Wow, I feel so loved! My first fanfic and I'm on people's favs! =^,.,^= *sniffle* Thank you, everyone!
Starling: Quit being so sappy or they might change their minds.
Niana: Love you bunches, too, pup. :P
Starling: I know you do. ;)
And now, for those dreadfully monotonous disclaimers: No, still not the owner to the rights of Ranma or YYH. I guess I'll just have to be content with merchandise, naming my plushies after favorite bishies, and calling my computer Kuwabara. ('cause that's exactly who it acts like!) Sigh.
Chapter Ten: An Unfortunate Turn of Events
**********
All right. Now he's really starting to get irritated. There's two holes in his memory instead of one now, and he's very much disinclined to go to Rei about it, since the holes seem directly related to her somehow. It's maddening. And he can't help but feel the tiniest itch of a third involving that thing he and the fox delivered to Koenma.
After driving himself half-crazy with it for a few…days…Hiei finally gives it up as a lost cause and tries thinking up fun ways to dismember his enemies just for something to do. Maybe he'll go irritate the fox later…
***
"Damnit! Now where am I??" comes a familiar howl from somewhere off to the left. The screen adjusts, and reveals a very tired, rather ragged Ryoga wandering down the street, totally lost--a usual day for him, then. As far as he can guess, he's supposed to be in Kyoto right now, but that's…he spots the Neko-Hanten and starts swearing inventively in several bizarre languages. Nope. Right back where he started. Damn, damn, and double-damn!
Hiei is watching this in mild interest--the boy's got a good grasp on the sentence structure, even if his fire-apparition accent is absolutely terrible. Not to mention several words in several mammalian-youkai languages and a few regional hanyou dialects. This kid gets around a lot, it would seem.
Ryoga's cursing is broken off, however, when he notices the streak of red aiming for him. He'd assume it's his sister (wow, he still isn't quite used to saying that yet) if it wasn't so small. It's cat-sized, really. After it flashes by his brain pauses, redigests the memory-clip, and informs him that that was a fox, not a cat. On a busy street, in broad daylight, looking very concerned. And it was wearing a very familiar bandanna.
Three burly men sporting various minor injuries shove rudely past him, obviously intent on following the path of the fox. With a grim smile Ryoga falls into step behind them, praying that he isn't right and that he ABOVE ALL ELSE doesn't get lost NOW! Hiei, surprised at the thought patterns that just got shouted into his head by that fox, follows after them all while staying to the tree-tops, katana out and ready.
***
About fifteen minutes before that…
"'Scuse me," a large man in a business suit startles Rei from her gardening, making the slender girl jump and regard the man with wide eyes. "Is dis the Kenobishi res'dence?"
"Depends on who's asking, sir. Can I help you?" Dusting off her hands, she rises to her feet and brushes off her knees, keeping this stranger well within her view at all times.
"I'm an employee of a bizness pa'tner of dis girl's boyfriend, see," the man explained in that atrocious Japanese accent, "and it seems the boyfrien' ain't being too cooperative on some of our deals. Renegin' if ya want. An' my boss, he ain't too happy 'bout it. So's we got sent to find da Kenobishi place and talk to da girl."
"Are you intending to harm her?"
The man seems positively horrified at the thought. "Geez, no, miss! We just wanna talk to da girl, 's all!"
Rei doesn't even twitch as she picks up on two other rather strong auras sneaking up behind her, and mentally cursed that stupid baka Chaos for stirring up trouble. She knows for a blasted fact that Taro has zero dealings with any of the 'Family'. "You keep mentioning 'we'. I suppose you have friends."
"Yeah. Mick, Dave, say hi to the nice lady here." Rei reluctantly shifts enough to be able to see all three and sighs inwardly. All of them would have the reach and muscle on her. Her only hope would be her speed, if it came down to that. The two others, equally muscled and dressed in identical blue suits merely nod.
"Yo./Hello."
"How do you do?" Rei responds politely, not really expecting an answer. "Might I inquire as to your Family?"
"Family, kid? Ain't got no idea whatcha talkin' 'bout!" the first man laughs, but Rei picks up the increasing tension rising off the man and frowns.
"I'm afraid none of the Kenobishis are home; they left to do some shopping a while ago and won't be back for a few hours at least," she lies glibly, but by the narrowing of all three men's eyes, she knows she is not being believed. Crap, here we go again. Chaos, I'm gonna kick your ass for this one!!
"Well, den, why doncha show--" the first man begins to walk towards her, the other two reach into their jackets. She doesn't give the first guy a chance to finish his sentence, slapping a palm onto the ground and channeling ki into it before jumping straight up and into a tree. From there her path leads to the top of the wall and down the other side in time to avoid the explosion caused by her 'Dynamite Mole' attack. The three are barely scratched, though, when they come racing around and over the freakin' wall--she'd have to think of something better.
Then she starts snarling her own chain of curses as she runs straight past this neighborhood's 'Water-tossin' Old Lady' and gets doused. For a moment, she hopes that the disappearance of the human Rei will throw the thugs off, but no such luck. She really needs to remember to ditch the checkered bandanna when she gets chased by people from any 'Family'.
And now she leads them on a merry chase through a good portion of Nerima, wondering how the hells these men have worked up enough stamina to keep up with her. 'Must be steroids,' she thinks as she runs, darting between legs, underneath grocery and food carts, around trashcans and across lawns, under fences and the like in an attempt to shake them. It, like her 'Dynamite Mole' has no luck in working. And in this form, she has no hope of manipulating their Threads to make them forget about her.
She spends the next few moments after that particular realization mentally shouting a stream of invectives at the blasted Meddler and his thrice-forsaken Card's unwitting effect. She's run out of city by now and races among the trees, ducking bushes and brambles with as little effect as before, except to shave away that much more of her energy.
An involuntary yowl of pain escapes her throat when she trips over an unseen and unsmelled gopher hole, wrenching a hind-foot painfully in a near 180 degrees and slowing herself considerably. The men, who had finally gotten confused, instantly orient on the sound and resume their chase. In a last-ditch effort she crawls into the heart of a particularly nasty blackberry bush and lies there, panting and cursing every single aspect of Chaos with extra fervor.
The sounds of plants getting hacked away reaches her exhaustion-dulled ears and she sends up a single prayer to the ones she knows might hear it. 'Higher ups, please! Don't let them reach me! I hate getting quasi-killed!' And then she squeezes her eyes shut and scrunches herself into a lump of red and black fur and waits…for anything.
***
Its own miracle, Ryoga does not get lost following the men, and follows them with considerably greater woods-skills, quiet as a breath as he creeps up on the bastards that dare go after his sister. They've circled a thick pile of blackberry runners with vines the same diameter as his wrist, hacking away with gradual effect with blades too big to be called pocket-knives, but still too small to be called daggers.
Hiei has already taken perch in a tree directly above the center, where he can just barely catch glimpses of burnished red fur from amidst the bush's canes. He'd heard quite clearly her screech of pain, and wonders what she's done to make it. The boy from before seems to have had no problem following the men, and is now creeping up behind them. The koorime admits to himself that the ningen boy (with fangs?…) is actually decent at sneaking around. In total silence he resheaths his katana and sits back to watch the show.
A few more minutes creep by, the men about halfway through the bush and snarling curses as their hands are stabbed by the wicked thorns. 'Morons,' Ryoga thinks scornfully, 'anyone with sense knows to wrap their hands before handling those vines!' Hiei lifts an eyebrow--useful advice, but these men are undoubtedly foolish as the boy labels them. But why does he keep calling that fox his sister? Admitted, the thoughts he caught before shields slammed shut were human and felt like Rei, but Rei has never mentioned having a brother.
Finally Ryoga's close enough, and he taps the one he's closest to on his shoulder. "What the--?" The man begins to turn, and that satisfies Ryoga's honor code enough to allow his to strike before the man has more than his profile to him. 'Never strike from the back' is a rule Ryoga tries hard to live by. The man goes flying from the force of Ryoga's blow, right into another patch of blackberries. His cursing, raspy from having a rib broken, is most satisfying. The other two men simply pull out two handguns and aim them at him. 'Crap.'
And suddenly, they are both holding the back halves of their guns, as a slender, short boy with spiky black hair simply reaches down with a wicked katana and slices them. Ryoga merely glances upwards as the stranger resumes his seat and keeps watching.
"A real fighter has no need of stupid human 'guns'," Hiei informs the stunned men coldly. "Fight with your own selves."
They don't get the chance. Freed of the problem of having a bullet hit him before he can twitch, Ryoga leaps across the brambles to the next guy and uses him as a landing pad, both feet landing squarely on the man's (Mick) chest, sending him tumbling hard to the ground and then propelling himself into Dave. The man goes down just as hard as his companions, and stays down. Ryoga stands there a moment, not even breathing the slightest bit hard, before turning towards the center of this tangle. Hiei has already seen fit to send the first man into temporary oblivion, quickly enough that Ryoga doesn't notice.
"Rei?" he calls gently. "It's okay, imouto-chan. They're not gonna hurt you anytime soon." To Hiei's mild surprise the fox slips from between two canes the size of his forearm and limps slowly towards the fanged martial-artist. She is panting from her longer-than-usual run and from the pain of her leg, but nothing else seems to be wrong besides the few scratches her fur couldn't save her from. Ryoga gently scoops her up and glances upwards, to where Hiei is still sitting, this time with his feet dangling and his elbows resting on his knees. "Thank you."
"Merely leveling the playing field," is the brusque, unemotional reply, and Rei snorts, opening her shields for a single thought.
"And if he didn't win you'dve kicked all of their asses, right, Hiei?" He simply looks at her.
"In a heartbeat." And then he vanishes from both the ningens' sights. Rei merely shakes her head and points her brother in the direction of home.
**********************
Wow, Hiei actually does something nice. O.o
*Hands her two reviewers cookies* Thank you very much. It's nice to know someone's actually reading my story.
Starling: That's a hint to review, people. So far we've only had two people, and Slade doesn't count 'cause he's actually reachable to pound if he didn't.
Not that I'd actually hit my 'big brother'. Tease him, maybe, but he's too nice to hit. *Fends off hugs from Slade*