A/N: So tell me what you think. Sorry if I screwed up a little (or a lot). This is basically going to be a prologue. Most things will be explained next chapter, and then we'll-eventually-have our conflict! Again, give me some advice! It's seriously appreciated! By the way, this isn't my first FFN story. This is, however, my first story on this account. My other one was hacked by some of my *friends*.

Oh, and I also wouldn't mind having a beta for this who can catch my slip-ups! PM me if you're interested, please! You can only make me better! (Which, by the way, isn't too hard to do) ;D

Love ya!

It started with a knock.

Genkai frowned, setting her kettle on the stove. This was strange. Genkai rarely got visitors that weren't Yusuke and his team, and she had never known them to knock (other than Kurama, but these were school hours-he shouldn't be over for quite some time).

"Yukina," she called, voiced raspy and horse from the Epic Shouting Match Yusuke and she had gotten in the night before, "someone's at the door!"

"I'll get it, Genkai-san!" the koorime's voice floated back to her.

Genkai chuckled to herself slightly, grabbing the tea leaves off the shelf above her. That girl never would drop the damn formalities around her. It was sweet, though, and-as much as the old woman hated to admit-it she still liked having the demon as company. Whenever Yusuke wasn't storming around, things tended to get a bit lone-

"GENKAI! Please, come here! Hurry!"

The old woman flipped off the stove with the now-screaming kettle and moved quickly towards the doorway. Yukina never screamed. Yukina never dropped honorifics.

Genkai could hear the tears in the apparition's voice. She moved faster and opened the door that led into the main living room. Hopefully Yukina wasn't hurt.

Hopefully it's not Yusuke, her mind supplied and Genkai pushed the thought back. She needed to stay focused. Pushing her mind outside itself, she felt carefully around the temple grounds for any "odd" energy.

Damn it, something's here, I can feel it! How did I miss this before? A string of curses flew through Genkai's head. There wasn't any strange energy, no, but there was an absence of energy. The entire front half of the property was blank.

A shield. A large shield. That's never a good sign.

"Yukina!" shouted Genkai as she navigated down her many hallways. "What's wrong?"

"I-I t-there's so much blood Genkai-san. S-so much blood. I-I've never seen anything like it."

Genkai rushed into her living room, still beating herself up for being so incompetent.

"Yukina," Genkai urged, "you need to tell me what's wr-"

Genkai froze. It wasn't Yusuke that was lying in her doorway. It wasn't even a boy. A girl, Genkai thought, and a young looking one too-a teenager? A hiker that had been attacked by an animal, maybe? There isn't a bag with her, though. This is too suspicious for my tastes.

She lay just inside the door, collapsed onto Genkai's very expensive wooden flooring. Blood covered the side of the door facing the outdoors, with no trail visible. She's been dropped off here, Genkai realized.

Genkai had never seen so much blood on someone so young-not even Yusuke. The jeans on t-shirt on her small frame were ripped and torn and bloodied. Glasses perched on her nose had one lense missing and the other cracked. Gashes and cuts covering the visible parts of her flesh oozed blood. What wasn't red was slowing blooming into purple-brown splotches. Her braided hair was frayed and dirty.

Then there was her face. The left half was virtually mark-free, save for a bruise covering the eye. The other half had four long, deep gashes that went from the side of her temple to her cheek, just barely missing her right eye.

Her eyes were shut, and for a moment Genkai wondered if she was dead. Then, as if triggered by her thoughts, the girl took a painful sounding breath and then began a raging hacking/wheezing fit. There was a gurgling sound coming from her throat.

Genkai's head snapped up to Yukina. The koorime was blinking tears from her eyes and moving over to the girl as quickly as she could.

"Genkai-san," she said, trying to lift the girl up, "she's choking!"

The old woman moved to help Yukina. "She's choking on her own blood," she agreed quietly, a weary tone to her voice.

"We've got to help her!"

Genkai took a breath, "Yukina, I do not know what we can do. Her condition isn't well. There is no way this human girl could survive much longer-not with injuries like these."

Yukina was crying then, and small gems fell onto the girl's lap. "Genkai-san, we must try. We cannot allow her to die!" she pleaded.

The psychic touched the human's hand-it was already becoming cold. She reached her hand toward her neck-a pulse, but it was slow and very, very faint.

Genkai sighed, trying to find a way to tell Yukina that the girl stood no chance with Yukina's small amount of healing abilities. Even with her wounds healed, she'd lost too much blood. Humans simply could not take it.

"Yukina-"

Genkai stopped.

"N-nottt h-hu..." the slurring came from below the hand Genkai had placed on the girl's neck. Looking down, she saw two dull, green eyes staring up at her. Genkai could feel the vibration in the girl's throat. She was...speaking? In her condition? Impossible!

Yukina and Genkai stared with wide eyes

"We can't understand you," Genkai told the girl impassively, hoping that being a bit rude to the girl would get her to talk more.

"N-nottt h-huuum...annn," she croaked, and began choking again, blood spurting from her mouth.

Genkai raised an eyebrow. Yukina placed her hands on the girl's right arm, ready to heal her.

"Then what are you? A demon?" the old woman asked.

"Y-ye-ahhh"

"Genkai-san!" Yukina exclaimed, taking her hands away from the girl's skin.

"What is it, Yukina?"

"Her cuts, they won't heal!" Yukina placed her glowing hands on the girl again, and then took them away. They looked no different.

Genkai's eyes hardened. Damn it. "Whatever's torn her up so badly has poison imbedded into the claws or weapon that did this. You'll have to get out the infection before you can heal it, girl."

"What can I use?" Yukina asked, already on her feet.

"Go to the guest bath and get Yusuke's first aid kit from the cabinet. There should be some peroxide in it for infections and poisons," Genkai said, glad that Yusuke's first aid kit had all of her heavy duty bandages and herbs (the kid was a walking disaster, after all). Yukina nodded, picked up the ends of her kimono, and ran out of the room.

Genkai looked down at the young girl-demon-lying in front of her. Her eyes were still open, but her pupils were very large and not very focused.

"Why did you appear here?" Genkai asked her, hoping that conversation would keep her conscious but also curious.

She blinked her a moment as if she was trying to think, then managed a strangled, "B-because you co-uld h-h-elp me."

"Uh-huh," Genkai said, not really believing her but also not wanting to argue with a half-dead girl. She tried another question.

"Why are you still in this form?"

She almost grinned at the, albeit weak, "oh shit" look in the girl's eyes.

"I-I t-thought you wo-uld h-elp-" she broke off, coughing and spitting up blood again.

"Ah," Genkai nodded. "You thought an old woman who is known for killing demons wouldn't want to help a dying demoness such as yourself? Although, I'm guessing at the time you blurred out your energy you didn't quite realize how bad off you are."

"C-corre-ct," she stammered.

"It must be killing you, keeping this form while almost dead," Genkai observed casually.

"I-I'll m-m-manage. D-Don't li-ike other fo-orm," her eyes were slipping closer to shut.

"Are you stupid?" asked Genkai. "Demon energy is power in itself when it's not being masked. It'd help fight against the poison coursing through your system, and your wounds would heal ten times as fast."

"D-Don't wa-anna look li-ike tha-at anymore. D-Don't wa-anna look li-ike him," she slurred, eyes finally closing.

"Look like who, exactly?" Genkai was more than a little pissed at this girl. And where the hell was Yukina with that first aid kit? The apparition had probably stopped to dust a picture frame.

Damn, she wanted a cigarette.

When the girl didn't answer, Genkai sighed. The best way to get something down was to do it yourself, she supposed. Taking both hands and placing them on the girl's forehead, she focused her spirit energy into her palms. Genkai shut her own eyes and began pushing her pure energy through the demon.

The girl's eyes flew open almost immediately. She screamed and gurgled around the blood. She tried to kick and fight, but it didn't have much effect. Genkai continued pushing until the blurs around her energy were gone and she could feel the demonic aura surrounding her.

The girl was breathing deep and heavy. If looks could kill, Genkai was sure this kid had just knocked her into one of hell's bottom rings. After a few seconds, her eyes slipped shut again, and her breathing evened out. She was unconscious.

Genkai took a breath herself. Using spirit energy wasn't as easy as it used to be, she grumbled silently. The old woman kept a close eye on the demon before her, ready for her actual body to show itself. The most she expected was a change in skin color or a pair of cat ears.

She didn't expect what had actually happened.

The girl morphed slowly. Her height and build didn't change, her skin turned green. Her dirty, braided, red hair got so thick and frizzy that it broke her hair band-turning black as it did so. Genkai nodded to herself. Weird, but not too weird.

She spoke too soon.

A sudden amount of curved lines popped up on the girl's skin. All over her arms, legs, and face. Genkai could see a few more lines through the holes in her clothing. Huh, those almost looked like-

-ah, fuck.

"I'm getting way too old for this," she complained, but reached over to touch the girl anyways. She brought her hand up to the girl's face and opened the girl's two eyes. The white in her eyes were yellow, and her green eyes were now red. Genkai swallowed, fighting back a groan. Her eyes flickered to the largest curved line on the girl's body that rested on the forehead. She pulled gingerly at the skin there and cursed again.

It was an eye.

A Goddamn purple eye.

And she was covered in them.

Genkai brought her hand back, barely noticing the fact that her cuts had stopped bleeding and were starting to close on their own.

"Yukina!" Genkai yelled.

A muffled yell came through the wall, "I'm sorry, Genkai-san, I dropped the bottle of liquid! I'm trying to clean it up!"

"Never mind that, girl! I need you to call Kurama."

"Of course, Genkai-san! What is it that you wish for me to tell him?"

"Tell him to get Hiei's ass over here. He has some explaining to do."

Genkai's eyes fell back down to the demon in front of her. She bit back another groan.

I'm never going to be able to retire in peace, am I?