The Shotgun Approach

Chapter 25: You're Blind, Urameshi

A/N: Yusuke POV chapter my dudes!

. . .

"You're just torturing yourself now, you know."

Kurama was right. He always was. But that didn't stop me from keeping my ass planted in this uncomfortable chair, eyes trained on the TV screen mounted to the wall.

I couldn't personally go to the Reikai, so this was the best Koenma could do.

His best wasn't good enough, damn it.

"Why isn't she doing anything?" I threw my hands up, slapping them back down against my thighs.

Hours. I'd spent hours watching her now, smoking cigarette after cigarette. She never moved, just sat on the cot in her cell and stared at the wall.

For the first two weeks she was kept in isolation according to Koenma—for withdrawals. They wouldn't let her have the drugs and Koenma had no intentions of letting her go. This wasn't like a Hiei and Kurama situation where they stole some petty shit outta his daddy's vault.

She was being tried for illegal cross dimensional travel, mass murder, and terrorism.

She would be put to death.

I knew that. I should be fine with it.

Should being the key word there. I was anything but fine. I wanted to scream at the top of my lungs how all of this was bullshit, that Ettie wasn't like this—she saved people. She saved fucking lives, for years.

So why? Why did she do all this now?

For her imaginary fucking son?

The image she had in her head of him was of the baby she lost years ago, didn't she understand that he was long gone? Nothing was going to turn back time, nothing was going to fix what her family did to them both.

I hung my head between my knees and scrubbed irritably at my hair, messing it up even more but not giving a single shit.

I hadn't showered in three days, what did it matter.

"Yusuke..."

"Shut up, Kurama."

"You could go see her, you know. Koenma would allow it without much convincing."

"I need to be here," I snapped.

It wasn't a lie. While I spent days just staring at a TV screen, I should be out helping rebuild the part of the city we'd lost thanks to her.

No, not her. Her goddamned brother.

Kurama dropped it. Instead asking, "Have you heard from Hiei?"

"Normally I would be asking you that question," I said.

"I'll take that as a no then."

"Wish he was around. Could use a fight right about now."

Or a fuck, I added in my head.

The thought crossed my mind now and again...ever since that kiss. The prick.

Something told me that was exactly what Hiei was hoping for. He always did like to rile me up.

A flicker of movement on the screen had me sitting straighter, forgetting about Kurama hovering behind me. Someone was at Ettie's cell door and it was with a small amount of pissed off astonishment that I realized who it was.

"There's our boy," I said, getting up so fast I nearly knocked the chair over. "Time to go, Kurama."

. . .

The guards leading me to the cell block holding Ettie were taking too damn long. I knew Hiei couldn't do anything too crazy here—he would end up thrown in a cell too—but that didn't stop me from worrying.

What the hell was he doing here? How did he convince Koenma to let him see her?

We heard raised voices down one of the many corridors lined with cells and I picked up my pace, running ahead of the guard, Kurama hot on my heels. I was half expecting him to have moved on and was thankful he hadn't. I needed answers and I wasn't gonna wait for the little shit to come to me.

Hiei was near the end of the hall, his entire body pressed against the bars of the cell as if hoping he'd melt through them. I was surprised his white knuckled grip hadn't dented them yet and wondered what the fuck Spirit World used to make them.

"Hiei!"

The snarl he turned on me didn't scare me, but the look in his eyes sure as hell did.

They were wild—not exactly angry...but...there was no real explanation for it other than that.

He turned that look back on Ettie, said something in a language I didn't recognize and then stepped back from the bars. He put his hands into the pockets of his loose black slacks, shoulders hunched, and glared at the cement floor as if it personally offended him.

It was hard not to turn and look. Hard to keep my eyes off her. I swallowed past a lump in my throat, temporarily forgetting why we'd come here in the first place.

Seeing her in shackles in person was so much worse. Her arms, legs, and even neck were wrapped in thick metal, the chains anchored to the floor and walls. They only gave her enough slack to lay down or take a piss. She couldn't even reach the bars.

But that wasn't the worst of it. The worst was the iron muzzle they placed over her mouth and lower face. There were slats so she could breathe and talk, but only barely.

Both her eyes were still black from when I sucker punched her, her broken nose an angry reddish purple with yellow around the edges. The shackles drained her energy and kept her complacent, which meant she couldn't heal her wounds either.

A vindictive part of myself thought she deserved at least that much.

They'd dressed her in the prisoner's equivalent of a burlap sack, with the number 1088 blazoned across her chest. Her normally vibrant blonde hair was dull and dingy. She looked so goddamned tired.

I shouldn't feel sorry for her.

I tried everything to drag up that anger from months ago, to bring it back to the surface and scream at her just like Hiei, but it wouldn't come.

Seeing her again was like seeing a ghost.

I'd missed her so much.

"Yusuke, come here please."

So lost in thought I never noticed Kurama took Hiei further down the corridor to converse alone. It was hard for me to draw my gaze away from her now that I was looking, but I managed and really wished I hadn't.

Hiei looked ready to strangle the nearest person and Kurama...his face was so carefully composed I immediately felt wary.

"What?"

"Why the secrecy?" Ettie barked from her cell. "It's not like he didn't already tell me."

Even her voice made bitterness claw its way up my throat. She sounded so broken, her voice raspy and used up.

Hiei's jaw tightened as he gnashed down on his teeth, eyes trained on the floor.

"Told you what?" I asked her, still staring at Hiei, completely confused. I hated being kept in the dark.

"Tell him Hiei. It'll mean so much more coming from you."

The biting coldness of her tone made me shiver...my stomach sinking.

"What is it, man?!" Anger. My one and only defense against the tide of emotions I could feel swelling in my chest.

I was gonna be sick any minute, I just knew it.

Hiei squared his shoulders, but he wouldn't look me in the eye. Instead he looked somewhere past my shoulder, the hands in his pockets balling into obvious fists.

"I've petitioned Koenma to allow me to be her executioner."

He said it so bluntly, so nonchalantly...that I just lost it.

There were no powers. Just an all out brawl in the middle of Spirit World's maximum security prison.

By the time the guards managed to pull us apart, a few of them caught in the crossfire, neither of our faces were recognizable. And I still wanted to kick the ever loving shit out of him. I wanted to see him choke on his own blood and spit in his face and wrap my hands around his goddamn throat and choke him within an inch of his miserable fucking life.

"Fuck you, Hiei! What the fuck is wrong with you?!" I screamed, tossing one of the guards into a nearby wall and gunning for him again.

I was quickly caught and restrained, energy draining cuffs slapped over my wrists as a group of them wrestled me to the floor.

Hiei was in the same boat, his swollen eyes still managing to cut me with their glare.

"Bastard!" I screamed, spitting blood across the floor, my aching cheek pressed into it so hard I thought my jaw would snap. "I thought you loved her!"

He never said a word. Not even as we were both hauled off and tossed into cells opposite each other.

He just sunk to the floor in the farthest corner...and buried his head in his arms.

. . .

We were released after a night to 'cool down and think of what we'd done.' Koenma's words, not mine.

Hiei of course ran off with his tail between his legs and I wasn't interested in talking to him anyway. He made his choice and he was the kind of man that would stick with it.

No part of me believed he could be that cruel. That's what hurt the most.

He was right to be angry. We all were. But to go that far...?

I couldn't wrap my head around it. My brain was too small for this shit.

There was still a nagging curiosity in the back of my mind, wishing I could have gotten the chance to ask what they'd been yelling about before we showed up. I wasn't so stupid to think it was only about her execution.

Hiei went there specifically to see her. And I didn't think for a second it was just so he could rub his decision in her face.

Then again, that might be per the norm for those two.

I found myself at our usual haunt and the bartender took one look at me before just handing over a whole bottle of sake. I thanked him by holding it up in a wave, before I sat at our booth and chugged straight from the bottle.

Kuwabara showed up half way through my second. He'd been scarce since the day I caught them together at Ettie's apartment.

I didn't think he was hiding anything, but I didn't let him know that either.

He sat across from me, pouring himself a drink like a civilized person, and downing it in one go.

"Do you think she ever gave a shit about us?"

"You wanna know something, Urameshi?" I stared at him, imploring him to tell me something I needed to hear. But what came out wasn't what I expected and it was twice as painful.

"The other day, when you showed up at her place and she got a good look at you for the first time in months, wanna know what I felt from her?"

I always forgot about Kuwabara's creepy emotion reading. Kinda grossed me out.

"Lemme guess?" I slurred. "Her undying devotion to me, right?"

I tried to make a joke of it, I really did, but I was so goddamned miserable.

"For a brief second all I could feel was this—this frantic energy. A mix of fear and excitement and pain, so much pain. But the biggest part? The biggest part, Urameshi, were her feelings of pure resolve."

"Damn, thought you were gonna say love and I would have had to barf on you. You ruined my dastardly plans."

"You can't make a joke when you sound so freakin' depressed, man."

"Doesn't mean I won't try." I poured Kuwabara another drink, taking a long pull off the bottle myself. "So you felt her resolve. Resolve for what? To kill us all?"

"If she wanted to kill us she would have the day we caught her with her brother. This was something else."

"Stop being so fucking cryptic, you're reminding me of Kurama."

"Alright, don't get your panties in a twist."

"I'm gonna twist 'em up real good and shove 'em down your throat in a second."

Kuwabara was quiet for a bit, fiddling with his sake cup and chewing on his bottom lip. It was annoying, waiting, but I just continued to drink while he collected his thoughts—or lack there of, considering.

"I think..." he shook his head, eyes becoming hard with certainty, "I know it was her resolve to save you. She truly believes your life is in some kind of danger and that she's the only one who can stop it."

"You're singing a different tune from just a few months ago," I pointed out, waving the bartender over for another round of drinks.

"Yeah...I know. But, I thought about some things—really sat and tried to remember everything from that day."

He took the drink I offered him, his cheeks getting redder by the second—he'd never change. Damn light weight.

"Oh yeah? And what did that pea brain of yours find?"

"Hey! I'm smarter than you, asshole, and you know it!"

"That's debatable," I mumbled, grinning from behind my own sake cup.

He made a poor attempt at glaring at me and acting offended, before shit got serious again.

"She saved me, ya know, from her brother."

"Sure could have fooled me." I tossed back the cup, seriously contemplating just going back to drinking straight from the bottle. "You were half dead when Hiei and I showed up."

"I would have been dead dead if it wasn't for her."

I cast him a dubious look, lip curling in disgust. "Riiight."

I wasn't sure why I didn't want it to be true. I supposed it was because it would make things so much harder.

Easier to let her go if I could just believe she was evil.

"You don't have to believe me, Urameshi. But it changed how I thought. That's why I started watering her plants and taking care of her place...plus you were there so often I figured you could use food in the fridge and a clean place to sleep."

"How fucking noble of you, my knight in shining tinfoil."

He really did glare at me this time and I had to wonder if he wasn't taking lessons from Hiei. Did everyone have to get so serious on me lately?

For a long moment neither of us said anything. In that time my mind raced and raced—thought of Hiei, Ettie. Stupid shit really.

So, so stupid.

The first sob came out choked and awkward, loud between us and the sudden silence of the bar.

The soft grungy music playing in the background did nothing to mask it. And I couldn't stop it, no matter how many times I told myself I was being a baby—don't be a crybaby Yusuke, don't be that guy—it didn't make a difference.

I sobbed openly into my sake cup, fat tears running down my cheeks and snot from my nose and I hated myself so much in that moment. Hated that I still had so many feelings. Hated that I couldn't be stronger or more capable or smarter.

Hated that I couldn't save her.

And hated that I suddenly understood where Hiei was coming from.

He was angry. Far more angry than I'd ever seen him get before. But when he heard she was going to be tried and ultimately executed—he made the choice to be the one to do it.

And damn if that didn't take some serious resolve.

He would make it quick and painless. She wouldn't suffer at all. I don't know why I didn't see it sooner. He was angry...but he was also really good at hiding everything he felt other than that.

"That bastard," I sobbed like some fucking heartbroken loser who's boyfriend just left him for some trashy whore.

Kuwabara moved around the table and slid in beside me, a hand rubbing soothing circles into my back.

I didn't have the heart to shrug him off and call him a bitch, as would be the norm. And if I wanted to be honest with myself, it felt kind of good—warm, comforting—all those gross things.

"Why don't you call in a favor, King?"

My head jolted up, nearly head butting Kuwabara in the process, "Shit, I didn't even think of that!"

His hand fell away and he looked at me like he'd just met the dumbest person in the universe. "And you call me an idiot?"

I shoved him out of the booth, pulling on my coat with one hand and my cellphone out with the other. I was the only demon to win the Unification Tournament twice in a row. Damn right I had some favors to call in.

"I'm gonna rig that fucking trial so even Koenma doesn't realize what's happening until it's too late," I said, laughing manically. "Just you fucking wait."

. . .

Kurama didn't like my idea, to say the least.

"Have you gone completely insane?"

...Okay, Kurama hated my idea.

"You will do no such thing! The trial will be fair and impartial! She will be convicted—as she should be—and, if she's lucky, Koenma will merely allow her to rot in an isolation container for the rest of her life."

"Kurama—"

"No, Yusuke! You are blinded by your feelings and I will not abide this! She nearly killed us all. She allowed her clearly psychotic brother to kill hundreds of people—over and over. She sided with them!"

"There's more to it—"

"Is there?! Can you honestly say that, with out a single shadow of doubt? Do you truly believe you know her so well?"

I'd never seen Kurama lose his shit like this. He always had this...cold, calculated anger. It was a whole shit ton scarier than even Hiei's absolute rages. But this was scary in a different way—it was like being scolded by your mom times a million.

The guilt was astronomical, but it didn't stop how I felt.

I couldn't explain it—didn't know how.

But I loved her. So fucking much.

Maybe that made me weak or an idiot or...or maybe I was blind. There wasn't a good reason for me to feel this way. Ettie rejected me, over and over. I didn't like giving up, but a man should know when he isn't wanted.

...Except I never really got that vibe.

She pushed me away because of who she was, not because she wasn't interested. I felt it every time we touched, by accident or otherwise—the handful of times I'd gotten to kiss her.

A lot of people would probably call this an obsession and that I was just setting myself up for failure, but I didn't give a shit.

I wasn't the only one that saw something in her—Hiei did too.

"Kurama," my tone made him pause in his rant I'd stopped listening to five minutes ago—voice serious and far too calm, "Can't you trust me, just this once?"

His face went blank as stone...and then he sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. I would always be his biggest headache.

"I've always trusted you, Yusuke, since the day I met you. You don't have a dishonest bone in your body...but that doesn't mean I think you're being any less foolish."

I took that as his blessing and spun around to high five Kuwabara. I could practically hear Kurama roll his eyes behind me.

"We are not doing this deviously," he said. "We will gather evidence and facts to use at her trial. I promise to do what I can, but I will not offer any guarantees."

I grinned, holding out my hand for Kurama to shake and when he took it I roped him into a crushing hug. "Thanks, man."

. . .

One Month Later: Mid March, 2005

The day of Ettie's trial arrived on a snowy morning that left the world soft and quiet.

I dressed in the best clothing I owned with Kurama and Kuwabara's help. A portal would open on the roof of my building to take us to Spirit World, with Botan as our guide. It'd been awhile since we last saw her and she spent a good portion of time just talking my ear off.

My heart was in my throat, so I just nodded along and pretended to listen and she was happy to fill in my silences.

Some things never changed and I found my adult self grateful for that.

Hiei was on the roof when the time came. I walked up to him with my arms across my chest; defensive. A different question burned on my tongue but I bit down and ignored it.

"You with us or against us?"

I knew Kurama told him our plan. And I needed to make sure what I thought about him was right.

Did he want to be her executioner out of mercy...or for revenge?

Hiei wasn't a merciful man when I first met him—the exact opposite. And he still had moments where his cruelty and anger overruled his common sense.

I needed to be sure this wasn't one of those times.

A circle of snow was melted around him, the flakes never even made it into his bubble of heat. His hands were clenched in his pockets and he was studying his feet with such a scrutinizing gaze I wondered if his boots wouldn't melt too.

"It would be a...waste," he finally said, "for her to die in such a way."

I tried to hold back the grin, I really did. But it spread until my cheeks hurt and then I was wrapping my arms around his neck and kissing him on the cheek with a loud smack.

His face burned a deep crimson and the circle of bare roof at his feet grew a few more inches. He wiped his cheek and looked personally offended, but the flush on his skin spread down his neck and I wondered if his chest was crimson too.

The portal opened behind us, twisting colors sucking in some of the snow and making me nauseous if I stared too long.

Botan pulled out her oar and held out her hand. "Ready?" she chirped.

"Always," I replied.

. . .

I sat in the front row with everyone else, other than Hiei who couldn't stand the crowd and drifted off to some corner. He needed to keep his loner status well established after all.

"How long is this gonna take?" I mumbled to Kurama. We'd already been sitting here forty minutes or better.

Koenma was presiding as the head judge, in his adult form, which caused me to roll my eyes. He sure liked to show off.

But there were four others besides him, making a team of five. They all sat at a long, raised dais, behind an ornate golden table. I didn't bother to memorize their names or faces, this would hopefully be the last time I ever saw them.

"They need time to review all the case materials and to prepare the list of witnesses they will call to talk on her behalf," Kurama said. "It shouldn't be much longer."

Another twenty minutes ticked by and I started to bob my leg up and down the more restless I got.

Just as I thought I'd lose my mind, the double doors at the back of the room opened. I turned with everyone else, half standing out of my seat to get a better look.

Six guards flanked Ettie, carrying the chains attached to her heavy shackles.

Her steps were stunted and they rattled with every movement she made. She'd grown thinner, her skin pale and face gaunt. It looked like she hadn't slept at all in the nearly two months she'd been here.

Without the drugs that was likely the case.

What I could see of her arms were bruised black and so were her ankles. The muzzle on her face was still there and I watched it frost over as she breathed through its slats, a fine cloudy mist trailing behind her in each wake of her breath.

I clenched my hands into fists.

She was a maximum security prisoner. I'd put countless demons in those cells and not once thought about how they would be treated—they deserved it, right? So who cared. Not me.

But this was Ettie—she was a person to me, not just some random criminal off the street.

I choked back the swell of anger, my youki surging under my skin glaringly obvious to everyone in the room. They looked but their eyes didn't linger for too long, not after they took one look at my face.

They got Ettie into her seat in front of the judges. She didn't have anyone there to represent her and I panicked before the trial even began.

"Kurama," I choked out, jerking my head towards where she sat.

He held up a hand to quiet me and then stood, clearing his throat pointedly. "If I may speak a moment, your honors."

They whispered amongst themselves for a moment before Koenma nodded, "Go ahead, Kurama."

"The defendant has no legal counsel. I would like to volunteer my services, if you will allow it."

Ettie stiffened in her seat but didn't turn. The judges went back to their whispering and this time it took so long I wanted to knock all their heads together.

"We will allow it," spoke the one at the end of the table, dressed even more pompously than Koenma, if that was possible.

Kurama gathered the briefcase of shit he'd brought with him and strode up to Ettie's table. He stopped just before pulling out his chair, looking down at her with an unreadable gaze, before addressing the judges again.

"I would also ask that the shackles on her face and arms are removed."

One of the judges waved to a guard, his expression both bored and annoyed.

The guard undid the manacles and they dropped heavy to the floor. The one on her face Kurama took off personally and I watched as some unspoken communication passed between them, the fox's eyes going cold and hard. He nodded to her once and handed the mask to the waiting guard.

Kurama produce a hair tie from the pockets of his dress pants and with deft fingers, gathered up the long spill of red down his back. "Then, shall we begin?"

Ettie's trial didn't go as planned.

But then again, when did anything in my life ever go according to the plan anyway?

. . .

A/N: Lemme remind you my friends that I am known in some circles as "The Cliffhanger Queen." Hate me, love me, but I'll never change xD

Also, if you think the boys are being a little too forgiving...just you wait.

Next chapter: The results of Ettie's trial. Kurama's petty revenge. And Hiei loses his ongoing battle with his "feelings."