Claimer: Chichiro is mine, as well as the storyline, and any other original characters.

Disclaimer: Hiei, Kurama, Yusuke, Kuwabara, Koenma, Genkai, and any other YuYu Hakusho characters used are not mine.

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Chapter 2—The New Mission

--

"You should be more aware of Kurama when you're around him, you know."

Hiei's casually chiding comment surprised Chichiro. Quite honestly perplexed by what he could have meant by it, the she-demon echoed indifferently, "Aware of him?"

"He's spent the last twenty odd years in the human realm," he explained, strangely willing to submit to the fact that Chichiro was of the type that would often need explaining to. "He's adopted their ways. Don't undress in front of him anymore."

At that, a devious grin spread across her lips. Hiei, she had noticed, had been acting far too comfortable around her lately. He didn't seem to notice or mind his own change outwardly, but even though it not unwelcome to Chichiro, she still had to take the chance to try and get him back to acting normally. Such a drastic personality change was odd for the short Jaganshi. "What, are you jealous?"

The comment, designed to irritate him back to his old self, failed to fulfill purpose. It did, however, shake him back to his previous mannerism. "Jealous of what?" he replied scathingly, rolling his piercing ruby eyes sideways and up at the fox demoness he was supporting on his shoulder. "He couldn't even look at you."

Chichiro raised her eyebrows. "Couldn't? What do you mean by 'couldn't'?"

Hiei, honestly, could not think of a way of explaining it that made sense. After all, demons were not bashful about nudity, but at the same time they wore clothing even when not necessary. Humans just wore clothing always, both when needed and when not, and were uncomfortable around nakedness. "Humans prefer clothes on," he decided upon finally.

"Oh," Chichiro accepted surprisingly easily. "Well I wish I'd known. I didn't realize humans didn't like seeing—"

"You misunderstand," Hiei interjected in a mutter, exasperated by her clueless nature already. One would think she'd never even seen a human before this mission.

"Well, no point in you trying then," the fox demoness grumbled back, and although they were still a good ways away from the hospital they were heading for, she withdrew her arm from where it had rested around Hiei's shoulders.

Hiei stopped where he was, staring after her. Females are the most temperamental creatures in existence, he considered as he glared away from her, baffled by what could have possibly upset her. And for a while there, he had thought she was finally beginning to make sense to him.

His eyes switched back to the retreating she-demon before him as she stopped suddenly. He thought for a moment she'd either recognized she'd nothing to be annoyed at or that she'd the intent to yell at him for whatever he'd apparently done to anger her. Then, he sensed a familiar spiritual energy he had not felt nearby in several days—Koenma's. His gaze drifted to the sky, finding that there was an enormous, translucent image of the toddler prince's face hovering before the clouds.

"I trust you're healed enough by now to return to Spirit World for your next mission, Chichiro?" his high-pitched voice greeted the fox demoness below, who seemed quite dwarfed.

"Yes, Lord Koenma," Chichiro answered almost robotically, as though she'd been through this exact situation several times and was well-rehearsed in what simple reply to supply. Hiei considered that this was probably true, though he had no idea how many missions she'd been on before this one.

"'Prince'," Hiei growled flatly, walking for Chichiro once more, his eyes skyward, "despite her claims, she's nowhere near healed enough to try and tackle any demonic power just yet. In case you're unaware, she died less than a week ago."

"And the day after his resurrection, Yusuke was given his first assignment as Spirit Detective," Koenma pointed out. "'Less than a week' sounds like a pretty nice deal to me, and I'm sure Yusuke would have agreed."

"And so would I," Chichiro put in, glaring at Hiei with sudden coldness. Something told him that her unfriendliness toward him was not due to whatever had angered her before, but with his defense of her just now. "I'm perfectly able, thank you very much, and if Lord Koenma sees fit to send me on my next mission, I will go."

Following her lead and addressing her with similar coldness, Hiei growled back, "I appreciate that you feel the need to make yourself seem strong, however—"

"However," Chichiro interrupted with force, "this is none of your business, no matter how you're looking at it. You are not my employer, are you?" And before he could respond, she went on, "Nor are you my protector. You have no right to be concerned for me."

Bristling with irritation, Hiei snarled, "Tell me, woman, is it your goal in life to sound like an ignorant, arrogant fool?"

"Why you—!"

"Enough," Koenma interrupted, his order only making impact because of its volume due to the size of his current form. "Chichiro, Hiei's right—you are being a bit of a brat. But Hiei, Chichiro's also right—you're not longer her partner, so you have no say in her readiness for battle."

No longer her partner. Kurama and Chichiro had both considered it without ever bringing it up with the other, but Hiei had honestly never much dwelled on the temporary alliance he'd made with Chichiro. Even if he had, chances are he would not have thought much of it. Surely, though, they had worked well enough together to merit another pairing for a mission?

The toddler ruler of the spirit world drew in a deep breath, considering exactly when he had been forced to become peacemaker, before he went on, "Now, I've set up a portal for you a few miles from here, Chichiro, if you'd kindly head that way."

"Yes, milord," Chichiro replied, turning away from Hiei and bowing to Koenma before she set off briskly in the direction in which she apparently knew the mentioned portal to be located.

Hiei watched her go, then glared up at the prince, noticing that Koenma was still watching him. "Well? What are you staring at me for?" Hiei grumbled.

"I should be the one asking, 'Well'," Koenma responded.

"And what do you mean by that?"

"Aren't you going to ask if you can go with her?" Koenma asked. Hiei found himself somewhat insulted that he had been seen through so easily. "Kurama has already put in a request to have Chichiro be added to his team whenever convenient for Spirit World."

Rather than leap at the opportunity, Hiei merely muttered in return, "Is she going to make it a habit to kill herself during missions?"

Koenma stared at him in silence a moment before sighing and telling the Jaganshi, "If I'm going to put you on her team again, you'd better make sure she doesn't." And then his image faded, leaving Hiei to smirk only for the benefit of himself.

--

It seemed to Kurama that everything began with the placement of the phone back onto the receiver after he'd hung it up. As if symbolic, it was in the moment after the click that signaled the end of a conversation with his human mother that everything from demon world came crashing back into his life, starting with Hiei. The little fire demon's entrance made the use of the word 'crashing' less of a figure of speech and more of a reality.

The telepath had managed to slip in through the window—which was cracked open halfway and would only allow passage of very thin, small beings such as Hiei—relatively quietly, without disturbing anything in Kurama's room save for the blankets on his bed that were directly beneath the window. Those, which crumpled a bit as Hiei fell back onto them, were forgivable. The damage caused by the enormous, twenty-foot-tall demon that tried to follow Hiei through the same window was not quite so easy to overlook.

It was automatic for Kurama to instantaneously summon his rose whip, removing the unfamiliar adversary's head in single fluid slash, though he realized as soon as he had summoned it that Hiei had killed the intruder seconds before. The jaganshi had strategically decided to use the narrow squeeze to trap the clumsy beast in an immoveable position and had stabbed his drawn sword into its skull at the first chance; such a move suggested that the battle had taken its toll on Hiei, else he would not have gone to such desperate measures to ensure a quick resolution to the fight.

Scrutinizing the fallen beast sprawled across the front part of his room through narrowed eyes, Kurama briefly pondered how he was going to remove it from its place lodged through his outer wall. He then drew in a small breath which he released as a yielding sigh, deciding to at least pretend to ignore the giant demon whose lower half was hanging outside of his house. "Hiei," he began calmly, "why exactly is there a several-ton apparition in my room?"

"To be fair," the Jaganshi muttered back, the faintness of his voice causing Kurama to immediately begin searching Hiei for wounds even before he moved toward the fire demon, "less than half of him is actually in the room."

"All the same," the fox persisted, now walking for Hiei as he spotted the first of what he suspected to be several injuries, "my curiosity lingers."

Hiei only fought Kurama briefly before conceding and allowing him to examine a shallow gash on his shoulder, which was bleeding a misleadingly large amount. "Koenma's orders," he replied sourly, not appearing motivated to explain any past that.

"I see." Kurama released Hiei's arm when the fire demon tried to tug it back a final time, crossing his room and searching through his dresser for the first aid kit he had learned to keep handy. Over the years, Hiei had used Kurama's house as a temporary refuge after battle several times and had often trusted the fox demon to patch up wounds which would have otherwise gone untreated beyond an unconcerned dressing. "Were you assigned to tracking this demon on your own?"

The question was casual enough, but Hiei picked up immediately on the fact that Kurama had asked out of curiosity of Chichiro's whereabouts. Neither Hiei nor Kurama had seen her since the day Koenma had come to fetch her at the hospital, which must have been two or three weeks prior to the conversation they were currently indirectly having about her. "Yes." Without any fight this time around, Hiei offered his arm as Kurama approached him with bandages and salve in hand. "I've only had two missions outside of this one since the tournament. Koenma sent me to those on my own as well." Not wincing or betraying any facial expression that hinted that his wound was being dressed as he spoke, Hiei lifted his cold red eyes to Kurama and asked, "And you? Has the child prince sent you on any assignments?"

Knowing the fire demon meant since Kagura had been taken down, Kurama admitted, "No. I requested that I had a few weeks on my own to try and make some sense of my life here in the human world. I had become a bit preoccupied with the goings-on of Spirit World, you see. I'd somewhat forgotten to pay attention to this part of my life."

Hiei, having never been in a similar situation, was not sure what the divide was like. Thus, he didn't comment on it. He instead addressed the fox's earlier subtle questioning after Chichiro. "Koenma hasn't mentioned that woman to me a single time since he summoned her for her assignment."

Kurama was amused that Hiei had chosen not to use Chichiro's name, acting as though nothing had changed between them since the tournament had started. He didn't comment on that, however, and instead asked distractedly, "Any others?" with an indication toward the injury he'd just dressed. Hiei merely shifted so that Kurama could see his side, which was also freely bleeding, and said nothing. The fox demon, after motioning for Hiei to remove his cloak, returned unconcernedly to their conversation. "Perhaps she had several, smaller solo missions as well. I did hear she partnered up with Kuwabara to stop a less crucial invasion a few days back."

Reaching behind himself and pulling up the lower half of his shirt by tugging the fabric on his back, Hiei straightened to allow Kurama access to his wound, briefly eying it. He then settled on glaring at the large, deceased demon that had caused it as he spoke once more. "I pity her, then." A short silence passed between the two seasoned comrades while Kurama summoned a plant from the demon plane that had the ability to stitch together damaged flesh. As it did so, Hiei broke the quiet that had fallen over them, though Kurama was not sure if he wanted to take his mind off of the stitching sensation or if he merely disliked the silence. "I wasn't aware Koenma still used him for that sort of job."

"Apparently so." The plant was quick-moving, thus Kurama was already able to press a gauze pad against the healing gash. "You know, my break ends tomorrow. I'm supposed to be heading to spirit world for an assignment from Koenma, if you'd like to come along."

"Hn." And though the fire demon's shrug was casual, Kurama was almost sure he could sense severely suppressed anticipation from Hiei's direction.

--

Kurama's prior assumption that Hiei had been hiding excitement at the thought of seeing their comrade proved to be correct. Quite early the next morning, the fox was roused by the fire demon, who asked plainly when they would be heading out. "When the sun's risen," Kurama had replied sourly.

"No problem there," Hiei had alerted him, for, as though he had planned his wake-up time around the assumption of what Kurama would say, the sun was now peeking just over the horizon. The Jaganshi was more than happy to alert him of this.

Thus, they arrived in Koenma's office in somewhat offensively early hours, though Kurama found that the young prince of the spirit realm was not as tired as he and was rather quite awake. "I didn't expect you so soon, Kurama," Koenma greeted him energetically. "I assume this early visit is Hiei's doing?"

"Clearly," the spirit fox replied moodily.

"And here I thought you'd be excited to see me," came another voice—female this time—from just beyond Koenma. From the doorway at the opposite end of the office stepped Chichiro, looking as weary as Kurama felt, but also quite a bit more cheerful.

"Chichiro." The fox demon felt the first grin of the day upon his face. "How have you been?"

"I guess 'well' would suffice for a long, boring tale of all my daring feats," the she-demon responded with good-natured sarcasm. "How've my favorite two boys been holdin' up?"

"Also well," Kurama informed her, though at the mention of 'two' he glanced beside him at Hiei, who'd been silent the entire time. He appeared no different having seen Chichiro, nor did he seem altogether too excited at being near her again after a few weeks. Kurama figured either Hiei had changed his opinion on the demoness since just the previous day, or he was as skilled an actor as ever.

Chichiro, on the other hand, was not quite so used to putting on a façade of indifference, thus her attempt to hide her excitement bore little fruit. She did control her gait as she walked over to them, and smartly gave herself more time to calm down by hugging Kurama first and then embracing the shorter fire demon beside him.

The physical contact seemed to spur a greeting from Hiei. Unconventional as ever, he did not offer a true greeting but rather initiated a conversation immediately. "Kurama told me you were stuck with the idiot on a mission."

Raising an eyebrow, Chichiro asked, "'The idiot'?" Having now met the so-called idiot, she was no longer likely to understand who he meant immediately, as she had only seen the gentleman side of the human.

"Kuwabara," Kurama put in.

"I don't know why you dislike him," Chichiro commented in his defense immediately, to Hiei, though not adamantly. "Sure, he's a little rough around the edges when he's talking to guys, but he was a real gentleman to me."

"I fail to see what part of that was an explanation as to why I should like him," Hiei replied flatly.

Kurama felt a smirk twitching at the corners of his lips, and so turned to Koenma to contain himself. "Lord Koenma, the mission?"

"Ah, yes," the toddler replied in his usual attempt at sophistication, "the mission." He hesitated a moment, as though he believed Kurama would take offense to what he would be told to do. "I'm going to send you to stop a group of Escque," he explained. "Normally the less powerful detectives could handle it, but unfortunately they're all tied up with other matters."

Escque: Corpse-like creatures of little intelligence, created for the sole purpose of destroying the human realm for the gain of demons. They had been a favorite weapon as of late for the demon warlords intent on disobeying demon world laws and trying to conquer the human world.

"Surely you do not insult us by suggesting that we go along with Kurama," Hiei piped up, his crimson glare fixated coldly on the toddler prince.

"I don't recall giving any such order," Koenma replied flatly, "nor do I recall asking you here, Hiei. However, if by 'us' you meant you and Chichiro, then I am—apparently—insulting Chichiro by telling her to go along. You underestimate the size of this Escque patrol."

"And you must underestimate Kurama," Hiei snarled back. "Grossly so, if you believe he requires aid to—"

"Shush," Chichiro cut in, lifting her leg and shoving Hiei gently with her foot. "I'll go and I don't have a problem with it. It's a nice, easy break from the usual stuff and it gives me an excuse to be with you guys."

In what seemed an attempt to look down his nose at her despite her several inches of advantage over him, Hiei replied, "Are you suggesting I intend to go?"

"I'm suggesting you don't have a choice," the fox demoness replied with a smirk, "but I don't think you have a problem with it anyway."

"…Hn."

Kurama restrained a snicker of amusement. He would have assumed Hiei would have refused the mission merely to get back at Chichiro, but it seemed even the fire demon could swallow his pride if he wanted something. The fox never would have assumed a few years back, however, that what the demon would want now was to be with a she-demon. It was difficult, but he bit back a comment describing to Hiei this thought, for the amusement would not have been worth the punishment.

"Well," Chichiro's voice broke into Kurama's thoughts, "shall we get going? That Escque party isn't going to wait for us politely and I'm pretty sure there are a few humans out there that will unwittingly be grateful to us for saving their asses if we leave now."

"Indeed," the fox agreed, smiling at the she-demon before she had turned to head out the portal Koenma had supplied, followed closely by Kurama and the grudging Hiei.