No Reason – Chapter 8

Disclaimer: Yami no Matsuei belongs to Yoko Matsushita and that's it.

AN: --; Another chapter. FINALLY!! … .. …I don´t know what to say. Hope you like it. Thanks for reviewing to shiny moon ( I finally managed a update!;), Kalong-chan, malika-azrael, Dje,Yanagi-sen, midori hitomi, Cary and Fluff Inc. Thanks a lot!!

To malika-azrael: Yes, there will be Yaoi between them! I´m definitely going to have it in later chapters. ;)

As ever, beta-ed by the talented Ryuke-Naoe.

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"Touda? May I talk to you?"

The black-clothed serpent-shiki turned at my question. From behind him I could see the stars sparkling on the nightly horizon. Although I recognised some of the constellations, they weren't like the ones on Earth or Meifu. Somehow they seemed to be more bright than usual. Maybe it was because the air was less polluted here. I don´t know. I was never the type to be calmed by watching the stars.

"Kurosaki-san."

It was less of a question than an acknowledgement of my presence. It was difficult to think of him as the same shikigami-type as the fierce Suzaku and Kurikara Ryuoh. Ouch, wrong thought. Quickly banishing it and others like it out of my head, I gave him a stern glance.

"I need your help."

At that statement, something flickered in his eyes. Just for a second though, and then it was gone. Touda lightly tilted his head. Seeing him with long hair still bothered me. "About what?"

I forced myself to remain calm.

"Kurikara."

Touda gave me a surprised look. "Ryu-oh? I don´t think I could do anything about him." For a moment, the depressing feeling of being powerless flickered over to me. Then it was gone. "As you know, I´m a fire-shikigami as well. Against him, I´d be utterly useless."

I shook my head. "I know. What I mean is…" I dropped my hand, feebly searching for an appropriate way to express what I wanted to say. "You know, I talked to him, Touda." The black serpent raised an eyebrow, gesturing for me to go on. Taking a deep breath and calming my heart, I did. Normally, people didn´t notice when I was nervous, but this time it was obvious, I simply knew it.

"When… when Suzaku was attacked today. Before it happened, I spoke to him. I… he… I didn´t know that it was him you were all searching as the intruder. I thought- I was simply too surprised. He didn´t act like he usually did."

Shooting the taller shiki a desperate look, I broke off, searching silently for the right words to continue. When I finally found them, they didn´t turn out as I had expected.

"I think I understood, then. Why they call him a god. That time… When I was speaking to Kurikara in my room – he wasn´t like normal. He was… I don´t know how to describe it. As if he´d completely changed his character." Meeting Touda´s cool eyes, I lowered my eyes, whispering. "He´s ancient, Touda, ancient. Not like an angry kid or some pissed-off fighter like usual, but a real god. Powerful. And he was worried."

Waiting for the words to sink in, I searched the expression in the serpent-shikigami´s face. It was unreadable. "He was uneasy. A …lot. I don´t think he actually wanted to come to Tenkuu." At that, Touda tilted his head in a silent question. I understood it nonetheless. Then why had he? "I- I think he wanted to warn me of something!! He kept repeating that there was something I had to know. And… I don´t know, he was simply acting strange!! As if his time was running out and he knew it.."

Stepping away from the railing, Touda watched me with a calm expression. "You think he´s being controlled." I nodded. "Yes." He considered it for some moments.

"…Impossible."

My eyes flew open at that. "W-What?! Why?!" Touda met me with a stern face. "…He´s too strong. No known method of mind-control would work on him. His youki wouldn´t allow it." I stared speechlessly at him. How could he say that? Touda was very powerful himself and had been mind-controlled as well! Sensing my internal uproar, Touda sighed.

"I´m sorry to destroy your hopes, but whatever he does, it´s of his own free will."

I felt my eyes narrow into a glare. How could he dare say that? How could that puny snake dare claim that Kurikara would do something like that without even considering that option while he himself was using it as a completely legal excuse for attacking Tsuzuki, his own master!! I must have been radiating some of my emotions off, because he took a few steps back. It didn´t help to quell my anger.

"You were." I all but hissed. "Raitei controlled you to attack Tsuzuki! Why shouldn't somebody else do the same to Kurikara?"

At my outburst, Touda took another step back, but remained firm otherwise. "It´s not the same. I was wearing the machine that he used to take control the whole time. There was nothing like that on Kurikara." I shot him a defiant glare. "There was nothing you could see. Kurikara was bleeding heavily from his forehead when I talked to him. He said it was nothing of importance, but what if it were?! You say that he´s powerful. Too powerful for normal control mechanics! What if somebody decided to put one directly into his head?!"

"That would change the situation, of course. He was wounded at his forehead, you say? Do you remember exactly where?"

I whirled around at the new voice. Behind us stood Rikugou, the stargeezer, in all his six-eyed glory. Behind me, I could hear Touda shift. "You were listening?"

"Why, yes." Rikugou nodded, blinking with all of the four eyes in his head. I grimaced. The two in his palms were probably blinking too. Grinning lightly, he stepped closer, giving us a little wink. "With the volume you two used, I couldn´t help it, even if I hadn't wanted. So Hisoka´s wondering if Kurikara´s being controlled?" He grinned again. I couldn´t help but feel reminded of Watari by his expression. I´m not so sure if that´s a good thing, though. With all the skill and knowledge he possessed, the blond scientist tended to blow far too many things up for my liking (aside from his whole ´let´s-make-a-gender-switching-potion!´-obsession.). I didn´t know if I wanted to tell this peticular piece of information to his shikigami version.

"That´s quite possible in my opinion."

On the other hand, what harm could it do? Rikugou watched me calmly. "I was wondering along the same lines, actually."

Touda watched him with a sceptical expression. "You believe him, too?" Rikugou countered the suspicious look with a cheerful grin. His eyes, however, stayed serious. "Of course. Why shouldn´t I? What he says makes perfect sense." Suddenly, within seconds, his whole posture changed from friendly-amused to menacing and dangerous.

"Think about it, Touda. There are many out there who desire power. If it´s their own or somebody else's whom they just simply control doesn´t really matter to them. Kurikara Ryu-Oh is powerful, my friend, even more so than any of us might possibly imagine. So if you´re asking me if I think that Kurikara-chan is being controlled, I don´t know…"

He gave Touda a serious look that could have matched with SohRyu´s glare of death easily.

"…But if you want to know if there's somebody that wishes to control him, then yes, there is. And he most definitely as hell will strike him down at every chance presented."

I couldn´t help but shiver at those words. They made the strangely ardent resistance of the petite Kouryu against our bounding much more understandable, in some way… I felt a rare twitch of guilt nag on my conscience. How many before me had desired the dragon god´s strength? How many had sought out his forge, ignoring the exile; how many had demanded to be tested before? How many had there actually had been?

And that was just after he had been banished…

Kurikara must have had armies of aspiring masters, not just one or a few. I wasn´t listening to what the other shikis said anymore, this new thought being too much. I had never paid a thought to whoever might have strived for Kurikara´s assistance before. Sure, I had known that Tsuzuki had tried (and had royally been kicked out), but about others trying as well… I never had really thought. It was only just me. Me, me, me, ME and his power. Never had I really paid attention to what was behind those powers I desired. (Aside from the fact that it was pretty vicious, hot-tempered and had a serious inclination to constantly be in an extremely foul mood.)

"How-… How old is he anyway?"

"…What?"

Rikugou and Touda were both staring surprised at me, stunned by the broken quality my voice held and the sudden question.

"Hisoka-kun… What do you mean? How old is who?"

"Kurikara RyuOh…"

I gave Rikugou a serious look. Despite it, I couldn´t quite keep the pleading edge out of my words as I continued.

"Kurikara Ryu-Oh… How old is he? Does any of you know?"

"….." The both shikigami exchanged surprised looks. It seemed that they had never paid it much thought as well. After a few minutes, Touda finally turned his head away with a jerk.

"…I don´t know."

Making a step forward, Rikugou gave me a sorry look. "I have no clue either. Ever since I met him he was…" The blond shikigami broke off, not really knowing how to approach the touchy issue. Lowering his head, he said, "I´m very sorry. Having been his friend before the Great War, I should have paid more attention to it. But since there´re many shikigami that don´t look their age…" He shook his head. "The only thing I can tell you is that he´s about the age of SohRyu. If not a bit older..."

I blinked in surprise.

"Maybe… even older than SohRyu…?"

"Surely doesn´t act or look like it, does he?"

Rikugou grinned meekly, before his face turned slightly sad. "Kurikara-chan always tended to make fun of his own childish actions himself. That was before the war, of course." Almost as an afterthought, he added. "He was also a very gentle and a patient friend, back then…" The blond shikigami´s voice had turned sad at those last words.

I blinked, surprised.

"Rikugou… I didn´t know you two were friends once."

"Yes. It´s not very likely, is it? Me and my striving for knowledge and Kurikara with his ´let's worry about it later´ attitude… We got along greatly, though. Ever since the incident shortly before the outbreak of the war, he´s changed…"

He looked up, a sudden cheery grin replacing his previous sullen mood. I couldn´t help but feel uncomfortably reminded of how Tsuzuki could be sometimes.

"But that´s kind of obvious, isn´t it? The more important matter is to get Kurikara back to his senses now, regardless of whether he´s being controlled or having a bad day."

Touda nodded sternly. All our talk, the serpent shiki had stayed silent. Now, he seemed to have made his mind up about something. I hoped it was in our favour.

"You´re right. The Ryu-Oh on rampage is nothing Gensoukai can withstand that for long. We have to stop him."

I nodded.

"Right. Let´s go!"

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One thing we had conveniently forgotten in our glorious plan of confronting the Kouryu was how we were supposed to actually find him.

Luckily this part took care of itself rather fast, as we were unexpectedly found by him. Except it didn´t even make the effort of trying to look like the usual Kurikara RyuOh anymore. I don´t know how it was for the others, but to me it was shockingly obvious this time. The whole way he held his body had completely changed; from the normal way of moving like a bored tiger (the worst in the area and knowing it), it had changed into a slouching crouch in a poor imitation of the original.

It almost looked as if his body was being moved by an untrained puppeteer.

Watching his abnormally shiny, red eyes light up as he noticed us, I felt a cold shiver creeping down my spine. No. That was not my Kurikara! That was never Kurikara RyuOh… The ´imposter's´ lips pulled into a huge, sadistic smirk as he cautiously sauntered closer to us, grinning all the while. Serveral parts of his kimono were covered with so much blood that the bright pattern wasn´t even visible anymore.

´Kurikara´ smirked, his eyes following the direction mine and Rikugou´s shocked eyes had wandered. Only Touda had remained calm, though he too had visibly tensed at the Koryu´s appearance. Kurikara grinned.

"Boo."

Raising my eyes, I met his dark red orbs with a shell-shocked look. Staring right into their glassy depths, I heard a disbelieving whisper that I recognized only afterwards later as my own.

"I… Who are you? There´s no way in hell that you´re Kurikara…"

The shikigami´s features switched into derisive laughter at this disbelieving question. Resting his hand against his hip in an all too Kurikara-like motion, the ´thing´ snickered haughtily, displaying a set of pointed fangs in the process.

Giving me an assessing look, 'Kurikara' finally answered.

"Kurikara really has to be pitied if even you as his own shinigami don´t recognize him. Poor Kurikara-chan…" he snickered. "But you´re right. I´m not him. Though…" Still smirking, he ran a hand over the torso down to Kurikara´s small hips. "…this is the RyuOh´s body. Ah, quite nice, isn´t it? And with so much power stored in it…"

Suddenly changing to serious, he gave us a grim smile.

"I´m the new owner of this body and his power. Fudo MyuOh!"

CONTINUE…?