A/N: hey everyone. Once again, just want to say thanks for coming back and no, I haven't forgotten this. As promised, I am updating more often on this story. It's almost finished but for now I am going to make this chapter shorter than usual because I want to make the meeting with Koenma it's own chapter. So here is this chapter. Enjoy!
Chapter Eleven: The Gossip of the Day
The rest of the day passed aggravatingly slow for Hiei. As promised, he spent the rest of the morning in Kurama's pocket, staying out of sight and away from the other students. Kurama entered the gym for his fourth class and paused when he saw several small groups of students clustered around the gym, all of them whispering excitedly.
"Hey, Kurama!" a voice shouted from his right.
Kurama turned to see Yusuke waving to him as he approached. "Hello, Yusuke. What's going on?"
"Didn't you hear?" Yusuke asked as he stepped up beside him. "Someone has been causing chaos. Well, more than usual, anyway. And it's not me!" he shouted to several of the groups behind him. Some of the groups paused and stared at him skeptically before turning back around and continuing their conversations. Yusuke turned back to Kurama and scowled. "So, what did Hiei do?"
"What makes you think I did anything?" Hiei asked from inside the pocket.
Yusuke rolled his eyes. "Oh, gee, I don't know. Maybe it was the story of the extremely hot baseball bats. Or the metal pipes in the girls' bathroom that melted and is now spraying water all over the place. Or better yet, it could be the fact that every single soda in the vending machine was open. Other than that, I have no idea."
Kurama sighed and glared down at his pocket. "Figures."
"Hn, you missed one detective." Hiei said, popping his head out of the pocket and smirking. "You forgot about the papers flying out of the window."
"Papers?" Kurama asked.
"Oh, yeah." Yusuke said. "The music sheets from the choir room were found all over the place outside. I guess throwing them out the window would be a good way for that to happen."
"Well, it's not like that was unjustified." Hiei said defensively. "If they call that garbage 'singing', then it looks like we found a new torture method."
"Hiei, you can't go around doing things like that." Kurama whispered. "You could get in a lot of trouble. Or we could. The last thing we need is to draw attention to ourselves. Didn't I just finish telling you guys that?"
"Whatever, it doesn't matter now. It's over with." Hiei said.
"Not likely." Yusuke said. "This will be the talk of the school for quite a while."
"Then these humans are more idiotic than I thought." Hiei muttered.
Suddenly a whistle was heard and Kurama and Yusuke turned to the gym instructor, Hiei ducking back into the pocket. "Alright, everyone. Front and center! Move it!"
Everyone bunched together and waited for the teacher to begin. "First I want to see Shuichi Minamino. Where are you, Minamino?"
Kurama stepped forward. "Here, sir." He said.
The teacher looked him up and down. "How were you in your other school? What was the last thing you did?"
"The last thing we did was an obstacle course sort of thing." Kurama responded.
"Right, well, today we're going to be doing a physical fitness test." The teacher said. The other students groaned. "Shut up!" the teacher snapped. "You guys are way too lazy. Besides, you can thank whoever messed up the baseball bats, because that was what we were originally going to do but thanks to whoever that was, that will not be possible."
Yusuke glared at Kurama's pocket, where a small chuckle could only be heard by him and Kurama. "Damn it, Hiei." He muttered under his breath.
"Now get going." The teacher commanded. "Go change and meet back out here in ten minutes. One point docked for every minute you're late."
Everyone rushed to the locker rooms to change, most of them still grumbling. "You don't have a gym uniform yet, huh?" Yusuke asked.
Kurama shook his head and pulled out a piece of paper from the pocket Hiei wasn't in. "No, but I have a note from the guidance counselor explaining it and excusing me for today. I will be picking it up after school."
"Lucky." Yusuke said. "I don't get why we have to change in the first place. Why can't we just stay in our regular clothes?"
Kurama shrugged. "Don't ask me."
After they had finished dressing into their gym clothes, everyone headed back into the gym. "Now." Said the coach. "Everyone get into pairs. You and your partner are going to be recording each other's times, counts and heart rate. Now hurry up and get into pairs."
Yusuke glanced at Kurama. "Partners?" he asked.
"Sure." Kurama granted.
"Right." The coach said once everyone was in pairs. "One person from each pair come and get a clipboard, a recording sheet and a timer. Move it!"
"I'll get them." Kurama said.
After Kurama returned with the items that they needed and the coach had released them, the two of them moved to a small corner of the gym, away from the other students and any unwanted eavesdroppers. "So, do you want to go first or should I?" Yusuke asked.
"You can go first." Kurama said.
"So, what are we going to do about this?" Yusuke asked as he got down onto his back to begin sit-ups.
Kurama sat down next to him and began timing the sit-ups. "I'm not sure yet. Hopefully we won't have to do anything at all. After we speak with You-Know-Who, we should be able to decide what to do about how to change Hiei back."
"Well, yeah, that's great but I was actually talking about what Hiei did to the school." Yusuke said, pausing in his sit-ups to gesture at Kurama's pocket. "Like I said before, people aren't going to let this go unless something even bigger happens."
"Bigger?" Hiei said from the pocket.
"No, Hiei." Kurama said, marking down Yusuke's time and amount of sit-ups when he finished.
"No, what?" Hiei asked.
"Don't get any ideas. No drawing attention, remember?" Kurama said.
"You worry too much, fox." Hiei said.
"Well, I have to be the worrier since no one else will. So I'm warning you anyways." Kurama said. "And don't call me fox."
After their gym class ended and Yusuke changed back into his street clothes, Yusuke, Kurama, Kuwabara and Keiko sat on the roof of the school, eating lunch and talking to each other about what to speak to Koenma about.
"Well, I think the first thing we should think about is finding a way to change Hiei back." Kurama said. "Once we do that, we can focus on finding the one who changed him in the first place."
"Well, actually. Doesn't this sort of help?" Keiko asked. Yusuke had filled her in on what had happened after they had left Koenma's office the day before yesterday, leading up to the part where they saved Hiei from the clutches of the little girl. He generously left out the part about the dress and other humiliating things that Hiei would no doubt kill him for mentioning.
"What do you mean 'help'?" Hiei snapped, glaring at her from his seat on Kurama's knee. He gestured to himself. "How the hell does this help?"
"Well, what I mean is, since we know this demon turns its victims into dolls, we can use this information to help find him." Keiko clarified. "And also, since Hiei is back with us and knows what this demon looks like and how he acts, it will help us identify him if he decides to walk around town in disguise. It would be a lot more useful than trying to find someone when you don't know what they look like."
Kurama looked at her in mild surprise. "She has a point." He said. "After we speak to Koenma and get Hiei changed back, Hiei can take us to where he was captured and we can go from there. We can search for clues in the area that the demon left behind."
Kuwabara, who had been looking puzzled for a while now, finally spoke up. "But what if this is his plan?"
The others looked at him questioningly. "What do you mean?" Botan asked.
"Well, what I mean is that this guy captures Hiei, turns him into a doll, builds a doll house and puts him in it, and then sells it. Wouldn't it be better if he kept them all so that he can keep an eye on them? But if it was his intention for the dolls to be found, then he's not going to care if one or two of his dolls disappears or gets found. Maybe he's smarter than we think and he just doesn't care." Kuwabara finished explaining and then blushed when the others continued to stare at him in shocked silence. "T-that's just my guess."
"The oaf finally said something intelligent." Hiei smirked. "Hell must have frozen over."
"Hey!" Kuwabara snapped.
Kurama jumped in before they could start fighting. "Kuwabara may be right. If his theory turns out to be true, then this demon will be a lot harder to catch than we first thought. We should make sure not to underestimate him, just in case. This should be something we speak to Koenma about as well." The others agreed.
"It's settled then." Yusuke said as the bell rang, signaling the end of lunch. Everyone stood and gathered their things. "We speak to Koenma about changing Hiei back. Then Hiei explains what he just told us about what happened to him after he was changed. Then we tell Koenma about our theories. And after that, we go search for this doll-making demon and kick some ass."
Everyone agreed and headed back inside the school. Hiei ducked back into Kurama's pocket and Botan manifested her oar and flew back to Spirit World. The rest of the day passed achingly slow and without much incident. Kuwabara and Yusuke had gotten called into the office half way through their last class, most likely because of the suspicions of them being the ones who caused all of the incidents that had happened. Kurama and Hiei were surprised to learn that Hiei was a quick learner when it came to Spanish. By the end of the class, he had already learned how to greet, say what he liked, wanted, needed, had, and hated. Somehow he also learned how to say 'go to hell' and 'you're dead'.
"See, Hiei." Kurama said as he exited the school grounds and headed for the line of trees across the street that started the woods. They had agreed earlier to meet there after school. "If you actually gave it a chance, you might find that you would actually like school."
"Hn, I doubt it, fox." Hiei muttered.
Kurama smiled but didn't say anything. As they waited under the trees, Kurama tried to get Hiei to admit to anything about school that he actually enjoyed and coax him into enrolling when this mission was over with. Hiei refused. Finally, Yusuke and Kuwabara showed up. "Ready?" Kurama asked them. Yusuke and Kuwabara nodded. "Then let's go."
The three of them entered the forest, Hiei riding on Kurama's shoulder, and walked until they reached a clearing, where Botan waited next to a shimmering part of the air, which was their portal into the Spirit World. "Everyone ready?" she asked when they stopped in front of her.
"Ready as we'll ever be." Yusuke said.
"Right, then. To Spirit World!" Botan shouted. To anyone passing by, they would have seen four teenagers randomly disappear into thin air.
A/N: Well, how did you like it? I know it was a bit slow and short. This wasn't exactly my favorite chapter. But I had to get the rest of the school day over with so that we can get to Koenma. Once we do, the story should get better. Just warning though. I'm not really good with investigations and stuff. But I'll try my best. Don't forget to review!