Chapter Twenty-five

Kurama managed to gather himself, suppressing all his emotions behind a careful mask of calm the way he had so many times in the past. Despite what others seemed to think, he was always the strong one, the one to make decisions based on logic rather than emotion. Hiei, on the other hand, depended completely on whatever emotion filled his psyche at any given moment in time rather than accessing all the facts. Kurama followed his friend into the hallway and grabbed his arm.

Xander took off his glasses and tucked them safely in the front pocket of his lab coat. "Yes, Kurama?"

"I know you stated all the possibilities, but what do you think is wrong with my son? Xander, your instincts as a doctor are internationally renowned. When others failed to properly diagnose a patient, you always corrected the mistake. You've saved hundreds of lives because of your medical research and your willingness to find new, and often unheard of, treatments for uncommon ailments. I trust what you've told us, but we need to decide on a course of action."

"Kurama, you truly are a fox, thinking such flattering words will persuade me." Xander smiled down at his friend softly. "In my personal opinion, I don't think that person is your son. I think it is a Shadow. I think that as a young child, his genetic profile was copied and the demon took over his identity. The shadow demon has probably spent so much time pretending to be Ayden that he honestly thought he was for a time. But now the body is dying and the demon wants out of it."

"So what shall we do?"

"Let the sedatives wear off and torture that being until he gives up the location of your actual son." Xander sighed softly. "I usually don't encourage such barbaric methods, but I think this will be the only way to get the shadow demon to show his true colors. Don't allow Valihari to do it. He's still convinced that this is his mate."

"What if my actual son is…" Kurama let the question hang in the air, unable to complete the thought and say it aloud, as if speaking it would bring it into being.

"If the real Ayden died, this copy would die too. Your actual son is dying, Kurama. We need the copy to tell us where he is, so we can bring him back and treat him before he actually dies from the genetic mutation."

"What would happen if this shadow demon succeeds in killing the body?"

"He would simply leave the body as little more than a spirit and wander until he finds someone else from which to copy genetic information."

"And if I killed the copy?"

"He would be forced to follow the body into death."

Kurama nodded and returned to the hospital room. His eyes narrowed as he looked at Valihari. "You. Out. Now."

"This is my mate. I'm not leaving him."

"Now!" Kurama roared. Green bled to tarnished gold, red turned to silver. Yoko Kurama stood in front of his son's mate, swishing his tail back and forth in a clearly agitated manner. His ears were pressed flat against his skull, showing the depth of his anger as he growled and bared his teeth. "Get out pup, before I force you out."

"You lack the power."

"Have you ever gone up against a pissed off Yoko Kurama?" Xander questioned from the doorway. "Especially when his parental instincts are kicking in?" He raised an eyebrow as Valihari shook his head. "I didn't think so. Yoko Kurama's mind is impenetrable when taken over by blinding emotion. Nothing sways him, including Seliki mind control. I suggest you take your leave now, before shreds of flesh decorate the walls." With a chuckle, he led the way out. Valihari wisely followed.

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Hiei nearly broke down the door to his son's room, just in time to see the three collapse onto the bed. Hiroshi was wedged between the two demons as they fell back in a tangle of limbs upon the bed. Crimson eyes narrowed as they fell on the dragon. "Get out."

Sage groaned and threw a thin sheet over all of them, covering their nudity from his father's prying eyes. "Dad, don't get involved, all right? We're mated, so you might as well just silence your protests now."

Hiei nearly shook with rage. "Mated?"

"Destiny fucking rules," Ian murmured and yawned lazily. "Now I get two tight asses instead of one."

"Ian!" Hiroshi and Sage scolded together.

"And two nags," Ian muttered under his breath.

Hiei pointed a finger at Sage. "I'm not going to get involved this moment, but I am going to tell Kurama what you've been up to after he's done dealing with your brother." His eyes glittered as Sage's own golden orbs widened in shock. "Oh yes, this is up to him to decide. If he beats all of you to a bloody pulp, I won't stop him. He is not going to be very pleased at all to come home to another stray pup invading his house. It's bad enough you brought home that vermin." He motioned to Ian before storming out of the room and down the stairs, muttering about disobedient children and the lack of discipline.

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Kurama hit a black button near the doorway after the two had left him alone. Metal covered the windows and a sheet clanked down in front of the doorway, effectively putting the room into quarantine lockdown. He was impatient, annoyed, and angry. However, there were no outside signs of any of these emotions on his face as he stared at the prone figure in the bed and waited for it to stir. In fact, he looked eerily calm and serene. He unhooked the I.V. so that the sedatives would no longer be pumped into the unconscious form.

After ten minutes, the young man began to stir. "Uh… My head hurts," he murmured.

"Where is my son?" Kurama sat down in a chair beside the bed and folded his hands carefully in his lap, cold golden eyes keeping a careful watch over the figure.

"Your son? I am your son, and if you're talking about Sage, I would assume he's at home with Ian."

"Doctor Tahir has confirmed that you are, in fact, only a genetic copy of my son; a pathetic excuse of a creature that took his identity for lack of having one of your own." Kurama's eyes flashed with emotion for a brief moment. "Either tell me, or I'll rip that body to shreds. Like it or not, you're attached to that form."

A brief shadow of fear crossed the young man's face before he bowed his head. "I don't know what you're talking about."

Kurama reached out and grabbed a delicate hand before he squeezed it, almost in reassurance. The grip became tighter and more constricting until the sound of breaking bones could be heard. Kurama smirked and let go. "You've got three warnings before I start tearing off limbs. You have just used your first."

"You're insane!" The boy struggled to get out of the hospital bed, but only succeeded in getting his legs tangled in the sheet. He fell on his face.

Kurama grabbed a handful of hair and used the grip to hoist the boy to his feet and slam him against the nearest wall. Claws dug into the tender flesh of the teenager's throat as the fox strangled him. He let him go only when the creature was about to fade into unconsciousness once again.

Ayden gasped for breath and coughed as he collapsed on the floor once released. "Ha… How can…" He took a moment to catch his breath. "How can you do this to your own son?"

"You aren't my son and you just used your second warning."

"You're just like Hiei!"

Kurama paused. Hiei… His lovely fire demon had abused this child from the time he was young. Perhaps… "Hiei was right to do what he did. He knew you were an imposter. That's why he beat you; he was trying to get information." He knelt down and grabbed a handful of cinnamon hair once again, dragging the boy closer to him. "Hiei hid the fact you were an imposter from me because he knew I would kill you and our only link to Ayden would go to waste. My mate was trying to find our son." He shook the other demon roughly. "You will tell me what you know. Trust me, my version of torture is much worse than what my mate had done to you."

"I don't know what you're talking about."

Kurama dropped the boy and stood up, taking a few steps away. "Don't say I didn't warn you." He took a seed from his hair and flung it into a far corner. Within seconds, vines covered half of the room. They bound the enemy. Smaller vines, tiny little tendrils, drilled their way into the figure's pores and wormed their way into his veins.

Kurama laughed as the boy screamed.

"I'll tell you everything I know!"

Kurama snapped his fingers and the tiny vines halted their penetration into the body of the boy. "Speak. I'll decide whether the information you have is useful or not."

"The boy, the child, wandered off one day. A tribe of my people captured him, and I was chosen to be his genetic copy." The figure's chest rose and fell heavily as he struggled to speak past the pain. "We made it seem as though I was Ayden and that the child had been raped. We had a watcher spying on your mate. He took your other son inside, and had to wait for your return home before he could come and find the lost child. Leaving your other son alone in the house could have resulted in both of your sons being captured."

"I was late that day," Kurama mused. "I didn't get home until nearly two in the morning."

"By that time, I had copied all the genetic information from your son and my people had moved him to another location. I wasn't told where. When your mate found me, it looked as though I was your son and I had been raped. That explained away any personality changes that he would have noticed. It took him nearly two years to realize that, though I was an identical copy, there was something about my spiritual signature that wasn't quite the same."

"And then the torture began." Kurama moved closer to the figure, caressing the cheek in what could be considered a loving manner. "What was the goal behind this?"

"What else? Power." The copy rolled his eyes and winced as the vines delved deeper, sensing their master's displeasure. "Had I been flawless, I would have become the ruler of a land. My people even convinced that stupid bitch you and your mate used as a surrogate that Hiei belonged to her, that the throne belonged to her. We convinced her to use the Seliki to murder me so the daughter could take over. It was all a clever plot, of course. I seduced the idiot Seliki leader over there and convinced him to kill the other two heirs and take over the land. And then I would have been supreme ruler."

"Such a clever little demon you are," Kurama said, a hint of sarcasm lacing his voice. "It's too bad your acting skills are rather horrible, and that the genetic mutation was enhanced in the copy you made. Where is my son now?"

The shadow demon shrugged. "All I know is that our leader took him away shortly before your mate came and got him."

"Is your leader still alive?"

"Yes. Her name is Maori." His eyes pleaded with Kurama. "Let me go?"

Kurama caressed the smooth expanse of the exposed throat. "I think I shall enjoy tearing you limb from limb."

##########

Hiei picked up the phone and hit the little green button. He had long since learned that the only person the 'celly' thing ever called was Kurama, and so hitting the green button made it call Kurama's phone.

"This is Xander Tahir speaking. May I take a message on behalf of Kurama?"

Xander Tahir? The name didn't sound familiar, and Hiei found himself visibly bristling as he glared at the tiny device. Some other man was answering Kurama's phone; was this the same man with which Kurama had begun an affair? "Where is the fox?"

"Currently, I do believe he's contaminating one of the hospital rooms with shards of flesh and bone. Shall I have him call you back after he's done cleaning up his own mess?"

"Tell him his mate called." Hiei snapped the phone shut and glared at the small device before setting it gingerly on the counter. In his rage, he had broken quite a few of the fragile things before. Kurama hadn't been pleased. No sex for a month for every cell phone he broke. It wasn't something Hiei was willing to part with over a minor temper tantrum.

##########

The metal casings over the windows and the door slid up. Small bits of flesh dripped from the ceiling as Kurama caught his breath. There was not one shard remaining that could be used for identification purposes. Quite simply, it looked as if a bomb had been placed inside the body and had exploded. Xander pushed his glasses up his nose. "The shower in the next room over is running, and a change of clothes has been prepared. I trust that you'll need to leave quickly, but you won't make it past the front gate covered in blood."

"Thank you." Kurama's hair faded back to red and sparkling green eyes blinked at his good friend. "You've been a great help."

"Of course. I, too, want to see Makai ruled by peace rather than blood. It's been my lifelong vision." Xander smiled softly. "Now, what are you going to do about this mess?"

"Make Valihari clean and sterilize the room. It should keep him occupied and out of my hair long enough to allow me time to find the real Ayden."

"Your mate called as well."

"Thank you again, Xander." Kurama moved to the next room over and washed himself quickly under the lukewarm spray. He was more concerned about getting the blood and bits of flesh off him than actually being clean. In less than ten minutes, he was showered, dressed, and in Makai.

Author's Corner: How's that for a plot twisty? For all those who absolutely hated me for making Hiei such a bastard, now you see my reasoning. I had it planned out all along! Mwahahaha! Anyhow, I updated quickly because I felt so bad for taking so long to update. Hopefully, I'll have another one done here soon. I'm feeling inspired. Thank you all for reading and your kind reviews.