Disclaimer: YYH is the property of Yoshihiro Togashi. If I were him I would be creating more manga, not writing fanfiction.

A/N: Fast update, no? Okay, maybe not quite so. Please enjoy.

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For only this will justice ring

Asha plummeted to towards the head of the demon that had haunted her for more than a lifetime.

Hate is a strong word, and should rarely be used, of course, but Asha hated Toushi Koi with such a firey passion, that as she attacked him, her eyes seemed to change from cold silver, to burning sapphire. Her magic sword glinted dangerously in the light of the setting Makai sun.

She kicked out with her feet and Toushi Koi ducked his head, anticipating that she would go over him. Instead, the shinobi twisted in the air, bringing her sword to slice into the demon's back. She spun around him, swinging her sword into his chest, piercing his hideous red skin, no longer sickly and ashen.

Toushi Koi gripped her neck and flung her away. Asha corrected herself in mid-air, landing cat-like on the ground.

She had enough time to think, 'The swan for his grace,' then launched her attack again.

The shinobi aimed her sword for her opponent's chest, but as he reached to block the attack, she changed trajectory and sliced Toushi Koi under his arm. He was far frompleased. He lunged for her, but she leapt out of his way, somersaulting backwards to crouch momentarily near Hiei.

"Okay, Sparky. Where I've inflicted and am going to inflict wounds, you go in again with your sword and do as much damage as possible. Make sure you pierce something vital, like his heart. I don't have the courage to break it myself."

He glanced at her incredulously. "Even now you find time to joke?"

"Yusuke is a bad influence."

Toushi Koi swung a blow at their heads. They jumped back.

"Concentrate, onna!" Hiei shouted.

"I don't need to be told twice," she muttered.

Asha—her sights focused once more on her enemy—began to circle the massive demon.

Toushi Koi grinned cruelly at the assassin. "I should have killed you all those years ago. I don't know how you managed to live so long, ningen," he spat, "but I know that you will not live past this meeting."

She said nothing. Hiei waited, knowing the situation was volatile. The others lay in wait, fascinated at the scene unfolding before them.

"How shall I kill you? Perhaps I'll squeeze the life out of your frail body. Or maybe, I'll rip your heart out, and eat it while you're barely alive to watch."

The shinobi circled calmly. His jibes were an attempt to rile her, she knew that. She was cool, restrained—at least on the surface. Asha was raging inside, desperately trying to keep what little control she had, her hatred of the demon threatening to be her undoing.

"Or maybe," an evil glint came into his eyes, "I should kill you like I killed that friend of yours."

Asha tensed visibly. She stopped moving. Toushi Koi prowled closer.

"Does that upset you? The way I'll slice you open, let your blood flow freely for my minions to drink. What do you say,shinobi girl?"

"I will not be joining her before I kill you!" She screamed. She ran at Toushi Koi, her eyes blazing, her sword held high. For a moment, she could not be seen, her speed was so great, but she could be heard. Her cry was terrifying, lonely, filled with such pain and echoing eerily among the trees. The tantei knew she had been pushed beyond the brink, and they could not stop her. Their hearts were torn at such a broken sound. But suddenly, it stopped. Toushi Koi held the shinobi by the neck, her vocal chords and air paths restricted. Asha's sword was imbedded in the demon's body.

His eyes were wide.

Her mouth was open in a silent wail, tears falling freely down her face. She had lost herself.

The next thing the tantei knew, Asha had impacted with a tree. There was a resounding crack and her body fell limply to the ground. Even in the dim light, the glistening at the back of her head could be clearly seen.

The demon ripped the blade out of his chest, and threw the point towards Asha, confident she was dead. He turned away, only to be assaulted by an enraged fire youkai.

Hiei found he was only able to inflict minor damage, receiving more wounds than he gave. In his peripheral vision he could see the others fighting. Demon fighters fell left and right. Any who tried to run were impaled on Kuwabara's sword, or sliced to pieces by Kurama's whip. The tantei danced an intricate step, but none more so than Hiei. One stumble, one thrust where he should parry, could mean death.

He needed to find a way to get the magic sword. Then he would actually stand a chance of killing the monolithic demon he was fighting. The sword point was stuck in the ground by the shinobi's body. Hiei was capable of pulling it out of the ground as he ran by, but he needed a way to distract the demon first.

The clearing was huge. Hiei fought in the middle, but the shinobi's crumpled form lay at the edge. He was too far away from the body to run to the sword and back without his enemy's notice. There could be no tricks. It was an all out duel. Hiei focused once more on Toushi Koi, waiting to see how the dance would end.

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The others had seen Asha attack Toushi Koi. The others had seen her strike him with her magically enhanced weapon. The others had heard her strangled howl. It was one of the most sickening sounds Kurama had ever heard in his life: the sound of the insane. The others had seen Toushi Koi move before Asha had.

Kurama wasn't sure whether it was him, or another, or everyone who screamed when Asha's head had hit the trunk of the tree.

He had exchanged only a brief glance with Hiei across the field; in his red eyes Kurama saw Hiei was intent upon revenge for the woman they had not saved. Like Kurama had told Yusuke, Hiei was fiercely loyal, even if he didn't quite show it. Asha hadn't necessarily earned the Koorime's trust, but he had made a promise he wasn't given the chance to keep, and Hiei was angry for it.

They had come out of the bushes ambushing the demon spectators, some tantei yelling in rage, others in anguish and some in both. Kurama knew that tactically it was absolutely idiotic, but he pushed that voice of reason aside. Revenge was all that mattered now.

While Genkai and Yusuke mauled the main demon body, Kurama and Kuwabara became border patrol. They made sure no demon left the clearing alive.

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Hiei was sweating. He had fought a number of demons in his time, but Toushi Koi was something else entirely. Hiei had never faced any being like him before. He was monstrous, and wounds didn't stay wounds for very long.

Hiei delivered a blow that would have killed anyone else, but with Toushi Koi he watched astonished as skin knitted with skin covering the slash as if it never existed.

"Kuso."

Toushi Koi laughed. Everyone in the clearing—demons and tantei—froze at the sound. "Do you think you can kill me? I cannot die."

Hiei glanced behind Toushi Koi, scanning the ground for the magic sword. His eyes alighted on the weapon, but they were drawn to what was taking place just beyond.

Kurama had taken the opportunity of the cease fire to check Asha. He rolled the dead woman over, her head limp over Kurama's left arm, her hands dragging on the ground. Kurama placed his right hand behind Asha's head, supporting it. He rocked her body back and forth, crying over her, holding her close. Hiei saw the kitsune drop his head in loss.

'So Kurama did come to love the girl,' he thought.

He barely had time to parry Toushi Koi's blow. Hiei shook his head. He had become distracted. It wouldn't do any of them good if he was dead. Her sword was out of reach, he would have to make do. The fight started again, as if Toushi Koi had given permission by attacking Hiei.

For ten minutes, or twenty, or maybe an hour—Hiei wasn't sure—he fought the massive demon, sword against brute strength and immortality. Hiei was beginning to feel decidedly outmatched. If he could just edge to the side a bit…

"Why do you fight me, demon brother? You are strong; you could be my second here." Toushi Koi followed Hiei's path with his eyes only, an unmoving statue of sinew and brawn.

Hiei scoffed. "Once I would have accepted your offer, but now I'd just be on the run from Reikai with a boke oni."

"I do not take to insults very well, chibi youkai."

"Really, I was hoping we wouldn't have anything in common."

Yusuke and Genkai looked at each other. He raised an eyebrow. She shrugged. Hiei was stalling, and neither of them knew why.

Toushi Koi laughed again. It was like having a knife pressed up against your spine. Everyone tensed, waiting for the final strike.

It never came.

At least, not from Toushi Koi.

The demon looked down. Protruding from where his heart would be was a blood coated sword. The Chinese characters along its blade glowed stronger as more blood seeped out of Toushi Koi and into their crevices. He slowly turned around, and three shiruken found their deadly marks: his forehead, his nose-bridge, and his stomach. Asha's right hand was still outstretched. She was still, but for the uneven heave of her ribcage. The ragged inhale and exhale of her breathing echoed in the field.

Toushi Koi bellowed angrily. Another shiruken found its way through the back of the demon's throat and out his neck, killing two demons behind him.

'She's standing,' Kuwabara thought.

Asha collapsed backwards into Kurama's arms.

'Or not.'

Hiei blinked, and then ran his sword through Toushi Koi for good measure. But the demon was already dead, the runes in the magic sword blindingly bright. Hiei combusted what was left of him, the flames eagerly consuming the monster.

Hiei plucked the swords from the ashes, scattered them as he did. "What should we do with this one?" He held up Asha's sword by the falcon hilt.

"We'll wait for her to regain consciousness. Asha will decide."

"What if she doesn't come back again Kurama…"

"She will!" he snapped. "Yusuke, open a portal."

"But what about these…guys…" The clearing was deserted.

"The few who survived have run off, and are no concern of ours now. They're weak and disorganized," Genkai said.

Yusuke shrugged his shoulders, and opened his compact mirror. "Hey, Botan, prepare a bed in the infirmary." He glanced up at Asha, cradled in Kurama's arms. "It's bad."

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Kurama paced nervously in Koenma's office. Asha was being tended to by the best doctors in Reikai. The best doctors in Reikai…but it gave them little solace. Fear of losing her began to creep up on more than one tantei.

"C'mon guys! Think positive!" Botan encouraged.

"I'm finding it real hard to fit positive into my vocabulary right now, Botan," Yusuke muttered.

"Oh posh. A lesser human would have died."

"A stronger human could still die," Hiei grumbled.

Kurama wished he had some whiskey, or scotch…vodka would do the job too. Any alcohol at all would be great if it shut the voices up inside his head.

"Why not try to be a little sensitive shrimp? Can't you see Kurama's worried?"

Anything to shut the voices up outside his head.

"No really, baka? I thought he was trying to dig his way to the other side of the world."

Kurama decided to pace some more. He chanted the mantra, 'She will live, she must live,' over and over again, being interrupted too often by doubt.

Suddenly, the double doors swung open. A teenaged Koenma appeared, dark circles forming under his eyes.

Kurama immediately battered the Reikai Prince with questions. "Is she alive? Will she live? What's her condition now?"

Koenma brought a hand to his head. He dropped himself on the edge of his desk, transforming into his toddler form.

His voice sounded as weary as he looked. "Yes. I've no idea. Critical. My physicians have told me that a piece of her skull is floating in the serous fluid in the subdural space in her cranium."

Yusuke glanced at Kuwabara. "What?"

"A piece of her skull isn't where it's supposed to be, and it is now floating in a space in her head that isn't naturally there. Not to mention every one of her ribs is broken."

"Oh. They can fix it, right?"

"They're performing the surgery right now, Yusuke. They're trying to remove the skull bit from the fluid, and then they'll need to overlay the fractured area of her skull with more durable material. It may even be necessary to remove the fractured portion and give her a metal plate. They'll bind her chest, but there isn't a whole lot they can do for her ribcage."

"How likely is the surgery to be a success?"

The tantei watched Kurama. He had ceased his pacing, but he still seemed like a caged animal in distress.

"I don't know Kurama. I'm sorry, but all we can do is wait and see."

And wait is what they did. It was three weeks before Asha was taken off life support, able to breath on her own again. The Reikai physicians decided against the metal plate, successful in removing the wayward piece of bone from her head, and the fine, web-like lines in her skull were beginning to scab over.

It was three more weeks before the doctors stopped monitoring her day and night, allowing periodic visits after they had checked Asha's vitals and the progress of her healing.

Individuals of the group were able to spend time privately with their odd companion. They would sit with her, one by one. Some held her hand as she lay in her coma, talking to her about some mission or another they had recently wrapped up. Others sat silently by the window, glancing over every now and then, comforted by the steady rise and fall of her chest.

A month went by, then two more. The reikai doctors began to lose hope in the practicality of the shinobi ever waking up. The tantei were not so willing to give out on her yet. It was too difficult to move on with their lives outside the Reikai with the shadow of her impending death hanging over them, so they chose to believe, and to hope and to pray that their shinobi comrade, their shinobi friend would survive.

One night, Kurama sat alone by Asha's bedside. He twirled a rose through his fingers. He finally placed it among the collection of other flowers at her bedside.

"White is for silence," he whispered.

A shadow fell across the bed. Kurama did not bother to lift his head to greet Hiei.

"I saw you with her on the field."

Kurama did not move.

"I saw how you held her."

No response.

"Kurama." Hiei did not sound pleased, but still Kurama said and did nothing.

"The odds that she will die are greater than the odds that she will live. Find a way to accept that. No matter how much you pine for her, she cannot hear you in the realm of her dreams."

"Ningenkai doctors believe that if you talk to a patient in a coma, they will come back. If the patient hears the voice of a friend, or loved one, they will fight to come back." Hiei thought he might have heard Kurama's voice crack.

"What happened, that day? We all saw her fall."

"Yes, we did. But she did not die."

"How?"

"I don't know. A miracle."

"The miracle of love?" Hiei sneered.

"I don't love her…I…I can't explain it. I care for her, and feel for her, but she's so…different from me. It's like two sides of a coin, together but so far apart. It's as if I've found a half of myself I didn't know was missing, and could live without, but don't want to. I want to help her. I want to be there for her. But I don't love her. It's…strange and unexplainable."

"Will we ever know what happened?"

"Either she will tell you, or it will pass with both of us to the grave."

'Wake up, Asha. I am not the only one who wants to hear this tale of your…miracle. Nor is Kurama the only one who needs you. Perhaps you've changed us.'

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A/N: So one more chapter, then I'm done. All will be revealed.

Kuso is the abbreviated form of chikuso, essentially an all purpose curse, but most commonly means 'shit.'

Boke oni means dim-wit demon

Chibi youkai means little demon