It was a few minutes before midnight. Darkness covered the world, only broken here and there by dim street lamps. There was no light behind Yusuke's apartment complex save for a distant street lamp some ten yards away.
Hiei was leaning against the building, his arms folded and his eyes closed. Kurama was standing a short ways away from the building, hands thrust deep into the pockets of his brown jacket. Yusuke was leaning against a tree, staring at the street. Kuwabara had yet to arrive.
All three heard a far off clock strike midnight and ring twelve times. Botan appeared in the sky and touched down on the ground before the last bell chimed. She looked around at all of them, shouldering her oar.
"Where's Kuwabara?" she asked.
"The fool hasn't graced us with his presence yet," Hiei answered shortly, not bothering to open his eyes as he spoke. The sound of distant footsteps made them all turn. Kuwabara came sprinting up the street, nearly collapsing when he skidded into the grass behind Yusuke's building. He doubled over, placing a steadying hand on the tree Yusuke was leaning against.
"It's about time," Yusuke grumbled. He didn't really want to be here right now. He had told Koenma already that he wasn't going to do this anymore. He had purposed to Keiko a short month ago and refused to continue being Spirit Detective once they were married, it simply put his wife-to-be at too much risk, it always had. But Koenma had convinced him to keep taking missions until a replacement was found, or the wedding took place, whichever came first.
"Sorry," Kuwabara apologized, "What did I miss?"
"Nothing yet," Botan assured him in her usual, bubbly voice. "Well, now that we're all here, lets begin," she continued cheerfully.
"Botan, this isn't a picnic," Yusuke said in an exasperated tone. Her attitude towards the meeting annoyed him beyond having to be here in the first place. This was a mission, after all, and missions never meant good news. It was always the world was coming to an end, or some demons were killing off the human race or else brain washing them or something. With the possible exception of Yukina's kidnapping way back when, no mission they had taken on had ever not included mass murders and destruction.
Botan's cheerfulness went down a notch at Yusuke's words. "Well excuse me for trying to be in a good mood," she huffed.
"What's the point? We all know that if it's important enough for you to call us out here in the middle of the night it must not be anything even remotely good," Yusuke argued back. Botan was about to open her mouth to protest again when Kurama interrupted, breaking up the fight.
"Botan, what is it you have to tell us?" he asked quietly.
"Oh, right," Botan jerked her head to face the rest of them. She took a deep breath, then began to explain.
"A little over a hundred years ago, the Japanese government began researching procedures to enhance the strength of their military forces. In order to gather research on the subject, an organization known as Nightmare was created. This organization was not bound by legal standards. They were basically allowed to do whatever they wanted, to whoever they wanted, whenever they wanted. There were no rules and no restrictions holding them back. Many of the deaths during the late 1800's were because of side effects caused by the experiments Nightmare performed on the humans of the time. Then, in 1919, a successful experiment was performed. It has since been know as Demonic Fusion."
"'Demonic Fusion?' What's that?" Kuwabara asked.
"Just what it sounds like," Botan said matter-of-factly. "Demonic fusion is a procedure that usually works best on humans in their late 'teens or during early stages of life when their bodies are still developing. It is a process that takes demonic DNA, and even a soul extracted from a demon, and fuses it with the pre-existing human DNA and soul. However, the only one to ever survive it was the first test subject back in 1919."
"But that doesn't make sense. Hasn't medical stuff gotten better since then?" Yusuke questioned.
"Well yes, but the first success was a fluke. They hadn't expected it to work and so hadn't taken notes. Now, no one is exactly sure how they did it," Botan informed him.
"Who was the first test subject?" Hiei asked, genuinely curious.
"We don't know. He or she escaped shortly after the procedure," Botan answered. "But, even though the first test subject escaped, Nightmare was encouraged by their success and has been running experiments on humans ever since. No one who has been fused has survived since the first subject. They have been running the experiments for eighty-five years now, and the death toll is somewhere in the seventies. Nightmare is so secretive that we aren't sure of the exact number of human's tested, but we do know that there have been no successes."
"How do you know that?" Kuwabara asked.
"We hacked into the Nightmare database. The experiment records are highly guarded, that's why we don't have an exact number, but we do know that there are no living specimens left, save for the first one," Botan said rather proudly.
"If Nightmare has been doing this for eighty-five years, how come were trying to stop them now?" Yusuke asked.
"Well," Botan said hesitantly, "I already said that Nightmare is secretive. We've had our suspicions for a while, but weren't able to gather enough evidence to prosecute them until we hacked into their system last week."
"Where's their base of operations?" Kurama inquired.
"We're still working on that one," Botan admitted quietly.
"If you don't have all the information yet, then why did you call us out here?" Hiei asked in an annoyed tone.
"Because," Botan reared on him hotly, "this way you guys can keep an eye out for anything suspicious and maybe stop Nightmare from killing anyone else while we gather all the facts."
"I'd like to know more about this Demonic Fusion, as well as Nightmare itself," Kurama strategically stopped the inevitable fight.
"Oh, well...I'll start with Nightmare then," Botan said, tapping her chin with her finger as she thought of all she knew about the organization. "If I remember correctly, Nightmare began as an all human organization. But when the Demonic Fusion began, they found it easier to obtain and work with demonic souls and DNA if they had a team of demon scientists as well."
"There was some promised reward for these scientists I presume?" Kurama interjected.
"Yes, actually. They were promised to be allowed to freely roam the human world and do as they wished without being hindered by human governments, once the experiment was completed. Of course though, the experiment never was completed and Nightmare never intended to keep that promise in the first place. They planned to kill all the demons involved in their experiments as soon as the correct procedure for the Demonic Fusion was found."
"Of course," Kurama murmured. "And about the fusion...?"
"Right. Well...it's kinda complicated," Botan stated, pausing as she wondered where to begin. "Well, for starters, there are two steps to the Demonic Fusion. First is the Spiritual Fusion, and then the Genetic Fusion."
"Demonic Fusion? Spiritual Fusion? Genetic Fusion? Too many fusions! I'm really confused now!" Kuwabara cried in frustration, trying to process all the information he was being given.
"You were born confused," Hiei grunted.
"Shut it Shrimp!" Kuwabara yelled, clenching his fists threateningly.
"Children, enough! There are people tying to sleep around here you know," Yusuke said irritably, stepping in front of Kuwabara so he couldn't rush at Hiei. Kuwabara relaxed slightly while Hiei grunted his trademark "Hn."
"Botan, what is the Spiritual Fusion?" Kurama asked, getting the conversation back on track. He had been doing that a lot tonight.
"The Spiritual Fusion," Botan began in a very college-professor-manner, "is a process that fuses the demon soul with the soul of the human being experimented on. It has been done many different ways over the years, but the gist of the whole thing is to trap both souls within the human's body and force them to become one. Many of the test subjects don't even make it through that phase of the procedure."
"I would imagine not. Such a thing would put a horrible strain on the body. And if the body is not destroyed form the inside, the souls would most likely force each other out rather than bond," Kurama concluded.
Botan nodded gravely. "Yes, that is typically what happens, and if they survive that, then there's the Genetic Fusion." She took a breath and regained her professor-voice. "The Genetic Fusion," she began, "takes the DNA from the demon who's soul was fused with the human's and adds it to the human's DNA. In some cases, surgical procedures are performed to transfer things such as ears or tail to the human subject."
"What's the point in that?" Yusuke wanted to know.
Botan blinked. She hadn't been prepared for that. "Well...um..."
"The point," Kurama answered for her, "is that some demons have physical abilities that humans simply don't. In order for the fused humans to obtain these abilities, an operation may be in order to, as Botan said, transfer certain body parts of use to the fused human's body."
"I couldn't have said it better my self!" Botan cried enthusiastically.
"Which brings me to my next question," Yusuke said. "Why are they doing this in the first place?"
"I already told you, to enhance the fighting abilities of the Japanese army!" Botan said in an exasperated voice.
"Yes, but why? This whole thing sounds like a procedure to turn a human into a demon. If they want a demon army, then why go through all this trouble?" Yusuke argued.
"Don't be stupid," Hiei scoffed. "Do you really think any self respecting demon would take orders from a human commander? Obviously they want a powerful army that will obey them. This way, it will have all the strength of a demon army, but all the fused humans will still have their own minds. Well, more or less anyway."
"Okay, that's one question answered. But you still haven't answered why they want this so badly in the first place. I mean, they've been at it for over a hundred years, right? Why do they want it so much?"
"Because of war," Botan said simply. "Think about it Yusuke. What kind of chance would an army of human's stand against an army of demons? Even if they were equal in number, the human's would never survive. Guns don't really stand up to acid breath, or energy blasts...or spirit guns." Yusuke had a mental image of hundreds, no thousands of humans being wiped out by every kind of demon he could imagine. Botan was right. Such a war was hopeless for the human side.
"But," Kuwabara put in, having been silent for a while now, "why are they doing these experiments on random humans they kidnap of the streets? Why not on the soldiers it's going to be eventually used on?"
"First off," Botan answered, "we don't think the test subjects are entirely random. We believe there is some connection, but we just can't find it yet. And second, the government doesn't want to risk any of their soldiers dying and doesn't want Nightmare to start testing it on them until they are sure it is safe."
"Oh, of course!" Yusuke cried. "They can kill thousands of innocent kids but they dare not lay a hand on the people who the procedure is really for. Pfst!" he spit off to the side, "I hate people like that!"
Botan sighed, then seated herself on her oar, hovering several inches from the ground.
"That's all I know. I'll let contact you if we find any more information. Until then, keep your eye's pealed for anything suspicious!" She yelled the last sentence over her shoulder as she disappeared into the starry night sky.
Hiei was leaning against the building, his arms folded and his eyes closed. Kurama was standing a short ways away from the building, hands thrust deep into the pockets of his brown jacket. Yusuke was leaning against a tree, staring at the street. Kuwabara had yet to arrive.
All three heard a far off clock strike midnight and ring twelve times. Botan appeared in the sky and touched down on the ground before the last bell chimed. She looked around at all of them, shouldering her oar.
"Where's Kuwabara?" she asked.
"The fool hasn't graced us with his presence yet," Hiei answered shortly, not bothering to open his eyes as he spoke. The sound of distant footsteps made them all turn. Kuwabara came sprinting up the street, nearly collapsing when he skidded into the grass behind Yusuke's building. He doubled over, placing a steadying hand on the tree Yusuke was leaning against.
"It's about time," Yusuke grumbled. He didn't really want to be here right now. He had told Koenma already that he wasn't going to do this anymore. He had purposed to Keiko a short month ago and refused to continue being Spirit Detective once they were married, it simply put his wife-to-be at too much risk, it always had. But Koenma had convinced him to keep taking missions until a replacement was found, or the wedding took place, whichever came first.
"Sorry," Kuwabara apologized, "What did I miss?"
"Nothing yet," Botan assured him in her usual, bubbly voice. "Well, now that we're all here, lets begin," she continued cheerfully.
"Botan, this isn't a picnic," Yusuke said in an exasperated tone. Her attitude towards the meeting annoyed him beyond having to be here in the first place. This was a mission, after all, and missions never meant good news. It was always the world was coming to an end, or some demons were killing off the human race or else brain washing them or something. With the possible exception of Yukina's kidnapping way back when, no mission they had taken on had ever not included mass murders and destruction.
Botan's cheerfulness went down a notch at Yusuke's words. "Well excuse me for trying to be in a good mood," she huffed.
"What's the point? We all know that if it's important enough for you to call us out here in the middle of the night it must not be anything even remotely good," Yusuke argued back. Botan was about to open her mouth to protest again when Kurama interrupted, breaking up the fight.
"Botan, what is it you have to tell us?" he asked quietly.
"Oh, right," Botan jerked her head to face the rest of them. She took a deep breath, then began to explain.
"A little over a hundred years ago, the Japanese government began researching procedures to enhance the strength of their military forces. In order to gather research on the subject, an organization known as Nightmare was created. This organization was not bound by legal standards. They were basically allowed to do whatever they wanted, to whoever they wanted, whenever they wanted. There were no rules and no restrictions holding them back. Many of the deaths during the late 1800's were because of side effects caused by the experiments Nightmare performed on the humans of the time. Then, in 1919, a successful experiment was performed. It has since been know as Demonic Fusion."
"'Demonic Fusion?' What's that?" Kuwabara asked.
"Just what it sounds like," Botan said matter-of-factly. "Demonic fusion is a procedure that usually works best on humans in their late 'teens or during early stages of life when their bodies are still developing. It is a process that takes demonic DNA, and even a soul extracted from a demon, and fuses it with the pre-existing human DNA and soul. However, the only one to ever survive it was the first test subject back in 1919."
"But that doesn't make sense. Hasn't medical stuff gotten better since then?" Yusuke questioned.
"Well yes, but the first success was a fluke. They hadn't expected it to work and so hadn't taken notes. Now, no one is exactly sure how they did it," Botan informed him.
"Who was the first test subject?" Hiei asked, genuinely curious.
"We don't know. He or she escaped shortly after the procedure," Botan answered. "But, even though the first test subject escaped, Nightmare was encouraged by their success and has been running experiments on humans ever since. No one who has been fused has survived since the first subject. They have been running the experiments for eighty-five years now, and the death toll is somewhere in the seventies. Nightmare is so secretive that we aren't sure of the exact number of human's tested, but we do know that there have been no successes."
"How do you know that?" Kuwabara asked.
"We hacked into the Nightmare database. The experiment records are highly guarded, that's why we don't have an exact number, but we do know that there are no living specimens left, save for the first one," Botan said rather proudly.
"If Nightmare has been doing this for eighty-five years, how come were trying to stop them now?" Yusuke asked.
"Well," Botan said hesitantly, "I already said that Nightmare is secretive. We've had our suspicions for a while, but weren't able to gather enough evidence to prosecute them until we hacked into their system last week."
"Where's their base of operations?" Kurama inquired.
"We're still working on that one," Botan admitted quietly.
"If you don't have all the information yet, then why did you call us out here?" Hiei asked in an annoyed tone.
"Because," Botan reared on him hotly, "this way you guys can keep an eye out for anything suspicious and maybe stop Nightmare from killing anyone else while we gather all the facts."
"I'd like to know more about this Demonic Fusion, as well as Nightmare itself," Kurama strategically stopped the inevitable fight.
"Oh, well...I'll start with Nightmare then," Botan said, tapping her chin with her finger as she thought of all she knew about the organization. "If I remember correctly, Nightmare began as an all human organization. But when the Demonic Fusion began, they found it easier to obtain and work with demonic souls and DNA if they had a team of demon scientists as well."
"There was some promised reward for these scientists I presume?" Kurama interjected.
"Yes, actually. They were promised to be allowed to freely roam the human world and do as they wished without being hindered by human governments, once the experiment was completed. Of course though, the experiment never was completed and Nightmare never intended to keep that promise in the first place. They planned to kill all the demons involved in their experiments as soon as the correct procedure for the Demonic Fusion was found."
"Of course," Kurama murmured. "And about the fusion...?"
"Right. Well...it's kinda complicated," Botan stated, pausing as she wondered where to begin. "Well, for starters, there are two steps to the Demonic Fusion. First is the Spiritual Fusion, and then the Genetic Fusion."
"Demonic Fusion? Spiritual Fusion? Genetic Fusion? Too many fusions! I'm really confused now!" Kuwabara cried in frustration, trying to process all the information he was being given.
"You were born confused," Hiei grunted.
"Shut it Shrimp!" Kuwabara yelled, clenching his fists threateningly.
"Children, enough! There are people tying to sleep around here you know," Yusuke said irritably, stepping in front of Kuwabara so he couldn't rush at Hiei. Kuwabara relaxed slightly while Hiei grunted his trademark "Hn."
"Botan, what is the Spiritual Fusion?" Kurama asked, getting the conversation back on track. He had been doing that a lot tonight.
"The Spiritual Fusion," Botan began in a very college-professor-manner, "is a process that fuses the demon soul with the soul of the human being experimented on. It has been done many different ways over the years, but the gist of the whole thing is to trap both souls within the human's body and force them to become one. Many of the test subjects don't even make it through that phase of the procedure."
"I would imagine not. Such a thing would put a horrible strain on the body. And if the body is not destroyed form the inside, the souls would most likely force each other out rather than bond," Kurama concluded.
Botan nodded gravely. "Yes, that is typically what happens, and if they survive that, then there's the Genetic Fusion." She took a breath and regained her professor-voice. "The Genetic Fusion," she began, "takes the DNA from the demon who's soul was fused with the human's and adds it to the human's DNA. In some cases, surgical procedures are performed to transfer things such as ears or tail to the human subject."
"What's the point in that?" Yusuke wanted to know.
Botan blinked. She hadn't been prepared for that. "Well...um..."
"The point," Kurama answered for her, "is that some demons have physical abilities that humans simply don't. In order for the fused humans to obtain these abilities, an operation may be in order to, as Botan said, transfer certain body parts of use to the fused human's body."
"I couldn't have said it better my self!" Botan cried enthusiastically.
"Which brings me to my next question," Yusuke said. "Why are they doing this in the first place?"
"I already told you, to enhance the fighting abilities of the Japanese army!" Botan said in an exasperated voice.
"Yes, but why? This whole thing sounds like a procedure to turn a human into a demon. If they want a demon army, then why go through all this trouble?" Yusuke argued.
"Don't be stupid," Hiei scoffed. "Do you really think any self respecting demon would take orders from a human commander? Obviously they want a powerful army that will obey them. This way, it will have all the strength of a demon army, but all the fused humans will still have their own minds. Well, more or less anyway."
"Okay, that's one question answered. But you still haven't answered why they want this so badly in the first place. I mean, they've been at it for over a hundred years, right? Why do they want it so much?"
"Because of war," Botan said simply. "Think about it Yusuke. What kind of chance would an army of human's stand against an army of demons? Even if they were equal in number, the human's would never survive. Guns don't really stand up to acid breath, or energy blasts...or spirit guns." Yusuke had a mental image of hundreds, no thousands of humans being wiped out by every kind of demon he could imagine. Botan was right. Such a war was hopeless for the human side.
"But," Kuwabara put in, having been silent for a while now, "why are they doing these experiments on random humans they kidnap of the streets? Why not on the soldiers it's going to be eventually used on?"
"First off," Botan answered, "we don't think the test subjects are entirely random. We believe there is some connection, but we just can't find it yet. And second, the government doesn't want to risk any of their soldiers dying and doesn't want Nightmare to start testing it on them until they are sure it is safe."
"Oh, of course!" Yusuke cried. "They can kill thousands of innocent kids but they dare not lay a hand on the people who the procedure is really for. Pfst!" he spit off to the side, "I hate people like that!"
Botan sighed, then seated herself on her oar, hovering several inches from the ground.
"That's all I know. I'll let contact you if we find any more information. Until then, keep your eye's pealed for anything suspicious!" She yelled the last sentence over her shoulder as she disappeared into the starry night sky.