Recap: Hiei broke paradise and was sent back to his own reality (after Kurama forcefully healed his wound). Back in his own reality, he met Kuwabara, who still could not remember him and mistook him for a rebellious youngster and he went to see Shuichi, who said a few things Hiei didn't want to hear.

Chapter 35: Foundations of Paradise

When the sky began to darken and night began to fall over the city, Hiei began to feel a little bit disappointed and rejected: he had been back in his own reality, in the living world, for several hours, and the irksome spirit world Special Defence Force had yet to find him. He had not done anything rash to draw any attention to himself, but neither had he bothered even trying to suppress his energy or presence there. He had been walking the streets expectant of a kick, energy blast, punch or shoulder tackle at any moment, but time was passing and that moment was never arriving.

And for some reason Hiei was sure he would never fathom, his travels eventually took him to Yukimura Restaurant, which seemed to be open, and Keiko's parents were clearly standing behind the counter, but the only customer they had was Kuwabara, sat alone at a table for four.

Hiei hesitated outside the restaurant window as he debated what he ought to do: to walk on or to go in and deal with brainwashed Kuwabara? When Kuwabara spotted him and started waving at him Hiei conceded defeat and entered the restaurant, slowly making his way over to the table the bumbling idiot was sat at and dropping himself into the chair opposite him.

"Hey little guy," Kuwabara greeted him. "We meet again, huh? I dunno what it is about you and the way I keep bumping into you: I sort of feel like I was meant to help you. Like fate has–"

"Don't talk to me about fate," Hiei cut him off. "She's a bitch and a liar and a fraud."

"…Okay… Well how about this then: my name's Kazuma. What's yours?"

"Hiei. Which you would know if you hadn't let the SDF wipe your memories like the idiot that you are."

"Hiei, that's a strange name."

"You're named after a bush."

"…What?"

Hiei sighed.

"Yukina," he said.

"…You what?" Kuwabara echoed.

"Botan," Hiei tried. "Koenma. Toguro. Sensui… Yusuke Urameshi."

"…Are they members of the gang you're in?"

"Do you remember going to high school?"

"Of course I do!"

"Do you remember your friends there?"

"Some of them."

"What about… What's your happiest memory?"

"…Why? You sure are a weird little punk…"

"What is your happiest memory, idiot?"

"I'm not an idiot – and, though I don't really see why you would care, my happiest memory was the day I got Eikichi, my cat. I remember picking her from a litter of kittens in the pet store."

"Fantastic. Tell me all about it."

"…What?"

"Why did you pick that cat? Why not one of the others?"

"Um… Because she was the prettiest?"

"Great. Can you remember how you felt when you first held her?"

"Sure."

"Hold onto that thought."

"Um, okay, but I – oh God no, not that again!"

Hiei, who had just pushed his bandana up into his hair, focused his jagan eye on Kuwabara once more, in one last, desperate attempt to reach through to something. Although he was an expert on the use of his jagan eye for its most basic functions, he had never bothered mastering the more complex tricks it could perform: though he did vaguely remember something about a technique called "mental cleansing", where the jaganshi would lure the victim into recalling a clear memory in great detail as a means to gain better access into the recesses of their minds.

But, as the technique required patience, people skills and a knack for utilising fancy words, Hiei had, needless to say, never bothered mastering it. In fact, until that very moment, he had never even bothered trying to use it before.

Hiei almost felt vindicated when his strategy failed – it was another victory for violence over diplomacy, as far as he was concerned – but as he ended his attempt and he heard Keiko's parents collapsing behind the counter, he saw something that made him panic: Kuwabara's sister was suddenly standing in the middle of the restaurant, glaring at him in disbelief, apparently as immune to the effects of looking directly at a jagan eye as her brother was.

"Hiei?" she asked.

"Fuck," he grunted, leaping from his seat and fleeing the restaurant.

As he ran from the restaurant, it very quickly occurred to Hiei that, up until the moment he had noticed Kuwabara's sister watching him, he had wanted to be caught by someone who would report him to spirit world or else open a breach in the Kakai Barrier for him, so running in blind panic from just that opportunity was nothing short of ludicrous. He started to slow down and eventually stopped just beyond the city limits. He looked back at the city, waiting for a flash of light or the grey and blue of a Special Defence Force uniform, but neither came.

As he stood watching the city, Hiei felt something wet on his face again.

"Fucking rain," he grumbled, looking up at the immaculately clear sky.

Hiei spent his first night back in his own, shitty, reality sleeping in a rather short tree by a roadside, mostly expecting to be rudely awoken at some point during his sleep by someone looking to arrest or else simply kill him. When he awoke to a bright sky, the position of the sun indicating that it was beyond mid-morning, and he found himself without handcuffs and still in possession of his head and all his other vital organs, he felt strangely lucky. He let himself fall to the ground before dragging himself to his feet, yawning, scratching his crotch, spitting and then sneering at the passing busload of women all gaping at him in horror.

His first instinct was to get some coffee, but he reasoned that it was time to stop humouring that addiction, since it no longer served a valid purpose. And besides, he did not have much longer left to live anyway, so prolonging it by indulging in the agonies of sleep depravation seemed pointless. He had intended to rise early and search out Kuwabara – assuming that he made it through to the morning alive and yet to be captured, which of course he could now see that he had – but he supposed that this was perhaps easier, as Kuwabara would inevitably be at his desk by that time of day, and so easier to hunt down and harass.

Hiei had decided that, until he got sent back to demon world, (or sent to spirit world prison or just simply executed) he was going to keep trying to unlock Kuwabara's vanquished memories. It was a challenge, and it was one that might prove worthwhile overcoming, since Yukina would need a strong friend to protect her after the war ended and Botan upheld her promise to collect Yukina from the ice village and return her to the living world.

As he walked back to the city – because he had no reason to rush, and at a walking pace he was more likely to be noticed and stopped, which was what he ultimately wanted – Hiei thought about what sort of place the norm reality really was. His first thought was that it had been quite odd to see Kuwabara at the bus stop by the old lady's temple. Not because he was at that location, rather because it had been early evening and he seemed to have finished work for the day, which was unusual for the over-worked Kuwabara of the norm reality. His second thought was that he really quite wanted to know where Botan was and what she was doing, but he was too cowardly to check. And it was out of cowardice that he did not check: he had seen her running into the arms of Koenma one too many times, and that bitch of fate had said "some things are meant to be", and obviously she had been referring to the fact that Botan was meant to always be with Koenma.

Maybe it was for the best.

Hiei hated – truly, completely, despised and detested – the idea of his wife with that miserable little snot-rag of a man, but also he knew that Koenma was extremely fond of Botan, and Botan herself (in Hiei's own reality) had only had good things to say about him, even when she had been upset to learn that he would never have children with her. They were always happy together – ecstatically so in that one reality Hiei had visited briefly where they had been long-time lovers – and, apart from disappointing her by having children with another woman, Koenma would never do anything to hurt her.

And so, since he was destined to die and he might never know what had or would become of Botan, Hiei tried to tell himself that her being with Koenma was the best thing that he could hope for, because it would mean that Botan would never be lonely and she would always be loved.

It was a nice theory, and surely Kurama and/or Shuichi would be proud of him for thinking of it: but it was shit, and Hiei still wanted Botan for himself after all.

Fuck Koenma.

At the building Kuwabara worked in Hiei boldly made his way through the front entrance, ignoring the man at the reception desk who demanded to see his security pass, instead aiming himself for the stairwell to start up to the floor Kuwabara would be on. The man from behind the desk darted out towards him and Hiei stopped abruptly: but not because of the frantic man trying to block his path, rather because there was something hanging on the wall at his side, barely visible on the edge of his vision, something that was very familiar, and something he had never seen in the paradise reality, though he was sure had been present in more realities than his own.

It was a poster, advertising a competition to win a contract to build a house for a famous singer who liked wooden houses.

Hiei had seen it before of course, and he could even vaguely remember having a conversation with Kuwabara about it at one point. And the man pictured on the poster was the same one that had been pictured on the cover of that book Yukina had been reading in the paradise reality, so Hiei finally understood why he had looked familiar. After worrying that he had been turning into that other Hiei, he now realised that, in this instance at least, it had simply been a case of confusion between realities.

There was probably something else significant about the poster but Hiei did not really care what: he was mostly thinking about how it seemed to illustrate that he never had been acquiring memories of that other Hiei or turning into him in any way, rather he had simply been thinking about and feeling things from other realities. And that was a relief, because he had never liked that other Hiei: that other Hiei who was now no doubt back in paradise, basking in a glorious life that he had done nothing to deserve.

Hiei picked his way around the pathetic human trying to stop his passage to the stairwell, and as he reached the stairs themselves, another interesting and almost darkly amusing thought occurred to him: back in the paradise reality (and only the day before) Mukuro had said that it was not the ultimate utopia existence, only very close to it. Hiei had considered the paradise reality to be so perfect that it ought to have been the "utopia of his life", but, according to Mukuro, that was not the case. What then, he wondered, was the "utopia of his life"? Was it something that was only perfect in Hiei's own life, or did it affect everyone else around him too – as the changes in his life had in the paradise reality – he wondered?

Hiei eventually reached the large open-plan office area Kuwabara's desk was located in and, as expected, Kuwabara was sat at his desk as loyally as ever: though he did look a little more relaxed and rested than he usually did when sat there.

"Hey little guy!" Kuwabara greeted Hiei as he caught sight of him approaching. "Did you change your mind about the job? Maybe you should have put on a clean shirt first, y'know. Or at least one that wasn't all ripped like that…"

"Listen idiot, I need you to pull yourself together and be strong for Yukina," Hiei answered him, stopping by his desk.

"…What?" Kuwabara asked, his smile vanishing to be replaced by a confused frown.

"I need to know that she won't be exploited after she leaves the ice village, and you're the only human in this world strong enough to actually give her the sort of protection she'll need," Hiei reluctantly admitted.

"Damn it Hiei, why can't I ever have a normal conversation with you?"

Hiei faltered slightly upon hearing Kuwabara address him by his name: but then he remembered that he had told Kuwabara his name the day before, so his use of it was not indicative of a partial return of his memories, but rather a continuation of the new life he now led.

"You're such a strange and moody little guy!" Kuwabara added.

Hiei took a deep breath and surprised himself by simply sighing it out again. There was no point in arguing with or even just insulting Kuwabara: he had no concept of who either of them truly were and he could not remember Yukina or his feelings for her, so it seemed like a waste of energy to bother mocking him.

"I'm going for lunch," Kuwabara said, cutting into his thoughts again. "If you're moody because you're hungry, I'll buy you lunch. You look like you need a good meal, you're smaller than my neighbour's twelve year old daughter."

Hiei bared his teeth but again said nothing. Instead he followed Kuwabara out of the office again, waiting until they were out on the street and Kuwabara had begun unchaining his bicycle before talking again.

"If I say Yukina, Yusuke Urameshi, Kurama, Genkai and Botan to you, do you understand anything about any of them?" he asked.

Kuwabara slowly stood up, blinking blankly at Hiei.

"…Isn't Yukina a type of plant?" he asked.

Hiei growled in frustration.

"Forget about your lunch, come with me instead," he said.

"Oh no, I can't play with you right now, little guy," Kuwabara said gently. "I have to collect my lunch orders and get back to the office with them. Maybe you should go to school today anyway, study hard and–"

"Get on your fucking bicycle and follow me, or I will fucking murder you!" Hiei yelled, tearing his sword out of its sheath and pointing it at Kuwabara's chest to underline the severity of his threat.

Kuwabara's eyes grew large for a few seconds before slowly thinning, his eyebrows lowering over them into a scowl that almost rivalled one of Kurama's in its intensity. Hiei thought that Kuwabara might actually fight him then, and maybe that would be a very good thing, because maybe, when his life was in danger, he would instinctively summon his spirit sword to defend himself and maybe accessing his powers again would help remind him who he was.

"I don't have any money on me, little guy," he said quietly. "The lunch order gets put on a tab for the company."

"I'm not mugging you, idiot," Hiei growled back.

"And I don't have any rich relatives, so there's no point taking me hostage," Kuwabara added.

"I'm not taking you hostage," Hiei replied.

"…And if you try anything else – like anything, y'know, funny – I'm gonna fight back."

Hiei's face dropped.

"I'm not trying to rape you either, you infinite fool!" he snapped irritably. "Just get on your stupid bicycle and follow me, because I need to try one last thing to make you remember!"

"…I don't really know why you keep following me around, little guy," Kuwabara began. "But you should know that–"

"Just do it!" Hiei cut him off.

Kuwabara slowly eased his bicycle out of the stands and climbed onto it, his eyes never leaving Hiei as he did so.

"And don't even think about trying to get away from me," Hiei warned him.

Kuwabara gave him a strange look and Hiei realised that he had no other choice but to trust the idiot. He started to move and was pleased to see that Kuwabara did follow him, despite being very obviously reluctant to do so. Hiei gradually quickened his pace, pushing until it was clear that Kuwabara was struggling to keep up with him. He led him out of the city and up and around the long, winding road to the bus stop they had met at the day before, there turning off the road and starting through the forest. Kuwabara managed to keep up with him until about halfway through the woods, at which point the path was too overgrown and rocky for his bicycle, and so Hiei waited as patiently as he could whilst Kuwabara chained his vehicle of choice to a suitable tree and then they continued on foot.

When they finally reached the temple steps Kuwabara stopped, his eyes slowly travelling up their length.

"Whoa," he said. "There really is an old temple up here, huh?"

"Yes, now let's go," Hiei replied, starting up the steps.

"Up there?" Kuwabara echoed in disbelief. "But I'm exhausted already! I just cycled all the way here and walked all the way through that forest… Though I guess you've been running all this time, you must be even more exhausted than I am, and if you still have the energy to get up those steps after all that, you really must be determined about whatever is up there, and that kinda makes me want to see it too… So let's go."

Hiei frowned, confused by Kuwabara's logic: though when he saw that it had been enough to send him moving briskly up the stone stairs, his long legs managing two steps in each stride, he gave up trying to understand his motivation, instead simply following after him.

At the top of the steps Kuwabara stopped again, first looking up at the broken gate above and around them before looking across the expanse of lawn at the remains of the temple. His expression was quite neutral, and when he started to walk onwards Hiei let him go, simply following after him as patiently as he could in the hope that he might find something himself that sparked a memory of who and what he had once been. He walked up to the front entrance and paused there for a little while before turning and walking around the outside of the broken down part of the temple, picking his way past the sticky remains of the ponds and flinching slightly when he inadvertently disturbed a disgruntled racoon.

"Is this where your gang hangs out, Hiei?" he asked as they passed a particularly offensive phrase spray-painted over the remains of one of the exterior walls.

"Look at this instead," Hiei tried, pointing at a raised area of the garden.

Kuwabara turned to the area Hiei was pointing at and started towards it. Hiei followed him all the way to the end of a raised walkway, only then realising what it represented.

"This is terrible," Kuwabara said quietly, kneeling down by the broken headstone. "The people who broke this shrine should be put in prison!"

Hiei had never really liked humans in any way, but he had always admired the old lady's strength, courage, determination and dignity, and the sight of what had become of her grave was sickening to behold. Kuwabara looked quite pale, and Hiei wondered if what they had just found might be the trigger he had been looking for to break him.

"That's disgraceful," Kuwabara said, standing up again and shaking his head. "Somebody really ought to restore this temple and this shrine."

Kuwabara walked off again, and Hiei watched him go, realising that the shrine had not been enough to reach Kuwabara's old memories, despite it having been shocking enough that even Hiei was still tense and angered by it. And if the sight of Genkai's grave desecrated was not enough to reach Kuwabara, it was arguable that anything else ever would be.

Hiei sighed, moving on again and rejoining Kuwabara as he moved through the rooms of the temple that were still standing. Together they passed through many rooms that they had both once been in when the temple had still been well-kept, even in their own reality. They passed the broken remains of the display cabinet Hiei had already been angered by and eventually reached a room with a hole in the floor that seemed to have happened gradually, as the result of a leak in the roof slowly rotting away the floorboards.

Hiei wanted to give up at that point, but when Kuwabara dropped onto all fours and began prying back the partially rotted floorboards his interest was once more peaked. He watched in vague amusement as the idiot recklessly ripped up sections of the floor, damaging his own ugly suit in the process before dunking his head and shoulders down into the foundations, his hands digging down in search of something. After a few minutes of frantic scratching about, he resurfaced with a metal box between his hands, shuffling around on his knees to face Hiei.

"Check this out," he said, placing it down on the ground. "It's still locked. I wonder if there's a way to bypass the lock and –"

Kuwabara stopped abruptly and made a small yelp as Hiei made a low swing with his sword, slicing the box in half, its contents spilling out onto the floor around them. Hiei's impetuous response had damaged some of the items inside the box, but the rest were still surprisingly in tact. Unfortunately however, all that the box had seemed to contain was a mass of trinkets of arguable value.

"Hey…" Kuwabara muttered, carefully moving aside some of the little pieces of crap. "That's weird…"

He uncovered a single photograph and gingerly picked it up, frowning heavily at the faded image it depicted. Hiei edged closer and craned his neck to peer down at it too, seeing a photograph that he could vaguely remember being forced to be a part of many years before.

"That's me…" Kuwabara said, pointing at the younger version of himself grinning idiotically at the back of the photograph. "And that looks like… You?"

Kuwabara glanced back and forth between the picture and Hiei.

"But how is that possible?" he asked. "I don't ever remember getting my photo taken with you! Or any of these other people! Oh hey, wait, that's Keiko!"

Hiei thought that perhaps seeing himself with the others might kick-start Kuwabara's memories: but what he said next almost made Hiei slap his own forehead in despair.

"And that's Natsuko!" he said, pointing at Botan.

"Forget it," Hiei sighed. "This is obviously pointless. In fact, I don't even know why I bothered wasting my time trying again."

Hiei began walking at an unhurried pace back out of the temple, all the while wondering when the Special Defence Force would finally catch up to him: they were certainly slow on the uptake this time. Ridiculously slow. Almost suspiciously slow. But mostly just infuriatingly slow, because now all that Hiei wanted to do was get back to demon world.

As he heard Kuwabara exiting the temple behind him Hiei looked back over his shoulder and saw something that seemed quite bizarre: he was stuffing the photograph he had just recovered into his shirt pocket.

Not that it made any difference. As long as he could not remember who he was, there was no hope for him anyway.

And with that thought, Hiei took off for the city again, moving at full speed and leaving Kuwabara and the temple far behind him.

Hiei sat on a hilltop on the outskirts of the city and watched the sun set. He had survived a day and a half in the living world of his own reality without anyone from spirit world or demon world finding him there. He decided that, if he was still there by the next morning, he was going to go on a violent rampage of destruction through the city, since that was bound to get spirit world's attention, and this time he actually wanted them to apprehend him and send him back to demon world. He had already accepted what his fate there would be, though he still did not like it. He had given up caring about his own demise, but he still did not like the idea of knowingly killing Yusuke and Kurama, despite what they had become since the war began. It was a suitably shitty thing to have to do to end his life in such a shitty dimension.

He wondered if he ought to do something a little less shitty first. Maybe, he thought, after the Special Defence Force sent him back through the Kakai Barrier, he might have time to rescue Yukina himself. He did not really like the thought of Botan going to demon world, even if the war did end, and, as Yusuke had pointed out to him in the paradise reality, he did not like to leave things to chance, and hoping that Botan would manage to even find the ice village was taking a pretty big chance. Maybe he would go and rescue her first and take her to a portal to the living world: she was weak enough that she would be unaffected by the Kakai Barrier and could pass through it without him.

But what about when she got to the other side? There should be someone there to take her somewhere safe where she would not just be hunted down and sent back again. But where was safe? And who could he ask: Kuwabara could not remember Hiei or Yukina, much less understand the importance of keeping Yukina hidden in the living world.

It would be better if Kuwabara could remember, Hiei thought. If that big idiot could remember who he was and how to use his powers, he could create an opening in the Kakai Barrier for Hiei to pass though, get Yukina and take her back to Kuwabara and the living world. Then Kuwabara could hide her safely until Hiei had carried out Mukuro's plan and ended the war in demon world, at which point Yukina would probably be free to live in the living world anyway. Probably.

Everything was a risk. Everything came down to chance, and Hiei hated that more than anything else. But he could not escape the deep sense of guilt and the knowledge that he could do something for his sister at least. Kuwabara was a lost cause: he would probably never recover his memories or powers, and he was far too late to become the successful businessman he had been in the paradise reality – the hideous house on legs in the norm reality was proof enough of that. Yusuke was too far gone: he had long ago reverted to his full demon form and sustained it for several years, and if his behaviour in the paradise reality had been any indication, apparently he had always had a hidden desire to live that way anyway, and there was no chance of him returning to his human body, least of all becoming a chef at the failing Yukimura Restaurant of the norm reality. Kurama was also locked into his full demon form, his human form lost to Shuichi, who was destined to spend the rest of his existence being an eccentric and obnoxious prick: Kurama would never return to the living world and never adapt to life there again and so he was lost too. Botan had, Hiei assumed, returned to her life as a ferry girl, and she had told him that she would never like him, so there was absolutely no way he could ever convince her to give up her ferry girl duties, take a human trial and become his wife: and besides, Monzan was supposed to be four years old already and Botan was supposed to be pregnant again, so he had missed the opportunity to make that happen too.

And that just left Yukina. Yukina was the most innocent of them all, and of them all, the only one truly blameless for her own current unfortunate circumstances. She was also the least able to help herself because she was so meek and mild-tempered, and even if taking her to the living world would mean her living in that awful apartment with a Kuwabara who could not even remember her, it was still a better existence than her slowly rotting away in the ice village.

Hiei had to do something: this, he supposed, would have pleased Shuichi, because he was making a good decision based on something he had learned in the paradise reality.

But how he was going to even begin the rescue and hide operation was another matter entirely. He would need the help of Kuwabara at the very least, and even then it was debatable how much he could achieve.

Suddenly Hiei realised that he was no longer alone on the hilltop.

He tensed slightly until he was sure that the presence he could sense was only human and not a pesky spirit world Special Defence Force soldier or a weak demon that had managed to pass through the Kakai Barrier and was looking for a partner in crime. He then turned his head to look back over his shoulder, slightly taken aback to see Keiko walking towards him. Of all the humans who might have approached him at that moment, she was the last one he had ever expected to see: especially since she was completely alone and a long way from anyone else.

She saw him looking her way and she did a double-take in his direction but did not break her pace, continuing towards him, her face looking strangely determined and slightly annoyed. As she got within easy speaking distance of him she pulled something from her coat pocket and Hiei realised that his mind was about to be made up with regards to how he would get back to demon world: she was holding up a spirit world communication mirror.

Hiei turned away from her again. Of course she was going to call spirit world to come and catch him, it was what she had done before in this pointless reality, and it was no doubt what she would now do again. Of course, she could have done it from far away, she had not actually needed to seek him out and do it in front of him. He wondered why she had sought him out. He wondered how.

How had she known where he was?

Hiei turned his head sharply as something landed with a light clatter at his side. Keiko had inexplicably dropped the communicator onto a piece of hard ground nearby where he was sitting. He looked up at her for an explanation, seeing her face still hardened and determined, the expression even more intense when seen close-up.

And then she did something that really made no sense: she stomped her heel into the communicator, smashing it against the ground.

Hiei glared at Keiko's booted foot as she ground her heel into the remains of the communicator. She then threw down another device – clearly of spirit world origin – and sat down in front of it, a short distance from Hiei's side.

"The SDF are looking for you," she said, keeping her eyes on the device in front of her. "They aren't in this world any more, but before they left, they gave me this compass and that communicator, and they told me that if this thing started going off, I had to call them and tell them where you were."

She touched a button on the device in front of her and it began flashing and beeping maniacally, a floating arrow on its face turning to point directly at Hiei.

"They said it was programmed to pick up on your individual demonic aura," she continued, picking up the compass. "They put a piece of your hair in it so that it would find you."

She flipped open the compass and tipped out a small locket of Hiei's hair, which he watched fritter to the ground in mild curiosity.

"They got it from you when they arrested you the first time around," she explained. "It allows them to close in on your signal, and they said that, without it, the compass wouldn't really work because there are still a lot of weaker demons in the living world, and the compass would only ever focus on the closest aura, not the strongest one."

Hiei's face started to contort in increasing confusion and mounting fascination as Keiko produced a lighter from one pocket and flicked at it to produce a flame.

"I hate spirit world," she said quietly, moving the flame to the chunk of Hiei's hair on the ground. "They took Yusuke and turned him into something awful. He was just a normal kid before they came along. They made him fight all those monsters, they brought out his inner demon, and all of that made him what he is now, and for that I hate them. And when they saw what they had turned him into, they even tried to kill him. They're such bastards."

Hiei's face twisted further at both Keiko's use of profanity and the smell of burning hair as she proceeded to reduce his hair sample to ash with her lighter.

"I hate you too of course," she said, snapping shut the lighter and returning it to her pocket. "You tried to turn me into a demon the first time I met you, you nearly killed Yusuke that day, you fought recklessly during the Dark Tournament – sending out that black dragon and nearly killing everyone else around you – you were unreliable and unpleasant and you let Botan die, and that was just plain vile, because Botan was like the glue that held you all together. She had to keep the order of balance between the demons of the team, the humans and Koenma, and it was never easy for her, but she did it and she did it well. Without her, I never would have known what Yusuke was really up to."

Keiko buried the ashes of Hiei's hair sample beneath some loose dirt and then put the compass down on top of the communicator and thrust her heel into it, destroying it and smashing the communicator into even smaller fragments.

"I hate you Hiei," she said, her eyes still on the damage she had just caused. "But I hate spirit world just a little bit more because of what they did to Kuwabara and Yukina. I don't know where Yukina is now, but I see Kuwabara every day and it's pathetic and I hate it. I hate what's become of him even more than I hate what's become of me. And so does Shizuru."

Keiko sighed and then turned her head to look Hiei in the eye for the first time since her arrival.

"And he told me you've been hanging around him a lot this last day or so," she said. "And Shizuru caught you trying to use your jagan eye to hypnotise him. We realise that you're trying to help him get his memories back. We don't really understand why, because you always really, really hated him, but actually, we don't really care what your reasons are, since we want the same thing as you, and if you can make it happen, we support you."

"…What?" Hiei muttered.

"We support you," Keiko repeated. "We can see what you're trying to do, and we want to help you. We still don't like you, but we figure that spirit world won't ever undo what they did to Kuwabara, but if you can, that makes you a better ally than they are. So I told Koenma that you're not in the living world right now. I told him I'm using the compass to check every hour of every day, and that I'll call him as soon as I see anything out of the ordinary."

Keiko turned to look at the broken spirit world devices and Hiei copied her actions, seeing the tangled mess of now completely unusable technology, which served to underline what she appeared to be saying to him.

"I've got the SDF off your back, Hiei," she said, turning back to him again. "Tell me what else I need to do and I'll do it."

Hiei turned to face her, a strange feeling passing over him as his eyes met hers, the determination and conviction shining in her previously dulled over and lifeless dark eyes casting a small ray of hope over his otherwise pathetically bleak situation.

"Let's do it Hiei," she said. "You and me and Shizuru. Let's get Kuwabara's memories back. I'll do whatever it takes. I'll lie to spirit world as many times as it takes."

Hiei smiled in spite of himself.

"Let us build the foundations of paradise, and let us start with a simple act of goodwill," he said, before laughing at the sheer irony.

"What?" Keiko asked, smiling herself.

"Never mind," he replied, rising to his feet. "There is something else you can do for me today."

"Sure, anything," she said, standing up in front of him.

"I need a place to stay. I need to hide in a human household, ideally one with several other humans in it, just in case the SDF do come looking for me. They won't approach me if I'm surrounded by humans. I need to stay at your house."

"No, no way."

Hiei's face dropped.

"I mean, there's no space, I live with my parents," she added. "But I do know somewhere you could stay instead. It's a building full of humans and it's probably the safest place for you to be."

Hiei sobered then: he had known that things could not go well for him, and that brief moment of hope he had experienced had ended already. Obviously Keiko was going to make him stay somewhere quite awful.

Next Chapter: (It's so obvious where Hiei will be staying, I'm not even going to bother putting it in here: even the chapter title makes it obvious). Hiei, Shizuru and Keiko set about planning how they will help Kuwabara get his memories back, but they struggle to find answers, and out of desperation, Hiei consults Shuichi and Hiei makes another new ally who may be able to help him on his quest. Chapter 36: Show of Humility