(Tuesday, November 8, 2005)

I stayed home from school today and read a book. It was entertaining.

I think I have over 100 reviews on this story... I realized I haven't been keeping track... Oh well... Let's check... 116. Yay.

I don't think there's anything objectionable in this chapter... So, onward toward the land of reading the chapter I finally posted after making you all wait over a week.

CHAPTER ROKU
Fightin' Words

Hiei woke up slowly, his brain refusing to respond for some reason. He quickly regretted waking up when a splitting pain shot through his head. A groan of pain escaped him.

It took him another minute to notice he was clinging to fabric, pressed close to something warm that distinctly smelled like Kurama. The stench of alcohol floated into his brain next and he groaned again. He opened his eyes to confirm that yes, he was laying on the couch nuzzled up against Kurama like he would nuzzle up to Shadow. Kurama was awake and looking at him.

"I'm drunk, aren't I," Hiei muttered.

"You were drunk," he corrected. "Now you're just hung over."

Hiei groaned again and relaxed. "I didn't... do anything to you, did I?"

Kurama's eyebrows went up. "No! Why would you ask that? Is it regular for you to be a sex-monger when you're drunk?"

"No. You didn't do anything to me, did you?"

"Hiei! I wouldn't!"

"Youko would."

"I wouldn't let him."

Hiei shrugged slightly. "I should get up."

Kurama chuckled. "If you could. But I doubt you can. Stay here." He moved over Hiei to get off the couch, picked up all the bottles off the floor, and glanced at Hiei.

"I drank all those?" he asked in a voice that was quiet to keep his own head from hurting worse.

"Yes, Hiei."

"Huh. That was probably pretty stupid, wasn't it," he stated intelligently.

"Yes, Hiei. But you forgot about Shadow for a while, didn't you?"

"Yeah... But now I have a headache."

Kurama shook his head, smiling, and left the room. Hiei closed his eyes and rolled over, curling against the back of the couch. He felt something move behind him and rolled over again, coming face to face with Kokuei.

"Told you so," she taunted. He winced.

"Don't talk to me. It hurts my head."

"I warned you, but nooo," she continued, ignoring him. "No, you just had to go and get drunk. Did you benefit in any way from it? I didn't think so." She then slurped his face, causing him to cringe with disgust, and turned away. He reached out and scratched behind her ears before she could get away.

"Stupid dog," he muttered. She snorted, but said nothing more. Kurama came back and handed Hiei a mug of coffee.

"It doesn't work, but if you think it does, it might."

"Why not just a whole bottle of pain relievers?" Hiei asked, sipping the hot drink.

"Because that's not healthy."

Kokuei jumped up on the couch at Hiei's feet and lay down. Kurama sat on the arm and waited for Hiei to finish the drink.

"I wanna go to Reikai," the hiyoukai announced after a couple minutes. "See how Koenma's doing in finding them."

The redhead nodded. "In that case I probably should give you some sort of pain relievers, shouldn't I. Koenma wouldn't be pleased to know that without Shadow, you go and get yourself wasted."

"Oh, shut up. I'm going to take a shower." He sat up, putting his mug on the coffee table. There was a pause, then he said, "I wonder how they're doing, alone with all those bishounen."

"Let's not think about that, shall we, Hiei? I'm sure they're still being perfectly loyal to us. Yusuke's there to keep an eye on them."

"OH, SESSHOUMARU! I'M SO SORRY!"

Shadow flung her arms around him and hid her face against his chest. "I lied! I should have prepared you for the worst! But I led you to believe that it wouldn't be any big deal!" She sank to her knees, arms sliding down along with her to subtly feel his ass through the leather pants before wrapping around his right leg. "Will you ever be able to forgive me!"

The remaining eight bishounen were gawking. Especially Miroku, who, of the rest in the room, knew Sesshoumaru best.

"Me either!" Eclipse added, flinging herself to her knees and wrapping her arms around his left leg, but unfortunately lacking the proper alibi to feel his ass without it being obvious that she was doing it with every full intention of doing it just because she wanted to, not because she had her hands all over him anyways so why not grope his ass while you're at it, like Shadow did.

"What am I forgiving you for?" he asked. Eclipse, sobbing against his leather pants, paused suddenly.

"For not protecting you from that vile, disgusting, insidious Karasu slime!" She went back to sobbing.

There was a short pause, in which the only noise in the room was the sobbing of the two guilt-ridden girls, before Miroku spoke.

"Um... If I may be so bold, Sesshoumaru... What in the world happened to you?"

"I was brutally raped," he replied sarcastically. Miroku's eyes widened. Not only had Sesshoumaru just spoken sarcastically, but what he had said was amazingly un-Sesshoumaru-like. If Miroku were to guess one thing that Sesshoumaru would ever joke about--hell, he never would have ever even guessed that Sesshoumaru would joke, or even could joke--it certainly would not have been about being raped. Not even most normally sarcastic people joke about something like that.

The monk laughed nervously. "That's not really what I meant."

"I know that." Then, under his breath, "Stupid git."

Miroku continued as if he hadn't heard, and perhaps he hadn't. "I meant... Why are you dressed like that?"

"It's punishment," he stated, "for allowing a couple morons hide in my sleeves and jump out at a rather inopportune moment."

"Hey!" Shadow snapped, jumping up and pointing at him accusingly. "Any moment would have been inopportune! She said she was just waiting for the right moment to stuff you into this sinfully tight, sexy outfit! She would have done it even if we had never jumped out of your sleeves!"

"So it's sinfully tight and sexy now?" Sesshoumaru said coldly. "Funny. Only ten minutes ago you were saying it was atrocious."

"I was?" She screeched again and again fell to her knees, hugging his leg. "How will you ever be able to forgive me?"

"I won't."

"You WON'T? How could you not forgive me! I did everything I did in your best interest!" She was on her feet and angry again.

"Convincing me to kiss Karasu was in my best interest?"

"You did WHAT with Karasu!" Miroku cried, disbelieving.

"Yes it was! If you hadn't done it voluntarily, they would have dragged you in there and he would have forced himself on you, and there would have been pain and bloodshed in the end, and for all we know, it would have been yours!"

"Cretins like Karasu could never hurt me."

"What if the fanatics chained you up and warded your strength, like they said they would? You have to admit, you were at a disadvantage against your brother there, wearing those skintight leather pants that are drop-dead sexy and show every beautiful contour of your sexy legs."

"Perhaps I was," he said through clenched teeth, "but kissing him was still the most disgusting experience of my life."

"Well I've done it and it never hurt me!" Shadow snapped.

"AHHH!" Eclipse screamed, leaping back from both of them (she was on the ground hugging Sesshy's leg, for those of you that forgot). She held her head with one hand and pointed at the bickering pair with the other. "Shadow, you're arguing with the God and Lord of All! You're disrespecting Sesshoumaru with your petty words! You're treating him as if he's your equal instead of your EXTREME SUPERIOR!"

"FUCK YOU!" Shadow screamed. Everyone cringed from the pitch of her voice. "I WANT HIEI!" Without warning, she flung her arms around Sesshoumaru again and held him tightly around the middle, trembling.

"She's really upset," Hiro muttered. "I didn't think it was possible."

"Good," Yuki muttered. "Maybe she's not so shallow after all."

"I heard that," Shadow hissed quietly, but didn't move away from Sesshoumaru. She nuzzled her face against his chest, and he gently placed an arm around her shoulders.

Aww, tender moment.

"I want Kurama," Eclipse muttered spitefully, arms crossed, "but you don't see me breaking down and crying about it."

"Oh, get stuffed!" Shadow snapped. "Hiei's been beside me for three years!"

"And you've never gone without him before? I think you just wanted an excuse to cling to Sesshoumaru like a little whore."

Shadow growled. "I don't NEED an excuse to cling to Sesshoumaru like a little whore! I do it all the time anyways!"

"That you do," he agreed.

"Oh, shut up. You like it."

He snorted. "You don't sound very upset anymore." Shadow smugly noted that he didn't deny it, but she said nothing about it.

"I get over things very quickly when Eclipse bitches at me. And plus, I have you to cling to."

"Joy."

Hiei, pumped full of pain relieving drugs, led the way to Koenma's office. He walked in unannounced and without permission and went straight up to the toddler's desk.

"Anything yet?" he asked. Koenma's scream was heard from behind a pile of paperwork that was so tall it hid Hiei completely from the toddler's point of view. The fire demon walked around to the other side of Koenma's desk and looked down at him, arms crossed.

"What's all this, Koenma?" he gestured to the three-foot-high stacks of paper. "What could you have possibly been doing to get so much work piled up?"

"This bishounen abduction has caused a major influx of paperwork! I have dozens of oni at work trying to find them, but so far we've reached 2010 and there's nothing so far!"

"2010? You've only searched five years in several days?"

"We are searching Makai and Ningenkai AND Reikai, every moment of every day in every place in all three worlds! Cut me some slack! I have as many people on it as I can spare! I've considered pulling a few off to help me stamp these papers!"

"You pull any off, and I'll stamp your FACE. With my foot!" Hiei threatened.

"Hiei, you have no people skills whatsoever," Koenma snapped. "You also have very little grip on political leadership. I'll do what I must and I'll do what I can. As for your precious girlfriend, when I find her, there is no guarantee we will be able to reach them any time soon. Shadow's antics when you were kidnapped will not be repeated by you. There were more reprocussions than I'd like to think about after her little stunts."

"Really?" Kurama asked. "She never said anything about that."

"Of course she didn't! She didn't care! Even if I'd told her that what she did is worthy of prison, she would have laughed at me and danced away and fallen out a window or something! But would she have died? NOOOO! Even if she strapped bombs to herself and flung herself out the top window of a sky scraper onto a field of two-foot spikes, she won't die! She'll never die! God knows what it will take to kill her!"

Hiei had a very horrified look on his face.

"You sound like you've been looking into this extensively, Koenma," Kurama muttered. The prince looked up with wide eyes, as if he just realized what he'd said.

"No! I haven't! I swear!"

"If someone puts out a hitman on my girlfriend, you're the first person I'm going to accuse," Hiei said.

"Hiei, I haven't been researching methods of killing your precious girlfriend!"

An oni appeared out of nowhere from behind the stacks of paper with another stack. "Koenma sir, where should I put these?"

"THERE'S MORE!"

"Yes sir."

"Just put them there." He gestured to the shortest of the piles. The oni set his stack of sheets on top of that one, and it waved shakily. Hiei backed away, sensing the imminent implosion.

Every single stack of papers fell simultaneously on top of Koenma. Hiei snickered from the safety he'd fled to in the corner.

"Well, Koenma, I'd hate to keep you from your work. I trust you'll notify us when anything comes up?" he said innocently.

"Don't you dare leave, Hiei!" he snapped from under the papers. "Surely you're bored without Shadow." Crawling up on to the top of the papers, he continued, "So I think you should stay here and help me stamp."

"I don't think so. Good-bye."

"STAY!"

"Nope. I'll consider helping you after Shadow's back." He headed for the door.

"WHEN SHADOW'S BACK YOU WON'T HAVE ANY FREE TIME!"

"Sure I will." Then he was out the door, Kurama on his heels.

"That went well," the fox remarked.

"Koenma has made next to no progress whatsoever. It will definitely be more than a week before he finds them at this rate, unless they're somewhere around 2011..."

"He's doing his best."

"Uh-huh."

Dinner for the bishounens was a very hectic ordeal. Yusuke and three others went without, Roy was taken off to some unknown place to eat a romantic meal with his fanatic, and Inuyasha was overjoyed to see that his attempt at capturing his rabid psycho brother had gained the fanatics' forgiveness. Shadow and Eclipse got nothing again, so Sesshoumaru donated his food to them.

"But don't you need to eat too, Fluffy?" Eclipse asked.

"Not ningen food."

"If you don't eat human food," Shadow mused, "then what do you eat?"

"It doesn't matter."

"Do you eat anything?"

"Yes."

"Are you just too dignified to eat in front of us? Is eating food too low and menial of a task for you?"

He raised an eyebrow. "I eat. So does Eclipse." He turned Shadow's head to look at the other girl. She let out a strangled cry. Half the meal they had to share was already missing. She lunged and knocked Eclipse away, then quickly grabbed the plate and shoveled the rest of the food into her mouth. Sesshoumaru sighed and rolled his eyes. Chewing and swallowing quickly, she returned to his lap and wrapped her arms around his neck, resting her head against his chest and humming happily.

Yusuke walked over to the group and sat down heavily. "About sick of this yet?" he asked the demon lord.

"What, this,"--he gestured to Shadow and Eclipse--"or this?" and gestured to the room.

"The room. I know you're sick of these two."

"Yes," he answered. Shadow sat back and looked at him, offended.

"Sesshoumaru! I take great offense at that statement!"

"Oh well."

"Yeah, Shadow. I don't think he really cares that much."

"Fine. His loss." She moved to Yusuke's lap. He yelped.

"Hey! No. Hiei would kill me." He shoved her away and she fell on her face.

Meanwhile, Miroku, Inuyasha, and Koga were sitting off to the side watching the proceedings. The monk sighed wistfully.

"Why does Sesshoumaru get the girls?"

"Why?" Inuyasha asked incredulously. "Who cares why? I'm glad they stay with him and leave us alone. Those two are lunatics."

"I heard that!" Shadow called across the room.

"Yeah, what of it!" Inuyasha returned. The girl stood up.

"I'll kick your ass, that's what! You won't even know what hit you!"

"You know secretly you're really very jealous of your older bro cuz he can get the ladies without even trying," Eclipse added.

"Jealous? Of Sesshoumaru? Sesshoumaru's a loser."

"Them're fightin' words, young lady!" Shadow snapped angrily, and with that, took off across the room at top speed. Inuyasha jumped to his feet and Koga and Miroku lunged out of the way just in time. The girl made her attack at speeds everyone but Yusuke and Eclipse were startled to see she possessed. She gave Inuyasha quite the workout, attacking him without a pause for breath, no hits making contact but not giving him time to make any swings at her.

Inuyasha lunged backwards at least fifteen feet and prepared to put Shadow on the defensive, but a very unexpected explosion of flames quickly foiled that plan. She burst through her own attack and punched Inuyasha square in the jaw. He was sent flying backwards and hit the floor, rolling a few times before he managed to jump to his feet. Then he managed to get Shadow on the defensive while she was striking poses with her eyes closed.

POW!

Shadow went flying. Kenshin nearly screamed.

"You shouldn't hit girls, that you shouldn't!"

"She's hardly a girl!"

"HARDLY A GIRL?" Shadow shrieked. At that point, it turned into a wrestling match. Shadow strangled Inuyasha, Inuyasha pinned Shadow, Shadow punched Inuyasha, Inuyasha picked up Shadow and flung her. He lunged and grabbed her in mid-flight and proceeded plow her into the ground. Or rather, the person who happened to be sitting directly where she would have hit the ground.

Sesshoumaru had a very intelligent thought before the two snarling halfbreeds smashed into him: "Aw, damn."

And then he was suddenly plowed backwards, Shadow on her back on his chest and Inuyasha on top of her. Before either of them had recovered from being knocked back, Inuyasha was back on the offensive, grabbing a handful of Shadow's shirt and not seeming to notice, or perhaps just not caring, that Sesshoumaru was under them both.

A bright light filled the room, accompanied by the loud electrical ZAP! that announced someone's arrival. Seconds later, when everyone could see again, there stood Karasu. He turned around and looked at them, eyebrows raising.

"Why do I miss all the fun things!"

Inuyasha, straddling Shadow and holding her closer by a handful of her shirt, fist clenched to punch her, suddenly realized that he was sort of straddling both her and his brother, and it probably did look very wrong. He jumped away and simultaneously Sesshoumaru shoved Shadow off him and got up. She flopped to the ground like a corpse and didn't move. The demon lord got to his feet and dusted himself off unhappily, more as a show of dignity than because he would have any dust on him.

Karasu smiled and walked closer, and Sesshoumaru stepped into a defensive stance, ready to snap his light whip and lop off the crow's head at any given moment.

"Don't worry, Sesshoumaru-sama," he purred. "I won't bother you any more than Shadow and Eclipse do."

"Like that says much," the demon muttered. Inuyasha snorted.

"Hey, I missed you two kissing earlier. Why don't you do it again?"

CRACK!

Inuyasha was sent flying backwards by a particularly angry lash of his brother's whip, and crashed into the wall head-first, proceeding to crumble to the ground and twitch.

"Touchy, touchy," Karasu muttered. "You should relax, Sesshoumaru."

Shadow jumped to her feet, seeing the impending onslaught of pain from two directions aimed at Karasu. Sesshoumaru tensed, and Eclipse was already rocketting across the room towards the crow. Before the inuyoukai could act, Eclipse made a flying tackle and slammed Karasu to the ground. Shadow made a flying tackle simultaneously and knocked Eclipse off of Karasu and onto the ground.

"STAY!" she ordered, and lunged from her friend onto Karasu, straddling him. He blinked up at her innocently. "You."

"Yes, Shadow? Oh, thank you for protecting me from Sesshoumaru yesterday in the bath, that was really sweet of you."

She cocked her head to the side. "I wasn't aware I had."

"You didn't. You tried to kill me. I was being sarcastic. Now, what were you saying?"

There was a short pause, during which Shadow looked baffled and clueless. Then she snapped her fingers.

"Oh yeah. You seriously need to leave Sesshoumaru alone. He's currently in a very bad mood. In fact, he's always in a bad mood when you're around, now. Keep your mouth shut, do not talk to him. He is superior to you. He could kill you in the blink of an eye."

"I know," Karasu murmured, smirking. Shadow's eyes widened.

"Ew, and that turns you on, doesn't it."

"Yes."

The girl shuddered. "Keep it to yourself."

"I'll try. But he's just so beautiful."

"I'll give you that. But remember Kurama! What happened to loving Kurama?"

"...I'm mad at Kurama."

"Why? Because he sedated you heavily? Whatever happened to that one kid... uh... what the hell was his name?"

"Ryosei."

"Yeah, what happened to him?"

Karasu shrugged. "I fucked him one last time after he took care of me, then I left."

"You would. Ingrateful little shit."

"I am not ingrateful!"

"You're ingrateful. You're more ingrateful than me. Everyone puts up with me, and I'm very grateful to them. Hiei puts up with me, and I'm grateful and he gets rewarded. Kurama puts up with me and I'm grateful, and he--"

At a nasty look from Eclipse, Shadow nearly choked on her own tongue.

"And he, uh... Doesn't get rewarded in quite the same manner as Hiei, but, uh..."

Karasu took her moment of discomposure to switch their positions, pinning the startled girl to the floor and straddling her, then getting in her face. "How do you reward Hiei, hm?"

Her eyes narrowed. "You're really horny, aren't you?"

His voice grew quieter, but didn't decrease in its lustful tone. "I kissed Sesshoumaru, Shadow. If I weren't horny, I would have to have absolutely no sex drive."

She paused. "You have a point."

"Thank you."

Yusuke cleared his throat. "Um... You, uh... If Hiei knew about this, he'd be mad."

"Hey," Shadow said, "this was all totally Karasu's idea. And all he's doing is sitting on me."

"Straddling your hips when he's horny."

"Sitting on me. And telling me how much he wants to... uh, not finishing that sentence..."

Karasu smirked and whispered, "How much I want to fuck Sesshoumaru."

The leather-clad demon lord turned and stalked across the room to be as far away from Karasu as possible. Shadow looked from Karasu to Yusuke to Sesshoumaru, back and back and back, then shoved Karasu away and ran across the room, tripping halfway and falling on her face.

"I JUST HAD A BISHOUNEN OVERLOAD!" she announced happily. Picking herself up, she dusted off her clothes and glanced at the general gathering on the other side of the room.

Yuki, Sesshoumaru, Tsume, Hiro, Saitou, and Aoshi were all standing in the same general vicinity. Shadow looked like she was about to melt on the spot (especially considering how Tsume and Sesshoumaru were in tight, tight leather). Eclipse, a short distance behind her, was drooling all over herself.

"Sesshoumaru, we were so distracted with you that we almost forgot there's multiple other extremely hot older men in this room..."

"Great," Yuki muttered.

"MR. SEXY!" Eclipse screamed. She flew over to him and threw her arms around him. He cringed and tried to push her away, but fanatics, as he knew, have iron grips when they don't want to let go. Shadow wandered over to Hiro and tossed an arm casually around his shoulders.

"So, Hiroshi--it was Hiroshi, wasn't it?"

"Yes."

"Yes. So, Hiroshi... What've you got going on in your life?"

"You mean other than this?"

"I mean, in your life. Not in this crappy excuse of an existence we're existing right about now in this shithole room."

Yuki was suffering pretty much the same treatment, only worse.

"Do you have a girlfriend, Mr. Sexy?" Eclipse asked, leaning back to look up at him.

"Not... exactly..." he muttered, irritated.

"Not exactly? What do you have, a wife?"

"No."

"Then what do you have? A boyfriend?"

The man frowned. Eclipse's face took on a look of wonder.

"You have a boyfriend? You're gay?"

"No."

"You have a boyfriend but you're not gay?"

"YOU HAVE A BOYFRIEND!" Shadow abandoned Hiro in the blink of an eye and shoved Eclipse to the ground. "That is so awesome."

He groaned.

"So, what's his name?"

A glare was his answer. She crossed her arms.

"Don't tell me and I'll start guessing."

"No."

"What's he look like?"

"It doesn't matter."

"Fine. How old? Older or younger?"

"Go away."

"Younger?"

"No."

"Older!"

"No."

"The same age?"

"No."

"Then he's older?"

"No!"

"Younger, then! How much younger? One year? Two? Three, four, five?"

"Go away!"

"What's his name?"

"Shut up."

"Let's try a different approach. What do you do for a living, Yuki-sama?"

He sighed. "I'm an author."

"Really? Awesome. Why kind of books? Horror? Sci-fi? Fantasy?"

"Romance."

"Romance?"

"Something wrong with that?"

"You don't strike me as the romantic sort of guy."

"I don't have to be romantic to write romance."

"You have a point. So, what's your boyfriend do for a living?"

Yuki sighed again.

"Is he an author too?"

"No."

"Doctor?"

"Far from it."

"Is he... a sanitarian?"

"No. Would you drop it?"

"What's his name?"

"Drop it!"

"I'll start guessing. Eclipse, help me out."

"Will do!"

"You may want to sit down," Yusuke advised from a short distance away. "They won't quit until you tell them."

"Is it Aki?"

Yuki glared.

"Akinori?"

"Akio?"

"Atasuke?"

"Baiko?"

One hour later...

"Jiro?"

"Nooo..."

"Josuke?"

"Noooooo!"

"Kagehisa?"

Yuki hid his face behind his hands and sighed heavily. Sesshoumaru and the others had long since taken a nice long walk to the other side of the room.

One more hour later.

"Is it Sanzo?"

"Satoru?"

"Satoshi?"

"Sawao?"

Ten minutes later.

"Shoyo?"

"...no..."

"Shozo?"

"...nope..."

"Shuichi?"

Sigh.

"Shuichi? It's Shuichi? Are you serious that it's Shuichi? Omigod, that's so freaky! Eclipse's boyfriend's name is Shuichi! What's his last name? Does he have red hair?"

"No."

"Phew! Good thing, Eclipse. Otherwise I would have started thinking that perhaps Kurama was bisexual and cheating on you with this gorgeous hunk of man here."

Eclipse sighed. "Thank the lord. Though, I wouldn't be too opposed to knowing Kurama was cheating on me with some really hot guy."

Yuki flopped backwards onto the floor and flung his arms out. "Are you done?"

"Not quite," Shadow said, suddenly straddling him. His eyes widened. "Can I ask you a personal question?"

"N--"

"How big is your--"

"SHADOW!" Yusuke snapped. "Leave the guy alone, for the gods' sakes!"

She slouched and sighed. "Fine, fine... Good night, Yuki-sama... See you in the morning..." Getting up, she dragged her feet over to where Sesshoumaru was sitting. Eclipse said her good-byes as well, hugging him quickly, then got up and followed Shadow with a much more lively step than the other girl's dejected shuffle.

"Sesshoumaru," Shadow muttered, plopping down on his lap entirely without his permission or consent, "I'm tired."

"Then go to sleep."

"Aren't you tired?"

"No."

"Yeah right. You're tired. You had a very trying past few days." She moved to face him, straddling him, and put her hands on his shoulders. "With your permission, of course, I would like to give you a massage."

"No."

"I thought so." She began gently massaging his shoulders.

"I thought I said no."

"You did, Beautiful." She continued. He rolled his eyes, but didn't protest further.

Karasu just won't give up. So sorry. He won't give up for another couple chapters... Like, maybe until the end of the story, or when somebody shooks him in the head with a silver bullet... Or if I decide to make him give up... I dunno... I haven't written in a while, and I don't remember what I wrote last... Such is life.