Anything important I have to say is at the end of the chapter... except that I wanna say not all chapters will be as serious as the beginning of this one is. I was bored, and I had nothing better to waste space with till the preliminaries started, so I stuck in some random character development. So sue me. Oh and also, from now on every chapter has a spoiler warning, mainly 'cause I've already seen the whole series, but I can't remember what came before what else, so I may be including info that comes after wherever the dubbed version currently is.
Disclaimer: Nothing is mine. Except the Tournie and the story itself. Ryouta was created and is currently residing somewhere in my twisted little mind, so yes, you could say I owned him, too. Rae, the cat hanyou, and pretty much anyone else mentioned (yes, they have names, they just aren't identified in this chapter) are the property of their respective owners.
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Chapter Two:
Half Demons, Spirit Beasts, and Things that go BOOM
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"Man this sucks," Yusuke snarled, pacing back and forth across the deck while his friends stood by. Kurama was leaning calmly against the railing, surveying the other teams with polite interest and pointedly ignoring the stares Hiei was attracting the two of them from his precarious perch on the metal bar that formed the top of the fence. Kuwabara had been one of more than a few others getting over their seasickness, and now he came over to join the others.
"I didn't think there could be anything more dull than the boatride to the Dark Tournament," Hiei remarked, crimson eyes narrowing dangerously. "I was wrong."
"There shall be plenty of action, once the island is reached," a familiar voice informed them. The elfin boy who had first brought word of the tournament stood before them, hands clasped in front of him as he moved towards them. "Perhaps too much action for some. Here, the tension is high, but they will learn to control themselves soon enough. Fighting, you see, is not allowed on the boat."
"What do you want?" Yusuke demanded sourly.
Instead of answering, the boy gazed out at the sea, golden hair gently brushing his shoulders, as he murmured, "The autumn will be a short one this year. The snows shall find us early, I would think." Turning his eyes back to Yusuke, he gave a gentle smile. "I am a helper of the tournament; to see to you is but one of my many assignments. By name, I am Ryouta; any questions you have should be addressed to me. For now, I must attend to other matters. If you will excuse me..." Ryouta gave a respectful bow, but before he could leave, a restraining hand seized his shoulder.
"May I help you?" the boy inquired, stiffening at the foreign touch. The youkai who stood behind him was a purple lizard-like demon, standing on its hind legs with slit-like nostrils flaring as its yellow eyes slid in and out of focus.
"Yeah... I was wonderin' if you gots any entertainment on the ship. Seein' as we's not allowed to be fightin'," Yusuke's own nose twitched at the heavy stench of alcohol coming from the demon. "Like say... any ningen womans or..." The lizard stopped abruptly, tongue flicking out subconciously as it's eyes roved Ryouta's form.
An expression that was half-terrified nausea and half-bitter disgust crossed the elf's face, and he pulled firmly out of the drunkard's grip. "There is no... entertainment as you say. Please leave."
For a moment, the lizard looked bewildered, then its scaly lips curved into a smile as it reached one clawed hand towards the boy. "And would be allowed t' make our own fun?" What happened next was so fast that it took the drugged creature a moment to realize what had happened. When it did, it gave a hiss of pain and started forward, enraged, only to find itself faced with an orb of glowing silver energy and a pair of flashing, pale green eyes.
"Give me a reason," a cold venom had entered the child's voice. To emphasize his point, Ryouta sent another pulse of energy through his palm, causing his enemy to fall over in his haste to retreat. "I may not be allowed to kill you now, but if you should lose in the Tournament..." He yanked on the chain wrapped around his other hand, drawing the attached scythe out of the older demon's palm. "I shall hunt you down and destroy you myself." With a flick of his wrist to remove the blood from his weapon, Ryouta lowered his hands to his sides, allowing his ki to be pulled back into himself. "Don't you ever touch me. No one... shall ever hurt me. Never again." Shaking his head, the boy's eyes returned to their normal emerald color as he smiled sweetly at the staring Team Urameshi. "Rest now, I would advise you. The preliminaries will begin sooner than you think, and it truly would be a shame for you to be harmed before the Tournament commences."
"That," Kurama mused, gazing thoughtfully at Ryuota as he retreated below deck, "was odd."
"How so?" inquired a female voice from behind the boys. Turning, they spotted a girl about thirteen years old lounging against the railing, her bright red eyes fixed on them. A long orange ponytail tipped with black flared out behind her, given a life of its own by the sea breeze.
She blinked at them, standing and straightening the yellow sash of her marroon kimono, "Well?"
"Wow... who's she?" Kuwabara questioned. The girl blinked again, then grinned.
"My name's Rae; I'm a Fire Demon, the Captain of Team Kasai. I expect you must be the famous Team Urameshi everyone's talking about lately," she offered her hand to Yusuke and repeated her question, seeing Kurama was not answering. "But really, why did you think what happened just now was so weird? Even among the strongest youkai you get some perverts." Kurama frowned, and she added as an afterthought, "If you're wondering if you can trust me, don't bother. It's not as if I'm scoping out the enemy; everyone knows what powers each of you have."
Kurama looked at her questioningly, then admitted, "It's his ki."
"Who... Ryouta's? What about it?" Rae asked unconcernedly.
Kurama paused again. "I couldn't sense it coming or even trace it."
"Of course not," Rae responded with a grin. "Because he doesn't have any spirit or demon energy, or at least, none of it that's pure."
"What the hell do you mean?" Yusuke cut in before Kurama could inquire further. "He's a demon, right? Of course he's got youki."
"Half right," Rae corrected. "His youki and reiki are all mixed up and merged. Or haven't you noticed? He's a hanyou."
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"Is all prepared?"
"Hai, Akumu-sama."
"Good. Everything is going according to the Plan. Start the preliminaries as soon as possible."
"Hai, Akumu-sama."
---
"A hanyou," Kurama mused as Rae walked away to rejoin her team. "How interesting. I never thought I would meet one."
Yusuke sent a quizzical glance in his friend's direction. "They rare or somethin'?"
"Now they are," Kurama affirmed. "However, in the Dark Ages, when demons could cross freely between the realms, hanyou were spreading like the plague. Most could not reproduce, however, and those that could mated with demons till, generations later, all traces of human ancestry had been wiped away. With the barrier so tightly guarded now, it's a wonder one exists."
"More than one," Hiei pointed to a fourteen year old girl with a pair of black cat ears poking from her marroon-streaked black hair. A similarly colored tail was camoflauged nicely by the black sash of the red kimono she wore.
Kurama glanced at the girl, nodding. "It appears we will be meeting some very interesting people during this tournament."
"This... just gets weirder and weirder," Yusuke griped, looking around for something to punch.
"What's wrong, you scared, Urameshi?"
"Shut up, Kuwabara! You're the one shaking!"
"Am not!"
"Are too!"
"Am no- hey... d'you sense somethi-" A second later, everyone on the ship felt the "something" Kuwabara was referring to as a rather large portion of the boat exploded. Bits of disjointed conversation were shouted back and forth as everyone tried to determine what was happening, whether someone was doing something to fix the situation, and if it would be okay to blow up the rest of the boat, seeing as it was already halfway there.
"Ryuko-san, you really have some anger management issues. Namely, every time you get mad, something explodes or implodes or spontaneously combusts or..."
"Shut up, rat."
"What the heck is going on here?"
"Or burns up or dies an excuciatingly painful death or..."
"Where's that hanyou? I want an explanation. Now. Or something dies."
"It went boom, you idiot. What more of an explanation does you pea-sized brain need?"
"You're going to die an excruciatingly painful death if you don't leave me alone. I didn't blow up the damn boat."
"Oh. That's okay, I was running out of sufficiently agonizing events to attribute to you anyways."
Moments later, Ryouta appeared on deck, and a high-pitched whistle blast silenced the crowd (amazingly enough). "Now the true test of your abilities will begin," he called, straightening the chain that held the whistle around his neck. "Those who cannot handle themselves in situations of being off guard do not deserve to participate in the true preliminaries. Your challenge is this; by whatever means possible, you are to reach the island. Helping others, you must not, but to hinder is also prohibited. Those who are able, follow me. You have thirty seconds to devise your plan. After that, the bomb that seals your fate will take you." Another whistle brought a winged horse diving from the clouds to land on the deck. "I wish you the best of luck," Ryouta said with a small smile, mounting bareback and taking hold of the reins. There was a stunned silence as the Pegasus took off again, and then someone began to laugh.
"They call this a test?"
"Let's do this."
"I was hoping for some action."
Yusuke watched as several youkai took off into the air before turning desparately to his teammates. "One of you better have a plan 'cause there's no way my spirit gun's gonna help us fly."
"Same for my spirit sword. Do you guys have something to fly with?"
"The explosion might help us out if you don't shut up and think," Hiei snapped back irritably.
Kurama closed his eyes, his hair beginning to flicker to silver. "I have a way, but we'll be cutting it close with my transformation..."
"We're already cutting it close, kitsune," the fire demon retorted. "Just do it."
"5... 4... 3... 2... Shit, too late! Times up!" Yusuke howled as the ground below them suddenly disappeared. All he could feel was himself falling towards not only the water, but the center of the blast.
"Stop whining," A voice told him as a tendril of a vine wrapped itself around his waist. Kurama navigated his way out of the smoke, revealing that he was in his Youko form and had managed to grow his flying plant, its butterfly wing-like leaves spreading above the fox demon. Another vine had managed to catch Kuwabara, and Hiei was holding calmly onto a final growth. Filling the air around them were winged demons supporting their comrades and others floating in midair, apparently using techniques similar to Jin's.
"Problem, kitsune," Hiei stated dryly. "We're losing altitude."
Youko glowered at him. "As I've told you before, it wasn't made for carrying four people. Especially not with some of them being helpless passengers."
"What's wrong?" A female voice shouted to them. A tall woman with crimson eyes stared mockingly at them, slit-like pupils an odd parody of a reptile's eyes. "Can't the powerful spirit detective do anything to save himself?" Catcalls erupted all around as she turned away, smirking.
Ryouta watched all this before calling for attention. "If you would please follow me. Midnight Isle should be reached by sundown if you can keep up." Wheeling his steed, he flew off, the other teams following.
"Why that- I'll show them who can't do anything," grumbled Yusuke, releasing a pulse of reiki so that he glowed softly.
"What're you up to Urameshi?" quizzed Kuwabara as his rival released another flash of aura.
"Watch and learn." At his last words, something blue shot from the sky and skidded to a halt right next to them. "'S about time he came in handy for something," Yusuke grinned, rapping the phoenix-like creature between the ears and earning a squeal of indignance from the giant bird. Climbing on its back, he motioned to the others. "They want speed and strength? They'll eat our dust." Hiei rolled his eyes as he followed Kuwabara onto the spirit beast's back. Kurama smiled lightly as he shifted back to his human form and situated himself in front of a wing joint.
"Awright, Puu, do your stuff," Yusuke commanded the bird, who twittered happily and zoomed off after the others.
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Very weird, I know. I just realized when I was writing this that team Urameshi has no wind powers. So it ended up a little awkward and jerky, but I like Puu, so it works out, if you ask me. Yeah. Go blue puffballs!
Anywho, on to the important stuff. Some of you say you've submitted a charrie, but I haven't received said character! So... I figure either you clicked a wrong button on the form (I have now removed all excess buttons) or something went stupid. What SHOULD happen after you click the button is it links to a page that basically tells you what you just typed in.
Characters I HAVE received at the time I am posting this include: Nytstar Daemon, Kaota Misucari, Tari, Akari, Rae, Jagan, and Sagara Miko Melanie. If you character's name is not here, either I have not gotten them period or you sent them after I posted this. If the former, please try again. Gomen nasai for any inconveniances.
One last note: if the owner of Rae is reading this, I needed a name for your team (seeing as you are captain). I can't contact you, so if it's okay, I named your team for you (see above chapter). Kasai means "flame" if you were wondering. If it's not okay, let me know. Somehow.
Review, send more characters, and I'll post another chapter as soon as I have enough submissions. I need a captain for every team at the very least, but that shouldn't take too long (4 of 8 slots are already filled). The only thing I am debating is whether or not to increase the number of teams to 16, but that wouldn't hold up the next chapter (I have 5 people I can count on to create entire teams, including myself). My only question is: what do you think? The story would be much longer if I did. (More time for me to torture your characters. Heh heh.) I'll have veeeery limited comp access for the next month, but I'll try to get the next chapter up ASAP (Chapter 3 is where things get interesting). I'm posting this at 5:30 in the morning before our flight leaves. Be proud of the fact that I'm awake enough to type.
Next Chapter: Team Urameshi reaches Midnight Isle unscathed, except, of course, for Yusuke's pride. After a Team Captains' meeting and a brief shouting match, the true preliminaries will be revealed in full, and the requirements and rules shock everyone present. What deadly secrets lie behind the innocent disguise of an obstacle course? Who on Team Urameshi will step up to take on the first challenge? Will I ever stop talking in questions? And if so much is on the line in just the preliminary rounds, what can be in store during the tournament itself?
