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Chapter 14: Dragon of the Darkness Flame
It started as small flames, and then they got larger, hotter, until they became uncontrollable. Audience members screamed as the flames licked at their feet, before the fire rose up and engulfed entire sections of the stadium. Streams of fire even sped toward the team members on the sidelines, who had to quickly dodge or block the flames. This all happened in seconds- long enough for Flein to realize they were directly in the line of fire.
She swiftly put a barrier up around herself and her friends just before a flame as hot as hellfire crashed into them. Rei screamed and ducked behind the other girls' legs, even though she had been blocked from harm. Flein could feel the heat radiating from just outside of her barrier. Just as she was beginning to feel like she was being cooked in a microwave, chuckling from Team Urameshi's competitor interrupted Zeru's train of thought and the random bursts of flame ceased.
As Zeru fired balls of flame at his smaller opponent, Flein put down her barrier and drew in air, realizing she had been accidentally holding her breath the whole time.
"Man, we're lucky to have Flein here!" Kirda exclaimed, laughing at their close call.
"That was scary!" Anji said, holding her hand to her chest. "I guess not even bystanders are safe." Before she could even finish her sentence, Flein could hear parts of the stadium ceiling crumbling down, as one of Zeru's fire balls missed its target once again, causing debris to rain down on the spectators.
"I'm just glad I saw it just seconds before it hit." Flein claimed, glad that her teammates were all right. She didn't know how she'd react if her team members were taken out by Zeru's needless urge to show off.
"I'm fine." Rei assured the others, even though no one had asked. She brushed invisible substances off of her imaculate dress. "I like fire. I'm not afraid of it."
"Even though you were ducking and screaming just a few seconds ago." Flein thought, rolling her eyes. She wondered how Rei would feel about fire if she had to fight Zeru herself.
Flein turned back to the arena to see a large wall of orange flame gathering above the pale demon's head, before shooting up through the circular open space on top of the stadium dome and exploding in the air. Warm light showered over the onlookers, brightening up the surroundings on a cloudy day.
"That's a lot of fire . ." Anji commented, looking up at the orange-red sky, the light from the flames reflecting in her fearful blue eyes.
The black-haired demon belonging to the Urameshi Team simply stood there, hands in his pockets, watching Zeru's elaborate show with an expression on his face equivalent to one who was watching a dull documentary about tree fungus.
As if his opponent's bored face challenged him further, Zeru locked his two fists together and drew all of the fire into this body, his pale skin suddenly turning bright red.
"He . . he seems to be engulfed in heat! He's glowing like a poker!" exclaimed the fox-tailed announcer, whose voice was easy for Flein to tune out when so much was going on in the arena at once.
"That's not good." Gaou said, his meaty arms crossed over his chest. "Zeru is as hot as volcanic lava now. In this state, no one can touch him." He lowered his head, seeming to have already reached his own conclusion. "It's over."
"I'm not sure." Flein disagreed, her vision locked on the other demon's red eyes. So far he had been showing no emotion at all- but after this latest development, his expression changed. "The other guy's smiling."
"How could he smile when facing such a strong attack?" she thought, looking at Team Urameshi's demon member. "He has to be stronger than he looks."
With a movement so fast that Flein almost missed it entirely, Zeru charged at his opponent and shoved his hand right through his stomach like it was warm butter. The black-haired demon flew backwards, engulfed entirely in flame. He barely had a moment to look shocked before Zeru lifted his arm slowly and shot a reddish-black ball of energy at him, which hit dead-on and turned the demon's form into a soot-like shell of his former self. He landed on the white platform with a crackle, and it was a wonder he didn't burst into ashes.
"You see it yourself, people! Hiei is done!" Koto exclaimed happily, her green eyes bright with excitement.
"Well, that's over with." Kirda stated, a corner of her mouth turned downward.
Flein looked down at the white scarf still wrapped around her neck, squeezing it tightly. She didn't know if she still felt comfortable wearing it, knowing it belonged to someone now deceased.
"Hiei, huh . ." she thought, taking the enthusiastic fox's word for it and acknowledging the name of the scarf's original owner. "Why did you have to prove me wrong?" She suddenly felt like climbing up on that platform and taking on Zeru herself. She couldn't stand knowing that he would walk around another day with his arrogance, thinking that he got another easy kill under his belt.
"As I said before," Gaou's deep voice rasped behind her, although she didn't bother looking up. "Zeru is a powerful opponent. We'll be lucky if he can be defeated by some other team before we have to fight him ourselves."
"You say that, but I have something to put out his fire!" Kirda said, a confident smile lighting up her face. "He wouldn't have such an easy time with me!"
"Or with me." The rest of the team turned to Flein to see her gripping the white scarf so hard her knuckles were turning white. "If we were to ever fight, he would see whose fire is stronger."
"Flein?" Anji's soft voice made Flein's right ear twitch slightly. "Are you okay? You seem kinda angry today . ." Flein supposed she was a bit high-strung, but she could easily blame that on the high amount of cocky bastards running around lately.
Before she could answer, the loud sound of a crackling fire made her snap her head up, only to see an enormous fire bathe the stadium in orange light once again. At first, Flein thought that Zeru had somehow found a reason to continue showing off, in which case she wouldn't have been able to stop herself from charging at him.
However, her enemy Zeru was standing on the opposite side of the arena, looking at the large fire with an expression of complete shock, his body already drained of all heat. In the center of the red flame, Flein could faintly see the form of a person within.
"Ah! Oh my! Hiei survived!" Koto yelled helpfully for the benefit of her near-sighted viewers, looking almost as shocked as Zeru himself. "He's on his feet, he's . . smoldering!"
"No way . ." Gaou was uncrossing his arms now, his pupils seeming to shrink as his eyes widened. "But nobody survives Zeru's attack . ."
"He's alive . ." Flein couldn't tear her eyes away from Hiei, who was now standing with confidence in the midst of a raging flame, with no more damage than a ripped and tattered blue shirt. The audience was so surprised at the sight of his living form, that every single demon present was so quiet that one could only hear the crackling of the fire surrounding the demon.
A small purple flame evaporated the white bandana that was covering Hiei's forehead, to reveal that it wasn't just a fashion statement- underneath opened a purple eye, staring directly at Zeru. "So my Jagan eye may not be natural . ." His voice reached Flein's senstive ears, just barely hearing him over the fire. "But it does give me exactly what I need!"
A glow so bright, that it eliminated the orange colors of the fire around him, erupted from his third eye. This time his voice echoed across the stadium with clarity: "Dragon of the Darkness Flame!"
Flein felt her entire body stop moving- even her organs seemed to come to a complete stop inside of her. "Dragon . . of the Darkness Flame . ."
"It's an attack most dangerous." Her father's booming voice traveled around the room, bouncing off the marble walls of the castle. "When one can harness the fire from the bottom of Spirit World itself . . no one can survive!" He exploded into a fit of laughter, his chest heaving up and down, stomping his heavy foot on the floor so hard that the ground shook underneath the ground she was sitting on. She knew her father well enough by now that he wasn't laughing because he discredited the rumor of the darkness flame- he simply loved the thought of destruction. "It would burn anything to ashes- no, to microscopic little bits- no, not even that, the darkness flame would just disintigrate someone entirely! It would even torch the one who held it in his grasp!"
"No one would be able to control a flame like that, Dad!" her half-brother spat, sitting with his head cradled in his hand, a look of dreary boredom etched all over his face. His pacifier was almost slipping out of his mouth.
"Perhaps!" King Enma retorted, before leaning over his daughter who was interrupted from an engrossing fairy tale by her father's shadow looming over her. "Someday I'm sure this cursed daughter of mine will become so tainted, her fire will turn dark as the shadows of the lower realms of the Spirit World, simply by association!" His mocking laughter hurt her ears, which felt like crawling inside of themselves to block such horrible noise.
"Ha! A fitting conclusion to such a rotten sibling!" Koenma shot in her direction, most likely still sour from Flein having sneaked a roll of bread off his dinner plate earlier.
She dropped her book on the floor, landing on its spine, as she brought her knees up to her chest and buried her head in them, shielding herself from the world.
The sky above them turned dark orange, then red, black clouds swirling into ghastly shapes. Even the very air around them seemed to blow ominously, as if to warn of what was to come. A dark hole opened up in the sky, raining down streams of darkness solely onto Hiei, who was channeling its power into him like a vessel. Flein's stomach started to perform somersaults on top of her intestines. If this was the technique she had heard about from her father . .
"You know, it's impossible to control it completely." Hiei said, his voice rising above the chaos, as clear as day. His hand was shaking as if to confirm what he was saying was true. "Once I release it, I have no say."
"Guys . ." Flein said, hearing a tremble in her own voice and fighting to control it. "I think we should step back . ." If this was really the Dragon of the Darkness Flame, she wasn't sure if even her barrier could stop it. If it decided to turn rogue, they coud be its unlucky victims.
She didn't have to tell Rei. She was already halfway down the corridor, almost out of sight, hiding behind an overfilled trash can.
"I have a bad feeling" Anji said, backing up slowly with Flein and Kirda. "It smells like death."
"I have the power to pull you into oblivion." Hiei was saying, smiling at his speechless victim. "I assume just my right arm will do."
Flein crouched down and put a barrier around her team again, in preparation for the worst. It was almost time.
"You should never have insulted the Jagan eye." A dark mist was circling around Hiei, taunting, teasing, leaving Zeru in a motionless stance. "Because you see . . in a way it has its own mind and loathes disrespect." His eyes, all three of them, locked onto his opponent, for the last time. "Resisting it is not something I would do."
For the first time, real fear hung over Zeru like a heavy sheet, and he sat there unable to move, blocking himself with his arms in front of him uselessly. Hiei drew his trembling arm back, unable to hold the dragon any longer.
"Dragon of the Darkness Flame!"
A fiery black dragon emerged from the palm of his right hand, shooting out toward Zeru with incredible speed and power. The dragon hitting its target was like experiencing an earthquake and a tornado at the same time- Flein and her teammates were knocked off their feet, her barrier disappearing into thin air when the back of her head collided with the edge of a table. Part of her leg landed on Gaou's arm, and she could feel Kirda gripping her shoulder like a steel clamp. The wind tunneled through the corridors and tore at their clothes, and Flein thought her hair was going to be ripped right off of her skull. For a few minutes all she could hear was roaring, and then silence.
"I'm deaf." she thought, gripping onto the leg of the table, which was the cause of the throbbing in the back of her head. "That's it, I'm deaf."
The wind slowly died down, Flein's blond hair falling in a tangled heap over her shoulders. Through a few strands, she could see Anji laying a few feet away, blown almost all the way down the corridor by the strong winds. Kirda's hands were still wrapped tightly around her shoulder, and Flein thought she might lose circulation in her arm any minute now.
"What the heck was that?!" Kirda spluttered, pulling strands from her own braid out of her mouth. Her grip finally loosened, and Flein slowly shook the feeling back into it.
"Okay, I guess I'm not deaf." she thought, relieved. Her chest felt cold against the dirty floor she was sprawled out on, and blushed when she realized her shirt was blown up in all the chaos. She lifted her body and quickly pulled it back down over her chest, glancing at Gaou from the side to make sure he hadn't noticed. She was lucky her small shirt wasn't blown off of her entirely. She probably had Kirda to thank for that.
"Anji, are you okay?!" Kirda yelled down the hall, cupping her hands to the side of her mouth. Anji pulled herself up off the ground, her hair practically a big purple bush framing her head. Her ponytail had come out sometime after the attack hit.
"I'm fine!" They could faintly hear her tiny voice carrying news of her condition. Rei was nowhere to be found. Flein found the trash can she was hiding behind overturned, and wondered if she had desperately stuffed herself inside of it.
"That's . . not possible . ." Gaou was already standing, his eyes fixed on the arena oustside.
"Well . . he's definitely out of the ring!" Flein heard Koto say. After a short pause, she enthusiastically cried, "Let's give it up for Hiei!"
No cheering followed her announcement. Yanking stray strands of hair out of her eyes, Flein rushed to stand next to Gaou, Kirda and Anji behind her. There against the wall of the stadium, soot lay splattered in the shape of a person- in this case, the deceased Zeru. After the dragon took him, there was absolutely nothing else left behind but an outline.
"So that's the darkness flame . ." Flein muttered under her breath, her eyes resting on Hiei, who was talking calmly to his teammates on the other side of the arena. It was as if he just did something as casual and mundane as drinking a cup of coffee in the morning. Flein looked down to see that, despite being blown back by the immensely strong winds, Hiei's white scarf still clung to her neck unscathed. "To control something like that . . it's amazing . ."
Never before had she ever really seen anyone else control fire as well as she did. Nobody else even presented a challenge for her when it came to a fire vs fire match. As far as she knew, she was the most skilled when it came to bending the flames to her will.
She would have to reorganize her thinking after seeing Hiei's match. Controlling the darkness flame was out of her league. Plus, who knew what else was in his list of possible attacks?
Suddenly, her desire to meet the members of Team Urameshi sharply increased. Things were about to get interesting.