Sorry for the long wait, but I was working on five other stories I'm contemplating on puting up. If any of you read my bio thingy, you'll notice that I said that I was going to only update ATOD. Who gives a damn. I felt like updatingthis so I did. Enjoy.
Fireflies Ablaze
Chapter Two
Hotaru stared sullenly at the only window that was the source of sunlight in the bleached room. She blinked her eyes lazily trying to comprehend where she was. Looking around the room she woke up in, she rubbed her right eye to rid it of blurriness and noticed the sprawled bodies of seven or so snoring teenage girls. Feeling her right eye twitch, Hotaru ran a pale hand through her short hair only for her to stop short when a nasty tangle blocked the flow of her hand.
After tugging fruitlessly, and making her head hurt, she sighed and gave up on her hair.
'I'll deal with it later…With a brush.'
Rubbing her eyes once more, the girl slowly got up from her place on the carpeted floor, and in a haze of sleepiness went for the bathroom.
Once having done her business, she stood in front of the mirror above the sink and nearly swooned a few seconds later in a sudden bout of light headedness.
Hotaru steadied herself on the protruding sink and stared at herself in the mirror. What she saw caused her dark eyebrows to furrow.
'Damn, I feel and look horrible...What on Earth did I do last night!'
Dark blue hair was tangled (that was to be expected), the whites around her purple irises were bloodshot and eyes glassy, while her skin under her eyes was a bruised color. She stuck her tongue out slightly in distaste, and found that her breath stank of a ranking smell.
Gagging, she quickly washed her face roughly and brushed her teeth with vigor. Then her hand sought out a brush, and ran through her hair without mercy.
When she finished, she threw her brush onto a shelf while opening the bathroom door in a flourish.
Feeling marginally refreshed, she headed toward the living room where she had woken up in. She jogged slightly, having a feeling that she should rush in what she was doing.
Quirking an eyebrow at her own odd thinking, she slowed to a moderate walk feeling stupid in her own dorm. Once in the white room, she noted that all her roommates and neighbors were still sleeping and had not moved an inch.
At the sight of them, she felt a slight depression of even knowing such people. Sighing, she instinctively checked the time on the kitchen clock and smacked her forehead.
'Gah! It's already 9:37! We're all late for school!'
About to yell and hit pans to wake her fellow students, a calendar mysteriously fell on her head causing her to see that it was Sunday not Saturday(1). But the recollection of the day did not calm her.
"Eyya! I'm late for the appointment!"
It caused her to yell out loud and scare a few birds into scattering but not wake the sleeping morons...Ahem.
Her dark hair flew as she rushed toward her room to change into something suitable. The large gray shirt and a pair of baggy sweat pants were thrown onto a random chair as a thin long sleeve black shirt was pulled on with a gray hooded shirt over it. Then she pranced around the small room in search of a clean pair of socks and pants. Her search led her to finding not one pair of good pants, but only a pair of semi-clean white socks. All other clothing were either stained or wrinkled beyond belief.
Mouth opened in disbelief, Hotaru raged at her two oblivious roommates.
'You stupid heads! It was one of your turns to do the laundry! '
Deciding that wearing sweat pants in public was much better than wearing only her underwear, Hotaru threw on her pj's and wrote a hurried note reminding her friends to clean up and to do the laundry while she was out.
Running to the living room, she placed the note on a random girl's sleeping face, and ran into the kitchen to grab the door keys off its hanger.
Then she jogged to the front door, leaping and jumping over the bodies littering her floor. But a few feet from the exit, her sock clad feet slipped on an unknown glassy substance that she only saw as a glance of shiny green before back flipping to avoid falling. She landed in a crouch in front of the thing she tripped on which ended up being a green bottle with...a beer logo wrapped snuggly around the middle.
Hotaru was completely speechless. Just to make sure it was alcohol, she quickly unscrewed the top and tentatively sniffed the small amount of liquid left.
With her dark bangs covering her eyes, she walked back into the living room and looked around carefully. She sighed, disappointed.
There were bottles of the same brand littering about within arms reach of each sleeping body.
Placing one hand on her hip and the other running through her hair she sighed again and turned toward the door.
As she unlocked the door, she slipped on her bamboo-like slippers that were sitting idly before the door next to her sneakers. Pulling the door open, she paused halfway in the doorway. (Hey that rhymed!)
She straightened and optimistically thought, 'Hey, at least I know that I don't get those legendary hangovers…although I did feel queasy this morning. Hm…'
Glancing back at the students flung about in the living room, she noticed that they were shedding away from the light of the window and door.
A mischievous grin spread across her face. They, unlike her, were going to have raging headaches and lasting hangovers.
Hotaru turned to the hallway of the dorm building and took a refreshing breath, thoroughly brightened up even though she was a 13 year old who drank beer the night before.
She stepped away from the threshold of her doorway and locked the door behind her. Checking the time on the dorm's hallway, she went her way out of the building hoping she wasn't late for her appointment.
Once outside, she started running toward the school gate, seemingly a dark blur to others. At the gate she noticed that it was locked showing she was late for her meeting. Tsking (You know, that sound you make when you're wagging your finger at someone disapprovingly? Tsk, tsk, tsk.), Hotaru looked around the area for any of the security guards or teachers. Finding none in her immediate sight, she leaped onto the column holding the tall gate up and onto the ground on the other side of the gate.
Once landed, Hotaru placed a hand over her eyes to block the sun as she turned around and looked at the gate estimating how big of a jump she did.
"Phew. It still amazes me each time I do that." (She finally speaks!)
The rusted iron of the gate was at least six times the size of Hotaru, and although she was short, it still is pretty huge. She smirked and zoomed off down to her right.
Over head, a distraught blue-haired girl hovered above a tree next to the school gate before floating after the curious ningen.
Genkai's Temple
Dark purple youki was lashing about everywhere and Yusuke was becoming anxious.
The dangerous dragon his friend had consumed was close to being unleashed and the ranting of Botan through the screen of the compact was not helping any.
Once on seeing the corpse of Yukina he had fished out the pink communicator and immediately contacted the ferry girl. Yusuke had expected Botan in tears or in a depression of some sort once he had reached her, so he knew something was off when she had answered with her trademark smile and cheery greeting.
He had sighed, feeling slightly guilty of being the bearer of bad news. Yusuke then told her of the situation at hand. But he was interrupted in his heated discussion with her by the tinkle of a hiruiseiki and then the yell of a name.
Yusuke bit his lip; if what Botan was telling him was true, was there a chance that Yukina could be brought back to life?
He snorted. 'If I was brought back to life with a crap-pot soul like mine, then it should be no prob for Yukina.'
However the koorime was still a demon, and from what he knew the king of the Underworld wasn't really fond of youkai of any kind. He furrowed his eyebrows in thought, then shrugged mentally.
'We'll just figure it out when we get to it.'
He tuned back in to see if Botan had stopped her rambling and screeching about the unfairness of it all or that an idiot was trying to take the matters of death into his own hands that she had started a few long seconds ago.
"-I'm a ferry girl for goodness sakes! Death shouldn't be handled by nimrods who think-"
Apparently not. He made a face and his thoughts drifted to the situation that was left at his house. Was Kuwabara alright? The idiot had seemed pretty out of it when they had left.
Yusuke snapped to attention however when he saw a black blur shoot past him and down the temple steps. He scratched the back of his head and sighed.
"Jaganshi Hiei has left the premises and has gone off for a refreshing killing spree…" he mumbled out, but Botan caught it and took it the wrong way.
She went on screaming, commanding him to go and grab Hiei before he killed any innocent ningen just happening to annoy him. Yusuke glanced to his side at a semi amused Kurama and shoved the noisy compact to him. Sweat dropping, Kurama fumbled slightly with the loud screeching compact and tried to reassure Botan that Hiei had not killed any humans nor was he going to. Yusuke idly stood there with Kurama, hands stuffed into his pockets.
Yusuke glanced at the mutilated Yukina in front of them and noticed a black cloak placed atop of her, covering her from sight.
He couldn't help but feel a flash of regret. Hiei hadn't been able to tell or convey in actions that he was Yukina's brother. And it was slightly doubtful that the naïve Yukina would have figured it out. Yusuke sighed wearily and heard a sharp snap behind him signaling the closing of the compact.
He blinked. Behind him? Discretely Yusuke looked in front of him and found that he was up close to the main doors with the covered Yukina held in his arms. His eyebrows furrowed, when the hell did he move? When did he carry or even touch Yukina? Blinking again he shrugged.
'Meh, must've been lost in thought or something…'
Maneuvering the body in his arms slightly, he slid open the shoji screen doors and looked behind him at Kurama. Seeing his friend's questioning expression, he said, "Well are you going to come in or what?"
Kurama nodded and slid the doors open more to give room for the girl in Yusuke's arms to enter.
After Yusuke placed Yukina on a futon in an adjoining room, he sat himself down on the floor mats with little grace, tired to the bone. Kurama was seated in front of him slightly slouching.
The red head smiled grimly.
"Well, it seems that we have another mission to complete."
Yusuke snorted, and Kurama continued.
"Botan informed me of Yukina's unplanned death and disappearance of her soul. But I am sure you know that already though."
He nodded, staring at the tea set sitting to hid right. Something was knocking against his head, telling him that he was forgetting something important. 'Te
"It's possible that what ever of who ever took a bite out of Yukina, ate her soul or has it contained in some sort of item."
"You mean like that Gouki you and Hiei used to work with?"
"Yes. It is a possibility for a youkai like Gouki to be around; however Koenma was not notified of any dark artifacts being stolen, or of a youkai without permission to be wandering around ningenkai. And soul eating oni only go for ningen soul as well as one's that are alive."
"Well since that's out, her soul's just wandering around the town or some other crack pot reason I can't think of."
"Mmhm," Kurama's eyes twinkled with amusement, "and you have nothing to worry about Yusuke, your darling Keiko is fine. It also seems that we have the duty of healing and guarding Yukina's body until Botan finds her soul."
"Guess we get to relax then, huh? We didn't even get three seconds of rest before Kuwabara went all wacko." Yusuke crossed his arms behind his head and toppled backwards, while Kurama stayed as he was waiting for a reaction he knew was coming.
It took a few more moments of silence for Yusuke to remember what Kurama had said before he sprung up and pointed a finger at his friend.
"W-what do mean about Keiko? She was here with Yukina! How the hell do you know!"
Kurama chuckled behind a raised hand and tapped his nose, "Yusuke I'm not kitsune avatar for nothing. I have a good nose."
Yusuke grunted and went back to his resting position, ignoring the snickering fiend in front of him. He closed his eyes and willed his body to relax, causing him to doze.
'Just as long as Keiko's fine…'
And he was out like a light.
Kurama soon lost his light hearted mood and stood swiftly gliding to the room containing Yukina.
He kneeled down next to the futon and ran a hand through his hair. Pulling out a small black seed, he placed it into the remains of her shoulder.
His hands then were raised over the gaping hole and directed his youki to the seed until a wriggling tiny fanged creature was brought forth by a tangle of vines.
"Ch." With a click of his tongue, Kurama skewered it with a strengthened pine needle. He then returned his attention back to Yukina's shoulder.
Looking at the hole carefully he stifled the urge to sigh.
Her shoulder was practically gone and the arm was only connected by a thick piece of skin of the armpit. The skin itself was shredded and torn around the edges of the hole. The broken ivory bone was seen while blood was still gushing out.
Although Yukina's soul was gone, her body as a shell, was still alive. Her demon healing had yet to kick in; with her soul most of her reiki and youki had gone. She would live, but if the bleeding didn't stop, then even Botan would be able to heal her.
Kurama slowly rotated his shoulder, this would take some time.
Placing his hands over Yukina again, he let the majority of his reiki, what was left of it, into her. Marginally, the skin and muscles healed themselves while bone slowly regrew.
As sweat slightly dampened his fore head, Kurama soon came to a slumped position placing his hands at his sides. He was panting lightly, and he placed a hand on his forehead, as if to stead off the incoming pounding headache.
'I did not get any rest from the mission before…I can't finish this...'
Kurama glanced to the shoji door blocking him from Yusuke and contemplated before reaching out with his energy and pulling a long thread of blue energy from his leader's rapidly growing aura.
'His energy shouldn't be regenerating this fast.' He glanced again at the general direction of Yusuke again. 'At the rate he's healing at, he won't notice me taking some of his reiki.'
Using the energy at hand, Kurama absorbed it into Yukina to boost her own healing. Seeing the skin and muscle tissue were healing together quickly, as well as the blood stopping, he leaned back into a comfortable cross-legged position and watched over the process.
Some time had passed in silence, and he estimated that it was around 4:50. Kurama leaned over Yukina and heard her breathing become distinctly easier to hear and the wound had only become a large area of tender dark pink skin.
His energy had not replenished as well as he wanted it, from using so much of his energy in such a short time. But since Yukina was healing so well with the boost of Yusuke's energy, he gently pressed the area of new skin, he probably wouldn't need to do anything more.
Kurama's eyesight was beginning to waver and he knew he would need to sleep or he would fall unconsious at some other without meaning to. In loath to move, he slid and scooted backwards until his back hit the wall of the room and leaned back to completely relax. Once his head was in a comfortable position leaning against the wall, he promptly fell asleep just missing his friend blur in and pick up the black cloak only to blur on the window sill with it on.
He also missed the small smirk on his face as well as the releif outlining his form.
Yes, Yukina would be fine.
Review people.