*backstage of p3...Anemone is conscious and is calming herself down as the others get ready for the next song*
Ellen: wee! Just think, Mones...once all this stress and what-not is out of your system, you'll be SO excited!
Anemone: *glare*
Hiei: Onna...we're going to perform now.
Anemone: ...?!
Ellen: um...why are you, of all people, coming to get her...?
Hiei: the others are preoccupied. They sent me to ensure all is well.
Anemone: yeah, I guess...damn this band business is hard...
Hiei: Onna, if you can remain conscious for one more song *Anemone glares* we're done for the night and are free to go.
Anemone: salvation!
Ellen: yay!! *drags Anemone from her seat and shoves her and Hiei off on to the stage* HURRY UP! I wanna freakin' celebrate our success!!
Hiei: hn...*narrow glare, walks off towards drums*
Kurama: alright, Mones...just one more song.
Anemone: thank GOD...
Kurama: see this wasn't so bad now, was it?
Anemone: *glare*
Kurama: erm...never mind...
Anneliese: *into her microphone* you ready?!
Audience: yeah!!
Mirai Trunks: *into microphone, smirking* you sure...?
Audience: Yeah!!! *pause*
Mirai Trunks: *whispers to Hiei* Hiei! Your line!
Hiei: hn? Oh...*into microphone* Speak more raucously!
Audience: ...?
Kurama: *into microphone* erm...he meant, louder...
Audience: OH!! YEAH!!!!
*Trunks is about to rev up his turn-tables, when some circuitry starts singeing behind him on the light system around the stage...he turns around confused, and, suddenly wide-eyed, covers his head as a huge blast of smoke and fire blasts in crackling sprays*
Mirai Trunks: shit! *starts patting half-frantically at his sleeve, which caught fire*
Hiei: what the hell...?!
Anemone: Future! Are you okay?!
Mirai Trunks: *tears off jacket, whips it to the floor*
Ellen: *comes running out with a bucket of water, didn't see Trunks had removed his jacket, throws the water on him*
Hiei: LOL...*collapses out of drummer's stool*
Mirai Trunks: *soaked, standing seemingly perfectly calm, only his face looks slightly annoyed*
Ellen: uh...oops?
Kurama: *snicker* erm...*turns to readers*...it seems that we are having some...technical difficulties-
Anemone: -FIRE! *whole stage going ablaze, everyone starts running like hell...except Hiei, who's still somewhat hysterical*
Anneliese: Hiei you dumbass get off the stage!! It's on FIRE!
Hiei: I'm a flame demon, Woman! Do you seriously think that this stage being on fire holds ANY significance to me in ANY manner?! *slowly walks off stage, meets the rest of Corrosive outside*
Anemone: hum...*snicker* well, I guess I got out of that last song, muahaha...
Mirai Trunks: *powers up slightly, his aura instantly drying him off* well, um...that's ONE benefit of the stage catching fire, Mones...
Piper: oh my God! Are you all okay?!
Everyone: *glares slightly*
Piper: I'm SO sorry! *looks upward* LEO! *if you've never seen 'charmed', that's how she gets hold of her husband Leo, who's also a humanoid angel called a White-Lighter*
Leo: *appears in a blue light* Piper? What's wrong?
Piper: MY CLUB! You were supposed to fix the lighting last night!!
Leo: I...I was...?
Piper: YES! It exploded! Now all the customers are running away!
Anneliese: *who has never met Leo before in her life* yeah, way to go, Leo...
Leo: *brief pause* do I even know you...?
Piper: p3 is on FIRE because of you! GO FIX IT!
Leo: eep! Yes ma'am! *orbs away*
Hiei: hn...our instruments couldn't have survived.
Mirai Trunks: don't worry about that...I'm sure my Mom can buy us some new ones.
Anemone: *who's still wearing her guitar over her shoulder, strokes it* I almost lost you...
Everyone else: *sweatdrop*
Kurama: riiight...okay...obviously we've a bit of time before our next performance...shall the readers get into the story?
Everyone: *shrug* meh, okay, sure...
Anemone: *sits Indian style on the ground, takes out her laptop, and starts typing like hell...as she types* Fox? Your line?
Kurama: *smirk* as if I need any introduction...
Hiei: *cough* conceited...
Kurama: *glare* *smiles and turns to readers* chapter 5, enjoy.
Chapter 5: Haunting
Hiei's form blurred from the smeared air to humanoid speed, his narrow eyes scanning acutely for his Kitsune partner. "Kitsune?"
His ears then pricked in hearing, a conversation between a male and female growing steadily closer. He slowly threw his ruby glare over his sharp shoulder, and was met with the sight of Kurama escorting his irritating mate towards one of the links to the human world. Both soon realized of Hiei's presence, and both smiled.
"Hiei!" Botan giggled, racing to his side and drawing the Dragon in a firm hug. She hadn't been in his company for six years, and she couldn't help but embrace him lightheartedly. Although she never expected him to return the gesture, she also never expected to find him so cold. He didn't move in the slightest, lacking himself of reactions and motions, and merely eyeing Kurama narrowly as the bluette held to him. "Huh? Hiei?"
Botan slowly drew away, the Dragon remaining inactive, but rather eyeing both his partner and the ferry girl with deep, singeing eyes.
"Hiei what's wrong?" Kurama's brilliant emerald glare thinned as he eyed the flame Koorime strangely. "...where are my children...?"
"Ai is in Spirit World, currently with the Detective."
"And my son?" Kurama asked slowly as suspicion threatened to creep into his tone.
"With Ryuu and Hinegeshi, in the human world," Hiei attempted his signature tastelessness in his speech, but his character was abandoned as Botan noticed a strange change in his eyes...they were daggered and poisonous as the norm, true...but...something in them, the way they sagged...
"What's troubling you, Hiei?" the bluette piped, slowly stepping to her husband's immediate side.
"Hn..." the Koorime grunted firmly, unable to formulate the words that shot electric through his frazzled mind to his lips.
"...Hiei?" Kurama inquired lowly, a stern expression tightening his sharp features.
"Kitsune...something very grave is happening." Hiei finally managed to force through immense strain.
"What is it?!" Botan blinked back.
"Don't rush me! This is a highly disturbing factor that needs to be laid down with thought!" the Dragon growled, baring a knit of teeth in her direction.
Botan's expression merely tightened in annoyance. "Don't yell at me, Hiei! I simply want to know what the bloody hell is going on!"
"Botan, calm..." Kurama ordered softly, gently taking her ivory hand in his own. "Hiei, please...what is this supposed disturbing factor?"
"Father!!" a break in the consistency of this conversation's voices tore sternly into the opening of the palace room. Kurama instinctively flashed wide emerald eyes for his daughter, the girl barely managing to stumble into the room. Yusuke followed close behind her, prepared to catch her come a potential fall...she had only ripped to consciousness and galloped after Kurama's ki signal, giving herself no mercy on her stressed body.
"Ai!" Kurama and Botan jogged instantly for their young daughter, the teenager on the cusp of collapsing again...her sprint had carried her from the very opposite end of Koenma's palace to the abandoned ferry-girl drop-off station, where her parents were leisurely hanging around in.
Kurama bound his arms to Ai's, holding the dizzy Kitsuna from wavering to the floor. She cast heavy, overwhelmed candy eyes to her father, desperation and fear thieving them of their natural lies of innocence. They quivered and drooped, total dread and emotion robbing Ai of her very youth in her frazzled sense of fear.
"Ai! Ai darling, what's wrong?!" Kurama locked concerned emerald eyes to his daughter's weighed raspberry ones, the girl panting heavily.
"Yusuke! What happened to her?!" Botan barked, slowly turning to her sweet little girl and stroking the teenager's sweaty, tense brow.
"Whatever happened it was Hiei's fault!" Yusuke roared, waving his arms in the air and wafting himself of any and all responsibility. "He just left me with her unconscious, she woke up, and ran here...don't blame me!"
"Ai!" Kurama tightened his bind to his daughter in sheer concern, bending to one knee and slowly dragging the girl to a kneel in sync with him. "Please, darling, what happened?!"
"Father...Father...I, I met...I met Ryooki!!" the girl panted heavily, her eyes wide with burning fear. Kurama drew back slightly, eyeing her with broad orbs of emerald shock.
"You...you met...who?!"
"Ryooki!" she practically cried from the strain of breathing...passing out had knocked the wind out of her, and running instantly had virtually caused inner plight, and a plague to her lungs.
"...Ryooki..." Botan pondered the name slowly to herself. *a/n remember she never really got a real introduction to Ryooki in the first one, she only heard his name like 2 or 3 times* "That sounds vaguely familiar..."
Kurama was lost within himself, framed in a gaping expression. "Are...are you...are you certain?"
"I was there, Kitsune..." Hiei half-growled from behind. "The whole time...and to answer your following question...no, he did not harm her...he merely yanked her tail in fox-like play."
"Indeed that hurt..." the teenager winced to herself, drawing her eyes to the side... "AHH!" she yelped, her sagging glare instantly snapping wide as she bound tighter against her father.
"Ai?!" Kurama blinked down at her in confusion, holding her protectively...when he realized...she had just seen his tail for the first time.
"F...Father!! Where...w-where did you get, get that?!" she stuttered in mad torrents of bewilderment.
"He spawned it this morning..." Yusuke grunted flatly. The silver mass of bushiness flicked and swayed smoothly, and was near identical to Ai's, let the overall color.
"Honey it's okay..." he assured her calmly, a gentle smile playing to his somewhat worried expression. "It's like yours, ne? Just a tail, darling..."
She slowly eased from her desperate bind to him, and locked raspberry against emerald yet again.
"Father..." she breathed slowly. "...he, told me...he told me to tell you..."
"Yes...?" Kurama eyed her warily, a tone of coaxing to his calm voice as he eased her frazzled senses smooth.
"...he wishes to meet with you..."
"He does," Kurama breathed in more of a statement than in question. "Do you know why, Ai?"
"...Because...because...!"
"Ai...?!" the concerned father gripped firmly to her arms. "...please! What is it you need to tell me?!"
"Father...!" her eyes brimmed in complete, defined pools of raspberry terror, Kurama blinking back in stunned bafflement. "...Grapko is back...!"
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"Ryuu!" Kisho roared, tearing his wrist free of the demonness's grip...and in doing so, he ripped from the lock of god-like speed, and collapsed to his lower back, skidding roughly against the rooftop they were currently sprinting across. A yelp escaped his gaping expression as he frantically clawed to the shingles, his form sliding closer and closer for the edge of the thirty-foot tall house. He just barely managed to pinch his hold to a rift in the roofing, just an inch up the brim...there he dangled, only one arm keeping him from a rather nasty fall.
Annoyed, monotonous red eyes cast lazily for his direction, Ryuuhayai glaring to him in irritation. "Now why did you go and do that, Kisho?"
The bluette growled. "Help me up!"
Ryuuhayai raised an eyebrow at the demanding youth, glaring to him with corrosive blood eyes. The bluette dangled awkwardly for a minute, deprived of a response. "...please?"
The Flame Koorime grunted lowly, a smirk playing to her lips as she gnarled a milky grip to the boy's wrist, dragging him up. The boy smiled with an expression of relief and gratitude as she dropped him just to her side, Kisho instantly stabilizing his footing. "Ryuu?" he asked cautiously.
"Hn?"
"What's going on? Why did we leave the group?"
Silence was all that met his question, annoyance steadily flashing more and more vividly to his narrowed eyes. "Hayai!"
The dragonness pricked slightly, throwing a devilishly acute glare over her shoulder.
"Tell me what's going on!"
Pause as the words formed tangible to her tongue. "I don't know."
"WHAT?! How can you not know why you dragged me away from Kane, Gakilei and Yukio?!"
A vicious growl contorted Ryuuhayai's features briefly, the bluette backing down instantly, but still possessing his tense, stern expression.
"I don't KNOW, Kisho...Father merely instructed me to remain with you and watch over my mother."
"Huh?" his countenance loosened spontaneously. "What's wrong with Hinegeshi? And why do you need me?"
"I don't know...he simply ordered I do so...happy?!" she half-barked in irritation. "I must get home to the dojo and protect Mother as Father demanded of me."
"Well...if she needs protecting...running there would only tire you out, right?"
Silence...Ryuuhayai refused to admit that sprinting at her fullest while dragging along a taller, heavier teenager along for a straight twenty miles would dim her energy slightly.
"...maybe it would be better if we flew." he smiled calmly, easing to a stand and propping his arms outward in tight extends...a flow of energy zapped to his fingertips, and what resembled spider webbing slipped in smooth ripples from his palms. The threading instantly wove and thread together, tightening until the fibers lacked in any motion...the energy he had mustered materialized to his wood-handled scythe...a shot of ki, and a wave of light swiped through the air from the upward end of the weapon, a smear of steal...the scythe blade. With delicate hand motions the boy spun it gracefully through the air, matching his precision only to his father's, the brilliant tactician Kurama. It slit smoothly through the air, in twirling motions until he jerked it to a halt, in exact position to leap upon.
"Your chariot, Miss?" he offered politely. Ryuuhayai eyed him monotonously, her expression tugged slightly with a raised eyebrow. Her corrosive ruby glare slowly rolled as she kicked her leg over the side, Kisho leaping on behind her. He strung his strong arms about her slender waist and in front of her, gripping firmly to the wooden handle. "Okay...to the dojo."
He bowed his standing slightly, his feet having still pressed to the roof, and kicked off with a violent thrust, his warm breathing against his companion's half-exposed neck. Smooth torrents of wind brushed through Ryuuhayai's bushy hair, the scent of cool charcoal wafting to Kisho's nostrils. His sensitive nose instantly caught the airy aroma, and he couldn't help but bask in it a little...a smile curved his lips slightly as he drew in a slow, tight breath, inhaling the dragonness's essence.
Of course Ryuuhayai sensed he was whiffing her delicate scent...she had to hold back with every fiber of her being from striking him off the scythe...because, alas...they were currently seven miles upward from the ground...and if he were to collapse off, the weapon would disintegrate...and she couldn't make that height without losing some important limb.
And, as much as it plagued her morbid mind to even consider...she kind of liked that particular type of attention. The slope of her little nose singed in redness, her eyes narrowed stubbornly as she jerked her vision for the far side. "Hn..."
Kisho responded with a soft smile...and lay his chin to the girl's shoulder. Instantly the dragonness pricked in awkwardness, her corrosive eyes somewhat widened...but, she again grunted and shifted in a weary sigh, focusing her acute glare to her immediate right and trying in obvious vain to ignore the bluette, while at the same time nestling against him. An eerily calming wind swayed over them as they glided in a swift soar above Eastern Tokyo.
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"Hello?" Kuwabara wandered aimlessly throughout the grand palace of Koenma, his search of his companions bearing no fruit for his efforts. "Urimeshi! Kurama! Shorty!! Where are you?!"
Suddenly, a pricking sense played to his face. He whirled around, just in time...to see nothing. A sensation much like the 'tickle feeling' to ever plague him washed over him in broad waves, the red-head wincing away apparent awkwardness. "Weird..." he breathed slowly.
Just then, his attention was drawn to yet another shadowed corner of the abandoned corridor. He jerked viciously for the direction, but saw no more than before. Again and again, faster and faster, he whirled in all directions. "I'm surrounded...!" he grunted in frustration as his onyx eyes tore from side to side. The sensation of demonic ki was overwhelming...he could sense it...he could feel it...four different apparitions, cornering in on him.
"Hmm...what a half-decent human..." one scoffed haughtily, in the veil of shadows obviously smirking.
"Tch!" Kuwabara spat to the side. "...you don't know me that well..." without a single motion, a ray of blinding energy shot from his sprawled palm, the red-head twirling it vigorously for a split-second.
"Aha!" another demon, this time a female one, giggled smugly. "He'll be more fun than the norm of our victims."
"Shut up, you dumbasses! There ain't no way I'm gonna be one of your victims!" Kuwabara crouched slightly in stance, darting his eyes back and forth as he felt out their energy signals. 'Damn! There's only four of them, but they spread their auras out so thickly I can't find the exact origin..."
"You're fighting blind," yet another tone rang, this one low and deep, smooth and masculine.
"Indeed..." the fourth, another woman, smirked calmly. "You cannot defeat Hell's Shadows."
"What the hell kind of name is that?!" Kuwabara wrinkled his nose as he continued to keep a sharp onyx glare set for his foes.
"Shadows spread smooth over any surface..." one began.
"...as do our energies..." another continued.
"...we blend as any shadow would..." a third smirked.
"...and what you can't see, will hurt you." the last of the four ended smugly...and four shots of black lightening tore through the air and straight at the surrounded Kuwabara.
Screams of intense pain escaped his gaping mouth as thousands of bolts of electricity zapped jaggedly through his entire system. Pain numbed his vibrating senses as they jerked violently from instances of agony to split-second pauses. The red-head shrieked as his very bones were tampered with and rushed through with immense shots of heat and crackling electricity.
"Hahaha!" one of the females giggled lightheartedly. "I overestimated him...he's no fun at all..."
"Well, I won't be in a second..." Kuwabara winced with a chaffing throat and gasping breaths. The four foes pricked, but merely surged all the more lightening into his tendered system. His expression gnarled tight as he held in another scriech of pain, and he growled hard, his onyx glare flashing narrow and dangerous.
A scream...his scream...but not of his foes' attack...merely his own aura, tearing through to the surface.
Four demons cast their eyes away, shielding themselves from the brilliant light of the red-head's aura...golden, as his signature sword. A blade of light licked into existence at his sprawled palms, double Katana's of Spiritual Power. "Not so tough NOW, are ya?!?!" he smirked, his voice loud to override the rumbling of his magnificent aura. An arrogant laugh jerked his chest up and down, as four demons strained to veil themselves again to the shadows.
"Take this, insolent human!" one of the females snarled, shooting a ray of darkness in his immediate direction. Kuwabara instantly dove for the side, but the demons' suddenly all shot to him zaps of dark lightening in spontaneous directions. The experienced human jerked in random positions, just barely dodging each ray and allowing escape his awkward expression grunts of yelps come each near faze.
"Damn humans, too flexible..." one of the males growled in frustration. That very demon kicked off against the floor, racing in attack to the human.
Kuwabara's acute eyes narrowed. 'Stupid demon!' he thought smugly...and whirled around instantly, striking his blazing energy Katana against the foe's neck. Skin cracked, blood sprayed...the enemy collapsed dead to the former punk's feet, Kuwabara smirking darkly at the corpse.
"See...this is what you get for ganging up on a human in Spirit World..." he shrugged egotistically. "...the only humans ever allowed up here are total ass-kickers!"
At that mere remark one of the females lunged at him from behind, binding her arms firmly to his neck and digging her claws deep to his tense chest. The red-head was taken aback, struggling to breath and snarling in a wince at the pierce of flesh to his chest.
"How DARE you, you FILTHY human!!" she spat angrily, surging her electrical attack through his system. A roar of pain rang from his stunned expression, but he soon jerked to reality and glared narrowly over his caught shoulder. He grit and winced through the torrents of pain pounding through him, and materialized yet another energy blade, his double Katana's having been dissolved after the shock of being attacked by this one girl.
"Oh DAMN...she's a girl!!" he yelled in frustration. "I can't kill a GIRL!!"
Naturally she had heard him, and her angered expression melted to a deep, thorough smirk. "Oh, can't slaughter women, eh?" her sly coo of a voice sang tauntingly in his ear. The red-head growled deeply, but jerked in pain as she poured yet another wave of electric ki.
"Your reluctance for the kill will be your demise, human!" the remaining male scoffed bitterly, his tone weighed after losing his Shadow Companion to this red-head's hands. Kuwabara struggled fiercely against the female pinned about his neck. The two remaining enemies both clasped hard to his wrists, and, piercing to the veins with their dagger claws, stung demonic ki throughout his slowly weakening system.
Blood escaped in rolling gushes from his fresh wounds, Kuwabara roaring in stabbed pain. Lightening crackled violently throughout him, pain overwhelming his senses. His wrists slit, his chest torn, and his senses numbed under influence of electricity...he was dying.
"AHHHHH!!" the red-head screamed in sheer agony, the three demons smirking deviously.
"Stupidity for straying from your Allies..." one scoffed.
"...stupidity for falling into our trap..." another sneered.
"...and stupidity for not killing your greatest enemy when you had the chance not thirty years ago...for he will slaughter your mate and son!" the last smirked.
Kuwabara's onyx glare widened in fear and shock, forgetting the pain that ensnared him so viciously tight. He growled a rolling snarl of anger, sheer, cold, jagged anger, in the deepest depths of his throat, and pulsed in a violent jerk. A steady roar escaped his stern expression as yet again his aura stung bright, his foes being torn from their rifts into his pierced flesh and being thrown violently into the far walls, where darkness still managed to persevere against the blinding light of his jagged aura.
"How DARE you threaten my beloved soul-mate Yukina and my son Kane! You will not live to see me defeat the one who holds this threat against my family, you ASSHOLES!"
And with a stunning, surging array of golden ki, energy rushing out all the more thickly through his open wounds. The Spiritual rays cracked to each demon's hearts, breaking the skin on impact and severing the organs in the immediate way...blood spilled in thick waves, washing over each demon's ebony garments. Red tints locked to the fibers of the deep black, and holes through each's chest left the three Hell Shadows dead with gaping expressions and frozen eyes.
Kuwabara allowed his ki signal to dim, his aura virtually easing to normality. The red head collapsed to his knees in firm exhaust, his breaths sharp and chaffing through the stab into his chest. In age, his heart had been troubled with illness and weakness, the former punk having strained it to even beyond his unmeasurable limits. The beats of his heart were pained and stung immense torment to his awareness. Suddenly, he froze, and was lost of the sensation of a beating heart...Kuwabara collapsed, his onyx eyes rolled back into his sagging lids and cold sweat beading to his brow...that last moved hadn't been pulled off since he was twenty-two...Kuwabara subconsciously gave in to a heart attack.
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*a/n: OMG! Why am I so cruel?! POOR KUWABARA! But, on a lighter note...Kisho is SO damn smooth lol...just like good old dad, eh wolfie? Pulling a classic Kurama right there, that he is...Anyway...OOH! Guess what! It's Ellen's fourteenth b-day! WEE! Anywho...please review, please state your favorite parts, and please do so quickly...latr!
Ellen: wee! Just think, Mones...once all this stress and what-not is out of your system, you'll be SO excited!
Anemone: *glare*
Hiei: Onna...we're going to perform now.
Anemone: ...?!
Ellen: um...why are you, of all people, coming to get her...?
Hiei: the others are preoccupied. They sent me to ensure all is well.
Anemone: yeah, I guess...damn this band business is hard...
Hiei: Onna, if you can remain conscious for one more song *Anemone glares* we're done for the night and are free to go.
Anemone: salvation!
Ellen: yay!! *drags Anemone from her seat and shoves her and Hiei off on to the stage* HURRY UP! I wanna freakin' celebrate our success!!
Hiei: hn...*narrow glare, walks off towards drums*
Kurama: alright, Mones...just one more song.
Anemone: thank GOD...
Kurama: see this wasn't so bad now, was it?
Anemone: *glare*
Kurama: erm...never mind...
Anneliese: *into her microphone* you ready?!
Audience: yeah!!
Mirai Trunks: *into microphone, smirking* you sure...?
Audience: Yeah!!! *pause*
Mirai Trunks: *whispers to Hiei* Hiei! Your line!
Hiei: hn? Oh...*into microphone* Speak more raucously!
Audience: ...?
Kurama: *into microphone* erm...he meant, louder...
Audience: OH!! YEAH!!!!
*Trunks is about to rev up his turn-tables, when some circuitry starts singeing behind him on the light system around the stage...he turns around confused, and, suddenly wide-eyed, covers his head as a huge blast of smoke and fire blasts in crackling sprays*
Mirai Trunks: shit! *starts patting half-frantically at his sleeve, which caught fire*
Hiei: what the hell...?!
Anemone: Future! Are you okay?!
Mirai Trunks: *tears off jacket, whips it to the floor*
Ellen: *comes running out with a bucket of water, didn't see Trunks had removed his jacket, throws the water on him*
Hiei: LOL...*collapses out of drummer's stool*
Mirai Trunks: *soaked, standing seemingly perfectly calm, only his face looks slightly annoyed*
Ellen: uh...oops?
Kurama: *snicker* erm...*turns to readers*...it seems that we are having some...technical difficulties-
Anemone: -FIRE! *whole stage going ablaze, everyone starts running like hell...except Hiei, who's still somewhat hysterical*
Anneliese: Hiei you dumbass get off the stage!! It's on FIRE!
Hiei: I'm a flame demon, Woman! Do you seriously think that this stage being on fire holds ANY significance to me in ANY manner?! *slowly walks off stage, meets the rest of Corrosive outside*
Anemone: hum...*snicker* well, I guess I got out of that last song, muahaha...
Mirai Trunks: *powers up slightly, his aura instantly drying him off* well, um...that's ONE benefit of the stage catching fire, Mones...
Piper: oh my God! Are you all okay?!
Everyone: *glares slightly*
Piper: I'm SO sorry! *looks upward* LEO! *if you've never seen 'charmed', that's how she gets hold of her husband Leo, who's also a humanoid angel called a White-Lighter*
Leo: *appears in a blue light* Piper? What's wrong?
Piper: MY CLUB! You were supposed to fix the lighting last night!!
Leo: I...I was...?
Piper: YES! It exploded! Now all the customers are running away!
Anneliese: *who has never met Leo before in her life* yeah, way to go, Leo...
Leo: *brief pause* do I even know you...?
Piper: p3 is on FIRE because of you! GO FIX IT!
Leo: eep! Yes ma'am! *orbs away*
Hiei: hn...our instruments couldn't have survived.
Mirai Trunks: don't worry about that...I'm sure my Mom can buy us some new ones.
Anemone: *who's still wearing her guitar over her shoulder, strokes it* I almost lost you...
Everyone else: *sweatdrop*
Kurama: riiight...okay...obviously we've a bit of time before our next performance...shall the readers get into the story?
Everyone: *shrug* meh, okay, sure...
Anemone: *sits Indian style on the ground, takes out her laptop, and starts typing like hell...as she types* Fox? Your line?
Kurama: *smirk* as if I need any introduction...
Hiei: *cough* conceited...
Kurama: *glare* *smiles and turns to readers* chapter 5, enjoy.
Chapter 5: Haunting
Hiei's form blurred from the smeared air to humanoid speed, his narrow eyes scanning acutely for his Kitsune partner. "Kitsune?"
His ears then pricked in hearing, a conversation between a male and female growing steadily closer. He slowly threw his ruby glare over his sharp shoulder, and was met with the sight of Kurama escorting his irritating mate towards one of the links to the human world. Both soon realized of Hiei's presence, and both smiled.
"Hiei!" Botan giggled, racing to his side and drawing the Dragon in a firm hug. She hadn't been in his company for six years, and she couldn't help but embrace him lightheartedly. Although she never expected him to return the gesture, she also never expected to find him so cold. He didn't move in the slightest, lacking himself of reactions and motions, and merely eyeing Kurama narrowly as the bluette held to him. "Huh? Hiei?"
Botan slowly drew away, the Dragon remaining inactive, but rather eyeing both his partner and the ferry girl with deep, singeing eyes.
"Hiei what's wrong?" Kurama's brilliant emerald glare thinned as he eyed the flame Koorime strangely. "...where are my children...?"
"Ai is in Spirit World, currently with the Detective."
"And my son?" Kurama asked slowly as suspicion threatened to creep into his tone.
"With Ryuu and Hinegeshi, in the human world," Hiei attempted his signature tastelessness in his speech, but his character was abandoned as Botan noticed a strange change in his eyes...they were daggered and poisonous as the norm, true...but...something in them, the way they sagged...
"What's troubling you, Hiei?" the bluette piped, slowly stepping to her husband's immediate side.
"Hn..." the Koorime grunted firmly, unable to formulate the words that shot electric through his frazzled mind to his lips.
"...Hiei?" Kurama inquired lowly, a stern expression tightening his sharp features.
"Kitsune...something very grave is happening." Hiei finally managed to force through immense strain.
"What is it?!" Botan blinked back.
"Don't rush me! This is a highly disturbing factor that needs to be laid down with thought!" the Dragon growled, baring a knit of teeth in her direction.
Botan's expression merely tightened in annoyance. "Don't yell at me, Hiei! I simply want to know what the bloody hell is going on!"
"Botan, calm..." Kurama ordered softly, gently taking her ivory hand in his own. "Hiei, please...what is this supposed disturbing factor?"
"Father!!" a break in the consistency of this conversation's voices tore sternly into the opening of the palace room. Kurama instinctively flashed wide emerald eyes for his daughter, the girl barely managing to stumble into the room. Yusuke followed close behind her, prepared to catch her come a potential fall...she had only ripped to consciousness and galloped after Kurama's ki signal, giving herself no mercy on her stressed body.
"Ai!" Kurama and Botan jogged instantly for their young daughter, the teenager on the cusp of collapsing again...her sprint had carried her from the very opposite end of Koenma's palace to the abandoned ferry-girl drop-off station, where her parents were leisurely hanging around in.
Kurama bound his arms to Ai's, holding the dizzy Kitsuna from wavering to the floor. She cast heavy, overwhelmed candy eyes to her father, desperation and fear thieving them of their natural lies of innocence. They quivered and drooped, total dread and emotion robbing Ai of her very youth in her frazzled sense of fear.
"Ai! Ai darling, what's wrong?!" Kurama locked concerned emerald eyes to his daughter's weighed raspberry ones, the girl panting heavily.
"Yusuke! What happened to her?!" Botan barked, slowly turning to her sweet little girl and stroking the teenager's sweaty, tense brow.
"Whatever happened it was Hiei's fault!" Yusuke roared, waving his arms in the air and wafting himself of any and all responsibility. "He just left me with her unconscious, she woke up, and ran here...don't blame me!"
"Ai!" Kurama tightened his bind to his daughter in sheer concern, bending to one knee and slowly dragging the girl to a kneel in sync with him. "Please, darling, what happened?!"
"Father...Father...I, I met...I met Ryooki!!" the girl panted heavily, her eyes wide with burning fear. Kurama drew back slightly, eyeing her with broad orbs of emerald shock.
"You...you met...who?!"
"Ryooki!" she practically cried from the strain of breathing...passing out had knocked the wind out of her, and running instantly had virtually caused inner plight, and a plague to her lungs.
"...Ryooki..." Botan pondered the name slowly to herself. *a/n remember she never really got a real introduction to Ryooki in the first one, she only heard his name like 2 or 3 times* "That sounds vaguely familiar..."
Kurama was lost within himself, framed in a gaping expression. "Are...are you...are you certain?"
"I was there, Kitsune..." Hiei half-growled from behind. "The whole time...and to answer your following question...no, he did not harm her...he merely yanked her tail in fox-like play."
"Indeed that hurt..." the teenager winced to herself, drawing her eyes to the side... "AHH!" she yelped, her sagging glare instantly snapping wide as she bound tighter against her father.
"Ai?!" Kurama blinked down at her in confusion, holding her protectively...when he realized...she had just seen his tail for the first time.
"F...Father!! Where...w-where did you get, get that?!" she stuttered in mad torrents of bewilderment.
"He spawned it this morning..." Yusuke grunted flatly. The silver mass of bushiness flicked and swayed smoothly, and was near identical to Ai's, let the overall color.
"Honey it's okay..." he assured her calmly, a gentle smile playing to his somewhat worried expression. "It's like yours, ne? Just a tail, darling..."
She slowly eased from her desperate bind to him, and locked raspberry against emerald yet again.
"Father..." she breathed slowly. "...he, told me...he told me to tell you..."
"Yes...?" Kurama eyed her warily, a tone of coaxing to his calm voice as he eased her frazzled senses smooth.
"...he wishes to meet with you..."
"He does," Kurama breathed in more of a statement than in question. "Do you know why, Ai?"
"...Because...because...!"
"Ai...?!" the concerned father gripped firmly to her arms. "...please! What is it you need to tell me?!"
"Father...!" her eyes brimmed in complete, defined pools of raspberry terror, Kurama blinking back in stunned bafflement. "...Grapko is back...!"
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"Ryuu!" Kisho roared, tearing his wrist free of the demonness's grip...and in doing so, he ripped from the lock of god-like speed, and collapsed to his lower back, skidding roughly against the rooftop they were currently sprinting across. A yelp escaped his gaping expression as he frantically clawed to the shingles, his form sliding closer and closer for the edge of the thirty-foot tall house. He just barely managed to pinch his hold to a rift in the roofing, just an inch up the brim...there he dangled, only one arm keeping him from a rather nasty fall.
Annoyed, monotonous red eyes cast lazily for his direction, Ryuuhayai glaring to him in irritation. "Now why did you go and do that, Kisho?"
The bluette growled. "Help me up!"
Ryuuhayai raised an eyebrow at the demanding youth, glaring to him with corrosive blood eyes. The bluette dangled awkwardly for a minute, deprived of a response. "...please?"
The Flame Koorime grunted lowly, a smirk playing to her lips as she gnarled a milky grip to the boy's wrist, dragging him up. The boy smiled with an expression of relief and gratitude as she dropped him just to her side, Kisho instantly stabilizing his footing. "Ryuu?" he asked cautiously.
"Hn?"
"What's going on? Why did we leave the group?"
Silence was all that met his question, annoyance steadily flashing more and more vividly to his narrowed eyes. "Hayai!"
The dragonness pricked slightly, throwing a devilishly acute glare over her shoulder.
"Tell me what's going on!"
Pause as the words formed tangible to her tongue. "I don't know."
"WHAT?! How can you not know why you dragged me away from Kane, Gakilei and Yukio?!"
A vicious growl contorted Ryuuhayai's features briefly, the bluette backing down instantly, but still possessing his tense, stern expression.
"I don't KNOW, Kisho...Father merely instructed me to remain with you and watch over my mother."
"Huh?" his countenance loosened spontaneously. "What's wrong with Hinegeshi? And why do you need me?"
"I don't know...he simply ordered I do so...happy?!" she half-barked in irritation. "I must get home to the dojo and protect Mother as Father demanded of me."
"Well...if she needs protecting...running there would only tire you out, right?"
Silence...Ryuuhayai refused to admit that sprinting at her fullest while dragging along a taller, heavier teenager along for a straight twenty miles would dim her energy slightly.
"...maybe it would be better if we flew." he smiled calmly, easing to a stand and propping his arms outward in tight extends...a flow of energy zapped to his fingertips, and what resembled spider webbing slipped in smooth ripples from his palms. The threading instantly wove and thread together, tightening until the fibers lacked in any motion...the energy he had mustered materialized to his wood-handled scythe...a shot of ki, and a wave of light swiped through the air from the upward end of the weapon, a smear of steal...the scythe blade. With delicate hand motions the boy spun it gracefully through the air, matching his precision only to his father's, the brilliant tactician Kurama. It slit smoothly through the air, in twirling motions until he jerked it to a halt, in exact position to leap upon.
"Your chariot, Miss?" he offered politely. Ryuuhayai eyed him monotonously, her expression tugged slightly with a raised eyebrow. Her corrosive ruby glare slowly rolled as she kicked her leg over the side, Kisho leaping on behind her. He strung his strong arms about her slender waist and in front of her, gripping firmly to the wooden handle. "Okay...to the dojo."
He bowed his standing slightly, his feet having still pressed to the roof, and kicked off with a violent thrust, his warm breathing against his companion's half-exposed neck. Smooth torrents of wind brushed through Ryuuhayai's bushy hair, the scent of cool charcoal wafting to Kisho's nostrils. His sensitive nose instantly caught the airy aroma, and he couldn't help but bask in it a little...a smile curved his lips slightly as he drew in a slow, tight breath, inhaling the dragonness's essence.
Of course Ryuuhayai sensed he was whiffing her delicate scent...she had to hold back with every fiber of her being from striking him off the scythe...because, alas...they were currently seven miles upward from the ground...and if he were to collapse off, the weapon would disintegrate...and she couldn't make that height without losing some important limb.
And, as much as it plagued her morbid mind to even consider...she kind of liked that particular type of attention. The slope of her little nose singed in redness, her eyes narrowed stubbornly as she jerked her vision for the far side. "Hn..."
Kisho responded with a soft smile...and lay his chin to the girl's shoulder. Instantly the dragonness pricked in awkwardness, her corrosive eyes somewhat widened...but, she again grunted and shifted in a weary sigh, focusing her acute glare to her immediate right and trying in obvious vain to ignore the bluette, while at the same time nestling against him. An eerily calming wind swayed over them as they glided in a swift soar above Eastern Tokyo.
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"Hello?" Kuwabara wandered aimlessly throughout the grand palace of Koenma, his search of his companions bearing no fruit for his efforts. "Urimeshi! Kurama! Shorty!! Where are you?!"
Suddenly, a pricking sense played to his face. He whirled around, just in time...to see nothing. A sensation much like the 'tickle feeling' to ever plague him washed over him in broad waves, the red-head wincing away apparent awkwardness. "Weird..." he breathed slowly.
Just then, his attention was drawn to yet another shadowed corner of the abandoned corridor. He jerked viciously for the direction, but saw no more than before. Again and again, faster and faster, he whirled in all directions. "I'm surrounded...!" he grunted in frustration as his onyx eyes tore from side to side. The sensation of demonic ki was overwhelming...he could sense it...he could feel it...four different apparitions, cornering in on him.
"Hmm...what a half-decent human..." one scoffed haughtily, in the veil of shadows obviously smirking.
"Tch!" Kuwabara spat to the side. "...you don't know me that well..." without a single motion, a ray of blinding energy shot from his sprawled palm, the red-head twirling it vigorously for a split-second.
"Aha!" another demon, this time a female one, giggled smugly. "He'll be more fun than the norm of our victims."
"Shut up, you dumbasses! There ain't no way I'm gonna be one of your victims!" Kuwabara crouched slightly in stance, darting his eyes back and forth as he felt out their energy signals. 'Damn! There's only four of them, but they spread their auras out so thickly I can't find the exact origin..."
"You're fighting blind," yet another tone rang, this one low and deep, smooth and masculine.
"Indeed..." the fourth, another woman, smirked calmly. "You cannot defeat Hell's Shadows."
"What the hell kind of name is that?!" Kuwabara wrinkled his nose as he continued to keep a sharp onyx glare set for his foes.
"Shadows spread smooth over any surface..." one began.
"...as do our energies..." another continued.
"...we blend as any shadow would..." a third smirked.
"...and what you can't see, will hurt you." the last of the four ended smugly...and four shots of black lightening tore through the air and straight at the surrounded Kuwabara.
Screams of intense pain escaped his gaping mouth as thousands of bolts of electricity zapped jaggedly through his entire system. Pain numbed his vibrating senses as they jerked violently from instances of agony to split-second pauses. The red-head shrieked as his very bones were tampered with and rushed through with immense shots of heat and crackling electricity.
"Hahaha!" one of the females giggled lightheartedly. "I overestimated him...he's no fun at all..."
"Well, I won't be in a second..." Kuwabara winced with a chaffing throat and gasping breaths. The four foes pricked, but merely surged all the more lightening into his tendered system. His expression gnarled tight as he held in another scriech of pain, and he growled hard, his onyx glare flashing narrow and dangerous.
A scream...his scream...but not of his foes' attack...merely his own aura, tearing through to the surface.
Four demons cast their eyes away, shielding themselves from the brilliant light of the red-head's aura...golden, as his signature sword. A blade of light licked into existence at his sprawled palms, double Katana's of Spiritual Power. "Not so tough NOW, are ya?!?!" he smirked, his voice loud to override the rumbling of his magnificent aura. An arrogant laugh jerked his chest up and down, as four demons strained to veil themselves again to the shadows.
"Take this, insolent human!" one of the females snarled, shooting a ray of darkness in his immediate direction. Kuwabara instantly dove for the side, but the demons' suddenly all shot to him zaps of dark lightening in spontaneous directions. The experienced human jerked in random positions, just barely dodging each ray and allowing escape his awkward expression grunts of yelps come each near faze.
"Damn humans, too flexible..." one of the males growled in frustration. That very demon kicked off against the floor, racing in attack to the human.
Kuwabara's acute eyes narrowed. 'Stupid demon!' he thought smugly...and whirled around instantly, striking his blazing energy Katana against the foe's neck. Skin cracked, blood sprayed...the enemy collapsed dead to the former punk's feet, Kuwabara smirking darkly at the corpse.
"See...this is what you get for ganging up on a human in Spirit World..." he shrugged egotistically. "...the only humans ever allowed up here are total ass-kickers!"
At that mere remark one of the females lunged at him from behind, binding her arms firmly to his neck and digging her claws deep to his tense chest. The red-head was taken aback, struggling to breath and snarling in a wince at the pierce of flesh to his chest.
"How DARE you, you FILTHY human!!" she spat angrily, surging her electrical attack through his system. A roar of pain rang from his stunned expression, but he soon jerked to reality and glared narrowly over his caught shoulder. He grit and winced through the torrents of pain pounding through him, and materialized yet another energy blade, his double Katana's having been dissolved after the shock of being attacked by this one girl.
"Oh DAMN...she's a girl!!" he yelled in frustration. "I can't kill a GIRL!!"
Naturally she had heard him, and her angered expression melted to a deep, thorough smirk. "Oh, can't slaughter women, eh?" her sly coo of a voice sang tauntingly in his ear. The red-head growled deeply, but jerked in pain as she poured yet another wave of electric ki.
"Your reluctance for the kill will be your demise, human!" the remaining male scoffed bitterly, his tone weighed after losing his Shadow Companion to this red-head's hands. Kuwabara struggled fiercely against the female pinned about his neck. The two remaining enemies both clasped hard to his wrists, and, piercing to the veins with their dagger claws, stung demonic ki throughout his slowly weakening system.
Blood escaped in rolling gushes from his fresh wounds, Kuwabara roaring in stabbed pain. Lightening crackled violently throughout him, pain overwhelming his senses. His wrists slit, his chest torn, and his senses numbed under influence of electricity...he was dying.
"AHHHHH!!" the red-head screamed in sheer agony, the three demons smirking deviously.
"Stupidity for straying from your Allies..." one scoffed.
"...stupidity for falling into our trap..." another sneered.
"...and stupidity for not killing your greatest enemy when you had the chance not thirty years ago...for he will slaughter your mate and son!" the last smirked.
Kuwabara's onyx glare widened in fear and shock, forgetting the pain that ensnared him so viciously tight. He growled a rolling snarl of anger, sheer, cold, jagged anger, in the deepest depths of his throat, and pulsed in a violent jerk. A steady roar escaped his stern expression as yet again his aura stung bright, his foes being torn from their rifts into his pierced flesh and being thrown violently into the far walls, where darkness still managed to persevere against the blinding light of his jagged aura.
"How DARE you threaten my beloved soul-mate Yukina and my son Kane! You will not live to see me defeat the one who holds this threat against my family, you ASSHOLES!"
And with a stunning, surging array of golden ki, energy rushing out all the more thickly through his open wounds. The Spiritual rays cracked to each demon's hearts, breaking the skin on impact and severing the organs in the immediate way...blood spilled in thick waves, washing over each demon's ebony garments. Red tints locked to the fibers of the deep black, and holes through each's chest left the three Hell Shadows dead with gaping expressions and frozen eyes.
Kuwabara allowed his ki signal to dim, his aura virtually easing to normality. The red head collapsed to his knees in firm exhaust, his breaths sharp and chaffing through the stab into his chest. In age, his heart had been troubled with illness and weakness, the former punk having strained it to even beyond his unmeasurable limits. The beats of his heart were pained and stung immense torment to his awareness. Suddenly, he froze, and was lost of the sensation of a beating heart...Kuwabara collapsed, his onyx eyes rolled back into his sagging lids and cold sweat beading to his brow...that last moved hadn't been pulled off since he was twenty-two...Kuwabara subconsciously gave in to a heart attack.
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*a/n: OMG! Why am I so cruel?! POOR KUWABARA! But, on a lighter note...Kisho is SO damn smooth lol...just like good old dad, eh wolfie? Pulling a classic Kurama right there, that he is...Anyway...OOH! Guess what! It's Ellen's fourteenth b-day! WEE! Anywho...please review, please state your favorite parts, and please do so quickly...latr!