It would be unfair to give the history of one of the main characters without divulging a tale from the other, now wouldn't it? Read on.
"Mr. Yomi, we're doing all we can to locate the whereabouts of Mr. Jaganshi-"
"If you were doing all you could you'd search downtown!" snarled Yomi, seething with such ferocity that Detective Botan began cowering.
"I'm sorry, Sir," Detective Koenma stammered. "But downtown is, uh, out of our jurisdiction..."
Yomi grabbed the detective by his shirt collar and lifted him up. "Did you know that when a person lies, their pulse quickens?" he hissed. Koenma began to sweat.
"Please," he tried, "Mr. Yomi, we don't even know if Mr. Jaganshi is in downtown-"
"I know something you could do to remedy that," Yomi scoffed.
"- And we also have to worry about the abduction of our witnesses-"
"Who may well be in downtown also! I tell you, 'Detective', the circumstances of this entire affair can be linked to the Youkai- and I'm sure everyone here has an idea of their work. You've no business standing around here doing nothing!"
"Mr. Yomi!" barked the Lieutenant (Botan and Koenma cowered at the sound of his voice- 'What an ogre!' they both thought). "Harassing my detectives won't recover your business partner any quicker. I'll have you know that we haven't searched downtown yet because there's been no suspicious activity-"
"Shush!" Yomi barked, listening to the television in the nearby coffee room. The news was on; he recognized the voice of the reporter, a young lady named Koto.
"Here behind me stands the renowned Minamino house, now thought to be headquarters of the notorious Youkai gang. Inside the house right now there is said to be a clash between two high-ranking gangsters including, as rumors have it, the legendary 'Yoko'- a criminal that is supposedly so cruel and blood-thirsty- Oh, wait a minute, it appears that some men outside the Minamino house are looking at us... and now they're coming this way... and they're pulling out weapons... Quick, Jiri! Save the camera!"
"Yeah," said one of the cops. "I heard that one of those gangsters was setting off explosives."
Yomi gripped the lieutenant's shoulder, so hard he felt something crack. "Well then," he said, smiling coldly and wishing he could see the expression on the other man's face. "I believe that is perhaps a little out of the ordinary, eh Lieutenant?"
"Well now, Foxy," Karasu said coolly. "I suppose you never listened in your school health classes when they said that alcohol is a drug that slows the reflexes."
"Gee, Karasu, how did the D.A.R.E. program ever let you get away?" the Yoko sneered.
Karasu narrowed his eyes and yanked on the rope, smirking when he heard the redhead draw a breath. "You may want to suck it in," he said briskly. "I like tying my ropes tight." He grabbed the Yoko's jaw and forced his face upward so that instead of the floor he gazed upon his own reflection in the vanity. "Take a good look at your male self," he said smugly, running a hand over the bound gangster's flat chest. "For I assure you, if I can help it, this area will be much bigger next time you look in the mirror."
He turned the Yoko's chair around so that he faced Hiei, whom Karasu had bound in a similar fashion. "Now sit tight, both of you. I have to tend to a few nuisances outside, and have the car brought around. And then you," he stroked the Yoko's hair, "and I shall go on a little trip."
"Go to hell!" the Yoko shouted after Karasu.
"You first, Suichi," Karasu shot back in a high-pitched voice as he shut them in.
Hiei rolled his eyes. "Perhaps you're not in the best situation to be hurling insults at him."
"Shut up!" He craned his neck around, and then began shifting his chair backwards and sideways.
"Who's Suichi?" Hiei asked.
"What?" growled the Yoko, shifting his weight in the chair to better propel it.
"I've heard him call you Suichi before, several times. Is that your real name or something?"
"No!" he snapped.
"Then why does he call you that?"
"I don't know," the Yoko sneered. "Why does he call me 'Foxy'?"
"Well, why does he?"
"Shut up," he grumbled.
"I told you about me," Hiei taunted, a little amused by the redhead's aggravation. "Why should you get to stay enigmatic?" The Yoko glowered at him. "So, who's Suichi?"
"Suichi is dead," the gangster replied shortly.
Hiei blinked. "Did you kill him?"
This question earned a shrug. "Possibly."
"Possibly? You don't know?" He noticed that by now the Yoko had edged the back of his chair by a small trash can. He watched his hands struggle against the ropes, fishing into the trash, grasping hold of half a broken vodka bottle.
"Where people like Suichi are concerned, it is very difficult to determine just who and/or what destroys them." The Yoko's fingers worked along the bottle's broken part, pressing against the jagged pieces. Hiei flinched as he saw the glass tear the flesh and blood began to drip down the bottle's sides. "It could be a number of people or things, really. Insensitivity, lack of acceptance, hatred, betrayal by a family member, alienation, et cetera..." A chunk of glass finally gave under the pressure, separating from the rest of the bottle. The Yoko's hands seemed to fold against themselves as he began to saw through the ropes binding his wrists with the glass.
"Somebody in Suichi's family betrayed him?" Hiei asked. "Hated him?"
"Yes," said the Yoko through clenched teeth, wincing as the glass sawed through and cut into his skin. "Suichi was a stupid boy who believed the best in everybody and everything. And it backfired against him." He grunted as he worked his arms up from under the ropes against his torso. "He lived in this house, you know."
Hiei furrowed his brow. "And you took it from him when he died." 'Or when you killed him,' he added mentally.
"It would depend on how you look at it; however, Suichi only lived in this house, he did not own it. The one this house belonged to died after he did. And I 'took' this house from no one."
"How did you know Suichi? Was he a gangster too?"
The Yoko snickered at him. "Suichi, a gangster? No, Suichi was a good boy who liked school and science and flowers."
He noticed that the Yoko used the term "boy" rather than "man." "Did he die young?"
"Yep," the Yoko grunted, heaving a sigh as he freed one arm from his restraints. "Barely an adult when the world quit spinning and he fell flat on his face." His tone was that of bitter amusement.
"But you spoke as though he were pushed."
"He was. He was pushed and couldn't catch his balance."
"Who pushed him?"
"I told you," the Yoko said, annoyed. "It's hard to concentrate on any one cause, be it a person or a thing."
Hiei did some quick thinking, wanting to learn more about Suichi. "Just who was Suichi?" he asked.
"Karasu could come back anytime," the Yoko said testily. "You aren't worried enough to not ask tedious questions?"
"You didn't plan to kill me, why would he?"
"He has nothing to gain from you dead or alive," hissed the Yoko. "He doesn't want your company like Sakyo did."
"Oh yeah," Hiei said suddenly. "Sakyo wanted Makai Enterprise, but how were you going to benefit?"
"Are you even listening to me!" the redhead snarled.
"Yes, but if you truly thought Karasu was a threat, then why would you take the time to answer all my questions?" The Yoko glowered. "What kind of life did Suichi lead?"
Green eyes rolled in irritation, an annoyed sigh was heaved. "Not all of downtown was originally a part of downtown, if you understand my meaning. This neighborhood and the surrounding area was part of an area once known as the Makai District- ah, your Yomi and Mukuro grew up in said District"- Hiei blinked at this information, wondering how the Yoko knew that- "... Though I believe that if you look on a map," the Yoko continued thoughtfully,"this area is still referred to under that name."
Hiei recalled seeing such a map before. The city was divided into three areas- the upper- and middle-class homes and businesses belonged to the Reikai District, some of the urban aristocratic grandeur mixing with the suburbs of the Ningenkai District, while the less refined parts of town fit into the Makai District. "Many years ago, when Suichi Minamino lived still, the neighborhood lay on the borderline between the Districts Makai and Ningenkai, though nowadays that border has shifted considerably and this house is now nowhere near it. This neighborhood, though it resided in the Makai District, was rather classy and populated by people who, speaking stereotypically, probably belonged in the suburbs of the Ningenkai District or uptown in the Reikai District, but could not afford property in either area. Despite that hindrance, the people in this neighborhood pursued the lifestyle lived by the 'upper-class,' I'm sure you can imagine what I mean- 'fine living' and that sort of thing. However, there was one thing that the ones these people imitated had that, save Reikai or Ningenkai property, they could never attain: gardens. The homes in the other Districts generally had lush, maintained gardens. The Makai District can barely sustain common grass.
"And so all the yards in the neighborhood went without vegetative adornment, except for one. Would you care to guess which?"
"Suichi liked flowers."
"Yes." The Yoko had by now freed his other arm and was at work cutting the ropes that bound his body to the chair back. "Suichi lived in the Minamino house, this house, with his mother, Shiori. Suichi had a vivid green thumb, and the yard and house was graced with the perfume of roses, jasmine, lilies, honeysuckle, wisteria, irises, and many other pleasant-smelling flora. He tended to a kitchen garden of herbs and vegetables for Shiori. He oversaw the growth of berry bushes and even a few petite trees. He did all of this to please himself and Shiori, who wanted so much to buy a home outside of the Makai District. She had a nest egg, to which she added spare money monthly, money set aside to one day make this dream of hers a reality. Perhaps she would have reached this goal much sooner, except she spent a lot of money so that Suichi could attend an exclusive private school in the Reikai District. For you see, Suichi was very intelligent, a prodigy, and the school's administrators practically got down on their hands and knees to beg that he attend, even giving him a bit of a scholarship.
"And Shiori was more than happy to spend every cent necessary so that her son could attend a school worthy of her son's gifts. She wanted Suichi to receive the best education possible, and from there pursue a distinguished career, and then to marry a nice responsible girl and raise the heirs to the Minamino bloodline in one of the 'better' parts of town.
"Of course, this devotion was not one-sided by any means. Anyone who knew the Minamino family said that theirs was the ideal mother-son relationship. Suichi worked hard at school, achieving top marks in all of his classes. When he turned sixteen he began to work part-time in a convenience store downtown, contributing the majority of his earnings to Shiori's nest egg. By this time the gangsters began to emerge from the deeper parts of the District, and the convenience store was the target of petty robbery, but never on his shift. Despite his mother's pleas, Suichi continued to work at the store."
"The gangsters hit Suichi's shift," Hiei guessed. "They killed him."
The Yoko narrowed his eyes. "One should never make such assumptions without hearing everything first. Moving on... On weekends Suichi would sometimes work the night shift, and during one of these shifts local gang members decided to hold up the store again. They were bullying a cashier two registers down from Suichi. Suichi stood up to them; one of them pulled a gun on him." He appeared thoughtful. "Suichi might have died that night, but then the customer he'd been waiting on pulled out his own gun, aiming it at the gangster."
He heaved a huge sigh once he'd finished cutting through the ropes, taking deep greedy breaths as the frayed coils fell to the floor. "Oh man," he sighed. "Whoa. I tell you, the only thing that compares to that is taking off a corset laced up too tight after a long day."
"I wouldn't know," Hiei said dryly.
"Eh." The Yoko waved him off. "Anyways," he said, working now to free his legs. "It turned out that Suichi's customer was even more thuggish, if that's the right word for it, than the gangsters holding up the store. He was young, worked alone, and these common brutes were terrified of him. He told them to get their hands off of Suichi and to get the hell out. He told Suichi that he admired his courage, and he left.
"But he came back, every day he came back, even if it was just to buy a newspaper and a candy bar. Every time Suichi worked, this vagabond, Kuronue, would appear, always coming to Suichi's register. And every time, he would wait until he caught Suichi's eye, and then he would smile and wink, and say something that one would expect from an Edwardian noble in a movie, not a vagabond in the downtown. Suichi was completely unaccustomed to this flirting- he'd been the object of more than several girls' infatuation at his school, but to his knowledge no man had ever thought of him in such a way before- but realized that it was not entirely unwelcome. After several weeks of this had passed and Kuronue asked if he might see Suichi in less capitalist surroundings, he accepted without a moment's hesitation."
The Yoko sat up and flexed his arms and legs. Hiei could see the cuts and blood and rope burn on the redhead's hands and forearms as he began undoing his binds for him. "Suichi and Kuronue's first 'date' was hanging out in a bar/grill downtown, and then the alley behind it, but the latter's charm and good humor made up for the less than charismatic surroundings. The two began going out like this frequently, progressing to where Kuronue would bring Suichi back to his place, a loft above his boss's mechanic garage. The two had known each other for almost a year, and it was an overcast afternoon that, to the shimmering of wind through the tree branches and the music of the rock station on the mechanics' radio downstairs, to the smell of oil and the fragrance of an impending rain, the vagabond and the prodigious student made love up in the loft."
Hiei stretched his limbs after the Yoko freed him. "What are you going?" he asked. The Yoko had knelt down, feeling along the floor boards.
"Hush up; I know what I'm doing."
"What happened to Suichi and Kuronue? Did the latter kill the former?"
"No," said the Yoko sharply. "Kuronue loved Suichi and vice-versa. Suichi was well-liked by most everybody he knew, but Kuronue was the first person other than Shiori whom he felt he could tell anything to-"
"What had he told Shiori about Kuronue?"
"Oh, my dear Koorime, your powers of perception fail to surprise me." Hiei wasn't sure if the Yoko was being sarcastic or not. "Shiori knew that Suichi would go out often to visit a friend, but knew it was normal for a boy to go see his friends and have a good time. She knew Kuronue's name, knew he had a job in a garage, but knew very little else. Suichi wanted to wait, until he knew that his and Kuronue's relationship was for sure, and then he thought it was time. He sat his mother down one summer evening after dinner, and told her that he was in love with Kuronue, and that Kuronue was in love with him." The Yoko put his fingers into the space between two boards and, to Hiei's surprise, pulled one up as though it were nothing.
"As I told you, theirs was thought to be the perfect relationship between mother and son. Suichi wasn't worried at all- he knew that she would be happy that he was in love, just as he would be happy if she were the one in love."
By now the Yoko had removed half a dozen floor boards, and was crouched down in the crawl space, digging through crumbly installation and dust. Hiei stood by the edge of the hole, looking in. "Your tone's sardonic," he commented.
The Yoko made a sound that was like a combination laugh and sneeze. "Shiori's mind was polluted by ill-based stereotypes and phobias..." He uncovered several objects and lifted them out of the crawl space. Hiei quirked an eyebrow: unopened bottles of liquor and cartons of cigarettes, a shoe box, a whip and a scythe. "What?" the Yoko asked. "I shared this room with Karasu" - the redhead shuddered involuntarily as he said the madman's name- "how else do you propose I arrange my personal possessions so that he cannot find them?" Hiei found it almost amusing that the Yoko would view toxins such as alcohol and tobacco his 'personal possessions.' He eyed the scythe; it looked like the ones used in the Feudal Era- if this was genuine, he could certainly understand why the Yoko would hide it away from someone like Karasu. He examined the whip curiously; it appeared to have no value, just a common whip. "What?" the Yoko jested. "I would have thought that, looking at me and such, you might have guessed my quirks?"
Hiei glanced at the Yoko. "Wouldn't that be an ill-based stereotype?" he asked. "What did Shiori do?" However, he had an ill feeling that he already knew.
He earned a contemptuous look. "She was outraged; Suichi had never seen her as such in his entire life, ever. Shiori slapped him across the face, and asked in a tone most unlike her normal sweet voice if he would like to collect his clothes before he left her house or if he would like hers instead, as he was perverse enough to like men as only women should."
"What?" Hiei demanded. "She kicked him out of the house, just like that?" The Yoko sneered at him.
"I find it amusing," he mused coldly, "how oblivious some people are to the realities of the world we live in, how astounded they are when their minds suddenly awaken to the cruelties and wickedness around us. And that you, what with your history that you've shared with me, would be surprised by what I've just told you, well, that just makes this ironic hilarity increase in its value, in a sick sort of way. Yes, Shiori cast Suichi, her only child, out of the Minamino house, but not before saying the most terrible of things to him. And he, having always possessed a certain, subtle naivety about him, was confused and upset by all of it, wondering how someone he had known to possess the demeanor or an angel, and a face to match, could deal him such verbal poison with a serpent's tongue; how his own mother could hate him for such a miniscule thing."
Hiei was not sure how to comment. Yes, he had been ostracized by his fellow Koorime, but given their culture and history, he had never expected otherwise. And at least he'd had his mother's love to the end... "What did Suichi do after his mother kicked him out?"
The Yoko looked up at him- from his vantage point and the lighting of the room, Hiei noticed for the first time that the cross-dresser's emerald-colored eyes had a gold hue to them- a side-affect from extreme alcoholism, he figured. "Suichi had only one year left of high school," the Yoko began slowly. "And after that, probably the choice of various prestigious colleges that would be more than happy to have him and his brilliant mind. The world would be his oyster, as the old saying goes- he could have done anything, if he'd wanted to. The boy had great aspirations, dreams for the future. However, that was before being exiled from the only home he'd known for his seventeen years of life, being exiled by his own mother. That night he left her house, he went straight to Kuronue's loft, and there he stayed for some time, he was so depressed. At the summer's end, he did not return to school, surrendering his dreams and trying to forget that he'd ever had the potential to fulfill them, despite Kuronue's constant insistence that he could still make it at any time, if only he gathered the will to do so again."
Here he paused for a moment, and then proceeded. "Had it not been for Kuronue's love and support, Suichi probably would not have lived for long after being tossed out by Shiori. Eventually, the darkness that had swooped down upon him lifted enough that he began to leave his and Kuronue's bed, and then the loft itself, and after that the garage... With time, he began to roam about Kuronue's neighborhood- well, it was his neighborhood now, too- and got a job in an old shop that specialized in valuable antiques and curios- though why the owner would set up shop with such merchandise in such an area of town, they never figured out..."
He trailed off. "But despite the fact that he did get out of bed and did summon the will to live, Suichi never was the same boy as he had once been ever again. Kuronue was aware of this, and Suichi himself knew and acknowledged the fact, but no matter what, he found he was unable to retain that exact persona he'd possessed prior to the wounds Shiori inflicted upon him that night. This betrayal, this empty feeling, ate at him for some time, gnawing away at his spirit, until eventually Suichi died altogether."
He watched Hiei intently, trying to decipher his expression. Finding that he could not, he resumed searching through the contents of the crawlspace, keeping his head down so that his hostage- or was the billionaire his former hostage now? - could not see the stinging brightness gathering in his eyes.