~A/N Just saw "Kuchisake-onna" on with English subtitles. Not really that scary, but I like the legend, and I got to thinking that maybe there should be something like this happening to the YuYu Hakusho group. But I do know that you guys are all going to hate me because of some of the… well, that's just going to give it away! :P Just keep reading…
~*~
The Reikai was relatively busy today, a sight that no one really wants to see. Many multi-coloured ogres ran about, all carrying heavy stacks of papers without miraculously spilling them over. They were all hollering about for other ogres to get out of the way while they raced to their designated areas. One certain ogre, a huge, bruise-blue creature with a mussed blonde mullet, quickly shoved everyone out of the way, holding only one single paper, which was sealed in a perfumed, pink package.
"Koenma sir!," he exclaimed as he pushed a huge wooden door open. His voice sounded urgent, yet awkward, while he ran over to a huge, paper-stacked desk. Sitting in the tall, luxurious chair was a small toddler. His eyes were squinting long and hard at the papers he stamped and threw away at different directions. His head shot up immediately at the beast's words.
"Darn it, Ogre! Can't you see that I'm very busy? I haven't the time to mess around with you today!," the toddler screeched in his high-pitched voice. The ogre could feel the acid of his boss' words drip onto every particle of his rough skin, forcing him to shudder a bit. But he shook out his fear and held up the delicate cargo, letting a twinkle of seriousness gleam in his beady eyes.
"But Sir, it's an important alert from Ayame-chan!," the ogre exclaimed in his serious tone, waving the mail in an almost-mocking way. The toddler, Koenma, as he was named, straightened his posture as he released his vice grip on the small object in his hand. He held out a bruising hand eagerly and snatched the envelope from his assistant's large hand, who jumped at his boss' eagerness.
"Of course, I can always do that later," Koenma blathered on inwardly as he skillfully opened the peppermint-scented envelope. He took out the fragile piece of folded paper inside and, with a snap of his wrists, he opened it, reading the characters briskly. The ogre's curiosity struck as he ran behind Koenma's small body and tried to read it with him.
Suddenly, with no warning or anything, Koenma let out a painful mewl as the sweet smelling paper gently floated to the ground. The creature, fearful that his boss knew that he was behind him, backed up as fast as he could, holding up his hands defensively.
"Gomenasai, Koenma-dono! I didn't mean to-," the beast shouted, letting the fear well up in his sentences, but he stopped mid-sentence when he noticed that Koenma didn't move a muscle. In fact, he was rather silent, which was out of character for him. Even an urgent mission in which his old Tantei used to complete while barely escaping with their lives had never made him this quiet. "K-Koenma sir?," the ogre said gently, in case the tot did blow up.
"Ogre…," Koenma whispered solemnly, letting tears well up in his large eyes as his soft, stunned voice broke through the silence. "Summon Botan-chan and Hinageshi-kohai… They must know of this…" The ogre gave Koenma a disbelieving look, which caused the tot to snap his eyes at his awkward assistant. "In fact, summon every last ferrier in the worlds NOW!" The ogre nodded and, although he tripped a bit, ran out of the office in three long strides as beads of cold sweat flew off of his forehead. Koenma glanced at the note once more before shaking his head disapprovingly, feeling the tears run down his puffy cheeks. The curtains that hung in front of his large window were opened, and he stared longingly at the ominous clouds that sauntered by.
"This will be a long night…"
~*~
Down a long, seemingly empty street, a group fight was arousing in the midst of night. Cracks of knuckles and crunches of bones breaking could be heard from a mile off as the crescent in the sky illuminated the entire island of Japan. A thump! sound filled the entirely, almost dead silent ghetto street area.
"Come on, Yusuke. These guys aren't even worth the trouble anymore," a gruff, husky voice was heard, indicating that he was buddies with the winner of the brawls. The sound of a tongue clicking had droned down the street eerily as two lone silhouettes stood alone. One was much bigger than the other, with possible curly hair that was bunched together into a hard cocoon. The other, an average sized male, to say the least, was hunched over, hands in pockets, with hair that was slicked back with large quantities of gel.
"Hai, hai, I know… Fuckin' morons don't know how to leave us the hell alone, right, Kuwabara?," said the smaller figure in an annoyed tone as his head hung and he stared at the fallen, unconscious bodies of the men the two had beaten together. The bulkier man nodded and heaved a long, heavy sigh, hanging his head as well.
"Damn it… 'Zuru's gonna be pissed at me once I come home…," he muttered inwardly, sounding a little worried. The smaller figure began to shudder a little as soft snickers escaped from his lips. A hand rose from the smaller silhouette and friendly patted the big guy's shoulder.
"No worries, dude. Jus' tell her you're stayin' with me," the male simply stated. His huge friend roughly shrugged the hand off his body, grunting in the process as he turned his body away from his friend. "Come on, Kuwabara! I know Shizuru's scary as hell, but I'm a friend. You should come over." A slick, brand-new car sped by just then, shining light on the two figures.
The bigger man, Kuwabara, had a very worried expression that was glued onto his gruff, bruising face. As said earlier, his bright orange hair was held together in an odd, hard cocoon style, and he wore a cerulean jumpsuit with golden buttons that trailed down his hard stomach. Muscles seemed to rip out of the uniform as he rubbed his nose, trying to clean his face from the blood that gushed out of his nostrils.
His friend, Yusuke, had been wearing a dirty green jumpsuit that hung off his seemingly gaunt body frame. His hair was raven coloured, with a blue sheen added to it, and was slicked back by hair gel as loose, thin bangs gently brushed against his sweaty forehead. Although crusty, his face hadn't a scratch on it from the previous street brawls that he was involved in. His face had a curious expression on it as he tried to touch his buddy once more.
"Oh, c'mon, Kuwabara! I'm jus' tryin' to cheer you up, at least," Yusuke retorted, rolling his huge chocolate brown irises as Kuwabara began to slap his hand away from him. Kuwabara growled quietly and opened his mouth in an 'O' shape, just about to reply to his friend's nasty attitude, but stopped right away. His slouched posture straightened almost immediately as his face turned blank, letting his arms fall to his sides. His fists and teeth clenched as he began to shiver.
"I think Botan's comin'," he stated apathetically, answering Yusuke's question, even though the delinquent hadn't even took the chance to ask what he was doing. Yusuke groaned under his breath softly as he swiveled his head towards the midnight sky. There, sitting on a wooden oar, a bluenette wearing a fluorescent pink kimono flew straight at the two boys. Kuwabara rolled his eyes to glance at the woman in the sky before he began to relax his tensing muscles as a small smile danced on his taut lips.
"YUSUKE!! KUWABARA!!," the woman exclaimed worriedly as she began to close in on the two. The somewhat cheerful expressions on the boys' faces washed away and fear began to boil in their bodies. In unison, they began to run towards their friend, both wondering the same thing; what was up? Yusuke began to flail his arms wildly as the young woman pulled her oar back violently, slowing down considerably.
"Yo, Botan!," Yusuke cried out, stopped dead in his tracks. Kuwabara copied the act, but, instead of staying on his feet, he flew forward and, with a loud crunch, hit the muddy pavement face-first. Although the enormous redhead cried out painfully, the juvenile delinquent ignored him as Botan stopped her oar right next to Yusuke, hovering above the ground about a foot or two. There were beads of sweat trickling down her smooth cheeks as a small redhead sat behind the bluenette, loosely gripping onto the oar as she gave Yusuke a weak smile.
"Konnichiwa, Yusuke-san…," the little girl murmured quietly, giving him a slight nod. Kuwabara, who had forced his limping body up to his feet, slowly made his way next to his friends and huffed annoyingly. That's when his beady eyes traveled over to the oar, and his eyes widened, along with Yusuke's stunned expression.
"Botan-chan, is 'zat Hinageshi?," Kuwabara asked dumbly, pointing at the naïve young lass. She gave him a nervous, yet friendly grin as Botan nodded vigorously. She and Hinageshi, the small redhead, motioned at the edge of the oar, indicating for the men to hold on.
"Yusuke-kun, Kuwabara-kun, Koenma-dono had ordered me and Hinageshi-chan to summon you both for an urgent message," Botan huffed out as she flicked away loose strands of her ruffled, light blue hair, which seemed a little out of character from her usual spick and span appearance. Hinageshi agreed with her partner, nudging at the end of the oar. Yusuke and Kuwabara exchanged the same confused glances before they could stare at the two ferriers once more.
"Pacifier Breath wants us to go all the over to Reikai for a message? Can't you girls just tell us what the hell he wants?," Urameshi asked bluntly, pointing at the two women whilst narrowing his eyes. Botan growled out what seemed to be a 'No' and motioned at the back of the oar again, tightly grasping onto the wood in an attempt to control her anger.
"Yusuke, Kuwabara, I would've just told you, but he wants to tell you both personally! Kurama and Hiei are probably already waiting for us in his office," the bluenette wailed furiously as Hinageshi tensed a bit, not used to her friend's fiery anger. Yusuke and Kuwabara both jumped as they slowly began to oblige to Botan's request.
"All right… But why does the toddler need Hiei an' Kurama, too?," Kuwabara dared to ask as the boys ran to the back of the oar and tightly gripped onto the edge of the smoothed, wooden oar. Hinageshi swallowed down a mewl that was forming in her throat as Botan closed her eyes and, using a pinch of her seemingly eternal ki, made a perfect 180° angle and, with no hesitation, leaned in forward and forced the oar to fly towards the silver crescent in the sky.
"He just told me that the Reikai Tantei," Botan said in a much softer tone, referring to their team name, "needs to 'be informed of the situation at hand,'" she finished, quoting the ruler of Reikai in her best impersonation of the high-pitched leader. Kuwabara and Yusuke glanced at each other briskly as they kept their vice grip on the flying object, careful as to not look down, knowing that their grip might loosen if they see how high up they are. After what seemed to be only a few minutes, the quartet had already seen a breakthrough of a gentle yellow light shine through a slit that seemed to appear right before them.
"Get ready, you guys," Hinageshi piped up cheerfully as she quickly wrapped her slender arms around the pilot's slim waist, letting giggles escape from her soft pink lips. "This news that Koenma-dono is pretty… gruesome…" Botan kicked at Hinageshi's ankle, careful as to not necessarily hurt the young kohai, but just enough to startle her.
"Hinageshi, quiet! Remember, Koenma sir wants to tell them in person, and gave us specific orders not to tell them anything," she reminded her naïve partner. Hinageshi's face fell a hair, but she agreed nonetheless, and shut her mouth. Yusuke opened his mouth to say something, but closed it instantly, knowing that the ride might seem longer if he and the professional one that was flying them to Reikai were to get into a fight. Instead, he glanced at Kuwabara, who had been using both of his hands to hold onto the oar. His expression showed fear, and, with a heavy sigh, Yusuke knew that talking to his buffoon of a friend would get him nowhere. That's when he decided to take the awkward silence between the four of them to sort out his thoughts.
"Well, I guess this must be important, if Botan's being bitchy and is sworn to secrecy. I just hope this isn't some stupid, 'youkai found my precious items' case again…"