disclaimer: I don't own, so don't sue!
warning: same as first chapter, slight shounen-ai
Chapter Two: Act One Scene One
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Night had fallen on the busy city, and shouts of "Taxi!" could be heard disrupting the night air. The opera had just ended and with it the swarm of richly gowned men and women who were in search of a ride home.
Meanwhile, of to the side of the handsomely decorated opera house are a huddle of people dressed in worn close gathered around a smudge-pot fire. Street performers rush through the crowed, juggling and performing acrobatics, hoping to catch a fine tip from such rich people.
"Don't just stand there Freddy. Go get a cab." Came the wine of an elderly lady. Her comment had been directed to the person that anyone would have guessed to be her son. He stood there, dressed in a fine tailored outfit perfect for the night they had just spent at the opera. The woman, who was dressed as finely as her son, gave him a star that prompted a response.
"Yes mother." His voice rang out, but there was something unusual about his voice. It sounded as though it belonged to a girl almost, and from underneath his top hat speaks of dark orange hair could be seen. His dark blue eyes sighed as he pushed open the umbrella he was caring and headed into the rain.
"WAM!" A soft thud could be heard as two people collided in the middle of the busy street. The first victim fell to the wet ground, contents of the basket she had been caring scattered to the floor. The second quickly began to pull himself together again, while trying to stay out of the way.
"I'm terrible sorry." He spoke, that almost girlish voice of his said with insincerity. He opened his moth to say something but was stopped when the other opened hers.
"Hn." Was the first response he got from the girl before she noticed what had become of the contents of her basket. "Two bunches of violets trod in the mud! A full days wages! Why don't you watch were your going, teme." The girl lectured in an almost wailing manner. Hastily she began to pick up the flowers and got herself off the ground.
"Freddy! Freddy, call a cab. You don't want me to catch pneumonia do you?" the lady wailed from besides the opera house.
"Yes mother." He said once more, and head off in search of a taxi.
"Oi! Taxi, taxi!" came the long-winded shouts from a man standing under the long columns of the opera house.
Slowly, the young girl reached the shouting man, quickly catching his attention. "I say, Captain, buy a flower off a poor girl."
Uneasily, the young man looked down at the girl in front of him. She wouldn't have been so bad to look at if maybe she hadn't been so dirty. From under her small hat, strands of beautiful raven colored hair, with occasional strands of white sticking out against the black could be seen. But with all its beauty, it was as ragged as the clothes she wore from not being washed in some time. Her crimson colored eyes stood out brilliantly against the black smudges of dirt on her white face. And the low tone of her voice caught him off guard when he had first heard it.
"I'm sorry. I haven't any change." The man said, trying to shake the girl off.
"I can change 'alf a crown. 'ere, take this for tuppence." The young girl said, her sentence very broken, making her letters sound choppy.
"Really! I haven't any." He said throwing his hands into the pockets of his tux. Fingering some coins he pulled them out and handed them to her. "Here's three ha'pence, if that's any use to you."
"Thanks." She said rather disappointed.
An onlooker from the crowd slowly walked up to the ragged girl and spoke softly to her. "You better be careful, and give him a flower for it. There's a bloke there behind the pillar taking down every word you're saying."
Successfully grabbing her attention, she sprang up and twirled around to look at the man. " Hn. I ain't done nothin' wrong by speakin' to the gentleman!" she suddenly turned to the Captain who had given her change before and started to beg. "Oh, sir, don't let him charge me! they'll take away my character and drive me on the streets for speakin' to gentlemen."
Suddenly, the man from behind comes into view, disrupted by the girls whining. "There! There! There! Who's hurting you, you silly girl? What do you take me for?"
"I swear, I never said a word…" the girl started, being cut off by the man in front of her. The man was unusually handsome, with bright emerald eyes and flaming red hair that was pulled back into a ponytail under his hat. He was very tall too, a good six inches taller then the poor girl he stood in front of now.
"Oh, shut up, shut up. Do I look like a police man?" His voice sang almost, even though he tried to sound hurting, it didn't suit the smooth nature of his voice.
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Kurama opened the door to his bedroom, exhausted from being up all night. He had just come back from the mission Koenma had sent them on, and caring a very knocked out fire demon. It was bad enough that he had to make up an excuse for his mother as to why he was returning home at two in the morning, but caring the body of another boy didn't help matters either.
"Now what am I going to do?" he asked to no on in particular. "Your such a handful sometimes, I swear." He said softly as he placed Hiei down on the bed. "I don't know what I'm going to do with you."
Slowly, he pulled the covers up on the small boy, trapping the heat underneath to keep him warm. He worked his way to the closet were he pulled out an old futon and spread it across the floor.
After Kurama had stripped himself of his sweat and blood stained clothes, he went back to the cabinet in search of something to wear to bed. Upon finding them he quickly dressed and settled on the floor next to his bed. Leisurely, he pulled up his hand to brush back the raven strands of hair from his companions face. A sad smile crossed the foxes face as he sat there looking at the half koorime.
"Wake up soon love." He whispered, before sleep had claimed him too.
XX
"Then what did you take down my words for? How do I know whether you took me down right?" Her words seemed panicked, but the emotion that played in those crimson orbs of hers was something completely different. It was some sort of anger, but to whom it was directed was the question. "Show me what you wrote about me." she demanded.
The graceful man stretched out his hand, which contained the words she had spoken earlier She took the book and went to read it, when suddenly she realized that she couldn't read it. "What's this? That ain't proper writing. I can't read that."
"I can." The man replied, picking the book gently out of her fingertips. "I say, Captain, buy a flower off a poor girl." He said, mimicking her every syllable.
"Sir, don't let him lay a charge agen me for a word like that…" she started whining to the Captain.
"Charge! I make no charge!" The man said, as his auburn eyes gleamed underneath the moonlight. Gracefully, he turned himself to the stranger standing next to the rugged girl.
"Really, sir, if you are a detective, you need not begin protecting me against molestation by young women until I ask you. Anybody could see the girl meant no harm." He said, a slight smile gracing his face.
Turning to the poor girl, the stranger smiled, reminding the girl of a fox in some odd way. "How did you come to be so far up east? You were born on Island of Koorime."
"Hn. What harm is there in my leaving the Island of Koorime?" She said in a low voice, as she made a growling sound under her breath.
"Live were you like, but stop that noise." The man commanded, earning yet another growl from the girl, as he opened his book, and started to scribble down something.
"Come, come! He can't touch you, you have a right to live were you want." The captain said, taking his hat off and running his hand through his black hair, which contained highlights of green.
The crowed around them seemed amazed at the strangers knowledge of were the girl had come from, when they started to step up asking to guess where they had come from. astonished at the stranger's talent, one man stepped forward. "Tell him were he comes from, if you want to go fortune telling." The bystander demanded of the man.
The stranger turned to the captain and looked him up and down before replying, "Sarayashaki and makai."
"Wow! Your good!" the captain said his sunburned eyes widened in excitement, as this total stranger had just
"Blimey, he ain't a tec, he's a bloomin' busybody, that's what he is!" one of the on-lookers commented from his spot in the crowd as they started to disperse.
"Yo, do you do this sort of thing for a living on the music halls?" The captain asked.
"I have thought of that. Perhaps I will someday." The stranger commented, his bright green eyes sparkling with amusement.
"How do you do it, if I may ask?"
"Simple phonetics." The man answered casually. "The science of speech. That's my profession, also my hobby."
"Ought to be ashamed of himself, unmanly teme" the ragged girl said as she watched the conversation between the two men.
"But is there a living in that?" the captain asked.
"Oh, yes. Quite a fat one." The red-haired stranger responded happily.
X
X"Teme…"
With a slight start, Kurama twisted himself from his position facing the door. He had been laying there facing the door for several hours since he had first come home, when suddenly he heard the muttering coming from his sleeping companion. It had jarred him from his daydreams, and back to reality.
"Hiei?" he asked softly, uncertain of what he had heard.
But he received no response in return. Kurama kept on looking but the only thing he could see was the motionless form of his friend underneath the covers. His eyes shifted from his bed, to the table that stood next to it. It was six in the morning, four hours had pasted, and still there was no sign of Hiei waking up. Just how hard had he been hit by his sword?
Sighing, Kurama picked himself up off the floor and over to his closet were he pulled out in dark maroon uniform, and headed to the bathroom to take a shower. Somehow he got the feeling that this was going to be a very long day.
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"You see this creature with her kerbstone English? The English that will keep her in the gutter to the end of her days? Well, sir, in sic months I could pass her odd as a duchess at an Embassy ball. I could even get her a place as a lady's maid or a shop assistant, which requires better English." The man said to the captain as they continued their talk on dialects.
"' ere, what's that you say?" The girl asked timidly, mildly interested in what the man had just purposed.
"You incarnate insult to the English language, I could pass you off as the Queen of Sheba." The man said as he turned to look at the girl to his right.
"Aooow! You don't believe that, Captain?" she asked, as the man she was talking to was looking for a taxi.
"Well, anything is possible. I myself am a student of Makai dialects." He reassured her.
"Are you? Do you know Colonel Urameshi, the author of Spoken Sanskrit?" the green eyed stranger asked.
"I am Colonel Urameshi. Who are you?" he asked.
"Minamino Shuichi, author of Minamino's Universal Alphabet."
"I came from Makai to meet you!" Urameshi stated amazed at his luck.
"I was going to Makai to meet you!" Mianamino said, equally as amazed as the man in front of him.
"Minamino!" the other man says, extending his hand to the other.
"Urameshi!" He says, bringing his hand to meet that of the others. "So where are you staying?"
"The Carleton." His friend replies.
"No your not. You're staying at 27-A Wimpole Street. Come with me and we'll have a jaw over supper." Shuichi offers.
"Alright." Urameshi responds as he starts off towards Minamino's home, leaving the girl behind.
"Buy a flower, kind sir, I'm short for my lodging." The woman says as she goes the grab the stranger's arm, before he can leave completely.
"Liar! You said you could change half a crown." He said, shacked at the girl's mendacity.
"You 'ought to be stuffed with nails, you ought. Here!" she said throwing the basket towards him. "Take the whole bloomin' basket for sixpence!" she stood there shocked, as the man emptied the contents of his pocket into the basket, each landing with a dull thud.
As the men walked away, the inhabitants of the street started to creep out, crowding around the girl who had just been showered in coins.
"Would you be lookin' for a good butler, Hiei?" one of them asked.
"You won't do." She remarked, brushing them off.
"It's rather dull in town,
I think I'll take me to Paree." Another started to sing in a low humming voice.
"The missus wants to open up,
The castle in Capri!" another sang, also in a low tone.
"Me doctor recommends
A quiet summer by the sea." The third sang, joining the other two, his voice higher pitched but accompanied by the soft, low hums of the people around him.
"Mmmmmmmmmmm! Mmmmmmmmm!
Wouldn't it be lovely!" the three voices sang together.
"Where're ya bound for this spring, Hiei? Biarritz?" the third asked, as the girl got up from her spot, and started to sing.
"All I want is a room somewhere,
Far away from the cold night air;
With one enormous chair…" she sang, drawling out the note and bringing it as high as her voice would let her.
"Oh wouldn't it be lovely?" she sat down on a crate on the floor bringing her arms up around her for emphasis.
"Lots of choc'late for me to eat,
Lot's of coal makin' lots of heat;
Warm face, warm hands, warm feet…!" Hiei sang, bringing her hands up to her face.
"Oh wouldn't it be loverly?"
"Oh, so loverly sittin' absobloominlutly still." She kept on singing, stretching herself outwards, as to were she couldn't stretch her hands anymore.
"I would never budge till spring,
Crept over the winder sill."
"Someone's head restin' on my knee,
Warm and tender as he can be,
Who takes good care of me…" she sang, as she stood and extended her hands her sides.
"Oh, woudn't it be lovely?"
"Loverly! Loverly! Loverly!" Hiei sang, as the last note finally came out and her song stopped.
"All I want is a room somewhere,
Far away from the cold night's air." The people started to sing around her as they crowded in and took her hand.
"With one enormous chair!
Oh, wouldn't it be lovely…"
XX
"Shuichi darling. Your going to be late for school!" came his mother's voice from downstairs.
"Coming mother!" Kurama scurried around his room, picking up scattered school items that he hadn't bothered to pick up the night before. He found his books and papers and then went to pick up the script to find that it wasn't at all in the place were he had left it.
"Where is that thing?" he mumbled under his breath, franticly scurrying through his thing on the desk. When he didn't find it there, he walked over to the shelf next to his bed and started tearing through there. Half way through his search something on the corner of the bed caught his eye. It was the script! 'what is that doing there?' he thought to himself.
He picked up the book and took a good look at the occupant of his bed, when a sudden thought hit him. 'Could Hiei have read this?' he thought, but quickly dismissed the idea when he reminded himself whom he was talking about. Though, several images of Hiei in a dress, singing on stage popped into his head and made him laugh slightly.
'Maybe this day won't be so bad after all' Kurama thought to himself as he shoved the script in his school bag and headed out the door.
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AN: so how was it? be truthful! this took me so long to write, and i don't know why! so could you guess who the characters were before I told you? can anyone guess who Freddy is? well i hope you enjoyed and that I didn't bore you too much! please R&R, they make my day!
p.s. (sorta) would you guys like a casting list so maybe it isn't so confusing?