katana and it normally never left her side. It was kept in a black scabbard and on its metal hilt was a flaming red phoenix representing that she was a master swords man. At the moment it was being cradled in her arms as she slept.
A branch or two above her slept Tsuki. She lay on the branch with her arm under her head as a pillow and the other wrapped around a leather bound spell book they had recently stolen. She was reasonably tall at 5' 9" with long, free flowing reddish brown hair that reaches well past her shoulder blades. Her skin was tanned by her constant being in the sun, and her eyes were light hazel brown but constantly changed colors with her mood. Her outfit was the same as Yoru's had been except that her pants were green and her shirt had some dangling pieces of material on her left shoulder.
The sun continued its steady rise over the hill, its warm light drying the dew from the girl's skin and clothes. Eventually the sun found its way to Tsuki's eyes. She gave a moan of annoyance as it began to burn her skin. After a minute or so she sleepily opened them and gave a tired glance at her surroundings. After another moment she sat up and, raising her hands over her head, gave a loud yawn before allowing her weight to carry her backwards so that she hung upside down by her knees.
As she hung there small droplets of water fell from the branches above her. Several of these drops found their way into her large cat like ears causing the hair on the end of her tail to bristle in annoyance. She shook her head in an attempt to dislodge the annoying little drops.
"Yoru, it's time to get up." Tsuki said grinning down sleepily at her friend "Yoru!"
Yoru gave a small groan of annoyance, waved the finger in Tsuki's general direction, and shifted to the left slightly but continued sleeping. Tsuki gave an annoyed sigh as she reached for a red cloth sack attached to her pants. From this sack she extracted a small green seed that was no bigger then a nail head. With great care she took aim and dropped it squarely into Yoru's lap. Almost instantly the seed began to grow. Numerous little vines began to wind their way around Yoru. They looked like little green snakes and soon had completely cocooned her so that only her head was visible. Separate from the squirming mass was a single vine with a large purple bulb on its end. Slowly it began to open into what seemed like beautiful flower. But as the last petals fell away from the center several very sharp jagged teeth made their presence known. It wriggled its way close to where Yoru was sleeping until it was less then an inch from her face, before it started to sniff at her.
"What's that smell? It smells like burnt eggs." Yoru groaned as she began to open her eyes.
As her eyes hit about half-mast she began to see the fuzzy outline of the flower. As the grogginess subsided she fully saw the plant creature in front of her as well as its sharp teeth.
"Ahhhhhhhhhh!" Yoru's scream echoed throughout the whole forest sending flocks of sleeping birds skyward in a flight of fear. "Its ganna eat me!"
Tsuki let out a loud giggle as she watched her friend struggle to escape from the wriggling mass that cocooned her. She let her knees go from the branch and summer salted once in the air before landing cat like on the branch that Yoru was on.
"Ya know if you'd just wake up the first time I called you we wouldn't have to go through this." Tsuki implied walking up behind her flower creature.
"Ok! Ok! I'll get up from now on! Just call it of, please!" Yoru begged as the plant began to inch closer to her.
With a quick jab at its stem by Tsuki both the flower and the vines withered and died. Yoru brushed away the dead plants as she stood up. She looked at Tsuki for a moment before unsheathing her sword and charged forward.
She was almost godly fast as she moved along the branch. Tsuki barely had enough time to jump and flip over her head. She landed in a kneeling position behind Yoru who remained with her back to her. They were both still for a moment before Yoru let out a small giggle.
"I'm ganna die of a heart attack one of these mornings if you don't stop that." Yoru said as she turned around and sheathed her blade.
"And I'm ganna die of blood loss if you don't start missing." Tsuki replied standing up and watching the blood leak though her pants and felt the wound slowly start to heal.
They both began to laugh and complement each other on evasion and striking skills. To anyone else it would have seemed like the girls were crazy. But to them it was just an average good morning.
"So what are we ganna steal, or who are we ganna piss off today?" Yoru asked stretching her arms over her head.
"Well let's see, there are spirit detectives all over the forest looking for us. Why don't we use some of these spells on them?"
"Good idea. What spells are we ganna use?"
"Let's talk as we move."
Both girls began leaping expertly from tree branch to tree branch as they discussed ideas as to what kind of spells they would use. Eventually it was decided that they would only elemental spell and save the rest for another time.
All day long they leapt from the branches of the tree searching for a group of spirit detectives to piss off. When they did come upon an unsuspecting group they each used a different spell and watching in amusement as their victims looked around for the cause of the magic. As evening fell the girls began searching for a safe tree to stay in for the night. Every now and again they would come across a group of people on whom they would use their magic but as the sun and the fun began to fade it happened less often.
When the sun nearly set both Tsuki and Yoru sat on a branch for a little rest before continuing their search for a safe place to stay for the night. As they sat there scanning through the pages of the spell book they began to hear voices coming their way. They crouched down lower in the in the thick leaves of the branches before scanning for the cause of the voices. It didn't take long till they saw a group of people emerge from the brush.
The group stopped under the tree that the girls were hiding in. It consisted of five people all of whom were boys. The girls listened as they began to talk amongst themselves.
"God damn, we've been searching for a whole day now and still haven't found them. I'm telling ya I'm really starting to hate these nature hikes." Grumbled a boy with greasy black hair.
"You didn't think we would find them the first day did you?" Remarked another boy with slightly blue spiky hair, as he spoke he pulled out a small silver gun and quickly checked the rounds in it.
"Yeah Urameshi! Didn't you hear Koenma when he said that these demons would be hard to catch?" Another boy with bright orange hair said as he whipped the sweat from his face.
"Shut up Kuwabara! Don't forget if I hadn't sweet talked your sister you'd still be at home doing homework." The boy named Urameshi near yelled at his companion.
"Is that so well I just happened to hear someone …"
"Guess they're after us too." Yoru said with a sigh as she watched the boys continue their argument. "Oh well, their just weak humans they won't find us."
"They're not humans. At least not all of them are." Tsuki replied staring down at the group.
"Yes, they are."
"Use your senses Yoru! The ugly orange haired one is the only human. The others are demons." She fell silent for a moment and stared at Urameshi for some reason she felt that they should fear him above all others but she wasn't sure why. "I think we should leave. Something is bugging me about that Urameshi boy and I don't want to stick around to figure out what."
"No way! This is to good a chance for fun to miss."
Yoru began flipping through the pages of the book searching for a spell that would best suit her need for mischief. As she scanned Tsuki watched over her shoulder and noticed a page that may be worth looking at later so, without fully explaining why, she grabbed a leaf from the branch above her and inserted it between the pages she wanted to see. After another minute of scanning Yoru came upon an ice spell that seemed to provide what she was looking for. She began to chant the words to the spell and within moments had caused the boys' feet to freeze to the ground.
"Hey, what the hell?" yelled the boy with blue spiky hair as he fell flat on his face.
"Hiei you punk, what's the big idea!" Urameshi yelled over his shoulder.
It was only then that the girls really noticed the two figures standing at the back of the group. One was a small boy, about Yoru's height, with bluish black hair that stuck up in peaks all over his head; it also had a white star at its front. He was dressed in a black cape with a white strip of cloth on his forehead and appeared to be carrying a sword.
The other was a tall, slender, red head; he had a reasonably calm face despite having is feet stuck to the ground. He wore a normal looking fighter style outfit that made him appear very feminine and as he glanced up into the tree the girls caught a glimpse of a pair of beautiful deep green eyes.
"If I was going to cause you any hell, detective, I would choose a far more effective way." Growled the spiky haired boy.
Yoru gave a mischievous grin as she watched the chaos her prank had caused. She was temped to laugh but remembered what Tsuki had said about them being demons and settled with an evil snicker. She only stopped her snicker fit when she heard Tsuki give a small gasp next to her. She looked up to see that her friends eyes had become the size of the end of an ogres club, and she had a look of terror on her face that Yoru had only seen their once before.
"Tsuki, what is it?"
"I think I figured out why that Urameshi boy is so unsettling. He's one of the Mazaku!"
Yoru looked closer at the greasy haired boy struggling beneath her. He didn't look like anything special just an ordinary monkey brain, spirit world lackey. But as she continued to stair she began to feel an energy force so great that it nearly knocked her off her perch. She sat back and looked up to see Tsuki smiling. She knew that her friend was prone to drastic mood swings but this was defiantly not something to go smiling about.
"Why are you smiling? Tsuki this is very bad we are aggravating one of the most powerful demons to ever walk in this world! Do you hear me Tsuki he could kill us with one glance!"
Yoru was near her breaking point. They had always messed with powerful demons but they also always knew how to get out of a bad situation. But if this descendent of the Mazaku were to find them there would be no escaping him.
"Stop panicking Yoru." Said Tsuki in a surprisingly calm voice "Do you feel the energy that he's letting off?"
"Of course! What do you think I'm freaking out about?"
Tsuki quietly knelt down and removed the book of spells from her friend's killer grip. She opened it and flipped to the page where she had stuck the leaf and read aloud, "Spirit energy removal spell." She looked down to see that Yoru was now mirroring the look that Tsuki herself had had not long before. She was indeed aware that her plan was dangerous and, yes, even foolish but she knew that if they could pull it off the pay off would be more then they could ever hope for.
Yoru could barely contain her voice as she yelled in a whisper "Tsuki, your crazy! You don't actually think that we could pull that off …do you?"
"Yoru consider the benifits." Tsuki said in a calm, convincing voice as she knelt down by Yoru's ear. "Now, we have been outlaws for the best part of two centuries, if we pull this off not only will we be able to sleep in a bed again but we can get a decent meal in our stomachs. And not just that, we can get back into clothes demons of our rank should be wearing and you can finally get a new sword."
The last remark caused Yoru to tighten her grip on the hilt of her sword. She knew that it was old, rusting, chipped and dull but she had had it ever since she'd left home and had no intention of giving it up. Still, she considered the other facts. It was true that they hadn't slept in a bed since they had been exiled and that they had been living off of what they could find or steal since then as well and the idea of being back in her old clothes was to tempting to fight off. She looked at Tsuki with a serious glare in her eyes and said, "If we die I swear I will kill you again before Koenma can place you."
Tsuki gave a small grin of humor at Yoru's comment, it wasn't everyday that she was willing to go along with one of Tsuki's crazy ideas.
"Deal!" Tsuki said with a small twitch of excitement "Okay the first thing we need to do is wait for a full moon, which is tonight so wait over. Next is to cast this spell on to ourselves so that the spirit energy has a place to go once captured."
"How are we going to get the energy into us to begin with?"
"We have to kiss them and hold it for as long as we feel energy going through us."
As Tsuki said this she began to doubt whether or not she'd be able to go through with this. She hadn't kissed anyone for two centuries. Not since that day…
"Tsuki, are you sure you want to do this now? I mean, you still haven't gotten over…"
"Yes Yoru I'm sure. How else are we going to survive?"
With that she snapped the book shut and began out the details of what would be their most difficult and later memorable theft ever.