Future Talk

Chapter 54:

"Boats & Birds"


Her impossible bulk filled everything. Red skin covered in a thin white skein glowed a little in the otherwise pitch-dark, and as I stared up into her orange-white eye she bared her teeth at me. They glittered like curved rubies, and the claws that tipped her powerfully muscled paws reflected the same bloody light.

She was a beautiful thing, my Salamander. Beautiful and deadly and full of ferocity I could hardly hope to contain.

"Hello," I told her. "I'm Dani."

Her head dipped low, the single eye that was as long as my entire body dropping even with myself. I stared into that eye as she stared into mine, and for one moment we just looked at each other in an assessing manner.

Then, very slowly, smooth lips closed over her teeth.

"You're the one in my tattoo," I said to fill the silence. It seemed impossible for something so large to make no sound, but even as the long coils of her body twined over themselves the silence stretched unbroken all around. "Me and you—we're bound together now, aren't we?"

Her aquiline head rose a little; the tip of her arrow-point muzzle hovered just above me. I reached up and gently laid my hand underneath her lower jaw, feeling the boiling heat simmering under her cool skin and the smoothness of her flesh. She felt like a snake, resonating all over with silkiness and hidden muscle.

"You're beautiful," I told her, and then my heart clenched. My next words were whispered.

"I… I killed you."

Her head recoiled with a soundless jerk, and then her jaw split wide. Crystalline spittle streamed between her jaws and through her teeth when she roared in my face, blasting me with heat and rage and enough sheer volume to send me skittering backward a step—only I didn't skitter, because my feet were both whole and my improved balance kept me upright, and even though they should have, my eyes didn't dry out when the hot air of her gut streamed into them. I withstood her cries without blinking, allowing her to bellow out her rage and pain and sadness for what must have been hours. Her long body shook and writhed and lashed, her claws slashed at the invisible ground, her teeth snapped inches from my face, and all through it she roared as if the world was ending.

Eventually, though, she fell quiet, staring at me with that agonized, baleful eye of hers, and when her lips closed back over her teeth I reached out once again and caressed her hot-cold snout.

"I'm sorry," I told her, and I meant it. "I'm so sorry. But…" I forced a smile. "We're together now, sister. I'll take care of you, just like you took care of me."

Her head tilted imperceptibly to one side, and was it just me or did my Salamander look… confused?

"You saved me earlier," I said. "Remember? That guy, Ryu—when he bit me, you…"

Her slits of nostrils puckered when she snorted, hot air wafting into my face with the scent of boiled stone. Obviously she remembered, and even more obviously she didn't like thinking about it. I'm not sure how I knew that was how she felt (her features weren't exactly readable) but nevertheless I understood.

"Yeah, that wasn't too nice of him," I agreed, because something about the set of her eye told me that she didn't like Ryu very much. "And yeah, you're right, I don't like Ryu like that. Totally not my type." I let out a low laugh, feeling a cold spot I didn't want to think about twinge below my breastbone. "I like my men with fouler tempers, I guess."

Her nose pushed past my hand gently, and inch by inch she lowered it under its pointed tip touched my forehead. I held my breath as her breath stirred my hair, but then I started smiling when a spear of warm comfort burrowed into my head, delving deep inside from the point where she touched skin to hide. The spear spread until it suffused my body in a cocoon of connection, and then the heat in my head began to coalesce into a shape. It didn't take long for it to form a pair of intent red eyes and a shock of blue-black hair, and as tanned skin fleshed out his face I let out a small chuckle. The image had been swathed in approval and dark, sensuous satisfaction.

Her message was clear: Is he more your type, then?

I couldn't help but laugh. "Oh, that one's Hiei," I said, touching her jaw again. I dragged my fingers down it and she purred with a sound like happy earthquakes. "And yes, I suppose he is my type. Certainly has the temper for it." I suddenly felt anxious for her approval. "Do you like him?"

A new image formed around Hiei's face, a roiling mass of dark scales and hot violet wrath. The Dragon's crimson eye burned almost as passionately as Hiei's grenadine ones did.

"Oh," I said. "I see. You like his Dragon, huh?"

Her muzzle pulled back but the warmth stayed in my head and I felt her consciousness ripple with consent. She lowered her massive body into a pose reminiscent of a cat, legs tucked under and tail curled around her body, and she laid her head down on the ground, long neck making an 's' shape between her shoulders and skull. Even in this position I felt dwarfed because I was only on level with her eye even when she pressed close to the floor, but I wasn't intimidated when I walked forward to place both my hands on her muzzle. Breath blasted me through her nostrils and I sneezed; from her distant torso came the bone-shaking rumble of something that sounded like a laugh.

"Hey, don't make fun of me," I said crossly. "Not all of us can be impervious to weather conditions and temperature changes."

I swear she rolled her eye. The warmth of our connection pinged lightly, reminding me of our shared images of Hiei and the Black Dragon. I smiled when I saw Hiei, unable to help the soft emotions that broke over me at the sight of those cherry eyes.

The Salamander burbled in happy sympathy; I knew she could feel my emotions just as easily as I could feel hers. The unabashed trust shared between girls sharing gossip on their crushes made my smile widen.

"I like Hiei a lot," I confided. "He's a real jerk most of the time, and when he's not being a jerk he's awfully confusing, but otherwise…" I trailed off with a blush. The Salamander burbled again, sounding a lot like an overgrown canary. "Well, I'm glad you like him, too."

The Dragon-image burned a bit brighter, making Hiei's face pale.

"I'm glad you like the Dragon, then," I said, giving her an affectionate smack on the nose. "But don't the two of them kind of go hand in hand?"

I felt her hesitate, and then Hiei and the Dragon fell apart in my head. The shreds of their images turned into an image of myself, or, more specifically, an image of my back and the tattoo burned into it. It was my first time seeing my mark, actually, and in my head I stared to take it all in: a circle between my shoulder blades seemed to glow like a crystal ball, and wings detailed with feathers branched off of it. The wing on the left curved downward, almost as if it were trying to lend extra support to my left arm and, by extension, my cane and the deformed foot it aided. The wing on the right curved upward like it longed to take flight, and the unbalanced affect looked like an avian yin-yang, or something.

My Salamander snorted into my hand, drawing me back on topic. The image of my back and tattoo burned a little sharper, and then next to it I saw an arm—Hiei's arm, if I knew the scars and the skin and the muscles as well as I thought I did, and then to alleviate all doubt I saw his skin bubble and burst, the Dragon cutting and burning its way out of him on its path to violent existence.

"Hiei and the Dragon," I said slowly, "are… well, they're like you and me, aren't they?"

She rumbled her agreement.

"Hiei took the Dragon into his body?"

Another rumble.

"And the Dragon can give him power?"

A third rumble; she seemed pleased that I'd put it all together so quickly.

I took a moment to process everything, fitting it together with my knowledge of Yu Yu Hakusho canon with little success. The Black Dragon had been given little explanation in the series: Zeru, the first person Hiei had ever used the Dragon on, had seemed to treat it like a separate entity one could only master via the use of a Jagan, but everyone after that bout of the Dark Tournament had treated the Dragon like a mere extension of the Jagan and not a separate entity at all, so…

So screw the canon, I thought. It's not like it's ever been useful to me, anyway.

Thinking on it some more, a new thought struck me. I couldn't help but frown. "Only, Hiei and the Dragon—they're not friends, are they?" I asked, stroking my Salamander. "Not like us?"

She hesitated.

"You wouldn't rip out of my skin like that if you could help it," I reasoned. "When you attacked Ryu, you were very gentle with me. If Hiei and the Dragon were friends, it wouldn't have to tear itself out of his arm like that."

She hesitated again, then made a noise of admittance deep in her throat.

"Well, that sucks for them," I said. Then, teasingly: "Maybe we should give the boys some pointers on playing nice?"

She chuckle-rumbled, but barely. Her eye pinched closed when she sighed; I felt sadness shudder in my head.

"You want them to be friends, don't you?" I asked softly, stroking her nose to soothe her.

Her eye cracked open.

"I do, too," I said. "It must be hard to have something inside you that you can't control. I'm lucky you turned out to be so sweet." I looked away, sheepish. "I don't know what I was expecting out of all this. I mean, they told me that the tattoo would hold the soul of a Salamander, but I never thought I'd get to talk to you, you know?"

My Salamander's nose butted my hand, knocking me back a step. Her expression seemed stern.

"Hey, the Sisters didn't tell me much," I said in my defense. "Is there anything special I'm supposed to do?"

Her response was a vague feeling of incredulousness mixed with I-don't-know-,-I'm-new-at-this. A snort set my hair to tossing above my head, and when it fell back down and hit my breasts I realized that I was very much naked.

That revelation, for whatever reason, didn't bother me the way it normally would. I guess I just felt safe around my Salamander.

"I suppose neither of us has ever done this before, then," I said. "But we'll figure it out together. I know we can do it."

The mental equivalent of her understanding smile made me giggle, but then I paused before asking: "Can you tell me your name?"

Puzzlement. That's all I felt.

"Your name. You know…" I gestured at myself. "I'm Dani. Who are you?"

More puzzlement.

"What can I call you?" I persisted. "Not just 'hey, you', right? And I feel like calling you 'my Salamander' twenty-four-seven'll get pretty old pretty fast. So… a name." I stared at her, but she still didn't get it. "Something I can call you, and you alone?"

Her shoulders bobbed many yards behind her head; it took me a second to recognize the motion as a shrug, and when I did I frowned.

"So you don't have a name, huh," I said. "Well, that's great." I paused. "Can I give you one?"

Another shrug, but I felt a small spark of excitement light up the heat in my head. She wanted a name, now that I'd talked about giving her one—and that was sort of cute, in an overgrown puppy kind of way.

"Sweet!" I said in triumph, grinning, but before I could wrack my brain for names she picked up the word 'sweet' and starting tossing it around in our shared head-space, illuminating everything up with repeats of the word in my happy voice. Sweet sweet sweet sweet sweet—

"Wait, wait!" I said, horrified and laughing all at once. "That's not what I wanted to name you, it's an expression, listen—"

My Salamander was having none of that, however, and she continued to throw the word around with glee. Sweet sweet sweet sweet sweet—her tone was a mix of petulance and insistence and pleasure, because she obviously liked the word a lot for whatever unnamable reason.

"Fine, fine, have it your way!" I finally cut in, and she raised her head to let loose a volley of high-pitched chirps that reminded me of a flock of particularly vocal finches. "'Sweet' it is. Happy?"

Very, she seemed to say as she settled back down (she certainly felt smug enough).

"So we're Dani and Sweet," I said, tasting the names together. "Huh. I kind of like that."

So did Sweet, apparently, because she scooted her face closer and nuzzled my sternum with another bird-chirp-burble-thing. Air blasted my chest, tickling me, and I pushed her back with a laugh.

"Settle down, Sweet," I told her. She blinked at me innocently, and I was about to ask her what else we were supposed to do when her white-gold eye shifted away from me. She nudged me back and raised her head, lips pulling back to show off her garnet fangs.

I spun, alarmed, but all that lay behind me was blackness. A small red light in the dark, however, blinked into existence a second later, and the darkness crept back to reveal a figure lying on the ground some distance away. I shrank into Sweet's shadow in alarm, but then I saw the red staff and the black hair and—

"Hiei," I said, and I ran to him on my spirit's whole legs. Sweet flowed along after me, and as I knelt at Hiei's side she surrounded us with her coils, head dipping in close so she could watch the proceedings with her single protective eye. Hiei lay on his stomach, right hand clenched tight around my bone-staff, and the arm connected to the hand was covered with blood. I carefully put my hands beneath his shoulder and rolled him onto his back, watching in horror as his head flopped atop his neck with the bonelessness of—

"Please be sleeping, please don't be dead, please be sleeping," I chanted as I pressed my ear to his chest. His heat hit me in a dizzying wave (Sweet growled above us) but I pushed the warmth aside until I felt the rise and fall of his breathing chest under my skull. I sat up with a relieved sigh; Sweet's head lowered until her muzzle brushed my hair, and I snaked my arm up so I could touch her for support.

"Why is Hiei here?" I asked aloud. "I thought we were in my mind, or something." Alarm made me look up at Sweet with a start. "This isn't a dream, is it?"

She snorted, and in my head came the image of my staff. I looked down at Hiei, frowning, because why did he have my staff, anyway? And how did he have it in my head, no less?

"You don't think that, you know, because he's touching it in the real world, he can get inside my head?" I asked.

Sweet seemed to think so, if her thrum of recognition meant anything. I stroked her skin absently while I stared at Hiei, and then, to my relief, I heard him moan. Eyelashes fluttered on his cheek, then parted to show cherry swimming with surprised disorientation.

"Dani?" he rasped, staring at me like he couldn't quite believe what he was seeing, and I smiled. Sweet nudged at the back of my head, our emotional link resonating with a brief farewell, so I dropped my hand and reached out to touch the staff still clasped in his strong fingers. It just seemed like the right thing to do, and since Sweet approved…

"We need to get out of here, I think," I said gently, and as soon as I touched my staff the blackness rushed back in.


Something cool and dry touched my cheek, and when I looked I saw a shadow looming above my head. I tried to sit up, blinking through a haze of sleep and the throb of a massive headache, but firm hands pushed me down onto something soft.

"Awake at last, are we?" said a scratchy voice—Genkai, I realized when I got used to the harsh light shining in my face and saw her hovering over.

"Where am I?" came my gummy reply. I wanted to put my hands to my face, but as soon as I tried I realized that my left one was caught under something and that my fingers, come to think of it, felt like they had steel rods running through the joints.

"You should probably let go sometime soon," Genkai said dryly. "Your fingers are turning blue."

Wait, what? I thought, and I made to figure out what she meant.

That time no one stopped me when I tried sitting up, and once I managed to open my eyes all the way I took a good look around. We were in my room, which was weird I guess because it looked so normal with the rocking horse and shelves of knickknacks and clothes and whatnot…

Weirder, though, was that three futons had been dragged in and lain side-by-side in the tiny closet of a space. I was on the middle one; Lauren lay to my right on her back. She looked so serene, with her halo of gold hair spread out along the pillow and her face relaxing quietly with sleep… someone had taken the Grand Mother's cloak off of her and covered her with a blanket, but otherwise she seemed untouched.

Thank God, I thought, smiling a little as I looked at her, and then I turned to my left.

Hiei lay on his back beside me. His face was turned my way and was covered in sweat, teeth grit and eyes screwed up so tight his forehead looked as crumpled as abused paper, and his right arm—the one with the ravaged skin and bloody wounds in the outline of a dragon—ended with a hand clamped tight around my staff. Muscles chorded in his forearm; veins stood out in his wrist, throbbing with pent-up blood; his fingers looked like they were about to shatter against the immoveable walking stick. My left hand clenched the staff a few inches below his own, and Genkai had been right when she said my fingers were turning blue. I practically had to peel myself off of the staff, finger by finger, joint by joint, and each motion was extremely painful and preternaturally stiff. My bones felt as brittle as glass.

"What happened?" I asked Genkai while I tried to pry my hand off the staff. She stood leaning against the wall by the door, watching me work through dispassionate eyes.

"I take it Demon World put a jump-start on your relationship with Hiei," she said bluntly.

I clenched my newly-freed fist against my chest, not looking at her while I blushed and tried to flex blood back into my hand.

"I'll take that as a yes," she said evenly.

"Did Yusuke say something?" I asked, staring at Hiei's hand on the staff. If my fingers hurt, his must be…

Genkai snorted. "No. Your actions spoke loudly enough."

I looked at her finally, confused, and her wrinkled mouth twisted with a smirk. "Dashing headlong into Demon World, Dani? If you wanted subtlety, you went looking in the wrong place." A harsh laugh. "Kurama's still nursing his wounds."

I vaguely remembered lashing out at Kurama before jumping in after Hiei, but the memory was a fuzzy one. "How badly did I hurt him?" I asked, worried. "I didn't mean to hurt him, I swear!"

"If Yukina hadn't been here, he would have needed stitches," Genkai said. "Though for people like us, that's just a paper cut. You startled him more than you hurt him, I think. None us knew you could attack someone."

"I'm not sure what I did," I admitted, thinking about it. I had attacked Hogosha in much the same way, using destructive discords to hurt my aggressors, but neither attack had possessed much by way of strength or control…

How had I even done it, come to think of it? I certainly hadn't been in my right mind during either attempt.

Genkai was studying Hiei with a critical eye. "The two of you collapsed when you came through the rift," she said, eyes on the staff. "Neither of you would let go of that new toy of yours. It was a real bitch, carrying you inside. And we couldn't treat Hiei's arm, either. Too stressed." She looked at me without expression. "I was hoping he'd let go if you did, but no such luck."

"Why would you hope that?" I asked.

She snorted. "Why do you think?" When I gave no signs of recognition, she said: "He grabbed the staff to stay close to you, idiot. Any fool could see that."

I felt very small when I said "Oh," and I licked my lips. Then I asked: "Where is everyone?"

"Sleeping, mostly. You've been asleep for a good two hours now."

I processed that. "And did anyone think to tell you about… what happened in Demon World?" I asked.

"I've been informed of the basics," Genkai said dismissively. "We'll discuss everything at length later. Right now, though, I'm more worried about Hiei. He'll lose that arm if this keeps up."

I had finally managed to get feeling in my fingers again, and alarm made my palms go slick with sweat. "Yukina couldn't, I don't know, heal him into letting go?" I asked fretfully, staring at his sweating face and taut-as-a-steel-cable arm. His fingers had gone discolored at the tips, swollen with blood and aching.

"No," Genkai said. "Kuwabara even suggested lathering his hand up with soap so we could slide it off, and we were desperate enough to try but it evaporated when it hit his skin."

"And my hand?"

She shrugged. "Same story."

That took me by surprise. "Heat and all?"

"We had to cut your clothes off of you to keep you from smothering," she said, and for the first time I noticed my scanty tank top and… well, utter lack of pants. I had underwear and my torso-slash-tattoo-bandages, sure, but still…

"And I rather liked those jeans," I muttered darkly.

"Get over it."

"OK, OK," I said. I bit my lip, thinking. Then I asked: "What do we do about Hiei?"

She shrugged. "It's your ballgame. We tried and we failed. The others all wanted to go to sleep after the excitement—Kurama mentioned that you in particular hadn't slept in at least two days."

It was true, I realized—between the Hunt, the feast, and the night with Ryu, I really hadn't slept a wink. I hardly felt tired, though, and what was up with that?

"When we realized that none of us could do anything about Hiei, I volunteered to keep an eye out so the others could rest." The arms folded across her chest tensed. "Ren, however, won't be waking up for a while. Her brainwaves show signs of deep sleep bordering on coma, but apparently she warned you this would happen."

"She did," I said.

She nodded. "We needn't worry about her for at least another day or two, by my count." Her eyes flickered to Hiei.

My heart stuttered. "And Hiei?"

"He always hibernates after unleashing the Dragon," she said slowly. "Only he's not this tense normally. If he doesn't get the rest he needs, he won't be able to reabsorb the Dragon's energy and repair his body." She pinned me with a glare. "If he loses that arm and the Dragon, I'm holding you personally responsible."

I swallowed. "What can I do?"

"I have no idea," she said. My jaw dropped, but she just went on with: "We tried what we could, so now it's your turn."

I turned back to Hiei, to his sweating face and pulsing jaw and at the way the bones in his neck stuck out from stress. I had no idea what to do for him, no idea at all, but blood had caked on his right arm and it looked gross and itchy, so…

"Can I have a bowl of water and some rags, please?" I asked, still looking at Genkai. "Or, or maybe a sponge or two. Oh, and bandages? Maybe ointment?"

"You're going to wash him up?" she asked, raising one grey-pink eyebrow.

"Yes... No. I don't know." I sighed, looking at my hands. "I'm just following my gut, OK? And my gut says that no one could sleep well with gaping wounds all over their arm!"

When Genkai did not reply, I looked up only to find her gone, having left without a word. She reappeared a few minutes later with a bowl of warm water and a pile of rags, which she set next to Hiei before walking out again.

I didn't wait for her to come back, crab-crawling sideways to get closer to Hiei. Sitting cross-legged on the tatami floor, I carefully draped his clenched hand and my staff across my lap, trying to ignore the flakes of tried blood that rubbed off on the skin of my thighs whenever I moved him. His arm burned into my leg, hotter, even, than the heat radiating from the rest of his body. A moment of pity made me lean sideways and stroke my thumb down the side of his face, and the subtle movement made the blanket slip sideways off his bare chest. I ignored the iron-hard cushion of his muscles, as sculpted and tantalizing as they were, to study his labored breathing and the sweat beading on his pecs.

"Oh, Hiei," I murmured, smoothing his hair from his face. He wasn't wearing a covering over his Jagan, I realized, but the eye remained shut tight above the rest of his agonized face.

The bowl and the rags sat in front of me; I leaned forward, grabbed a rag, and dunked it in the water. A bit splashed on my calves, and I wrung out the excess before carefully laying it across Hiei's forehead, hoping the cool water might calm him a little, but the rag just started to steam a bit and soon enough it was totally dry.

I frowned when I saw that. How was he not burning me to a crisp, if he was so hot he could evaporate water on contact?

"His body temperature increases under stress," said a voice, and I jumped. Genkai stood in the doorway, and her face was drawn when she set a bottle of antiseptic and a roll of bandages down next to the bowl. Then she sat down across from me, arms folded and legs positioned like mine.

"Elemental demons," she continued, "often have inborn defense mechanisms that come out when they're under threat. Yukina, for instance—when she becomes frightened the room freezes over. Hiei seeks to burn threats away."

"The heat isn't so bad," I said, taking the warm rag off of his forehead. I dipped a fresh one in the water.

Genkai snorted as I wrung the rag out. "He burns differently for you."

I froze, rag poised over his arm. I looked up at Genkai to find her regarding me coolly.

"Haven't you noticed?" she said.

"Noticed what?"

"When he's around, you'll say things like 'it's stuffy' or 'it's too hot in here', but no one else feels that way." A low laugh made me blush and look away. "You're more attuned to him than you realize."

"Well, we're close, I guess," I said, and I began to dab at his wounds. The blood flaked off and adhered to the cloth; I very quickly had to get a new one.

"And you'll get even closer now that you have that thing in your back," she said.

I swallowed, still dabbing away at his wounds. "They told you about my tattoo?" I murmured.

"Kurama seems to think you have the soul of a demon inside it."

"He's right."

"Then you know that your reactions to Hiei are only going to get worse?"

I hadn't known. I guess it showed on my face, because she looked stunned—well, as stunned as Genkai ever allows herself to look, that is.

"You—" she began, torn halfway between rage and utter disbelief, but then her face crumpled and she just laughed. "You're the worst demon I've ever met!"

"I'm a human," I said, though with only half my heart.

"Bullshit," Genkai said. "Your head might be, but your body certainly isn't. You need to learn how to handle yourself better or Hiei's going to suffer."

I looked down at his arm. I had managed to get much of the blood off, and the coppery tang of the red sludge didn't nauseate me the way I'd thought it might. It was just Hiei's blood—just a part of him, so what was there to be freaked out by? It might actually be kind of pleasant had the situation not have been so grim…

Wait, did I just think that blood might be nice? I thought, giving myself a mental smack. Gross!

Sweet, however, didn't seem to think so. For the first time since I'd woken up I felt her in my tattoo, thrumming with admonishments. She thought the blood comment was totally normal and she obviously didn't like me shying away from accepting it.

It's normal for you, maybe, I thought to her. It offends my human sensibilities.

She sort of… giggled. Little sparks of heat danced across my tattoo, anyway.

"Dani?"

I jumped; I'd gotten lost in Sweet and ignored Genkai, who was looking at me like I'd grown another nose.

"He's clean," she told me, gesturing at Hiei's arm. "Now what?"

I glanced at the arm again. Removing the blood had unearthed an odd sight: lines like glittering black thread coiled around his flesh in a spiral, mired amid torn skin and burns.

"Should I bandage him?" I asked, and Genkai hesitated.

"He wards himself when the Dragon returns," she said. "I don't know if he'd like someone else doing it for him." A pause. "But antiseptic wouldn't go amiss, I think."

I didn't reply with words. I just picked up the bottle, uncapped it, and splashed some of the acrid liquid onto a rag. Then I gently dotted it on Hiei's wounds, over the scintillating black lines and into the furrows of his burns, and when I thought I'd finished I set the rag aside and slowly, gently ghosted the tips of my fingers down the underside of his arm. He still gripped the staff so hard his fingers looked on the verge of breaking, and the discoloration had gotten worse.

"Hiei, please let go," I said, stroking his arm as sweetly as I could. "Please. It's OK now. All of us, we're OK."

He did not unclench his hand.

I looked up at Genkai, worried, but she just seemed pensive… surprised, even.

"Try talking to him," she instructed when I caught her eye. "His energy… it rippled."

My heart jumped with encouragement . "Hiei," I murmured, trailing my fingers over the veins in his wrist as I softly said his name. "Hiei, it's OK. We're safe. We're back at the temple and, and we're safe." I didn't know what to say—talking to someone who couldn't even hear you couldn't make for very good conversation—so I just rambled on. "You and me, we got through the portal and everyone took us inside. Lauren's safe and I didn't get hurt and you're in one piece, too." I chuckled. "I think I might have hurt Kurama a little, getting to you, but… well…"

I glanced up at Genkai, who raised an eyebrow. I blushed and looked away, not liking having an audience for what I was about to say.

"Well, I don't regret hurting him, if it meant getting you home safe," I whispered. I stroked his fingers, feeling the tension in them. "But you're safe, Hiei—I'm safe, we're both safe. Please let go of my staff."

His fingers didn't even twitch.

"Do you think maybe I could talk to him in his head?" I asked, tearing my eyes away from his pinched expression and sweating skin.

"He's too deep in himself for that," Genkai said.

I looked back at Hiei. "I saw him when I was asleep," I said. "I think the staff brought us together." I cursed loudly, threading my free hand through my hair. "Why didn't I talk to him then?"

"You didn't know what was happening," Genkai said. "Stop feeling sorry for yourself and just try something else."

But what was there to try? Since I had no idea, I just kept talking to him. "Please let go, Hiei," I urged, tugging gently at his fingers. It felt like I was trying to bend steel with chopsticks made of glass. "Please, please, please let go."

Nothing.

I swallowed down tears, ones that welled up before I even knew they were there.

"Try singing."

My head snapped up. Genkai wasn't looking at me, but rather at Hiei.

"If he liked hearing your voice talk," she said, "he might react even more to your singing." She snorted once. "I never thought I'd ask someone to sing Hiei a lullaby."

It was a somewhat giggle-inducing thought, that much was true, but I did not laugh as I continued to ghost my fingers over the black lines in his tanned flesh. I just thought about what she'd said, about how Hiei's consciousness rippled in reaction to my voice, and I thought about all the music I could sing him that might, might make him relax.

"My mother," I said at last, "used to sing me to sleep at night. Do you think it'll work for him?"

"How the hell should I know?"

I didn't answer her directly, but I did open my mouth. Soft, heartfelt words trickled out of me slowly, sung without flair or pomp or complication.

"If you'll be my star," I sang, "I'll be your sky. You can hide underneath me and come out at night."

I took a moment to breathe and swallow because my voice was thin and fragile, but I didn't strengthen it because vulnerability was what made the song work. I wanted Hiei to hear that vulnerability, wanted him to be called by it and be lulled into shared comfort, because that was what the son was about: love so strong it meant sacrifice, surrender, and letting go.

But most of all, letting go.

"When I turn jet black and you show of your light, I live to let you shine," I told him. "I live to let you shine. But you can skyrocket away from me, and never come back if you find another galaxy, far from here, with more room to fly…"

I let reached to the side and smoothed a fallen lock of hair from his forehead.

"…just leave me your stardust to remember you by."

"This is good," Genkai said.

"If you'll be my boat," I told Hiei, keeping my eyes on his sweating face, "I'll be your sea, with a depth of pure blue just to probe curiosity. Ebbing and flowing and pushed by a breeze, I live to make you free."

My fingers still traipsed across his arm, tender and warm and coaxing.

"I live," I sang, "to make you free."

Beneath my hand, something went slack.

"But you can set sail to the west, if you want to," I assured him, "and past the horizon, til' I can't even see you, far from here, where the beaches are white…"

His brow abruptly unknit, eyes slackening into black-lashed crescents, and the tension drained out of his jaw. Lips parted, and his jerking chest drew in one long, slow breath.

"… just leave me your wake to remember you by."

I stopped singing as I pulled the staff out of his newly opened fist, setting it aside so I could press my thumbs into his palms and push outward, slowly spreading his fingers so blood could reach the tips. Then I picked the song back up, crooning the first verse and the chorus over again as I massaged his swollen hand, rubbing the palm with firm swirls of my thumb. His skin felt feverishly hot; I dunked a rag in the cold water and passed it over his hand, cleaning it of sweat and grime just like I'd done to the rest of his arm.

He had nice hands, I realized. Big, deft, capable, with broad palms and long fingers. A warrior's hands, ones that could have been an artist's if not for the circumstances of his birth…

When the song ended and his skin had turned back to its normal color, I gently laid his hand at his side and pulled my knees to my chest, wincing when the blood on them flaked onto my tank top.

"Good work," Genkai said.

"Thanks," I said, and I pushed my legs out again to survey the damage on my shirt. "I think I'm going to go shower and cha-a-ange…"

The final word turned into a yawn, and suddenly my eyes felt very heavy.

"Sleep first," Genkai said.

But I shook my head. "No, it's bathtime." I braced my palms on the floor behind me and prepared to rise. "I'll go to bed afterward," I said, pushing myself off the ground a bit.

Genkai opened her mouth with a frown etched between her eyes, obviously about to tell me to sit my fool ass back down, but before she could do it something wormed around my leg, jerking me back onto my butt with a thump of tailbone against wood. I yelped in pained surprise, only to find that Hiei had, in his sleep, reached out and wrapped his arm around my left thigh. The expanse of leg just above the back of my knee lay nestled in the crook of his elbow; his forearm and still-swollen hand circled between my legs, and he had laid his palm flat against the juncture where my left thigh met hip and abdomen.

As I took in the fact that Hiei was grabbing me in a oh-my-god-this-is-really-freaking-intimate way, his head lolled toward me. With a small sigh I could barely here he pulled himself close, nose and forehead pressing into my bare hip, breath misting hot and damp against my skin. A little under three seconds later Sweet was doing a dance of giddy joy in my tattoo, setting the rest of my body practically ablaze because oh wow, he was holding me with the arm with the black Dragon-lines all over it, and oh my GOD, why was I not wearing any pants?

"… looks like he wants you to sleep, apparently."

I could barely look at Genkai without bursting into hysterically embarrassed laughter, but when I somehow managed to meet her eyes despite my massive, tomato-faced blush, she was only smirking the tiniest bit. I didn't say a word as she grabbed my pillow off my abandoned futon and passed it to me (I was too distracted to form coherent thoughts), and without a word I put the pillow behind my head and lay back against the cool wood floorboards. We looked at one another, me blushing and her smirking, as she stood up and headed for the door, and with a low chuckle and the words "Sweet dreams, Dani," she shut flipped off the lights and shut the door behind her.

The utter dark and the cool floor didn't do much to calm me. Hiei was just too hot.


Sleep, when it at last claimed me and Sweet together, was a nice reprieve from the torture of Hiei's searing grasp.

What came with that sleep, however, was a torture all its own.

"I'm only going to say this once," I told him. "Tell me the truth, Koenma."

To his credit, the man had trouble meeting my eyes. Not to his credit, he chose not to say a word.

Seeing this and not liking it one bit, I advanced on him and shoved him with the heels of my hands, hard. He stumbled back with a surprised expression, but I kept coming and shoved him back a few more paces.

"Tell me the truth!" I demanded with each push. "Tell me the truth! TELL ME THE FUCKING TRUTH!"

"Dani," he said, catching my wrists at last, but I wrenched away from him and aimed a punch at his chest. The blow connected with a smack, but my weak arms only made Koenma grunt a little—probably more out of surprise than pain, and that only made my rage burn hotter.

"When were you going to tell me I'm not from another world?" I demanded, punching him again. "When were you going to tell me all of this was a lie? When, Koenma, WHEN! Because I'm sick and fucking tired of all your little surprises, and—"

Honeyed eyes were desperate. "Dani, please, listen to me," he said.

Inconsolable, I cut him off. "You're a liar!" I roared, punching away. "You're a rotten liar! I should never have trusted you!"

"Everything I didn't tell you, it was for your own good," he said.

My fist landed against his chest again, but by then I had started crying and I didn't have the strength to both sob and hit him at once. My hands twisted into the fabric of his shirt as I cried, holding him arms-length away from me as much as I was holding him arms-length close to me. He made no move to comfort me with his touch, and for that I was grateful, but even so I wished he'd do something, because having him just stand there while I suffered was so cruel and—

"If I had told you about the Sisters and the Bright Ones ahead of time," he said just as his silence grew unbearable, "you would have run to Lauren's side before the time was right."

"But you flat-out lied to me," I said through a throat thick with tears. "You said that the past didn't have the Sisters in it."

"And if I had told you the truth about them, and if I'd told you Lauren was there when the Beasts destroyed the world, what would happen if you said something ahead of time to Yusuke and the others?" he said. "You have no memories of the Bright Ones—having knowledge of them with no memory of them would have incriminated you. It would have looked like someone was feeding you information. I had to lie. Otherwise, you wouldn't have been safe."

I glared up at him. "Safe from my big mouth, you mean?" I spat. "I can keep a secret, you know!"

"I know," he said gently. "I know you can."

I swallowed, thinking. Then I asked: "So Lauren really was in your past? The past where the Beasts destroyed this world? You woke her up and everything?"

Koenma nodded slowly, and something darkened in his eyes. I didn't like it.

"And me?" I asked suspiciously. "Was I in your past, too? There's a pod with my name on it, so did you just pull me out of it and wipe my memory and—"

"You aren't from this world, Dani," he said.

What? "Bullshit—Lauren remembers me!" I protested.

"She remembers your double, Dani," he said patiently. "Your double, who looks and acts just like you and who is you, but isn't." His face fell into sorrow. "Your double wandered out of her pod and died, alone and lost and confused. There was nothing I could do to save her."

I froze, staring at him in confused wonder. Then I murmured: "Her?"

His eyes fell closed. "In this world, you have a doppelganger," he explained. "So does Lauren."

"I don't understand," I said, because I didn't.

Koenma said: "The Lauren you met yesterday is not your Lauren, but rather a carbon copy of her that is indistinguishable from the one you know and love. She is a Lauren, but she isn't the one you loved." A gentle smile. "It is hard to understand, but… the love and friendship between the two of you still exists. You're still the same people, just… different incarnations."

"I," I said, but he shushed me.

"You really are from a different world, Dani," Koenma said. "That much I promise you."

"But how can I trust you?" I asked, the hands twined into his clothes tugging at him harshly. "None of this makes any sense! How can I be from another world but still exist in this one? How does it all work?"

Hands came up and encircled my wrists, pulling my hands down to my sides. Koenma's mouth thinned into a hard line of… something. I couldn't tell what.

"I told you," he said, "back when we first met, that I chose you to come here and right the wrongs of the past because you knew about the anime series Yu Yu Hakusho, and because you showed compassion so strongly that you gave your life for another. But that is not the whole story."

I couldn't move, couldn't breathe, couldn't even think, eyes locked on his lips as my ears numbly absorbed the words spewing from them.

"The whole story," he said, "is that you weren't a random fan of an old anime series." A hand came up and brushed the hair from my face.

"You," he said, "were anything but random."

"So what am I?" I said. "You picked me to stop Ryu and Seishou, but how can I stop those monsters when I don't even know what I am?"

Koenma attempted a reply, opening his mouth as his eyes dropped and tried to tell me the truth, but before he could speak someone else did.

No, I thought as I felt them appear behind me, felt their presence washing over my back like a cold graveyard wind. No, not someone.

Something.

He picked you to stop Ryu and Seishou, did he, little girl? the horrible voice boomed, and It began to laugh a laugh of steel severing bone and heads being crushed under tyrants' feet. He picked you to stop an inconsequential psychic and a freak of nature, did he, little girl?

I turned as if underwater, movements dragging slow and limbs hanging heavy, and behind me roared an utter blackness that threatened to swallow Koenma and I up like minnows before a whale with teeth like shark's. The space between me and the blackness throbbed and pulsed, like It wanted to come close and pulverize me into jelly of blood and—

I think you are both forgetting something, vermin, It screamed, and the blackness shot forward and engulfed us. Icy cold pulled at my skin and hair, lighting me up with pain that invaded as much as it sought to tear me apart from the inside; the shadow poured into my mouth and nose and eyes and ears, drowning me in hate and fear.

Ryu and Seishou, psychic and freak, are not your true enemies, It said, gleefully plunging into my soul. Ryu and Seishou are NOTHING. They are not the monsters you should fear.

"Dani!" I heard Koenma scream, and I think I screamed back, pushing the dark out of my mouth with all the music I could command. Out of the hateful black swam a small light, comforting and as warm as a zephyr in the tundra shadow, and out of the light came a hand, and I reached for it and tried to twist out of the grasping dark.

LEST YOU FORGET, LITTLE GIRL AND FALLEN PRINCE, It bellowed, grabbing at me as I felt Koenma's hand close over my wrist, THEY ARE NOTHING COMPARED TO ME, THE TRUE MONSTER!

"Let her go, Beast!" Koenma screamed, and then light exploded all around me and I was in Koenma's arms, safe and cloistered and held tight—

I AM YOUR TRUE ENEMY! said the voice. Around Koenma and I spun a sphere of light, light that shone out of Koenma's outstretched hand and held the dark at bay, and It slammed itself against the sphere over and over again as it tried to furiously get inside. YOU HAVE FORGOTTEN ME, AND THIS I WILL NOT TOLERATE! I AM YOUR TRUE ENEMY! I AM THE REAL MONSTER! NEVER FORGET THAT!

"Dani, you need to wake up; I can't hold It off for long!" Koenma said, and I stared into his face with an open mouth and tried to dip into theta, where I could—

"Woman?"

Koenma and I both froze, eyes locked together at the sound of this new voice, and before I could turn to look at the source Koenma's hands came up and cupped my face.

"Don't look," he hissed, honey eyes ablaze with amber fire. "Don't look, Dani, you know it isn't him! It's the Book, trying to seduce-"

"Woman?" the new voice growled, and the darkness around Koenma's sphere vanished. Silence made my ears ring. "Woman, let me in. I have to protect you."

That growl, those words, that voice

"Hiei!" I said, because it was his voice and he was out there with that thing, but Koenma would not let me go. I kicked and struggled and screamed, tearing at Koenma because Hiei was here, I had to get to him, I had to break free because Koenma had crushed me to his chest—

"Forgive me," he whispered above the sound of my struggling and screams. A hand cupped the back of my lashing head. "Forgive me, Dani."

A pinch, and—

In an instant, I was awake.


I woke up angry and with tears on my face, frightened because Hiei, oh my god Hiei, and then—

And then I relaxed because Hiei still had a hand wrapped around my leg; even in the dark I could tell. His heat made my skin prickle like a million roving fireflies. The steady breathing on my hip made the hairs on my arm rise to attention and my belly tingle with warmth, but I didn't move as I lay there and listened to him breathe. Lauren lay a few feet to my right, soft snores of deepest sleep telling me she was fine, she was perfect, she was—

She was in the past where the world ended, I thought, remembering. She was there. She died.

Despite my confusion, I had one clear thought. It was: I won't let that happen to her again.

I lay there for a few minutes more, thinking about Koenma as I calmed my racing heart. His talk of doubles, of how mine died and how the Lauren I slept beside wasn't the one I knew and loved… what did it all mean?

Though I couldn't see her face, I could remember it: I could easily recall the curve of her wide mouth, the strength of her jaw, and the set of her true-blue eyes. She'd looked at me with love when she came out of the pod, she knew our song, every time I saw her I felt relief steal over me like a tidal wave. She knew my name and just how to comfort me, even with our limited interaction I could see that much, and she was…

She was Lauren.

Double or no double, this was Lauren.

But she's not mine, I thought. She's not… my Lauren. Right?

Sweet twitched in my shoulders; I was sore from lying on the ground for however long I'd been there. She sent me a burst of comforting warmth as I sat up, and I smiled a little when a memory—not my memory, but hers—burst inside my head. I felt the way I'd felt when I held Lauren safe in my arms, saw the way she'd looked at me with an outsider's perspective. Love was evident in both our faces and words, from my singing to her drawling comforts to…

"She's still Lauren, I guess," I said into the dark, and I looked in her direction. I couldn't see her, but I could hear her snores and my heart softened. "Even if she's not the same one, my feelings for her won't change."

Feeling marginally better on the whole affair, I raised my arms over my head until my shoulders cracked. I wasn't cold thanks to Hiei's touch, but I really wanted to put on pants regardless. I turned toward Hiei, thinking about how I could make his let go of me so I could get up and leave, and so I could take better stock of the situation I dipped into theta, pulled out the firesong, and made a small ball of light hover between Lauren and I. She looked like a vaguely glimmering lump in the flickering light, and I couldn't help but smile at her again before looking down at Hiei.

He hadn't moved since I fell asleep, still lying on his back with one arm wrapped around my thigh and face turned toward my hip. His lips were parted, his eyes were shadowed in the firelight, his cheeks were handsome and hollow, and the blue parts of his hair were indistinguishable in the gloom. I stared at him for a minute or so, just trying to take him in and revel in the steady, unlabored sound of his breath. He looked peaceful, worry-free, and… well, cute.

Very cute, despite the killer behind the sleeping face.

"Fangirls across the world squealed when you fell asleep after your fight with Bui, you know," I told him in crass English. "If you're devastating when you're awake, well, sleeping's only the icing on the cake." I paused. "Rhyme unintentional. Blame the lyricist in me."

He didn't reply or even twitch. Unable to help myself, my eyes traveled over the muscled expanse of his chest with a hungry sweep, and as I traced the curve of his elegant collarbone and neck, something else caught my eye with a sharp silver glimmer.

Leaning forward with a frown, I reached out and touched the silver line that trickled sideways across his neck just under his jaw. With a start, I realized that I was touching something made of metal. I shivered when I grazed Hiei's hot skin in the process of carefully hooking a finger under the slim metal chain and dragging it forward, pulling it down the planes of his bare chest until it made a 'v' ending just below his sternum. A small weight on the hidden part of the chain made the process more difficult than it seemed, and I carefully reached behind his head with my other hand and found what hung there. The pendant tangled with his hair, but my fingers were gentle and I brought it slowly into the light.

I knew it was a Hiruseki stone before I saw it; it was as if the touch of it against my fingertips told me everything I needed to know and more. Cool on my skin and weighty, the translucent blue-green gem—flawlessly spherical, utterly breathtaking—reflected the light of my illusion-fire and made it shatter into glacier-blue spears of softness that bathed Hiei in a calming glow, casting his face into gentle relief as it lay steady on his chest despite his rise-and-fall breath. It seemed the exact opposite of Hiei in every way: where he was all heat and fire and fury, it was coolness and calm and serenity, and looking at it made my torn emotions mend, made my uneasiness melt, made…

"Maybe he and it are more alike than I gave them credit for," I murmured, caressing the gem with a fingertip. "Hiei's been pretty soothing lately."

Hiei's breathing hitched, and the Hiruseki and chain slipped to fall between his arm and torso.

"You said my name," he said. I jumped when his arm tightened around my thigh, fingers curling into my skin softly. "What were you saying?"

"I, I didn't know you were awake," I stammered.

His head moved, lips pressing into my hip. Hot air burned my skin when he said: "I heard you."

I didn't know what to say to that, so I said nothing and stared at the ground between my legs. I'm sure I would have made myself sound like an idiot if I'd tried to speak aloud. A half naked Hiei touching me in the dark made it hard to talk.

"Did you wash my arm?" he asked, lips brushing me with every syllable.

"Uh-huh," I squeaked.

He licked his lips; I knew because he 'accidentally' licked me in the process (though whether or not it was a calculated gesture is anyone's guess).

"Why is there blood on you?" he asked. He inhaled sharply though his mouth, pressing it wide open against my leg. Then his lips curled. "It's mine."

"Uh-huh," I said weakly.

"How long have I been sleeping?"

There was no way to avoid a direct question with a mere grunt. I took a deep breath. Then I said: "I don't know."

"Why?"

"I slept, too," I said.

His fingers curled slightly, then uncurled; I couldn't stop the shiver that came as a result.

"We slept like this?" he murmured.

Another deep breath. "You wouldn't let go."

"Did you want me to?"

Another shiver before I admitted: "Not really."

He chuckled in the dark, and then he sat up. My leg came up with him, still caught in the crook of his elbow, and I essentially wound up with my bad leg draped over his lap. His other hand came up and grabbed my knee before gliding slowly up my thigh, coming to rest on the inside of it about halfway up.

I forgot to breathe, staring at him in the light of the illusion fire hovering in the air next to me, because every part of me had caught fire. His eyes looked like they burned, sucking in the light and magnifying it…

"Go clean up, Dani," Hiei said, the low growl of his voice making another shudder quiver up my spine. "I'll be here when you come back."

Despite how nice a bath sounded right then (and despite how the promise of Hiei waiting shirtless for me in a dark room made cleaning myself up sound like a great idea indeed), I hesitated. What if Lauren wakes up? I thought, and I glanced at her. Even though she's a double or whatever, I don't even care anymore, what if she recognizes the Yu Yu Hakusho crowd? I bit my lip, still staring at her lumpy silhouette. I never got to ask if YYH existed in this world's past. I should be here when she wakes up so I can explain things!

Hiei saw where I looked and looked, too. His eyes narrowed, and he kept his gaze locked on Lauren when he said: "Go. I'll keep an eye on that one."

I looked at him sharply, but he seemed serious enough.

"And you'll be here when I come back?" I asked, and his lips parted over his teeth in a feral grin.

"You want me to be?" he asked, eyes flickering across my body. I felt my face heat up, suddenly conscious of my state of undress, and Hiei's fingers moved on the inside of my thigh.

"Yes," I bit out, because his touch had somehow made the word burst free, and embarrassment made me babble: "But you're going to have to stop touching me if you want me to leave."

That strange smile of his only widened. "Now isn't that interesting," he said, hand pressing against me more tightly. "You can't leave me?"

"Because, because I can't walk with my leg in your lap," I stammered.

He chuckled. "Of course that's the reason," he said, eyes half-lidded and smoldering. His arm slipped out from under my leg, hand catching me behind the knee so he could lift me leg and bodily turn me away from him. His other hand slid from the inside to the top of my thigh in a slow arch, then moved up and cupped my hip with a trail of molten heat ghosting in its wake.

"I'll be waiting," he said, mouth maddeningly close to my ear, and I tried not to look like I was freaking out when I stood up, grabbed my staff, and headed for the door, because I was still wearing just my underwear and Hiei had a really great view of my butt oh god oh god oh—

Escape into the hallway was sweet… sort of, anyway, because Botan was standing outside the door with her ear pressed to the keyhole.


NOTES:

Soooo Hiei might be a bit of a sadistic tease who's going to make Dani suffer with all the blush-inducing comments and touches he can muster. But you'll like it, and he won't always be this touchy because I won't be able to handle writing a scene like that each week. So, yeah, unresolved sexual tension. Very fun. And it will be used sparingly because I don't want this to turn into a sex-fic no matter what you little perverts say about it! SO HA! THERE! YOUR DREAMS HAVE BEEN CRUSHED!

Ahem.

Next week is plotty, and no, I haven't forgotten about Dani's bite or the loose ends with Koenma. Patience, patience…

I would like to give a shoutout to Miss Mercury Blue for introducing me to the song "Boats & Birds," which I love and am obsessed with and which I used in this chapter during the let-go-of-the-staff scene. BEST. SONG. EVER. THANK YOU!

Many thanks to those who commented last chapter, because your One-Year-Anniversary reviews are now safely saved in a word document of happy memories and love and cake. Lots of cake. Feel special. Itsallaboutbob, etowa-ru, Zetsubel, BiGayStraightWhoCares, Turtle Kid the Woolgatherer, colbub, Reclun, Asking Alice, Out-Of-Control-Authoress, Titch-ola, Supreme Baka, AmoreVampiresv-v, Ry171819, Kaiya's Watergarden, Doily Rox, Off-Color, Takara Rose Oizumi, chocolateluvr13, meganerd, ephemeral violet, Angel of Randomosity, American Senpai, Koryu Elric, Misuzu-PM, [ no name! whoops! ], j.d.y., Snowgirl7589, Kai-Chan94, SillyGoddessDisco, spiritfoxxx821, Kelly (Kelly, I think you tried to give me your email, but FFnet edited it out because it doesn't like it when people put links in reviews. Yikes! My email is on my profile if you need to get in touch!), Dude wheres my spirit gun, Katt Jeane, Tally Youngblood, Kaelyn Marie, Yumchaitea, The Tokyo Time Killer, rain chant, Masuyo Shun, Yoko Kiara14, AkaMizu-chan, OhhTaylorJade, sweetyjg, Naitza-Kururugi, ImMyOwnNoOneElses, ShadowFireFox13, DaAmazingMeepers!

Oh, and ARTWORK! We have MORE of it, by:

MistressXJade/OhhTaylorJade, who drew Dani's perverted face and Dani in her Elaina form! HOORAY!

Wings of Silver Rain/ThatPokemonFreak, who drew Dani as a pokemon trainer catching Hiei! HILARIOUS!

and TokyoTimeKiller, who drew Dani and Hiei's first kiss! HUZZAH!

Links are on my profile; GO SHOWER THEM WITH LOVE! And cake. That too.

GRAPHOSPASM, OUT! (*runs, hides, and begins to type next week's chapter of CRAZY*)