Flower Petals: Thank you Silversilk, TAB, and Misura for reviewing! This is the third and final chapter of this TriloChapter. It was fun writing it, and I hope you enjoy the conclusion to this short, Yu Yu Hakusho Christmas tale!

Disclaimer: I do not own Yu Yu Hakusho.


Flower Petals

Christmas Day - An Unlikely Santa and an Irate Elf


They were decorating the main room of the Little Valley Orphanage when Botan skipped in gleefully. She was so enthusiastic, she ran over to where Yusuke stood at the top of the ladder stringing up holly, and gave it a shake, almost causing the detective to fall.

"Botan!" he yelped, hanging onto the holly for dear life. "Don't shake the ladder when I'm on it! You could have killed me!"

"Nah, you wouldn't have died," said Botan. "I'm off work today."

"Oh," Kurama understood. "Right."

Kuwabara was confused. "What does people not dying have to do with Botan having the day off work?"

"Don't think too hard," Hiei warned, putting blood red lights on a Christmas tree, (it was the only thing he let himself be forced into doing), "your head will explode from the stress."

"Oh, yeah? Well one more insult and, um. . ." Kuwabara's brow wrinkled in thought. After a few minutes, he gave up all together and rubbed his head. "Man, my brain hurts."

"Yusuke," Botan said suddenly, turning to the detective. "I have a job for you." She whipped out a long red costume and a pair of boots. "You need to be Santa."

Yusuke fell off the ladder.

Hiei was laughing sinisterly. "Amusing, Detective. I guess you better begin practicing, 'ho-ho-hoing'."

"I wouldn't laugh Hiei," Botan advised. She pulled out an elfish green costume with a connecting pair of white/red striped tights. "Santa wouldn't be Santa without his little helper elf."

Hiei would have died if Botan hadn't been off work. "H-helper e-elf?" When he saw that Botan was dead serious, his eyes widened past the point of bulging. "There's no way-"


"I'll have my revenge on you Detective," Hiei mumbled under his goofy, green elf hat. The bells hanging from it jingled as he bent to angrily thrust a candy cane into a kid's hands.

Yusuke chuckled and stroked his fluffy white beard. "That's no way to behave in front of children. Ho-ho-ho! What's your name?"

A little boy climbed onto Yusuke's lap. "I'm Barney. Could I have a train for Christmas?"

"I don't know," Yusuke said in a deep voice. He looked over and winked at Hiei. "Lets see what our special, magical, brooding elf can come up with. Hiei?"

Glaring maliciously at the detective, Hiei took out a sparkly wand and gave it a few waves. Then he growled, "Mystical Christmas powers, please grant this-kid-his wish." Still glaring, Hiei twirled twice and clapped.

On cue, Botan carefully lowered the train on a rope from the ceiling until it fell gently onto Barney's lap.

His face brightened immediately. "Thank you, Santa!"

"All in a days work," Yusuke said. Once the boy was out of sight, he loosened his belt and beckoned Botan down. "Santa needs a break."

"Santa needs to die," Hiei grumbled. A child tugged at his striped tights, and he glared evilly down. "What?"

"You have a beautiful wand."

"So what?"

Another girl appeared. "Are you really a special, magical, brooding elf?"

"No."

"Can I have your wand?"

A batch of new girls appeared, all gawking over Hiei's wand. "So pretty. . ."

Hiei shot a glance at Yusuke. "Detective, I'll- oh, no!"

The girls attacked, and the rest of his words were lost.

The woman who ran the Little Valley Orphanage appeared a moment later and eyed the heap of girls. "He gets along well with children."

"That's Hiei for you," Yusuke laughed. He looked back over at the pile where a faint, "I'll get you Detective, I'll get you Detective," could be heard.

"The children want to hear a story," the woman said. "Come, they're waiting."


Everyone was gathered in a crescent around Kuwabara as he sat in front of the beautiful Christmas tree in the dimly lit room, reading a popular Christmas tale. Yusuke, Botan, and Hiei entered quietly, and took a seat on the soft carpet by Keiko and Shizuru.

"He can't read," Shizuru whispered to them. "Poor Yukina, she is trying."

The pretty ice maiden was standing behind Kuwabara trying to help him pronounce the word, "special."

"Sp-esh-ial," Kuwabara tried again.

"It's special stupid!" one of the kids shouted.

Kuwabara's face narrowed and he cried out indignantly, "Hey! You're stupid!"

"You're stupid!" the kid yelled back.

"Don't make me come over there and pound ya!" Kuwabara warned.

The kids gasped.

"I'll take over," Yusuke said hurriedly, and sat down in Kuwabara's place. "Um. . ." He looked at the Christmas book, thought a moment, then put it aside. "I've never been into Christmas, I guess. So I've always hated to hear these old Christmas stories. They're all the same. So I'm going to tell you a new one."

The kids looked surprised.

"This story starts out not too long ago, when a selfish, mean, butt-kicking kid got a second chance at life and realized there was more to living then beating everyone up. He began to care about people." Yusuke glanced at Keiko who blushed. "And he began to understand how special life really is. Then he got this mission, to make sure these special children got what they deserved. He didn't want to do it at first, because he was lazy and wanted to watch football-"

The kids laughed. Kuwabara blinked stupidly, possibly wondering what could be wrong with that.

"-but he came around in the end only after he had met the kids, and discovered how wonderful they really were. So after a lot of fun and memorable adventures, he sat down, and he's telling you this story now. . ."


"Merry Christmas Shizuru," Yukina said.

"You too, Yukina."

"Hey though, what would be so bad about watching football?"

"Nothing. Say, sometime later do you want to go to the mall?"

"Sure footba-er, mall is good."

Kuwabara had just finished dancing after he discovered he had gotten a perfect score on a toddler game. "Man, I don't need counseling after all!" He peered around to find someone he could brag about this amazing discovery about, but he couldn't find Yusuke anywhere. "Keiko, where did he go?"

"I think he's outside," Keiko replied, placing cookies on a cookie sheet. "He wanted some time alone."

"Oh. Hey Yukina! Guess what I did!"

Hiei appeared by Kieko and glared at the floor. Angrily, he shoved a box into her hands.

"What's this?" Keiko wondered in wonder and surprise.

"Open it."

Inside was a sparkly wand.

"Oh, thank you Hiei!" Keiko gave it a few whirls. "Say though, if I said a few enchanting words do you think I could do whatever I wanted with it?"

Hiei gave her a curious look. "Like what?"

Keiko had a mischievous look on her face. "Well, I don't know. . .you said before anything's better then those tights, right? How about a-"

Hiei ran off.

"Ah, that's better," Keiko sighed. She looked at the wand. "This might actually come in useful. . ."

It was a beautiful Christmas night, Yusuke realized, sitting on the stone steps and looking up at the clear sky. He never pictured himself staying still to admire something like this, but then again, he hadn't pictured himself doing half the things had done in the last two days.

He heard her come out and sit beside him before he actually felt her cold hands on his arm.

"Thank you, Yusuke," the little girl in the pink dress said. She was holding her teddy.

"I have something for you," Yusuke said. He dug into a red bag and pulled out a similar looking teddy that was bran new.

"For me?" the girl wondered in awe.

"Yeah." Yusuke turned to face her. "I know this one will never replace the old. You'll always have some part of it, even though it's not all there. I hope you'll always treasure it."

"I can stop looking now?" the girl asked, wiggling her new teddy bear's ears.

Yusuke nodded. And then he smiled. "Come on, Keiko was going to make cookies."

"I love cookies!" the girl exclaimed, and hurriedly ran inside.

Yusuke was still smiling as he stood and headed towards the door. He glanced once more up at the heavens, then stepped back inside the quaint little building in the middle of a small valley, a single tear escaping his eye. . .

Merry Christmas. . .

~

Flower Petals: Thanx for reading! I'm having a lot of trouble getting people in. So if it's not too much of a hassle for you, could you maybe see if there's anyone interested in reading this? I'd be very grateful.

Anyway, thank you again and I hope you enjoyed!

MERRY CHRISTMAS AND HAPPY HOLIDAYS EVERYONE!!!