Chapter: Onto The Fair

Disclaimer: I don't own any of the following characters, except for Keiyma Suriei.

The gang was walking along the street in a straight line based on their different walking speeds, or, more specifically, based on eagerness to get to the fair. Kuwabara was at the front, Yusuke behind him, then Kurama, Keiyma, and Hiei.

Keiyma kept turning her head suspiciously from the road ahead of her to Hiei. He noticed this and stared back at her. She started walking slower, so he did too. She got angry and stopped in her steps completely.

"What?" he asked her sharply.

"I don't like it when people walk behind me," she said, narrowing her eyes. "Especially people I don't trust."

"Please. I'm not coward enough to attack someone from the back." He snapped. "Especially someone so pathetic."

Keiyma tensed.

"I am not pathetic."

"Oh, shut UP!" Yusuke yelled. "Why don't you two just walk next to each other? Then nobody's at anyone's back, OKAY?"

They both fell silent and moved to walk side-by-side, still glaring at each other intensely.

"Maybe someone should stand between them," whispered Kurama.

"I will!" yelled Kuwabara, running over next to Keiyma.

Kuwabara smiled and put happily put his arm around her. Keiyma, incredibly unnerved with a strange man's arm on her, quickly shrugged it off. He frowned, but still seemed happy to be next to her.

Everyone was silent for the rest of the walk, except for Kuwabara, who was merrily singing the wrong words to the theme song of his favorite anime show. There wasn't a single person around who appreciated the noise.

Keiyma had been looking down at her feet while she walked, but as the noise around them grew, she looked up. Her eyes and ears danced when she found bright lights, giant machines, and cheery music. There were people smiling and laughing everywhere she looked.

"All right, let's go!" yelled Yusuke, running ahead of them, jumping up and down like a little kid. "Hurry up slow pokes, or I'll go without you!" Kuwabara ran over to him, grinning. However, since none of the others made any move to hurry up, the two simply waited impatiently for them.

They passed through the entrance and bought wristbands. Keiyma was a little self-conscious at how excited she was and tried to hide it, keeping a straight face and looking uninterested. The guys were all looking around, as if they were searching for something.

"Why don't I take Keiyma through the funhouse while you guys go check out the rest of the fair?" Kurama asked Yusuke, Hiei, and Kuwabara. They agreed and each one ran off to a different area.

Kurama brought Keiyma to a colorful building; the outside was decorated in pink and blue spots and all sorts of strange, abstract designs. They stepped through the doorway and Keiyma found she was surrounded with hundreds of reflections of her and Kurama.

"Race you to the end!" He yelled and then ran ahead, leaving Keiyma blinking behind him. She looked into her own eyes, which were strangely patterned over the walls. She started walking around and trying to find where Kurama had gone. Every time she thought she knew the way she ended up walking straight into a mirror.

After several tries, Keiyma started to get anxious and began running, which just caused her more injury. She rubbed her nose after a particularly hard collision with a mirror, thankful that it didn't break or start bleeding. Her nose had been broken several times in the past and was already quite crooked because of it.

Her paranoia kept growing within her and she began to feel as though she was trapped in this glass prison. Unable to contain her panic, she ran up as fast as she could and kicked through a mirror. She jumped backward to avoid the glass shards that flew around her. She walked through the path that was now available to her and pulled her sleeves over her hands in an effort to protect them.

Keiyma punched into the new mirror blocking her and ran through it. She continued to through the maze of mirrors, punching and kicking a straight path for herself. It took very little time before she reached the exit. She found Kurama there, staring, open-mouthed at the girl after seeing her punch the last mirror in her way.

"HEY! What the hell is going on over there?" Came a huge yell and the sound of someone approaching– fast. Kurama grabbed Keiyma and ran far away from the funhouse. They finally stopped in front of the Ferris wheel.

"That's NOT how you get through the funhouse!" Kurama said, flabbergasted.

"Well, you left me there! And I… I couldn't get out," she replied, pulling up her sleeves. "Am I going to be in trouble?" Keiyma asked, frowning at him.

"No, they don't know who it was," Kurama said reassuringly. "I think the fun house is going to be out of commission for quite some time, though." He chuckled, then looked down at his wristwatch. "The guys are going to meet us here in a minute or two."

Keiyma rubbed her knuckles as she waited. Kurama shot a sympathetic gaze as he saw them. The punching had bruised them and there was a gash on her left hand that would most definitely scar. Keiyma saw him staring and blushed.

"I guess sleeves aren't very good armor," she said sheepishly.

Before she could get a response, Hiei, Kuwabara, and Yusuke came running up to him.

"Any luck?" Kurama whispered very softly, though Keiyma still managed to hear. The three shook their heads.

"We couldn't find her anywhere," Yusuke whispered back.

"HEY! I KNOW! Let's ride the Ferris wheel! We can see the whole fair from there," boomed Kuwabara. They all stared at him.

"That's actually a... good idea," Yusuke said in complete disbelief.

"Hey, I'm FULL of good ideas," Kuwabara replied, pulling on his jacket collar in a cocky manner.

"Certainly full of something...," Hiei muttered.

"What was that, SHORTY?"

"We better get in line before it gets too long," said Kurama, pushing Kuwabara away from Hiei and the severe beating he was most definitely about to receive.

Keiyma was suddenly plagued with innocent curiosity.

She looked up as Kuwabara suddenly elbowed Yusuke and pointed over to the distance. She followed his direction to a girl with blonde hair that was tied into high pigtails at the sides of her head. She had a small heart-shaped birthmark on the higher part of her right cheek. She was wearing a bright pink dress and smiley vibrantly with a group of friends.

Kuwabara started walking toward the girl, Yusuke behind him, signaling for Kurama to follow. Keiyma, determined to find out what was going on, attempted to follow them, as well. Kurama put out a hand to stop her.

"Wait here."

"What's going on? I want to go with you," Keiyma tried to shout over the calls of the Ferris wheel operator telling her to take a seat.

"Nothing. I'll be back in a minute. Stay here with Hiei."

"What are you hiding from me?" she asked as the Ferris wheel operator began to get frustrated.

"It's... guy stuff. I can't talk about it, it's embarrassing," Kurama said.

Keiyma looked confused and somewhat disbelieving. But, before she could say anything, Kurama very gently pushed her and Hiei into the chair of the Ferris wheel and pulled down the bar. He waved goodbye and smiled to them as he began walking quickly after the two who had already left.

"Take good care of her, Hiei!" His voice echoed from the distance.

Keiyma stared, shocked, at Kurama's shrinking figure as he walked into the distance. However, strangely enough, everything else seemed to be getting smaller, too. She looked around the sides of her chair and realized she was being raised into the air. She frantically grabbed onto the sides.

"What are you doing?" Hiei asked, staring at her icily.

"I didn't know this thing went into the air," she replied shakily.

"You're afraid of heights? You've got to be kidding me."

"Shut up!" she whimpered.

The chair suddenly stopped at the highest point in the air, flimsily swaying from side to side. Keiyma bit her lip.

"Oh, didn't you know that it stops at the top? Why, that's the best part! Just you, a rickety old chair, and a fifty foot drop," Hiei teased wickedly.

Keiyma made a move to strike him, but stopped when she saw how it moved the chair. She put her hand down again, very slowly, so as to avoid moving it more.

Hiei noticed her carefulness and grinned. He started rocking the chair back and forth over and over again so that it was swaying viciously. He then laughed unkindly as her face became flushed with fear and anger.

Her palms were beginning to form a cold sweat, caused by her nervousness, and started slipping along the sides where she held on. She needed to find something else that she could get a better grip on. She looked around for something, but the chair was empty. Her eyes landed on Hiei.

"Why are you looking at me like that?"

Keiyma shuddered. She grabbed Hiei's arm and tightly squeezed her own around it, pulling it against her.

"Let go of me, you wench!" Hiei spat at her. He tried to pull his hand from her grip, but, her fear seemed to have greatly increased her strength, and he was unable.

Keiyma ignored his repeated insults and curses towards her, and closed her eyes, trying to get the thought of the fifty-foot drop out of her mind.

It was… surprisingly easy. Her mind felt completely calm. It was as if she'd never even left the ground. She was… cozy.

She felt the wheel slowly start to move again, bringing them back down to the ground. She exhaled deeply, relieved. She loosened her grip on Hiei as they got closer, and he, too, looked relieved. They stepped out of the chair and began walking away from the ride.

"Please, don't tell anyone about that," Keiyma pleaded quietly.

"You really think I want to go around telling people that you used me as your own personal teddy bear? I couldn't handle the shame of that."

"You are such a jerk!"

"Hn." Hiei watched as Keiyma sped off away from him. "Where are you going?"

"To the bathroom."

Hiei growled and then slowly walked behind her.

"Why are you following me?" Keiyma asked uneasily.

"People might have seen me come here with you. I don't want to be known for being associated with the girl who kept wandering around a fair, lost."

"Gee thanks, that's really considerate of you," Keiyma spat.

She kept walking towards the bathroom she had spotted. She stepped inside and shut the door behind her quickly. She walked over to the sink and turned on the hot water. It burned her at first, but she adjusted to it, and it began relaxed her swollen hands. She cleaned the wound she had received from the funhouse mirrors and then began to splash some water on her face.

Keiyma felt relaxed as the hot water dripped down her cheeks. She closed her eyes and savored the peaceful moment before wiping her face clean with her sleeve. She watched her reflection in the mirror and laughed, remembering Kurama's face when he saw her charging from the fun house.

Her smile quickly vanished when she noticed that hers wasn't the only face in the mirror. mirror. She saw the reflection of a pale man standing, bald, thin, and emotionless in the corner, staring at her. She sharply turned to face him.

"What do you want?" Keiyma asked, terrified. The man's face formed a grin, showing a mouthful of twisted yellow teeth.

"You," he whispered in an oily cackle, as he began to pull something up from behind him.

She would have at least tried to defend herself, had it not been that moment that Hiei chose to knock on the door and demand to know what was taking to long. She turned her head back from the distraction a second too late. An enormous amount of pain filled her head and everything went black.

O—o—O—o—O—o—O—o—O

Her head felt heavy, so heavy. She couldn't even open her eyes in the pain. Her surroundings felt soft and comfortable, much different than the cold and hard floor of the bathroom she had been in.

Where was she?

She was trying to turn to her side, but had not yet gained back total consciousness. The movements made her feel horribly dizzy. She was about to moan in pain, but silenced herself when she heard a voice from inside the room.

"Are you sure this is the right girl?" It was a deep voice that sent a shiver up and down Keiyma's spine.

"Yes, my liege, she came with the spirit detectives." Keiyma recognized the voice of the man who had knocked her out.

Spirit detectives?

"Those idiots... only one of them was with her, correct?"

"Yes. The one outside the door wasn't even paying attention as I slipped inside the back entrance."

"Fools."

Keiyma listened as she heard someone walking toward her. She heard the ragged breathing of someone close to her. For some reason, this made her feel horribly sick and thankful that she couldn't see the figure above her.

"It's strange to see such a powerful and important creature withering and completely at my mercy. I almost pity the girl," said the deep voice from above her.

"Bastard," Keiyma muttered, not realizing the effect of her talking until it was too late. She groaned as she heard the man give a chuckle.

"It seems someone was listening in on our conversation." The man with the deep voice suddenly put his face right next to Keiyma's ear and whispered, "Good to see that you're awake."

Keiyma shuddered and opened her eyes to finally see the man who was speaking. He was a middle-aged man, probably in his forties, with fairly long, dark brown hair. He was wearing an extensive black robe with a high collar. His eyes were hazel, and he would have been quite handsome were it not for the multiple scars covering his face.

Keiyma shuddered as she looked at the man. He made her feel empty inside and her stomach twist. As she peered into his eyes, she felt a sort of familiarity in them. It wasn't comforting, but she was certain that she had seen this man before, somewhere.

O—o—O—o—O—o—O—o—O

Hiei had past the full extent of his patience about ten minutes ago, and was now entirely fed up. He kicked open the door of the bathroom, ignoring the looks of the people near him. He stepped inside, only to find the room empty. He glanced at the door in the back and saw it was slightly open. He guessed that Keiyma had run off somewhere.

"Baka ningen girl…," he muttered to himself.

Hiei turned around to go back out the door when his foot suddenly slipped. He glanced down. In the dark he could just barely make out the small puddle of dark red blood.

"Damn it! They must have thought she was Myrani." Hiei seemed to disappear into thin air as he ran out of the room at a speed only he could.