Chapter 8b: Weapon of Choice

Botan let out a prolonged, pained groan.

"I can't... Even... Lift my... Head!" she whimpered pitifully.

She was so physically weak, she was laid face down on the ground – where she had slept through the night before – with Doshu standing in front of her, looking down at her with a look that was a mixture of contempt and pity.

"I warned you."

It was mostly a look of contempt.

"I know..." Botan muttered into the ground. "But I... I didn't think..."

"No, you didn't," Doshu casually cut in.

"I didn't think it would be this bad!" Botan wailed.

"Well, since you're finally awake, how about I take you back to the apartment?"

"Oh, no, I hate it there! It's dark and smelly!"

"Ugh, come on, you'll feel better after some more rest. But, you know, before you go on your next little round of target practise – because I can already tell you will, that I won't be able to talk your stubborn ass out of it – remember this feeling, and remember that exerting all of your energy like that will do this to you."

"I felt so empowered. All my arrows were striking their targets."

"You were starting to use your life energy."

"I felt so empowered."

"You were groaning and screaming and over-exerting yourself."

"...It's what I imagine sex must feel like..."

Botan pressed her face into the cold, damp ground, hoping that she had spoken her last remark quietly enough that Doshu had not actually heard her.

"You've... Never had sex?" Doshu asked.

Botan, her nose still pushed against the ground, shook her head.

"What about..."

"What about what?"

"Um... Right, Hiei wasn't a real thing. You just wanted him and never told him about it."

"You make it sound so pathetic."

"No, no! I mean, I'm sure it's not like you were writing down all your fantasies about him for several years, seeing him all the time and never even trying to make it real."

Botan finally managed to lifted her head, her masque muddy and askew, her pale face framed by her hair, which was bigger and wilder than ever.

"That's exactly how it was," she said.

Doshu looked suddenly guilty and awkward.

"I'm sure it wasn't that bad..." she tried.

"Yes," Botan said, stabilising herself by propping herself up on her elbows. "Yes it was that bad."

"I... I don't really understand why you wouldn't just... Tell him that you wanted him, since you did want him that badly...?" Doshu replied, her tone starting to sound as awkward as her eyes looked as they darted about and only fleetingly looked directly at Botan.

"He didn't notice me," Botan admitted miserably. "He didn't even know that I existed! And he always said that he loved Demon World, and he was repulsed by anyone or anything from anywhere else. And... Sometimes... I would try to just... Fall, and see if he would catch me, in a romantic, gentlemanly sort of way, and then gaze into my eyes, and just... Fall in love with me..."

"Ugh..."

Botan pouted and thinned her eyes at Doshu.

"Sorry," the bird demon conceded. "But surely you didn't really think all you had to do was literally fall, and he would catch you and... Fall... In... Love... Oh..."

Botan shuffled about and managed to haul herself into a kneeling position, sitting back heavily on her heels and sighing as she lifted heavy arms to right her masque over her face.

"I just want to go home," she said miserably. "I just want to go back to my bedroom in Spirit World, back to my notebook."

"Back to writing out your sexual fantasies about a demon who doesn't even notice you, and then masturbating over them?" Doshu asked.

Botan gasped.

"Am I wrong?" Doshu asked, frowning at Botan critically.

"Well... No, but you shouldn't just come out and say it like that!" Botan protested. "That is incredibly rude, Missy!"

"Alright..." Doshu said with a sigh. "How about this: I am struggling to comprehend why, when you are enjoying yourself so much here, like you did last night, you still want to go back to a life where you cart around human souls and live ninety percent of your life – experience ninety percent of your joy – inside your head."

Botan paused, her shoulders slouching, as the reality of Doshu's words truly sank in.

"What?" Doshu asked, frowning at her again. "Aren't any of your human friends this honest with you?"

Botan shook her head.

"Well maybe they should be," Doshu replied. "If I had always been your partner, I never would have let this behaviour continue. If I had been your partner when you met Hiei, you would never have had the time to write out any fantasies about him, because you would be living them. I would have made that happen for you."

"But how?" Botan asked weakly. "He doesn't even like me, I don't think."

A very strange look passed over Doshu's fuchsia eyes, and, briefly, she looked incredibly sad. Botan found it odd, but between her exhaustion and her mounting sadness at the thought that Hiei did not think of her the same way she thought of him – and the idea that she might not ever even see Hiei again – she could not really concentrate on trying to guess why Doshu appeared to be struggling with their conversation.

"Come on, let me take you back," Doshu offered, her voice soft, warm, and reassuringly friendly in Botan's moment of emotional weakness.

"Doshu, you are my partner," she said as Doshu moved around the back of her. "And you're my friend. My wonderful, helpful, honest friend."

There was a long silent pause before Botan finally heard Doshu open her wings, followed shortly by the feeling of her taloned feet gripping into the straps Botan still wore. The ferry girl made no attempt to support herself, instead taking fullest advantage of her new mode of flight and slouching completely, allowing Doshu to carry her weight entirely. Had she been on her oar, she would have had to concentrate, to expend energy to control it and hold herself upright, and, for the first time since losing her oar, Botan found herself no longer caring for it.

Briefly, between this realisation and her memory of just how physically satisfying the use of demon energy was, Botan began to wonder if she actually preferred being a demon to being a ferry girl.

Doshu was actually glad when Matsurika appeared. During the journey back to Uso's apartment, Botan had fallen into a very deep sleep, leaving Doshu carrying her entire weight. It was not a problem during flight, but, as she tried to manoeuvre into any of the windows, forced to flap her wings in short, wide beats, her wingspan was too great to fit through the gaps, and whenever she raised or lowered her wings high or low enough that she would fit through, she lost altitude, and could no longer fit herself and Botan through the height of the window.

"Are you okay up there?" Matsurika called up to her.

Doshu gladly lowered herself and Botan down until Botan's feet were just above the ground.

"I can't fit through the window with her, and she won't wake up," Doshu explained. "She overdid her training last night."

Matsurika looked at Botan's face, tilting her head to one side sympathetically. Doshu did not especially care for Matsurika – she found her irritatingly smug – but she had always tolerated her in the past because Uso was so fond of her.

"Let me take her," Matsurika offered. "Her apartment was ransacked, right? She doesn't even have a decent bed to sleep in. She can sleep it off at my place."

Doshu was hesitant to accept that offer, for a variety of reasons.

"I'll take good care of her, don't worry," Matsurika added.

Doshu held back a sarcastic retort, and instead acquiesced to the offer presented to her.

"Okay, but just let her sleep, okay?"

Matsurika stepped forwards and hooked her arms under Botan's. Doshu slowly released the ferry girl, all the while keeping her eyes fixed on Matsurika.

"Just let her sleep," she repeated.

"I'll take good care of her," Matsurika said again.

"I'd rather you just let her sleep," Doshu replied.

Matsurika sighed.

"Why don't you make yourself useful and go fetch some food or something?" she said dismissively.

Doshu shot her a dark look before turning and taking her leave. She was still not completely sure that she could trust Matsurika not to get Botan into some sort of compromising position, but she needed to use the window of opportunity afforded to her to meet up with Uso again.

Unsure where to find her mistress, Uso once more returned to the old temple in the living world, circling it several times before concluding that Uso could not possibly be there. She then landed on the roof and took a moment to feel out any significant energies nearby. Of course, she could no longer track Uso by her energy signal, since that signal now belonged to Botan – and Doshu had no idea what Botan's energy might feel like to use that to look for Uso – and so she instead just relaxed, just breathed and focused on searching out anything unusual.

Before too long, Doshu located a very high level of spirit energy – it felt human in composition, but demon in terms of raw power. Whatever (or whoever) it was, it was a lead she felt compelled to follow, and so she quickly flew across the landscape, through rolling countryside, and ultimately over a human city, eventually finding herself hovering over a house, in a street of similar houses. She tried to land on the streetlight outside the house – something she had seen other birds doing throughout the human city – but she quickly realised that she was significantly larger than the birds of the human realm, and could only fit one of her feet on her intended perch, and so she instead flew into a large tree in the front garden of the house she sought.

Doshu hid herself in the foliage and waited, soon finding the source of the energy signal she had sensed: a tall male human, with curly orange hair and a strong build. He exited the house and paced up and down the garden path before looking at something in the sky. Doshu followed his line of sight, spotting Uso, looking entirely unlike herself: apparently Uso had assimilated (visually at least) to her new life as efficiently as Botan had. Her hair, usually thick and wild, had been flattened and tamed up into a high ponytail, her face was devoid of make-up and she was dressed in a very plain, powder pink kimono, riding through the air on an oar.

Uso lowered herself down to the street to greet the human watching her. She slid from the oar and it fell to the ground, bouncing with a light clatter before settling and then finally disappearing.

"Botan, where have you been?" the human yelled at her.

"Silly, I went to Spirit World, to plead your sister's release, remember?" Uso replied, her voice sounding flawlessly like Botan's. "You were the one who disappeared! I went to look for you, to tell you Spirit World would not release Shizuru, but you had already left!"

"Yukina's gone, Botan! Where is she?"

"Yukina?"

"Yes!"

"I left her visiting Shizuru."

"Yeah, well now she's gone! Koenma said she'd gone home, but she isn't anywhere around here, and I can't find her! I can't even feel her! And I can't reach anyone else – the only person who's answering my calls is Hiei!"

"Oh, well, Hiei is, of course, always there when we need him. That's one os his qualities I like best of all."

There was a short pause in the conversation, during which Doshu noticed Uso glancing very quickly in her direction.

"Alright then, let me go back to Spirit World and ask around there," Uso offered. "I will try to find out if there was a mistake made, if Yukina is actually still there."

"Well hurry up about it!"

Uso sighed and summoned the oar again, leaping onto it and flying up past the tree Doshu was hiding in. She glared in at Doshu as she passed and Doshu duly took the hint, waiting until her mistress was almost out of sight before racing out of the tree after her. Doshu was one of the fastest flyers in all of Demon World, and so she caught up to Uso quite quickly, and when she did so, Uso indicated for them both to land on the rooftop of a tall building.

"What are you doing here again, bird?" Uso demanded as she leapt from the oar, which again fell down behind her.

"I need to just tell you that Botan told me Hiei has no feelings for her," Doshu explained, landing on the roof. "I remember you said you thought you could still have a relationship with him, but Botan told me he doesn't much like anyone from the human or spirit worlds."

"Well he definitely likes it when I get physical with him," Uso spat.

"Botan's a virgin."

"Ugh, really?"

Doshu nodded.

"Shit, so now I have to act like a virgin when I have sex with him..."

"...It's not the first time you've done exactly that..."

"Yes, but all the other times I lost my virginity, it was to some dumbass with more money than sense: this Hiei seems quite intelligent. I'll have to be very convincing."

"Well maybe... Or maybe you should just let it go."

Uso narrowed her eyes, glaring down at Doshu in a way the bird demon knew was never good.

"I mean, if he has no interest in a ferry girl, wouldn't you be better off doing something else instead?" Doshu tried. "Like, I don't know, try seducing one of the others."

"Bird, Hiei is Mukuro's second in command, he is an S-Class demon, he can freely move between all three worlds, and he is very low maintenance," Uso replied. "After centuries of searching, after countless failed attempts, I have finally found a life worth taking: you, as my partner, should be supportive of that, and that is not the vibe I am getting from you right now. What is wrong with you?"

"N-nothing," Doshu lied. "I just thought that maybe it was hopeless for you to push things with Hiei like you are."

Uso reached into the folds of her kimono and produced a ragged, well-handled book – Botan's beloved notebook – and began flicking through the pages with a condescending look on her face. Doshu felt oddly sickened inside as she watched Uso so callously handling Botan's most prized treasure, and she found herself also thinking she ought really not to have left Botan in Matsurika's care.

"Here we are," Uso said, stopping at the page she had apparently sought. ""I'm in love with Hiei. There is no point in denying it any longer. I never had something I wanted to do or be before I met him: I was happy to just carry on, ferrying souls and assisting the Spirit Detective. But that has all changed. Now I want Hiei. I want to be his wife. I have never felt so strongly about anything before. Sometimes I think the love I have for him is stronger, a more powerful force, than the love that Kuwabara has for Yukina, or Keiko has for Yusuke.""

Uso slammed the book shut with a smug smirk: though her expression morphed into something else entirely as she stared down at Doshu. She stowed the book back in her kimono and crouched down low, bringing herself on eye-level with her partner.

"Do you feel sorry for that pathetic ferry girl, Doshu?"

Uso so rarely called her by her name, Doshu immediately began to panic. She slid back one foot in an attempt to put some distance between them, but Uso grabbed her face in one hand, squeezing her entire head in a painfully tight grip.

"Do you?" she asked through tightly clenched teeth.

"No!" Doshu replied. "Of course not! I'm on your side! I just..."

"You just let yourself become attached to that idiot ferry girl," Uso said, her voice suddenly sounding almost gentle. "And now you want me to back off of Hiei, because you want to spare Botan the heartache of watching her one true love marry someone else. That's it, isn't it?"

Doshu was speechless.

"You are so simplistic, even someone without my experience of reading others could have seen through you," Uso said in a low voice. "And you ought to remember that you are nothing without me. You will return to Demon World, and you will do as I tell you, which is to keep that ferry girl there, keep her alive, and keep her out of my way. Do you understand?"

Doshu still could not speak: partly because she was frozen by the realisation that what Uso had accused her of was possibly true. Botan kept calling her a friend, Botan let her eat the golden apple, Botan never hurt her – even when she was angry – and Botan treated her as an equal, something no-one ever had before.

"Do you understand?" Uso shouted into her face.

"I understand," Doshu replied.

She did understand, but she was not so sure that she could continue to follow Uso's instructions. As Uso's partner, she was obliged to do as her mistress asked, and she had never had a problem following orders before. But, before, she had never had a friend.

"Get out of here," Uso said, finally releasing her and standing upright. "And stop bothering me."

Doshu nodded and took to the air, quickly flying back the way she had come, and back to Demon World.

Botan awoke with a groan, finding herself once more facedown. This time, however, instead of opening her eyes to cold wet mud, she found herself lying facedown in a luxuriously soft bed, her face – free of her masque – buried in a pillow that her arms were hugged around.

"You're awake."

Botan nodded. She felt as though she had overslept, and still felt groggy. In that moment, as she slowly came around, she found herself thinking that the last few days had just been a horrible nightmare. She had made it to the sleepover at Genkai's temple after all, and Yukina had just entered the room to serve her breakfast.

"You've been overdoing it again, honey."

"I know."

"Would you like me to give you a massage?"

"Yes please."

Botan sighed into the pillow as she felt the covers being lifted from her body. She felt Yukina's small hands on her shoulders, squeezing into her in a most delightful way. Botan closed her eyes and sank further into the pillow, relaxing into the delightful feeling of Yukina's hands pressing down the length of her back.

Botan's eyes opened again when Yukina hooked her thumbs under the hem of her vest and pushed it up, right up over her shoulders, exposing her entire back.

"Um, what are you...?" she mumbled into the pillow.

"Shh, just relax, honey."

Yukina had never called Botan "honey" before.

Yukina had also never so deftly unhooked her bra before.

"What are you doing?" Botan asked, lifting her head slightly from the pillow.

"Giving you a massage."

As Botan felt a weight on the bed at her side, she realised that the voice talking to her, whilst sweet and light, was not Yukina's.

"You're so tense!"

Botan turned her head and peered back over her shoulder as Matsurika hooked a leg over her and then sat down on her hips. In the horrifying moment that she leaned forwards and began pressing her hands into Botan's bare back, Botan remembered that no part of what was happening now or what had been happening in the last few days was in any way imagined: it was all horribly real.

"Where am I?" Botan asked.

"Doshu brought you to me," Matsurika replied. "So that I could take care of you."

Matsurika was not only stroking her hands in a very odd manner over Botan's skin, but she was starting to grind her crotch against Botan's backside. Just as it got to the point that it began to feel weirdly uncomfortable, Matsurika lowered herself forwards, almost lying down on Botan's back, her lilac hair falling over Botan's face as she brought her lips ticklishly close to her ear.

"You know, you never paid me for our little transaction last night."

Botan's eyes opened wide, and any hint of exhaustion left her.

"I can't do this!" she wailed. "Please get off of me!"

Matsurika slowly lifted the top half of her body up, her hips finally stilling, and no longer grinding against Botan. She paused there for a moment before her left hand pulled at something by Botan's left thigh, and, in the same moment that she realised what the feeling actually was, Botan found herself being flipped over onto her back. Matsurika pinned her down, one hand bunched into her hair, the other holding the vicious, serrated knife to her throat.

"Who the hell are you and where is Uso?" she growled into Botan's face.

In a moment if sickening irony, Botan wondered if any of her friends had done exactly the same thing to Uso, demanding where she really was.

"I asked you a question!" Matsurika yelled when Botan did not answer her, pulling harder at Botan's hair.

"My name is Botan, and I don't want to be here!" Botan wailed.

"Botan?" Matsurika asked, her eyes narrowing curiously. "What sort of name is "Botan"?"

"Well, what sort of name is "Uso"?" Botan muttered.

"Don't push your luck. What are you doing here?"

"I don't know! I didn't ask to be here! I just... Ended up here! I don't know what else to do!"

"Wait..."

Matsurika opened her fingers and the painful tension in Botan's hair eased.

"Uso took your life?" she whispered.

"Yes, she did," Botan replied. "But please believe me when I say that I am not trying to take hers! Her life is terrible! I don't want it! She can have it back!"

Matsurika sat up again, her hand brandishing the knife relaxing at her side.

"I've never met one of Uso's victims before," she said quietly.

"Well don't take this the wrong way, but I wish we'd never met," Botan replied. "I would never have chosen to come here."

"Why is Doshu helping you?" Matsurika asked, casually indicating Botan's nose with the knife.

"Could you please not point that thing at me?" Botan asked in a small voice.

Matsurika looked at the knife in her hand before sighing and slipping it back into its sheath at Botan's thigh.

"A-and could you maybe get off of me, and let me cover myself up?"

Matsurika looked down at Botan's breasts, barely covered by her loosened bra for what seemed to Botan to be an uncomfortably long moment before finally climbing off of her and off the bed entirely. Botan dived under the covers and quickly secured all her clothing back in place before reemerging, where she found Matsurika standing by the window – a real window, with actual glass panes, Botan noticed – holding Uso's masque in both her hands.

"Why are you dressing like Uso, and pretending to be her?" she asked as their eyes met.

"I'm not really," Botan replied, from her position knelt in the centre of the opulent bed. "I'm just trying to survive."

Matsurika nodded and handed her back the masque.

"Uso was my friend," she said.

"Yes, Doshu told me that," Botan replied, accepting back the masque.

"Sometimes she was a lot more than my friend."

Botan swallowed hard.

"Y-yes, I gathered that too..." she awkwardly replied.

"She had been spending more and more time away from home lately, I did wonder why," Matsurika continued. "I thought she would have told me she was leaving."

"She probably couldn't tell anyone, in case it ruined her... Masquerade," Botan offered.

Matsurika nodded.

"So what about you?" she asked. "What were you before all this?"

Botan looked down at the masque in her hands.

"Well, I was a ferry girl," she said. "But I'm starting to think that doesn't mean anything now."

Matsurika smiled a wry, humourless smile.

"I can understand," she said. "I used to be something else too. But where I am now, what I used to be is meaningless."

Botan frowned.

"Were you the victim of a masquerader too?" she asked.

"No," Matsurika replied. "Just someone who wanted a different life to the one my people chose for me... Not that I expect you, or anyone, to understand that."

"No, I understand that perfectly," Botan said. "I'm supposed to just collect souls, and run errands for Spirit World, but then I... I met some people who made me feel like I might want more. I met one particular person who made me want a lot more."

"A man?"

"Yes."

Matsurika moved over and sat on the bed beside Botan.

"Maybe you and I have something in common after all," she concluded.

Next Chapter: After arguably abusing Matsurika's hospitality, Botan wanders outside to find... Yusuke and Kuwabara. She fails to catch their attention, and after failing to understand Matsurika's apparent instant attraction to Kuwabara, Botan starts to formulate a plan to get her life back. Chapter 9b: My Love