Note: Thank you all so much for the lovely reviews! This would have been updated sooner had it not been for the numerous internet problems I've had lately what with switching over from AOL to wireless. That aside, chapter 3 is here and chapter 4 has actually been written already and should be up in the next couple of days. Leave me another review and tell me what you think!
Disclaimer: I (sadly) do not own Yu Yu Hakusho.
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Nox leaned back gently against the mossy bark of an old tree, one leg curled under her, the toes of the other trailing in the cool water of a mountain stream bubbling merrily on its way in front of her. She sighed softly and smiled to herself. This place always calmed her. Sure, she loved the excitement and the adrenaline rush that always accompanied a major "job" but invariably, she felt the need to wash it away, clear her head. She wondered where Solan was. Probably hunting up something for dinner. He took her absences with characteristic indulgence, preferring action rather than reflection for his part.
But here, it was quiet except for the chirping of birds and the whisper of the stream. Nox closed her eyes and took a deep breath of the mountain air. Immediately her eyes flashed back open as she jumped to her feet. The birds cheeped, irritated at being disturbed by her sudden movement, but Nox didn't notice. There was a smell on the wind that she didn't like, that shouldn't be there. The scent of humans.
Moments later, the four hikers arrived in a natural clearing surrounding the rock outcrop Botan had pointed out to them some time ago. Kuwabara and Yusuke were breating heavily and even Hiei was sweating a bit from the steep climb through the wood. Only Kurama seemed little affected by the morning's exertions.
"Finally!" Kuwabara exclaimed as he collapsed to the ground in front of the opening of the cave, "We're here!"
"Shut up!"
whispered Hiei harshly, "Do you want to announce our arrival to the
entire forest?"
"I wouldn't worry about that, Hiei,"
Kurama put in, "The breeze has been blowing away from us for some
time now. If they haven't heard Kuwabara, they've certainly
scented our approach."
Kuwabara suddenly stiffened on the ground and jumped to his feet. "Guys," he said in a harsh whisper, "There's someone here. My spirit sense is tingling."
As if on cue, a laugh danced through the clearing, echoing in some spirit-aided fashion off the surrounding trees so that it was impossible to get a fix on its origin. "It appears that the red-headed buffoon is not so stupid as he appears!" said the owner of the laugh with a wry tone of voice. "What an odd group of trespassers has found their way to my home."
"Nox?" called Kurama, "Is that you?"
"Oh!" the voice replied, "So you know my name, even?"
"Yeah we know your name fox lady, and we know what you did! So just come out here and face us so we can get this over with!" butted in Yusuke.
The voice was silent for a moment. From where she was concealed behind an ancient massive oak tree, Nox considered. Their spirit energies signaled nothing she couldn't handle – provided the fight was one on one. But she didn't want to get into a four-ring circus without Solan and nothing could guarantee against that. On the other hand, she couldn't leave the cave with the dagger inside undefended and her echoing trick was only going to work so long. She could feel one of the spirit energies searching her out from where she remained hidden in the tree line. Low as she kept her own energy, it was bound to find her sooner rather than later. The odd thing was, the searching energy felt familiar, as if she'd met it before and it seemed to know what it was looking for. But she was absolutely certain that she'd never met any of these fighters before in her life. She shook her head. Mind made up, she stepped out from her cover into the clearing.
Kurama had to force himself not to step backward or let his eyes open wider. It was the same Nox he had last seen so many years ago. The same jet black hair, night blue eyes and porcelain skin. The same loose white robes she had always favored.
"Since you know my name, trespassers," Nox opened simply as she smiled, "I must know yours. I fight no one anonymously."
Yusuke gritted his teeth, frustrated by the spirit fox's insistence on formalities. "I'm Yusuke Urameshi, Spirit Detective," he growled, The red-headed idiot is Kuwabara; Hiei is the short one and rose boy over there is Kur–"
"Suiichi Minamoto," put in Kurama quickly, bowing slightly. Hiei shot Kurama a quizzical look at this but said nothing.
Yusuke didn't notice. "We want the Obsidian Dagger, and your presence in front of Koenma."
Nox bared her teeth at the second request, "The first we might have been able to bargain for Spirit Detective, but the second I'm afraid we can reach no agreement on."
"Well then, I guess we'll just have to duke it out then," said Yusuke, grinning now that it appeared action was imminent.
"If you can catch me."
"Lady, do you know just how many times I've heard that line?"
"Have you ever fought a kitsune?"
Yusuke merely growled, leapt at her – and put his fist through air.
Hiei rolled his eyes. "Do you know how many times we've seen you do that?" he asked sarcastically.
Yusuke would have answered but Nox's voice stopped him. It came out of the forest again. "You came to me Spirit Detective. You'll have to fight me in my playground."
Undaunted by the newly sinister look of the forest, Yusuke strode in without a backward look at his friends. Almost immediately, the clearing seemed to disappear behind him. He stopped. Clenching his fists at his side, he peered through the gloom around him. A laugh was all he heard and a slight rush of air behind him. He barely had time to cloth his arm in spirit energy and fling it up to counter the two double-edged blades coming at his throat.
"Quick reflexes," observed Nox as she danced away, her white robes shimmering oddly.
"It helps if you don't laugh."
He lunged.
She dodged.
They became a blur of motion flitting from ground to branch to branch to tree trunk and back to ground. Fists and feet cut the air furiously. Huge branches slammed to the ground as Nox's blades sliced into them, missing Yusuke by only centimeters. After a few minutes even he was sweating but still unwilling to use his spirit gun, Koenma's "bring them back alive" echoing in his head. Inwardly cursing the toddler, he swung again at the elusive fox. And again hit nothing but air. His eyes searched from side to side, seeking a glimpse of her white clothing. His senses strained to catch a wisp of her spirit energy. Nothing.
It was a blow from behind that told him where she was. He was whipped around by its force and slammed backwards against a huge boulder half buried in the ground.
Bleary headed from the shock, he looked up to see Nox before him and heard her whisper, "Midnight's vines." Before he could move, black vines erupted from the ground, wrapped around his ankles and swarmed their way up his legs around the rest of his body.
"Looks like you're in a bit of a bind, Detective."
Yusuke narrowed his eyes as he strained against the vines. "You wish. Just wait till I unravel these!"
The spirit fox chuckled. "Keep trying, but while I've got you here, tell me: why does Koenma wish to see Solan and I? Surely if this was just about the Obsidian Dagger he wouldn't care whether or not you killed us."
"Who says I'm not trying to kill you?"
"Your self-defeating reluctance to use your spirit energy for one."
"You and your partner killed one of Koenma's agents. Bolivard. The guy who recovered the Obsidian Dagger."
Nox's eyes widened as she jerked her head back in surprise. "We did no such thing!"
"Nice try, fox lady, but that old play acting won't work on me!" Taking advantage of Nox's momentary confusion, Yusuke made a final effort against the entangling midnight vines. With a yell of effort, he forcefully tore them from the ground. As their roots left the soil, he felt them wilt and fall off his body. Taking a handful he hurled them at the bewildered fox spirit, sending his own spirit energy into them. The vines twined this time about their summoner who yelped helplessly as they wound like black snakes about her limbs. "Well, this is highly undignified!" she thought as she peered angrily up at Yusuke from the ground. "Only one thing for it…"
"You know, it's always the same," he said with mock despair, "You demons get to the crucial point and you can never resist ruining it by talking." He bent down to pick up the bundle of black vines and fox demon.
Kurama, Hiei and Kuwabara were waiting patiently in the clearing. Well, Kurama was waiting patiently. Hiei's foot kept up a brisk staccato against the ground and his scowl implied a none too tolerant attitude. Kuwabara kept up a constant stream of babbling that the two demons chose to ignore. That is until he asked: "Hey Kurama, why'd you tell her your name was Suiichi? I thought you knew her."
Hiei's foot abruptly stopped as he looked at Kurama, waiting for an answer, surprised the stupid ningen had noticed the fox demon's switch of names.
Kurama's quick mind raced to find a plausible answer because to tell the truth, he wasn't sure himself. The normally logical red-head had succumbed to an impulse triggered by something other than his brain. He opened his mouth to respond but was saved from doing so by the eruption of a brilliant light from the forest. All three fighters flung up their arms to shield their eyes.
The light evaporated as suddenly as it had arose and was followed by a yell, "God damned fox!"
"What the hell happened?" growled Hiei.
Kurama grinned, inwardly pleased at the distraction, "She momentarily blinded him and transformed into her spirit fox form. And from the sound of Yusuke's voice, she probably bit him too."
"How do you know she changed forms without seeing it?" Kuwabara interrupted.
"The change in energy is unmistakable."
"Hn," Hiei replied, "He just better hurry it up. This is beginning to get boring. And aren't there two we're supposed to be fighting?"
Yusuke cast about him for a sight of the elusive demon. For a sight of anything, really. His eyes were wide open and he couldn't see a thing. From over to the right he heard Nox's voice.
"Starlight, star bright, let's see how well you fight at night!"
Enraged, the Spirit
Detective sprang to his right but, like before, his fist connected
only with the thick forest air. "Where are you? Stop playing
games! What have you done to my eyes?"
This time Nox's voice
came from his left. "Poor Spirit Detective! Don't worry! My Moon
Beam will only blind temporarily. But it will be long enough to beat
you senseless!"
Kurama had been right. Trapped by her own vines, Nox had managed to get one hand free. As the Spirit Detective leaned down to pick her up, she had whispered the command to release the Moon Beam. The name was somewhat of a misnomer actually. A light a thousand times brighter than any moon beam had leapt from her free hand straight into the human teenager's face. Reacting quickly, Nox had leapt into the form of a spirit fox, bounding free of the vines before they could adjust to her changed shape. For good measure, she had delivered a deep bite to the blinded boy's hand before shifting back to her humanoid state. She could see the blood dripping from the wound though Yusuke could see nothing around him. Without another word, she dropped from the tree branch she had been perched on and sprang at Yusuke.
The detective knew nothing of the attack until her fist connected with the side of his head, her sharp little claws grazing red welts along the side of his cheek. Before he could recover, she was on him again, landing blow after blow. Yusuke's body flew about the forest like a rag doll, alternatively bouncing off tree trunks and Nox's fists. Finally he landed with a sickening thud against the same boulder and drooped to the ground. Feeling woozy, he lifted his head and opened his eyes. He could see again. He grinned. "Alright!" he thought as his vision fell on the fox demon standing in front of him, "Koenma's orders or not, it's time to end this thing with a little spirit energy!"
"I see you're still feeling cheeky," observed Nox.
"I see you're still too talkative," Yusuke shot back.
Then Nox noticed the small blue glow beginning at the tip of his right index finger. She dropped into a defensive fighting stance. This was going to get ugly.
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Solan bared his teeth in a feral grin as he eyed his prey from where he was crouched behind a fallen tree truck half buried in the soft ground. Brushing a strand of his unruly blonde hair from his face, he sniffed the air. It was filled with the scent of his prey. Being downwind of the unsuspecting two rabbits, he waited patiently as they hopped right towards him, following the fresh growth of clover. He could almost taste their succulent flesh.
Nox made fun of him sometimes, bothering to hunt when he could just as easily purchase their meat from any of the demons in one of the nearby villages. He took it good-naturedly most of the time but he didn't understand how she could not desire the hunt. "Thieving fills that desire," she told him when he asked. Maybe for her. For him, it fed it.
"Just a little closer…" he willed the rabbits. A few more inches and his darting claws could find easy purchase in their jugular veins. But before he could make the fatal move, a resounding boom filled the valley and even the ground shook slightly. The rabbits dashed away into the underbrush, forgotten, as Solan's head shot up and he spun to look up at the mountain top where the cave was and where the sound had come from. That noise could only mean one thing. The Spirit Detective had arrived. Solan took off at a dead run through the trees.
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Parting Note: Hope you all enjoyed! It was a long chapter as a reward for your patience. Like I said, next chapter should be up soon so don't desert me! Leave me a review! Thanks!
