Chapter 5
Rain pattered across the ground. Soaking the ground of a field lightly. Awakening, Shuuichi blinked. It took a few moments for him to fully understand where exactly he was. For a moment, he allowed his eyes to flick back shut. With trouble, he tried to summon why he felt so relaxed. Memories trickled back to him in an unnaturally slow manner. He could only think back to Hiei sitting next to him on the corner of his bed in his dormitory while an ancient lullaby drifted past their ears.
Coming to think of it, he knew it hadn't been Hiei singing. It was just crazy to think that he'd be doing something that loving for him. As it stood, he didn't believe Hiei knew any ancient languages. The closest thing would be the language that the strange book was written in. Somehow, though, he felt that it wasn't the case. It had almost sounded something like he'd imagine that strange language to be in that book he was reading for English. What was that language called again? Oh, yes, Elvish. He frowned at how difficult it had been to simply collect a simple memory. A haze hung over his brain impeding his ability to think clearly. Getting back to his original point, the language had been much too whimsical to seem remotely human. He tried to recall the words, but he simply was unable to do it. All he felt like doing now was going back to sleep. More problems hanging on the horizon kept him wide awake. He had no idea where he was or how he had gotten there. Briefly, he had considered it to be a dream. No matter how odd it seemed, everything was much to real to be any dream.
He found himself frozen when he tried to move his limbs. Not only were his muscles completely numb, but bound as well. It took him a minute to figure out that there was also a cloth drawn tightly around his mouth as well. He willed himself to speak out despite how hard he tried. About when he was ready to give everything up, he heard a voice speak out, directed at him. "You can't move, can you?" the feminine alto asked his. Flicking his eye suddenly to the side. A young girl sat right next to his head. She wasn't tied either. He narrowed his eyes to slits as best as he could. How she looked, he automatically assumed she was the enemy. He studied her curiously. She was rather pale, clad in an unadorned kimono. She looked young, yet still womanly at the same time. Sliding a hand across his forehead, she frowned and wiped it on her kimono sleeve.
"You've got a horrible fever, and you're sweating. I'm beginning to wonder if they're intentional on killing you with this drug." She then slipped he hand to the artery on his neck to check his pulse. Her frown increased. Not angry at all, she held a concerned aura about her. He was still studying her face in wonder. Her eyes were of the oddest color, a color completely unique in itself. He only knew one person who had the same eyed. Deep crimson orbs burned themselves in his mind. She patted his shoulder sympathetically. "Poor thing, I wonder how you got dragged into this." He was now beginning to consider her to be the enemy. But then who was she? He was upset that he was unable to ask her any questions.
"Yasuda, what were you doing? I thought I told you not to go near him. You don't want to be tied up too, do you?" Yukina looked up quickly to a brown haired man who had just walked up. Shuuichi could sense her fear as she bowed low to the ground. "Gomen, Kurada-san. It must have slipped my mind." With that, she left the two alone. Shuuichi watched her go wordlessly. What he had just heard still had yet to click in his mind. Kurada knelt down next to him, and did as the other girl had done. His hand quickly grazed over his wrist to check his pulse and went up to his forehead to check his temperature. He didn't have any sympathy like the girl had. Instead, he smirked, ruffling his hair. He really didn't like this guy all that much. He looked at his eyes. This man's irises were colored an odd shade of magenta.
A silence passed, in which the man set next to Shuuichi. Out of the blue, he said something completely random. "You might not want to try to move. I'm supposed to give you more of this drug if I see it," he commented quietly. He brought a syringe into Shuuichi's view, making sure that he was able to see it well. Quietly, he waited for the man to speak. This was his only source of information, even if it was from the enemy. He shivered slightly from the cold night's air.
"You see, it's as paralyzing drug, a depressant. Like I said, you had better watch yourself, as I said. The drug's strong, and if you're given an overdose, you could easily die from heart failure. That's why you're so out of it now, we had to give you a generous dose so there isn't a chance you'll surprise us." He informed, his tone cool and emotionless. It made Shuuichi almost shudder, the very nature how he said it. He tried to give Kurada the most questioning look he was able to muster at a time like this. He was able to perceive it easily, understanding what he was trying to ask.
"Mind you, I'm not telling you this for beneficial purposes. I was just ordered to warn you before you do something drastic. Come to think of it, don't worry about you own life, its Yasuda Hiei and his sister you should worry about. One wrong move from any of you will cost all of you dearly." Shuuichi gave him an incredulous look. Sniper laughed at it. The very tone he had spoken this in sounded like he almost… knew.
"Do you really think I didn't know about this, Koizumi? It's my duty to keep an eye on Hiei. Don't tell me you think that your pining is so well hidden someone could turn such a blind eye to it." This almost made Shuuichi cringe. Actually, he decided that it was most likely that he would've had his entire body not been numb. Was it really so obvious that people could tell? He felt a slow flow of blood move past his cheeks. Though it wasn't as noticeable as if he had regular blood flow, the blush on his cheeks was really quite obvious.
He looked briefly at Shuuichi again before rubbing a hand roughly across his cheek in a frightening matter. It was a gesture that told Shuuichi that the worst was most likely to come soon. "He'll be coming for you and Yukina, though. Yasuda is much to obsessed with his sister's safety to turn it down. You're just an added bonus. We may not be sure if Hiei will even care if you're gone or not, but it will make it all the better if he is." He shivered lightly, still cold from the night air. It was making his nerve endings all the more numb. With a roll of his eyes, he took off his jacket and laid it over Shuuichi's body. He felt heat practically radiating of the form while he shivered. His fever must be really bad. He looked up to the sky, kept in reality by the faint chatter of the boy's teeth in the background.
Hiei was back at the campus still kneeling in the room. He was sure Shuuichi hadn't been stupid enough to run away. Botan was keeled over, a complete and utter mess. He rolled his eyes while she sobbed, screaming all the possibilities of what may have happened. Somehow, rape, starvation, injury and death all seemed quite likely to him. However, the signs pointed to one thing, and it was one thing that he preferred the least. He'd just have to head back to his own room to confirm something. Botan was still shrieking, and it was only a lucky chance that none of the teachers had taken notice. He'd managed to drag her somewhere out of earshot of students and teachers. Now he paced, cursing himself for letting the defiant signals that it may happen go unnoticed. He looked back to the mess of a girl curled in a fetal position at his feet. She cared too much for her friend and most likely had an anxiety disorder. He snorted and grabbed her wrist.
"Calm yourself, women. If you keep acting like this, your friend's fate will be sealed. If you can just shut up and move maybe you'll have enough sense to make a plan to help Koizumi." The girl growled and snatched her hand out of his grip, sitting up long enough to give him a harsh punch in the chest. Her tears scattered and she hurriedly brushed them away. Keeping herself in a sitting position, she replied in a harsh voice.
"You don't know anything about Shuuichi! You don't even care about him!" he growled at her words. She surely spoke correctly in the fact that he really didn't know all that much about Shuuichi. Her last statement was a question of whether or not he really did care. Hell, he barely knew Shuuichi but he still felt in a way responsible for him. He'd met Shuuichi a few years ago, but hadn't cared to get to know him. After all, most of the students here weren't all that concerned with trying to really make friends with him. Why should the redhead be any exception to the rule? All he'd ever had was girls feeding him crap about sincerely wanting to date with him. Always, it was because people claimed that he was attractive. Every single day he made sure that he made up for it by being as cruel to people that crossed his path as possible.
He sighed and turned to face the window. The girl who was sobbing didn't seem to notice the lack of attention he paid to her. She was really, genuinely worried. He saw why she was given reason to. He was gone without a trace or a clue to where he may have gone. He wouldn't have been anywhere other than here if he truly were on campus. Shuuichi was a strong person, but he had been pretty weak from exhaustion earlier. He was so tired to a point that Hiei easily believed that he hadn't got any sleep at all the night before. He could remember seeing how quickly Shuuichi fell to the comfort of the bed, his head resting softly on the pillow, as he lay curled up waiting for sleep to claim him. In that moment, Hiei had sensed an odd harmony between them. The silence had almost wanted to make him curl up next to Shuuichi and sleep as well. However, he had chosen to give the boy solitude not even a few minutes later/
He looked down and grabbed Botan's wrist, dragging her off in the direction of the boy's dormitories, near where Shuuichi's was located. After pulling the unlocked door open, he threw the girl inside and slammed the door shut behind him. Botan looked around almost eagerly, as if hoping to see Shuuichi kneeling on the ground doing a homework assignment. Sadly, to her dismay, there was no such sight to be found. Hiei looked around carefully for any evidence hinting towards a sign of a possible struggle. He hadn't locked the door behind him when he left that morning, thinking that Shuuichi would be okay alone.
To really be truthful, he never locked his door. The students here were all mild-mannered and made sure that they kept to themselves. There was never a case where he had heard of anyone entering someone's dormitory without permission. It was unheard of, especially in most citizens of Japanese descent. He took slow and careful strides toward the bed. The covers were pulled back, unkempt and messy. He had made sure that Shuuichi was covered up before he had left the room. This, however, lacked much of the little that Hiei knew about the redhead's personality. He knew defiantly that Shuuichi was a very neat person, almost a perfectionist. He began to look around the folds of blanket for any other type of evidence. Though his suspicion was low that he would find anything here, it always paid off to check.
A flash of white caught his eye very suddenly caught his eye as he turned over the sheets. Even Botan saw it as the object fluttered to the ground. She had stopped crying only a few moments ago. Quietly, he went to pick it up. Brining it closer to his gaze, he found out that it was a sheet of plain while paper, folded into quarters. He snarled softly and opened it up. Botan made her way over to him and took a look at it. Botan took careful steps towards Hiei, curiosity fluttering. She squinted as she approached. The language was rather… odd. She could barely recognize what it was; though she knew it must be some language at least loosely based off of Latin. Of course, Hiei must've been able to read it perfectly. He immediately headed towards the door, a look of complete and utter disbelief on his face.
The only thing that stopped him was Botan grabbing on to him softly. She still looked concerned and most of all, very clueless. "I'm going to get your friend back, okay, Shimokawa? Are you going to allow me that, or are you just going to make me stand here all night until Koizumi's dead?" He roughly jerked away from her grip. Automatically, the woman looked down, her expression a mix of fear, uncertainty, and shame. He sighed in an annoyed fashion, making her shrink away from him automatically. Hiei paid no mind to it. For him, such a thing was actually quite common. He was about to go without saying anything else to her when she stopped him dead in his tracks.
"Yasuda-senpai, please be careful. You'll bring back Shuuichi alive, won't you?" she asked him in a voice softer before. She was saying this as a plea now, begging for him to help in the seemingly impossible situation. He could see why Shuuichi always stayed around her so much. Though it didn't seem like it, she was an extremely good friend to Shuuichi. She and the redhead had become an almost inseparable pair. Everyone knew that they weren't anything much more than friends. They were much to alike for a relationship to ever work out.
"So long as you make sure that the teachers don't know that I'm gone, I'll promise you. I swear that if you don't keep your mouth shut, though he'll die of you say the slightest word to anyone about our disappearance." He could clearly see Botan shiver at his threat. He really wasn't planning on killing Shuuichi, but it was something that would certainly ensure that she kept her mouth shut. If he did this quickly, he could be in and out with Shuuichi before it was time for everyone to be back in their own dormitories. Maybe if he was lucky he could help Yukina.
"Just bring back Shuuichi safe, and I won't say anything." She replied. Hiei nodded, waved, and ran off. He had and exact idea of their location. He had thought that they left Japan, but seeing as they had just taken Kurama, he was now able to pinpoint an exact location.
Darkness flowed over the sky a few hours later, rumbling threateningly. Rain had already pelted the two sitting under the sky. While Shuuichi lay weakly, shivering violently under the cover to the odd man's coat, the other man sat calmly under the tree as a light rain drizzled down.
"Any time, Koizumi-kun. I'd suspect that your Hiei would be here within a few minutes. Due by the rate he figures things out, I bet you he figured it out just a little while ago. Shuuichi kept absolutely still, even though he could feel slight sensation beginning to return to him numbed nerve endings. He didn't want Kurada to follow through with his plans of injecting more of the depressant into his blood stream. He had been right in what he claimed earlier. Overdose could be fatal, dangerous of causing something such as brain damage or heart failure. Again, he felt his temperature being checked again. The sensation of the man's hand jolted his entire mind to reality. It felt so cold against his skin, and he could feel a thick veil of sweat being brushed aside as his fingertips traveled across his forehead.
"Your fever's gotten worse and you're shivering more." He noted aloud to nobody in particular. "Wouldn't it be quite pathetic for you to die this way." After this comment, he brushed a hand across the boy's forehead, sweeping back bangs and then coming to comb through the long red hair.
"You know, this'll be quite a shame if you die. It isn't like you really deserve it. I always hated having to kill an innocent, too." He whispered softly. Out of the corner of his eye, Shuuichi caught a dark black blur. In his mind, it didn't quite register with him. Briefly, he saw Hiei knock the man against the tree. His eyes widened a fraction in disbelief. Never in his life had he expected Hiei to come. He thought that the other man had just been trying to get his hopes up. In another blur, the other man seized his body. He felt him undo the rope that bound his body together. With the bonds gone now, his body feel completely limp within the strong grip. Briefly, he also felt the needle from the syringe break his flesh. He groaned at it in disregard.
"Let him go, Sniper," was all that he heard from an enraged growl that Hiei gave. His mind was beginning to fog again from the poison. There was no way now that he could've become any more vulnerable. He could feel Sniper's hands combing playfully through his hair as his grip on staying conscious loosened slightly.
"Really, Hiei, it is a shame he has to die. He's such a pretty thing, isn't he?"
It was the last thing he heard before it fatigue finally took control of his stupor. As his eyes slid shut he could see nothing but darkness.
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Me: Sorry that seemed a little bit rushed. As it has been, I am extremely busy. Not to mention, I am now taking karate and volunteering at an animal shelter. Again, I will try to update A.S.A.P. Most likely, I will update next week, at latest week after next. Good evening to all of you and you're reminded that reviews are always well appreciated.