Disclaimer: Not mine.

Story Thus Far: Yuusuke's kingdom is fighting a losing battle against the hordes of Karasu's infected carriers. Meanwhile, Kurama and Mika are headed straight for the bio-hazard, thinking Yuusuke's territory to be safe. Then to top it all off, the first of the three assassins Hiei mentioned has just appeared to make things hard for Shizuru, Al and Cloud. Smashing darling!

Enjoy chapter 11!

Toasting the End

"Mika?"

"Yes?"

"I realize that a demon must arm one's self from attack but…"

"Huh?"

"You're nails are too long."

The teenager gave her guardian a startled look, making an odd sputtering sound as she ran along behind the redhead. The streetlights overhead whipped by like neon signs seen from the inside of a car in Vegas. They blurred in one long comet tail smear across the sky overhead as the two darted through the snowy night. The small mountain town streets had long since emptied, the freezing night driving all sane human beings indoor.

However, as previous conversation indicates the two beings running through the streets at high speeds rivaling a couple different jet airplanes, were not human.

Mika, dressed in only sweats and sneakers with her damp hair frozen in a clump about her head could think of almost no reply to her companion's strange attention to trivial details such as the length of her nails. As a teenage girl, the stereotypes said she was supposed to be fluent in the use of nail polish and pedicures, but she rarely dressed up nature's original plan with cosmetics unless she really, really needed something to do.

So, in retrospect, if she as a sixteen year old girl didn't give a damn about the state of her nails…then Kurama the millennia old fox thief who, while looking very pretty in the opinion of more than one crushing high-school girl, was in fact a male and probably should have less than minimal interest in the state of her fingertips. She also thought it her civic duty as a young woman to tell him so, lest doubts form in her mind as to the certainty of his masculinity.

"Umm…Yes, Perhaps I haven't cut them recently, but why do you care?" she inquired pleasantly.

Kurama's green-gold eyes flickered over his shoulder. "They're digging into my arm."

Mika, startled, looked down to see that her fingers had in fact latched themselves to the youko's arm with a grip so powerful she felt her fingers must have frozen that way in the cold.

"Oh…sorry…Kurama."

He smiled and wordlessly told her he didn't mind at all, just teasing her. He turned back to the road. She blinked, wondering momentarily just why she'd felt the need to cling to her guardian so tightly. Sure, that Terrasuka lady had her creepy quirks and yeah the Christmas carolers from hell didn't do much for the imagination, but cutting off the circulation to Kurama's fingers wouldn't much improve her situation.

So why do that?

She chocked it up to trauma and didn't relinquish her hold, finding that she didn't really want to anyway. Her subconscious might have something here even if her pride didn't want to admit it. She pulled herself closer and hugged his arm selfishly, taking comfort in the youko's proximity. As long as he didn't take off with out her she'd be fine. He couldn't leave her. She was Mika after all and he was her guardian. It was his job to protect her, be with her, care for her. One could almost saw they belonged to one anoth…

"Mika that hurts," Kurama said dryly.

The girls snapped out of her thoughts with frightening clarity, jerking like a student caught sleeping and tapped by a teacher. She released his arm instantly, blushing and falling into step behind him. Her brain struggled to wake and for just a moment of blurry haze she giddily wanted to tell him he smells just like an herb garden and roses, just to see what would happen. He'd probably look all cute and confused and not get it. What a funny thought!

"What?" Kurama said, stopping so suddenly she crashed straight into his back, her cheek hitting his shoulder blade.

"Ow!" she said, hurt. She rubbed her cheek furiously, but the kitsune was staring at her so peculiarly that she soon forgot about the sting of bruises. His gaze, well-humored only moments previous, had gone unquestionably bewildered as he examined her closely. She glowered, annoyed that he protector had hurt her. "What? Why are you staring at me?"

"What did you say?" he repeated, crouching beside a pile of trash cans and shifting them to one side. The dimness around them indicated that she and Kurama had entered an ally of some sort, the portal hidden in the filthy back-path somewhere. The youko tossed the last dumpster aside. The air behind them wavered and glowed, an indicator that the Barrier between the Maki and Ningenkai had worn dangerously thin. He touched it with an experimental finger and the distortions grew more pronounced before he withdrew. So focused on the barrier was he that he hardly noticed her battling expressions.

"I didn't say anything," she snapped, irritation growing. Wasn't he supposed to be really smart or something?

He cocked his head the way he did when he didn't like something. She'd seldom seen him give her that look and it disturbed her on an infinitesimal level. But a very different and unusual emotion swamped the little part and drowned it out. Anger…what right did he have to look at her like that? She was practically godsdamned royalty among demons and what was he? A thief and a cutthroat he had no right in hell to look at her like that. How dare he?

"Are you sure?" he said slowly, concern seeping into his slanted green-gold eyes. "I could have sworn you said something strange…"

"No!" she burst out, anger getting the better of her. "No! I didn't say anything! Dammit Kurama why do you have to be so stupid?"

And there it was. As soon as the words left her mouth and she really, for real heard them in the air she wanted nothing more than to nab them from the cold mountain altitudes and swallow them back up. But the damaged had been done and the collateral reflected in her guardian's expression of pure, unguarded shock. His cool, easy-going expression had fallen away in the face of her sudden verbal assault. He hadn't bothered to mask his feelings because…frankly, he hadn't thought he'd have to.

Mika slapped her fingers across her mouth and like waking from a nightmare broke into a cold sweat. "Oh…oh Kurama I didn't mean that!" she said frantically. "I'm sorry I don't…I don't know why I said that. I'm sorry."

"No it's okay," he said leniently, but gradually, standing up. "You're just a little shaken Mika. Once we get to your father's realm you can get some rest."

Anger flared, suddenly, illogically and Mika couldn't stop herself. "I don't need rest you idiot! I'm fine! It's your fault anyway!" Horror! Why had she said that?

Kurama's expression didn't melt into hurt this time. No. His eyes darkened and closed the way they did in battle and the soft curve of his mouth thinned into a hard line. His mask fell into place and that spoke far more deeply than any emotion the youko could have outwardly expressed. He only hid his emotions from those he could not trust completely without a shadow of doubt. Right now he treated her to the same expression he'd displayed against Terrasuka…none at all.

To the teenager's further horror, her mouth jumped on the thought and spewed it into words before she could halt the damning syllables.

"Why are you looking at me like that? Stop looking at me like that! Stop it!" she screamed, voice soaring in pitch. "You're not supposed to look at me like that! It burns! Fiery eyes burning straight into my bosom's core! Respite – respite sweet nepenthe from thy memories of Lenore!"

Kurama's grim, even gaze (far more wary that before for obvious reasons) flickered down to her grip on his arm and then traveled back to her. He stepped back, but she, desperate for him to hear her out, followed. She reached out and snagged his arm again, clutching his slender wrist in a clammy grip. His eyes flickered and she knew he'd considered whether or not to pull away from her, but he chose against it. He had to listen! He couldn't walk away without her apologizing first! She had to apologize!

"I'm sorry! I didn't mean that either!" she cried, tears of frustration gathering behind her feverish mocha eyes. "I'm so useless! I keep saying the wrong thing! Wait – no! That's all wrong too! Not what I wanted to say…again! Kurama-sama, I don't know why I keep saying stupid things!"

Kurama's expression grew anxious but he didn't try to hold or comfort her like he would have at age five. The last time she'd ever called his Kurama-sama. His slim, clever fingers traveled up to her clinging hands and pried them off his arm so he could hold them between his palms, examining them. He frowned and moved her hands up to his lips and breathed warm air gently between his fingers in an attempt to warm them.

"You're freezing. You must fever," he told her, tone even and calm. "You do need rest, Mika. I want you to hold onto me – tightly – and hold on until I tell you to let go. We have to stay together when we cross over. This portal is a natural one and very unstable."

She nodded numbly and the youko's eyes dared a glimmer of brotherly affection over their entwined hands.

And suddenly Mika couldn't tolerate that expression, couldn't stand him with his perfect face, perfect mind, perfect damn everything and she wanted to kill him. Right now! He wasn't expecting it. One good blast of energy would completely rid her sight of that face. She'd put up with his wiser-than-thou routine for sixteen years and endured his oh-so-benevolent presence for far too long. She had the pedigree of a Toushin line. A mongrel thief didn't deserve to call himself her guardian!

Time to lose that pretty face!

But no! She could do that. How could she have ever thought such a vulgar thing? A terrible thing! Shame consumed her and she wanted to cry, almost did too. How could she have thought of killing Kurama like that? Such an unforgivable thought so…so…so messy! She couldn't be messy! So unfitting! She wouldn't touch that face! Never! She'd take out his heart, his demon core, whatever it was that pumped blood through that immortal body of his and keep his perfect angel face untouched. The only worthy feature in his filthy body…

Oh why couldn't have just kept his hair the way it used to be?

Then Kurama interrupted her thoughts, startling her. His great green-gold eyes had gone wide, his mouth parted in a stunned expression. He slowly released her hands, stepping back from her as his face grew more and more distant.

"You've never seen me with my hair long…" he whispered…or did he growl?

She blinked. Oops…she must have said that last thought a loud without noticing. Ancient fox-spirit and high-schooler stood, face to face as conflicting emotion raced across their faces, flitted through their minds and something cracked in the air between them like a solid breaking of trust. The snow fell in a sudden flurry, swirling through the ally and throwing their clothes and hair awry.

Then a slow, disturbing grin etched up the side of her face and blue light flooded her eyes. "Gee Kurama, I didn't think about it but I guess I'm not totally in my own head," she snickered. "I'm so sorry, but you have to go now."

Kurama moved so fast Mika actually didn't see him do it.

His hand made an upward gesture of some sort and Mika grunted as a solid something collided with her belly. Pain blinded her, stars erupting behind her eyes and pain consumed her brain. The force of the blow rocketed her into the ally wall behind her with enough force to almost demolish the side of the building. The bricks exploded in dusty chips of mortar and stone, shattering with the impact of her teenaged body. The indent held her limbs in the broken brick a moment before gravity pulled her slowly out of the shock that her guardian had actually stuck her!

With a groan she slipped from the rubble's embrace and slithering to the snowy ground, moaning. Her head ached, her brain throbbing against the inside of her skull as if it would burst through the fragile shell of bone and spill her feverish thoughts across the icy concrete. Kurama had hit her…he hadn't even hesitated. He'd struck her down and he hadn't done much to lighten the blow save sparing her life. Blood oozes thickly from the long gash she recently noticed tracing the flesh from her collarbone to her belly.

The irregular and jagged rips of her skin and sweatshirt could only belong to his weapon of choice. The scent of the Rose Whip hung in the air like a fine perfume, masking the metallic tang of blood. For a second part of her wept that in that instant, in that moment Kurama, her guardian, protector a surrogate brother had beat her down in a single unfeeling blow. She'd heard the tales of his former ruthless lifestyle: logic so unfettered that compassion, though prominent in his mind, could be completely eclipsed by his cold intellect of battle…but she'd never truly believed them until now.

Then her madness and rage swamped her thoughts like a plague, infecting, and in her feverish mind she could suddenly see him for the monster he hid behind his angel's face. Killer, cutthroat, blood-spiller, thief, ruthless rogue! HE didn't deserve to live! What honor did he have? Even Hiei had a code, but not this mongrel fox!

"WHAT WAS THAT FOR!" she screamed.

Kurama flicked the rose whip behind him and eyed her with an expression so cold he might have never known her all his life. A sudden gust of white confetti snow blasted across her view and for a moment the world narrowed to nothing save her gaze locked on his and suddenly the entirety of all reality shrank to those piercing green-gold eyes and a cool so cruel that her crazed mind almost cleared.

Her lips trembled for an instant, her warm breath forming a wispy puff of steam in to chill air, a name slipping out with the silvery cloud; so weak and strained a child might have said it.

"Kurama-san?" she whimpered.

His eyes narrowed. "You're not Mika...and using her emotions to play with mine will not work. I won't drop my guard."

Mika grinned insanely. "Too late, Red! You're going for a long trip! Have fun!"

The fox didn't even hear her finish the sentence because just as she started talking another voice – originating from some place overhead – shouted loudly. "Yoink!" And something cold and solid slammed into Kurama's chest, ignoring the rose whip and the momentum sent both him and his attacker reeling back and the youko toppled into the portal, leaving Mika behind in an eddy of icy and snow.

Mika sat there on her knees, gasping, heat eating her body from the inside like liquid fire in her belly and blood. It hurt. It hurt and suddenly, as if someone had cut her marionette strings she slumped to the ground in a dead faint…the snow turning crimson beneath her battered body, the only thing remaining was a tiny black seed stuck to the back of her hand where Kurama had left it.

It began to bloom.

The darkened forest shook, trembling as the distant rumble of battle scarred the Makai soil with death and destruction. Yuusuke's realm vibrated, the world seeming to shake itself from reality as the skies boiled with dark crimson clouds that threatened to rain blood down through the twisted branches of perverted foliage. Cloud, Shizuru and Alaster stood back to back to back, surveying the surrounding forest for any sign of Kumuro's assassin.

Alaster momentarily marveled just how quickly and accurately the prediction of Hiei's Evil Eye had come to pass. Only a couple hours out of the Unlit and already, the first of the three assassins had arrived. Though, whether or not the other two, Blade and Marionette, lurked nearby remained uncertain. Then the killer broke the torturous quiet, a young and easy-sounding timbre cutting the tension like a scalpel.

"My name," said the assassin "is Shield."

"Congratulations…" Cloud mumbled, spinning his blade smoothly between his fingers, hissing through the air. Alaster stepped away from the dark angel so he had more room to maneuver and the blonde scanned the trees about himself with wary interest. "Now how about coming out and fighting us?"

"As you wish," the voice consented mildly.

A pale blue orb of faerie fire winked into life overhead.

The blaze illuminated everything in the clearing, throwing gnarled roots into violent exaggeration and revealing the tall, dark figure standing only yards away from the trio. Shadows stretched long, clawing fingers in the sudden exposure, casting funny patterns across their attacker's comfortably fit black tunic, leggings and fingerless back gloves winding up to his elbows under ebony arm guards. His soft soles shoes made no sound on the overgrown forest floor and he didn't appear to be armed, but then again, shinobi assassins rarely did.

He'd let his naturally dark hair grow long in the fashion of ancient shinobi sects and knotted it tightly at the base of his skull. However, by the same means that Hiei's hair did not submit to the laws of Issac Newton, neither did the eight odd spikes of contrastingly bright blue tresses along his hairline. Or perhaps the spikes were white, stained blue by the glow of the cobalt faerie fire.

The strange color choice added an unworldly glow to Shield's brilliant maroon eyes, making them glow and stand out vividly in his well-featured face.

Then again…

Alaster figured the glow probably had nothing to do with lighting affects.

"So…" Shield's strange eyes traveled amongst the mismatched trio. "You are the three. I anticipated the girl and the young kitsune, but I was not informed that there was a dark angel amid your number. I shall have to work much harder to please my lord."

Cloud tipped his head, a faintly neurotic glint penetrating the calm of his eyes. Glossy black feathers rippled in anticipation of a battle, his grip shifting ever so slightly along the hilt of his feather scimitar. Mimicking Shield, his eyes began to glow in the azure cast of the faerie fire, misty black energy darkening the dim light with his shadowy aura.

"I'll say," Cloud told him, face as expressionless as his voice.

Shizuru stepped toward him, twin long blades glowing at the ready. She lifted her masked chin and placed on hand on her hip, carefully angling her own blade away from her thigh. "Are you sure you want to fight all three of us?

Shield smiled coyly and tucked a stray coil of his odd blue hair behind the minute gray-feathered wing where most creatures might had sported an ear, then did the same to his opposite side. The assassin, by all female accounts, seemed a likely looking type despite the wings and burgundy eyes. Shizuru even paused to give him a good once-over. However, his deceptively shy smile masked the more sinister emotion Alaster could smell in the air, read in his body language.

Confidence…with a hint of insanity…

"I believe I am up to the challenge," Shield said with a nod.

Cloud gave a one shouldered shrug … then vanished. Alaster saw Shield's eyes immediately fill with an inferno of maroon fire. Flickering purple-red light blazed into life about his slender figure as the assassin closed his eyes and arranged his fingers in an arcane symbol before his chest. Soon a thin veil of colored energy shrouded his entire body like a second skin, filling the air around him with purple light while Cloud's comrades waited for their shadowkai ally to dice Shield into mince meat.

To Alaster's shock, Cloud reappeared beside Shizuru looking bemused for the second time this encounter.

His blade had vanished, leaving a burnt looking feather crumbling between his long fingers. Shizuru looked momentarily stunned by Cloud's failure to totally murder their assailant. So far Cloud's battle prowess, when really poured on, had solved all their problems with rough opponents thus far. His strange malfunction to do so now rather startled them. But Cloud turned to her with an 'Oh what? You can do better?' expression and her pride kicked shock out the door. She spun on Shield with a haughtily expression.

"I heard you can only defend yourself," she ventured haughtily. "Is that true?"

Shield's eyes opened, dimming back to a darker maroon, though his cloak over energy remained in place. Alaster noticed that the two wings located just beneath each temple had grown somewhat in stature and arched out farther from his head. As a result his hair fell in his face again, but that didn't detract from his demure smile.

"I can see you're worried," Shield remarked placidly, directing his words toward Shizuru.

"I'm not either. If you can only defend, what good are you?" she sneered, an attempt to rouse him to answer.

He only smiled that infuriating little grin…familiar…much like Touya's before he'd tried to kill them. "I serve my purposes," Shield murmured cryptically in the manner of most assassins. "For example, I recently met with the Master and lent him a bit of my spirit energy. Unless you can break my shields or kill me he too will be completely invulnerable to physical or spiritual attacks."

Shizuru narrowed her eyes. "Karasu? Then you're infected too aren't you?"

Cloud, who'd been occupying himself with a long glowering stare, made a low and feral noise in the back of his throat that sounded disturbingly bestial. The sinuous muscle along his slender arms grew tense at the mention of Karasu, his upper lip curling back from his fangs and Alaster smelled his scent change even. Obviously he didn't like anyone making his already difficult task any more difficult for him. Alaster chewed anxiously on his sucker, watermelon favored. Yum.

"That got your attention didn't it?" Shield went on, "Furthermore, while you are incapable of touching me… I can easily touch you."

Cloud took step forward, dark wisps of energy wafting off his skin. "Would you like to test that theory?"

"Little raven, you can test me all you want," he offered kindly. "Don't worry, I won't break."

Shizuru and Cloud exchanged looks…and lunged at the shinobi.

Suffice to say, it startled the assassin, obviously having not expected them to actually take him up on the offer, but nonetheless, he recovered well. Cloud's shadow wreathed boot smashed Shield directly across the crown of his skull and Shizuru's demon talismans snapped from her swift fingers like angry hornets to sting his body.

Cloud ended up jarring his leg, shoving himself off his target whilst Shizuru's paper spells disintegrated into piles of ashy dust. She looked shocked, Cloud looked pensive…which was probably his dark angel substitute for shock. The two warriors landed beside one another, steadied themselves and traded stares of bewilderment. Their spirit senses told them their powers excelled above his, yet still the assassin deflected their most lethal attacks…all of various types too.

Alaster, meanwhile, watched Shield's face very closely…searching for a weakness, a vocal point, a loophole in his strategy.

Cloud waved his arms in a slow, arcane spell and Shizuru stepped back, familiar with the nature of his attack and getting wisely away. The shadowkai's eyes turned a hellish fire color and the slow fluid gesture snapped into a violent cutting sweep and a crescent-moon razor of ebony energy launched itself from his hand with a screaming howl and Alaster had to block his ears to bear.

Shield's eyes flared maroon and his body glowed with burgundy light before the attack hit…and disintegrated into little black wisps. Cloud sucked a sharp breathe, Shizuru swore and Alaster just kept watching. As the dust cleared, Shield stepped forward, still glowing red as he waved away the dust, coughing.

"My, you're a powerful lot," he remarked. "Shame I must kill you."

The assassin sighed and lifted his left arm in direct symmetry to his right arm, slowly shifting to extend in a perfect horizontal line… Then he vanished completely. Confusion! Pulse-skipping! Shizuru threw up a hasty shield about herself, while her dark angel counter-part flared out his wings in a protective canopy, extending over himself and Shizuru both. Alaster combed a seed from his hair and began to feed energy into the…

"Alaster! Watch out!"

Oh, dammit, thought the youko.

Too late. A long-fingered hand circled his throat and the tip of a small, blackened dagger settled delicately against the dip of his collar bone, just at the base of his throat. Through the corner of his right eye he could make out the side of his attacker's winged head and the still-present maroon glow of his eyes and aura. He'd drawn his teammates into an attack, leaving Alaster separate and vulnerable to attack and the fox was pissed that he'd failed to see it in time. Damn…

Alaster's great rosy eyes immediately began to move from left to right, scanning the area as if in search of escape options and the lollipop spun meticulously inside his mouth. He didn't move; let his eyes scan the leafy boughs overhead, the dark splotches of thick red leaves blotting out the bloody sky. He let himself relax, his mind to come away from his fear to focus on escape. Fear was his only killer right now. He needed to think clearly and without panic.

Defensive technique.

Shield specialized in shinobi defensive technique, but only the defensive part. Any good fighter knew that the best defense was a great offense or better yet, a blend of the two. To only have trained in defensive style fighting left a hole somewhere where his offense should have played a key role. Alaster's mind flew to the words spoken by Hiei only hours earlier, the Touya and Jin's lectures years before that. There was a hole.

He just had to find it.

Falling through dimensions is kind of disorientating…just a little bit. For a shocking moment Kurama couldn't figure out what had occurred in the span of those seconds.

He felt himself falling end over end through time and space with somebody else gripping his shoulders so tightly his bones protested the strain. The pain and his distorted thoughts were the only things he could perceive in the spinning, reality of nameless colors and knowing it the wisest path, simply closed his eyes and refused to look. The silence of the Between pressed on his eardrums like a shrieking child's wail, and against his will his lips parted in a silent cry of pain as the noiselessness deafened him.

Then the silence exploded and the rushing roar of air in his ears and the soft noises of reality poured into his previously numbed senses and the youko instantly recovered from the nausea. First things first, he thought, get this person trying to throttle me off my chest…

Kurama snarled and seized his attacker's thick blue-white tunic and hurled the slighter demon off him. The enemy youkai grunted, flipping upright as he soared out of Kurama's line of sight. The youko coiled his body and arched his body into a quick spring, landing on his feet. She spun to face his attacker and before his assailant could recover he unloaded a fresh batch of generic rose petals at youkai.

A familiar voice laughed and Kurama felt his stomach heave as recognition struck him. Originally his anxiety was that he'd just attacked an ally…but that didn't last long.

"Mists of December!"

The slender figure of a youngish demon in blue and white shinobi garb leapt up and held out a hand as if to stop the deadly blizzard of petals with his bare hand. His eyes blazed a white hot blue the air pulsated and Kurama felt the condensation in the air get sucked from his very lungs as a deadly cloud of silver mist billowed toward him like a gauzy tidal wave. Kurama swallowed a hasty breath and threw his arms over his head as the freezing cloud engulfed him in the opaque vapor.

Kurama quickly flicked a seed into his fingers and bloomed it fast. Vines, thick, leafy and green snaked from his hand and spread like serpents across the smooth marble floors toward opposite ends of the room. Then with a mental command from him, the tendrils stemmed up from the ground and sprouted ugly gray-green buds that splayed four sticky, yellow petals, exposing deep mouth-like openings. The flowers all shuddered and instantly began sucking up the poisonous gases, absorbing them into its botanical anatomy.

Soon the air cleared, the mists drifting away into nothing as Kurama's plants breathed up the lethal cloud and expelled fresh oxygen to replace it. The fox waited until the haze totally cleared before venturing his first experimental breath. He didn't die, took this as a good omen and straightened up. He had a new Rose Whip in his hand before he even spotted his traitorous attacker.

The room's edges, misty with natural fogs that Touya's icy presence created, obscured the shinobi somewhere in the large regal chamber. The high arches of marble seemed quite familiar to the youko, but the time for décor admiring could wait until Ice Masters trying to kill him…stopped attempting to do so. He turned in a slow circle, green-gold eyes scanning the surrounding mist coldly.

"Touya!" he shouted, voice rippling with predatory aggression. "Why did you attack Mika and me? Come out and answer me, Ice Master!"

A snicker and Kurama knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that whatever had infected Mika – oh yes, he knew it a disease when he saw one – had also taken root in the mind of the young ice demon. The youko pursed his lips, expecting an attack at random, but instead he sensed Touya's aura from the right and turned to face him, curiously, as the slender demon stepped out of the foggy clouds.

His looked the picture of self possession, a charismatic smile angled crookedly across his handsome face, hands on his hips, eyes glowing with friendly enthusiasm. Now if, say, Yuusuke had greeted him in such a way the thief king probably would have laughed it off as a stupid prank employed by a stupid adolescent.

But since it was Touya the Ice Master, king of emotionless glares and logical efficiency Kurama knew that something had gone severely, murderously wrong with the shinobi.

"Touya. What happened to you?" Kurama demanded, thinking that talking would probably distract the ninja from attacking, give him a moment to settle and recover his bearings. Touya opened his mouth as if to say something, but before the syllables formed, the ice demon's eyes suddenly turned a sickly wine-red, and then flickered back to blue. But his words had left him and he only grinned insanely.

"What happened? Gods! A load of stuff!" Touya blurted, launching into an animated (and totally unnatural) verbal spiel. "Unbelievable really, I'd tell you all about it, Kurama, buddy, but I have an Emperor to infect and you've got a previous engagement with an old friend." He ended with a creepily pleasant smile.

Kurama felt a cold finger of apprehension trace down his spine and he carefully kept his face without expression.

"What are you talking about? Explain," he ordered.

"Ooh. Can't I get a please?" Touya asked, mock injured by the youko's blunt words. "Guess not. But tell yu' what. I'll show you to dinner and your host will gladly explain every thing to you. He's quite eager to meet with you again; been such a long time, memories, battles, death and all that jazz."

Touya looked toward the wall behind him and raised a hand. The mists of ice parted before him and revealed a previously obscured double doorway. Kurama's eyes lit with recognition as the great golden emblem of the Spirit Realm glinted from the centre of either door like great yellow eyes. Touya, grinning like a kid in a candy store, turned to face his companion and stepped aside.

"You first," he said mischievously.

Kurama didn't go first and he didn't let go of his Rose Whip. "No."

Touya shrugged. "Fine. I'll go, you follow. Whatever blows your skirt up, Red."

Kurama had the grace to look somewhat appalled but Touya already had his back to the fox thief and started walking toward the door, bare feet making no sound as he moved. The fox-demon huffed, hated every moment of this, but begrudgingly followed the younger demon through the entry.

As much as he disliked it, Touya's power was nothing to sneeze and fighting him would only result in the death of a friend, and his own exhaustion for whatever – stronger he suspected – host wanted to meet him. Besides, Touya had pulled him through some rift in the Between and in doing so, succeeded in trapping him in the Reikai and in Enma's Fortress no less. Just the setting, practically in King Enma's custody, sent nervous ticks through his criminal brain. Perhaps the 'host' was Enma himself, wanting to know where all his precious and recently stolen treasures had gotten to.

Best not to aggravate the situation when it could be avoided...

Touya led Kurama for quite some time and miraculously did so in silence more befitting of the somber Ice Master. The labyrinth turns of the Spirit World headquarters seemed endless and impossible to navigate, but the fox did manage to keep track of the left and right turns the ice demon made, hoping it would aid him in case of hasty retreat. The plush carpeting indicated that they currently walked through the royal wing of the fortress, reinforcing Kurama's suspicions about Enma's involvement in this little escapade.

Though…Touya's disturbing new personality did bemuse him somewhat.

"Touya," Kurama called calmly.

The ice youkai glanced back at him. "Hmm?"

"Why are we in the Reikai? A shinobi such as yourself would most certainly not be allotted such freedoms as this unless you've made some kind of deal with Enma. Am I wrong?"

Touya folded his arms and stared at the ceiling in open thought, another uncharacteristic trait Kurama didn't like. "Well…you could call it a deal. Yes, I've got a contract of sorts, but only distantly with Enma. Don't worry, though, Enma isn't interested in you right now. Far too busy trying to crush Yuusuke and control the Third Realm."

Kurama sucked a breath. "What?"

Touya clapped a hand to his face in mock appall. "Oh my, did I say that out loud? My apologies."

The ice demon turned suddenly to a large, black enamel door and violently kicked the entry way wide open. The door crashes inward, screaming on its hinges as it bashed into the wall and rebounded, but Touya had already entered and he caught the wooden with the heel of his hand, solid blue eyes lit up with reckless glee. Kurama carefully slipped in behind the shinobi, green-gold eyes examining everything with emotionless scrutiny.

"Your guest is here, tall dark and creepy! Should I hang around to wait tables or what?" he sneered, probably inappropriately.

Bright lights illuminated the room, many wax and faerie fire candles floating about or set about the room's furniture. The harmless scent of vanilla perfumed the air, but the youko suspected toxins and held tightly to the seed he'd used previously against Touya. Kurama narrowed his eyes, feeling his stomach worming a round the way it did whenever uncomfortable with something. The tall, arching marble ceilings, recently adorned with heavy velvet drapes of crimson, black and emerald green spoke of sensuous intimacy the way the long sloping dinner table with its elegant wood design and satin tablecloth did.

Frankly, he really didn't like it.

So when he spotted two large, throne-like chairs positioned at the two far ends of the long table and twin dinnerware laid out, polished and glittering on the table top his stomach elevated to flip-flops and a small measure of nausea began to take advantage of his squeamishness. As he continued to eye the table and the many covered dishes of delicious smelling delicacies and the single exit behind him…the only exit…he began to think he wasn't going to like who ever it was Touya called 'tall, dark and creepy'.

Then someone stood up from the seat at the far end of table, where the shadows had previously obscured him and Kurama felt his stomach had suddenly vanished from its place between the esophagus and large intestine, retreating and leaving Kurama to wish he could follow.

"Kurama. Lovely to see you again after so long…" drawled a slow, purring male voice, hypnotic and appreciative. "You've grown up a bit haven't you?"

Touya had vanished someplace between 'lovely' and 'grown up', off to infect people like he'd said he would, abandoning Kurama in the room with his impromptu host. The youko's immediate reaction, naturally, was to leapt up onto the table and attack with his most powerful demon plant life, but then again to rush in, throwing all his cards on the table might prove unwise. No doubt he'd planned for such a reaction.

The second option lay with that hopes that Touya had left the door unlocked when he'd made his exit and Kurama doubted that very much and his lock picking skills, no matter how good, could not get him through that door fast enough to escape his enemy sinking sharpened claws into his back. No.

He refused to run from this enemy.

So, with every ounce of self possessed dignity the deceptively young-looking redhead could muster without cracking a grimace, he dismissed his Rose Whip and pulled the near chair out for himself. Then he sank into the tall chair, feeling somewhat dwarfed by the size of all the décor about him and sat up straight, eyes narrowed into a feral slits of predatory hatred that touched him on a primal level.

His host smiled, having taken the liberty of removing his familiar metal face mask and laying it ominously on the table beside the salad dish. His pale angular face, the familiar haunting features that had so flitted through the fox thief's nightmares seemed to stand out with freakish clarity, framed by his trade mark black tresses, glossy and well kempt. His disgustingly lovely amethyst eyes drank the redhead in with sick intrigue.

Karasu poured himself a glass of dark, red-wine and swirled it in the delicate crystal glass before lifting it toward Kurama.

"To the end of everything, Kurama-kun," he toasted. "And to us."

Cheating death again…

Author's Note

Me: I hate to tell you this, but I have no excuses for my lateness save computer access. It's limited. No details available currently.

Cloud8.9: Sorry, she's crabby. Her family's too cheery for her and they all pisser her off every other minute of the day. She'd bounce back eventually.

Cheezit: No more talking!