Disclaimer: Do you guys even ready this! I can say whatever the heck I want and you guys would never react to it, would you? I give cyber chocolates to whoever actually remembers this. I don't own Yu Yu, but I do own Koko and Bri and Gina and a buncha others…I also own the bit of Hershey's kisses in my pocket.

Chapter 8: First Battle

…Bri…

It had been a month since my father passed away. Kuronue stared at me from across our shared desk/table, silent. Neither of us had really gotten over the shock yet. I think I'd always thought my father to be invincible now that I was here with him. I guess I'd thought wrong. Kuronue sighed.

"We can't do much else but comfort mother," he said quietly. Our mother hadn't done much more but lay in bed since the funeral. She'd lost the will to live, except for us. We were the only thing keeping her alive, Kuronue and I.

"Koenma wants to see us," he said again after I didn't reply. "Says that he has a job for us." I glanced up at him, not bothering to actually form the words on my lips.

What does mighty toddlerness want?

"We have to go to Spirit World to answer that," he shrugged. "Botan is here to bring us there, if you want to go. I'll do it alone if you're too lazy."

I scowled at him. Low blow.

"Only for you, sis," he teased.

I followed my brother out the window, where, sure enough, sprightly Botan was waiting for us. She, unlike the majority of the others, was one of few who knew who we were. Like Koko, she was of the opinion that I should just allow myself to go back to who I was before I was reborn. She, unlike Koko, was smart enough to keep her mouth shut about it, rather than constantly nagging at me.

Her nagging was almost as bad as letting Kurama hold me again. I was breaking my promise again, enjoying his embraces. Enjoying the comfort that he brought. The way his very presence soothed me, made the fact that my father was dead less stinging. How he made everything hurt less.

"You're missing a patch of your hair," Botan said. "Did that girl get to you again?"

I admit, Yue Junana was always doing something to me. If it wasn't splashing paint on my front, kicking mud on my shoes, dirt in my eyes, it was something else. This was the second time she'd managed to get something in my hair, although the first had been the worst. I smiled at the memory and at Botan.

"She did, but it's all right."

It's all right, because Kurama would do something to make me feel better again. He always did. The first time she got gum in my hair, I had ended up near bald. Kurama had cut his own hair and made me a wig for the first few weeks of school. I still had a few locks of that wig in my journal for the memory. His hair had grown back and grown a bit longer since then.

Botan's oar-driving skills are always being bashed by other people, but I myself find the rides she gives to be just that: rides. Like a roller coaster. Of course, I don't like roller coasters that often, so I don't really like getting on her oar. I will skip ahead, because this time had been rather embarrassing, involving several—shutting up.

I sat rather dizzily on the edge of Koenma's desk, glaring down at him from my higher perch. Even though he was still by far older than me, he looked much smaller and about five years younger than me. I still had some amount of intimidation and I used it to my appearance's seven-year-old chubby advantage.

"What do you want?" I asked.

"I sort of only meant Kuronue, but since you are here, I guess you can help, too," Koenma said, pointing to the screen before his desk. "Near the Wolf residences are several rock demons who appear to be planning an invasion of the city. This job is a lot simpler than most of Yusuke's and I think you two can handle them."

"You want us to be spirit detectives?" I arched one eyebrow at him, a trait I'd picked up from Kurama.

"Well, not exactly," Koenma said. "I just don't want to bother the others with the more trivial tasks, and…"

Just keeps digging his holes even deeper, isn't he, sis? Kuronue asked.

"Oh, yes, he is," I said, not even bothering to keep the conversation in our minds. "Fine. We'll take care of your little pest problem. And please hesitate to call again."

On the edge of Tokyo, only about half a mile from Nemoi District, we stood in a field with the only instructions being to "dismantle" the rock demons. I was beginning to regret opening my big mouth. Honestly, I wasn't a fighter, hadn't trained very long, and I had no clue what rock demons looked like.

"Just follow my lead," Kuronue said. He flashed his now-infamous fox-grin at me. "It's not that hard to fight. It's just hard to fight with style."

"If you say so. What do these things look like anyway?"

RUMBLE…

Two large stacks of stone rose out of the field, and for some reason, I think they were mad at us.

"Like that," Kuronue said calmly.

A rock fell exactly in the spot he'd been a moment before, where now he was in front of me.

"Oh," I said, dodging yet another falling stone. "How are we supposed to beat them?"

"Don't know." He jumped atop one of the stones. The stack moved from left to right, trying to find him with eyes that I couldn't see on it. I did the same to the other, grabbing hold of the topmost stone.

What do we do now!
I don't know!

You're the demon here!

You're a half demon!

Only in this lifetime! I wrapped both arms around my rock as it started trying to buck me off.

"Hey, look, Buck!" said a low, rumbly voice that definitely did not belong to the slightly squeaky-quality voices of myself or Kuronue. "This one's missing a patch o' hair. Maybe she's an old maid!"

"Nah, she's just a lil runt," rumbled back "Buck", who I supposed was the one I sat on. It was hard to tell the direction those voices were coming from. But this one's rocks shook when it "spoke".

Bri, fire it! Use your fox fire!

"Fire what!" I shouted aloud back as Buck bucked me around on the stone. "It's nothing but rock!"

The red stone, fire the red stone! The one right underneath you!

I glanced down, leaning over my stone to glare at the red stone just beneath my eyes. So there's where his face is. Ugh. He looked worse than George the ogre on a good day.

"Hello, human," said Buck.

"Hello, Bucky," I said in my own sweet little seven-year-old voice. I reached out with what little power I had, scrubbing together about three thousand or so molecules just in front of his face to make the infamous fox fire. Not a nanosecond after the blaze began, the stones began to fall.

Taking me with them.

"Bri!" Kuronue shouted. I don't know exactly what happened, but suddenly the rock I was on stopped in midair. I was too scared to even open my eyes. When at last I chanced it, I glanced down over the edge of the stone again. Kuronue stood on the ground, staring up at me with that stupid smirk on his face.

"Saved by the bell flowers," he said, grinning.

I glanced down underneath the rock again, where I'd seen the red stone with Buck's face only a few moments ago. Now all I saw was the smooth blue expanse of an enormous flower, holding me suspended atop the rock I'd never actually let go of. The flower slowly shrank. I pushed the stone off to the side so that it wouldn't hurt the plant that had saved my life. I was practically standing inside of a blue cherry picker of a plant as it slowly lowered me to the ground.

"Did you do that?" I asked.

"Nope. You?"

"I didn't use any of my powers…I'm positive I didn't…" I said, blinking at him. I sniffed at the wind, but whoever had saved me was smart. They had remained facing the wind so that I wouldn't catch the scent until it was unrecognizable.

"Well, we won," I shrugged, glancing at the two piles of stone. "Did we actually…kill them?"

"Rock demons can't be 'killed'," Kuronue said. "They're like parasites. They leech off the solar energy that rocks collect over a few years, and once you take out the main stone, they topple and disperse. Don't worry, they'll be back in about…a hundred years or so."

I shoved him over one of the rocks.

…

…

…

Okay, I actually added this chapter in after a while. I wanted to have an example of Bri actually fighting, since I've sort of made the fact that she does fight important. She's kinda incompetent (Bri: Hey!) at it, though, sort of like Yusuke, only even more so cause she doesn't have street fighting as a background.

Who is the mystery person who saved Bri's life and how on Earth did he know where she was, who she was, and what she was doing? Another important element. Hmm. And can anyone actually handle Botan's flying or Koenma's stupidity?

Question for my reviewers: When do ya'll get off school? I know some get out tomorrow and there are others who have summer school. Where do you stand? I'm kind of intrigued to find out who lives where and what a little of their lives are like. I know some people on Yahoo. If you have it, please, IM me! It's the same as my email.

Kuramafan: (From cha 6) Of course. Tsuki is always making life hellish. (Chapter 7) Yup, I'm a survivor. Lol, I hope that never happens again. I think Bri should thank me for being so avid about saving things.

Lucifer: (Chapter 6) Calm down, cakes, they'll get back together. (Chapter 7) I think the past repeats itself in an endless dance of deaths and births, both literally and figuratively.

Sillylittlenothing: (Chapter 6) Yup, Tsuki is back. Don't cry just yet, though. Sometimes, growing up with someone can make you rethink them entirely. (Chapter 7) It was kinda my hope that this chapter would be a tearjerker…at least I succeeded in that. Sorry, though, it had to happen.

Princess Kandra: Dear, you have just won however much yen you bet (stupid system takes out multiples) from Kurama! Yes, my dear, Yue is Tsuki. As I've said before, though, growing up with someone can make you rethink them. Oo I'm addictive, eh? Let's hope that's what the publishers say about Kitsune Maybe. I'm going for the original world now.

SilverDragon: I think it's amusing for Hiei, too. I'm very Kurama-like, in that I find things endlessly amusing and yet I can't seem to laugh out loud. Yup, Yue is Tsuki. We are never going to be rid of her, are we?

SallyWalker: Finally, some criticism. (Eep! No yelling! Just calm crit! Meow.) I actually don't try very hard with fan fiction. I read it through and make sure there are no mistakes, sometimes I add stuff. But it's my original stuff that I focus on the most. Sorry, but it won't be up on fiction press. Publishers frown at that sort of thing. About Hiei, though…I kinda believe that people change when they're with the people they love. My brother used to be very, very Hiei-ish: dark, brooding, I seriously thought he was going to literally murder me a few times), and then when he and his girlfriend started dating, he's changing. Still brooding, still dark, but he's just a little more light. I don't think he's going to kill me anymore.

Peeka-chan: Well, as I know who Yue/Tsuki really becomes, I don't think I'm going to kill her. And you'll just have to wait and see what I mean by that.

Saori: You're not bad…really…And you're not demented. Everything will click into place soon enough. You'll see. I'm the evil bad one for not informing everyone right away that it was up.