A/n: Just so y'all know two authors, Book Worm, and I, (V. Reed), are writing this fic. I have written the above chapter, and though it's not set in stone, Book Worm will probably write the next one. We'll be sure to tell you. Disclaimer: We do not own YuYuHakusho.

Dragon and Flames

-Prologue-

"Erufu wins the round— Team Juu advances; Team Namu is out of the Tournament." A male voice boomed over the loudspeaker. Next to Kuwabara, Yusuke rolled his eyes.

"Again? How many times can one girl win, anyway?"

"I dunno, that dragon-demon girl has won every battle for her team so far. Twelve straight… it's creepy." Kuwabara replied.

The two humans were sitting on the floor of a grassy outside plain. A run-down concrete fighting ring sat before them and behind them a cracked and molding wall loomed, holding a handful of demons in the stands. The wall was circular, but small sections were missing every few feet. This pathetic excuse for a fighting stadium was where the Toriyama Tournament was held every two months.

* Flashback *

"The Toriyama Tournament? What's this all about Koenma?"

"It's a tournament, held every two months. Its main purpose is to satisfy fans of the Dark Tournament whenever it isn't taking place. It has never been as successful as it was originally intended and few come to the stadium. However, that doesn't mean the demons fighting in it are any less powerful, Yusuke." Koenma looked nervously over at the Spirit Detective, awaiting a response. He wasn't disappointed, the impatient teenager quickly rushed to ask another question.

"Yeah, yeah, okay, but what is it you want done there?"

Koenma smiled, "It's relatively simple Yusuke. I want you to prevent a team, Team Juu to be precise, from winning, and bring their leader, Erufu, back to me. She's a very special, very rare dragon-demon-human-like… thing."

"Riiiight. 'Thing', huh? Okay then, where is this Toriyama Tournament held?"

"Literally in the middle of nowhere. It's a very old tournament ground … very run-down… Hiei and Kurama know where it is held. They'll take you. Oh, and Yusuke, this tournament requires teams of three. I suggest you take Kuwabara as a sub, I'll be needing Hiei once you capture this girl."

"Fine."

* End Flashback *

Kuwabara yelled across the stadium to where Team Juu sat, "Hey! Why don't you send someone else to fight for a change? You guys scared or something?"

One of the members of the team, a short dark figure wearing a cloak, snickered and murmured something to his teammates. Laughs followed.

Kuwabara growled, but before he could call back over, Hiei interrupted, "Why are you complaining? You fool, if they keep playing her then she'll obviously be tired when we fight her. Not to mention, it gives us plenty of time to study her fighting skills."

"Yeah, but what about the rest of the team, huh? We're not gonna know anything about them."

"Hn. You explain to him Kurama. I'm not in the mood to teach kindergarten at the moment." Hiei turned and walked off to the side while Kurama stepped forward and said simply that the others weren't important, the girl was obviously the strongest… and not very strong even at that.

"Fine, whatever you guys say." Kuwabara returned gruffly to observing the three team members of Team Juu.

There was the short one that had snickered earlier; he appeared even smaller than Hiei and more than likely was. "He's a sound demon;" Hiei had commented before the fighting began; "he controls everything about sound from volume to sound frequency to pitch. If he wanted any of you could start clucking like a chicken or wailing at a higher pitch then a banshee, there'd be nothing to stop him. He's short and thin as part of his sound ability: traveling at the speed of sound." Other than his height was the uncanny way his eyes continued to shift from beneath the cloak. They were large, but the pupils were small, so you couldn't tell the difference between his narrow eyes and a boiled egg. His entire face was hidden beneath the black cloak that was draped over his small and seemingly frail body, but whenever light shined for a brief moment into his face, Kuwabara caught a glimpse of swamp green. His name was appropriate: Mach.

The second member of Team Juu was in every way different from the sound demon. He was a bright blue, with thin, pointy ears that wiggled every time he moved his head. Unlike his teammate, he wore little clothing, enough to cover himself in the cold weather that morning, but only just enough. According to Hiei and Kurama this blue creature's name was Beri and he was a demon who had trained himself in the art of illusion.

Team Juu's sub sat on a rock behind Beri. Kuwabara rarely caught a glimpse of her except when Beri moved to the side or leaned over to listen to Mach. Whenever he could see her, all that was there to be seen was a sage-green humanoid with cat ears, eyes, and tail. "Felice, only a demon in-training. She's just there to take up space. Don't worry about her."

The final member was of course, the dragon-like demon Erufu.

She could have passed for a normal girl, were it not for her dragon-like qualities. She had a human face (though it was accompanied by two horns protruding from the skull). Flashing blood-red dragon scales covered her body. Her claw-like nails gleamed dangerously, as did the two vampire-like fangs that flashed in Kuwabara's eyes whenever she smiled. Her eyes were like gold under a charm to constantly shine and bedazzle those who dared to look at them, however, she seemed to be attempting to hide the jewel-eyes and kept her eye-lids nearly closed, giving her a lazy and yet dangerous look, though if you looked closely you could see them flicking from place to place, taking everything in. She had fiery hair that sometimes made Kuwabara swear someone had ignited a fire on her head… only to realize it was truly only a fantastic and frightening orange. She wore light, baggy crimson pants and a black sash, and a sleeveless shirt of the same design. She had an extremely mobile tail that served her well in battle, grabbing an opponent while they focused on her fists and feet. Pressed tight against her back were her leathery wings, which she had yet to do much with. The only reason Kuwabara knew they existed was because the dragon would occasionally stretch them to their full nine foot span. She attacked her opponents quickly and fiercely, rarely waiting for them to make the first move. She really seemed to enjoy fighting.

Next to him, Yusuke snorted, "You gonna stop staring at them or what, Kuwabara? Honestly, I thought you liked Yukina…"

The red-head fumed, "Of course I do! I was only checking them out!"

"Yeah well, it's drawing attention from the other teams, so stop it, 'kay?"

Kuwabara grumbled and looked away. Behind the two humans, Kurama removed his eyes from the battle in front of them to the battle chart at the right side of the stadium.

"It appears that we should prepare to fight Team Juu, it is only a matter of moments now,"

"What are you talking about? The team fighting now is probably gonna take at least another hour to finish up…" At the precise moment at which Kuwabara uttered these words and yellow-skinned demon flew out of the ring and was knocked-out on impact by the rotting stadium wall.

"You were saying?" Hiei snickered and Kurama gave a small chuckle as the announcement came over the loudspeaker, "Rayne wins the round – Team Icarus advances; Team Rokaan is out of the Tournament."

Moments following the short and dark Mach jeered at his teammate, Erufu, "Don't screw up now! The Ten will surely be furious if you do, and that'll be all your fault you elf-witch!" The dragon-demon only glared at him and barred her fangs.

"Her teammates don't seem to be too fond of her, wouldn't you say?" Yusuke glanced wearily at his own teammates who nodded.

"It's odd," Kurama spoke as though an after-thought to Yusuke.

Erufu didn't seem to take much notice to Mach. Stepping into the ring, her few wounds (some inflicted by her own team mates) didn't seem to hinder her fighting spirit any and she stared furiously at Team Urameshi, clearly awaiting her next opponent.

"Well, which one of us should go?" Hiei asked around.

Yusuke shrugged, "Hey, I took care of the bat-freak and the guy with the crazy eyes," he named his opponents in his first round battle, "and Kurama nailed the third one, what was he again?" Yusuke asked Kurama the nature of the final fighter.

"Jaiyde, he was the one with all the poisons, remember?"

"Oh yeah, right. Well in any case, it's you next Hiei,"

"Fun,"

"Team Urameshi, will you please present yourself a fighter for Team Juu?" The announcer broke in.

"I'm fighting," Hiei stepped forward and gingerly jumped into the ring.

"For Team Juu: Erufu; for Team Urameshi: Hiei. Let the fighting commence… now!"

Hiei pulled out his sword and began to swipe at the dragon, but instead a horde of flames erupted from her mouth and dodged away, leaving Hiei with a slightly scorched sword hand. Nothing that wouldn't heal in time, but for the time being, Hiei slid the sword back into its place at his side.

Glancing at the dragon-demon Hiei saw her chest heaving heavily. He smirked. She's too worn out from the previous battles, that little bit of dodging has got her on her end. I'll just wear her down. He came at her with an arm pulled back to punch, and watched as she moved her tired body to the side. He continued his simple pursuit of making her dodge and occasionally threw in a spirit blast or two.

Feeling satisfied that he had tired the dragon enough, Hiei halted his attack and began gathering spirit energy in his hand. The dragon-demon recognized what he was doing and stood directly across the ring from him, a clear shot.

Hiei released the blast and the dragon-demon stood her ground. Bracing herself for the impact, the spirit blast hit her full force and exploded upon her hard dragon scales.

After the musty smoke cleared, it revealed Erufu covered in ashes, but unharmed. Her scales are protecting her, Hiei thought quickly, the Dark Dragon technique would work, but I don't need to kill her, only knock her out. He resolved in the end that her strength was too much to just throw her out, and the choice came in the end to use a small Dark Dragon blast to knock her unconscious.

Summoning the energy in his hand, the dragon-demon seemed unaware of what was going on. She obviously thought that Hiei was only going to throw the same attack, because she took the opportunity to rest and braced herself for the upcoming blast. When the black flames finally erupted from Hiei's arm, she stood ready, unaware what was about to happen next.

A shocked look came across the dragon-demon's face as she collapsed in pain. Hiei glimpsed a flash of black and realized with a shock that Mach had attacked his own teammate. In her vulnerable state even this small blast would kill her.

The attack that should have killed her days indeed did not. Instead, they consumed her dragon form and raised her high above the ring. Eyes from all across the stadium followed her movement, most with interest, but Hiei and Team Urameshi with disbelief.

The black flames raged and circled the dragon-demon, before splitting… and splitting the dragon-demon along with the flames. The darkness of the fire prevented anyone from seeing what had been done to the demon until at last… they disappeared and two figures fell from the sky.

Hitting the ring floor first was a girl. A human girl. Her hair was red like the dragon-demon creature she had been apart of before, but it was slightly less fiery. Her completely closed eyes were large and wide, unlike the creature Erufu. The members of Team Juu were the only ones that did not seem suprised at the discovery of the human. However, the figure that fell soon after the human… shocked them all.

It was a dragon… not a part human dragon… a dragon. The great burgundy lizard very closely resembled it's European depictions. Glancing at the two beings laying on the stadium floor, you could pick out features of each that when placed together would create the dragon-demon Erufu Hiei had been fighting earlier.

Hiei stared down at them, "What in the—?"

The girl opened her eye's to reveal dazzling sapphire, hard as stone. She stood and glared at her team. The dragon stood as well, turning its golden eyes to Team Juu.

"That's it!" the girl growled. "I've had it!"

With that, the dragon let out a roar and attacked. The girl watched unflinching as her team was torn to bits.

Thoroughly confused, Team Urameshi could only stare in shock. Hiei then noticed his Dark Dragon reforming from the dispersed flame. The Dragon attacked the girl, striking her eyes. With a cry she fell to the ground, clutching her burning eyes. Immediately her dragon was at her side, bellowing flames as it destroyed the Dark Dragon.

Snapping out of his shock, Hiei started towards the girl, who was still clutching her eyes, moaning. Before he could get within a couple of yards of her, her dragon's enormous tail came sweeping around, sending Hiei into a wall. Gathering up the girl in its claws, the dragon beat its powerful wings and launched itself into the sky, quickly escaping sight. Team Urameshi could only stare after the retreating figure.

----

(If you want, see out bio for the meaning of the names used in the prologue and then wait for the next few chapters and find out their meanings. There are hints here, but I doubt you'll figure them out.)

Well, adios!

V. Reed