Jack woke up to a silent house. When he went down to make breakfast Shuuichi wasn't there. It was a little odd, since his cousin had been there every morning for a cup of tea before breakfast during his stay, but Jack had brushed it off. For all he knew, his cousin had slept in.

When Yusuke and Kuwabara came down to eat they were oddly quiet. Jack struggled not to let his anxiety eat at him. Had Shuuichi left? Had they had a fight? Was he hurt?

He tried not to think about it, but there was no way to know what was going on if he didn't ask.

He set out their plates but didn't eat, instead thinking of how to phrase his question.

"So," he said, after giving it some thought, "where's Shuuichi?"

The older teens shifted awkwardly, sharing a significant look. It was Kuwabara who answered.

"He… went out with Hiei."

"Oh. So Hiei came back?" Jack picked up his fork and started to eat, trying not to feed into the awkward atmosphere.

"Yeah, but he and Shuuichi are going to be gone for a while."

Jack froze. He set his utensil down. "Did- did he say how long he'd be gone?"

Kuwabara cleared his throat. "Nah."

Jack swallowed the lump in his throat. It was stupid to get all upset over his cousin leaving for a little while. He'd only been there for two weeks. Jack shouldn't have let himself get attached so soon. He felt stupid.

His fists clenched. He stared down at his food silently.

"Don't worry about it!" said Yusuke abruptly, "We'll take care of your training until he gets back. Right Kuwabara?"

Yusuke stared intensely at Kuwabara, waiting for him to answer.

"Of course! Yeah, we'll train you," sputtered Kuwabara.

Jack managed a small smile. He knew they were just doing this because they felt bad, but at least they cared.

They ate and then took him outside to train, mimicking his usual schedule with his older cousin. Yusuke decided to take charge.

"Here," said Yusuke, "let's begin with how my teacher started teaching me."

Jack watched in befuddlement while Yusuke scoured the ground. Kuwabara was on the other side of the clearing, practicing sword stances, so Jack couldn't even ask him for an explanation.

"This'll do!"

Yusuke put a rock on the ground. It was about the size of Jack's fist. Jack frowned down at it, not sure why it was needed.

"I'll show you what to do." said Yusuke. Then he proceeded to balance his entire body with only a finger on top of the rock.

Jack stared. Yusuke dropped down, a grin on his face.

"Now you do it."

Jack gaped. "You expect me to do that?"

"Well, yeah."

"How?"

"It's easy! Just use your reiki."

Jack didn't get it. Yusuke frowned at him.

"Look, can you focus your reiki into your finger?"

Jack focused and tried it. He nodded, as if his glowing finger wasn't visible enough.

"Use that to carry your weight."

Jack frowned, not certain that would work. Jack could manage a handstand in a pinch, but this seemed beyond his capability. But Yusuke was starting to look impatient, so he had to at least try. So he did. He fell off the rock immediately.

Jack kept trying for about a half hour. Yusuke seemed confused as to how he wasn't getting it. Finally, Kuwabara stomped over.

"Urameshi! What're you doing?"

"I'm teaching 'im ballance and how to concentrate his reiki." said Yusuke.

"You're doing it all wrong!"

"No I'm not- this is how Genkai taught me!"

"Yeah, that's how she taught you."

Yusuke frowned. Kuwabara scowled right back. Jack tried not to be too obvious as he scooted back a couple steps. He didn't want to get caught in a confrontation between these two.

"Yusuke, you're freak of nature!" Kuwabara said, "A normal person can't do the crazy stuff you do! Here, let me handle this. Jack!"

Jack stopped mid-step back. "Yes?"

"Come here. Can you do a handstand?"

"Yeah?"

"Show me."

Jack did. Kuwabara nodded, pleased. Yusuke continued pouting behind him.

"Try doing it with one hand."

Jack felt less sure about this. He was surprised, then, when he actually managed it. It wasn't easy, but he could do it.

"Good work!" said Kuwabara. Jack grinned and got back on his feet.

"Now I want you to try it with the rock. Use your reiki to help keep you balanced..."

-=-1-=-

Kurama made his way up the stairs to the temple, Hiei a step behind him. They encountered a set of opulent open doors. The Xiaolin Dragons and the man who he assumed was their master were waiting for them. They looked like they were ready for a fight. He was glad they at least had some defense strategy.

"You!" shouted the girl.

Their master turned to her. "I'm assuming you have met before."

"He's one of the guys who took Jack!"

"I see." He regarded Kurama and Hiei seriously. He could likely sense how powerful they were if he truly was a master.

"What is your business here?"

Kurama smiled sharply. "I am sent here on behalf of Koenma, the current master of the spirit world. We were asked to investigate your disciples and the shen gong wu which you harbor."

The man choked on his own tongue. He coughed into his fist and motioned for his warriors to drop their battle stances.

He bowed to them. "I am Master Fung. I am honored to welcome you into our temple. Would you like some tea?"

None of the children seemed to understand what was going on. They didn't look pleased. Only one of them seemed like he might have a clue.

"Master Fung," began the smallest among them, his voice a mere whisper, "Are they like the spirit detectives from the stories?"

"Yes, Omi." He looked at each child individually. "You must all treat these two men with respect."

Only the little one, Omi, seemed satisfied with this answer. Grudgingly, their team followed their master into the temple, Kurama and Hiei not far behind.

Tea was set out and they were all seated. Kurama took a sip of his drink, oddly morose that it wasn't the brew he'd been having at his cousin's home.

"We should have introductions first of all," said the master. He looked at his students.

"I'm Omi," said the small one.

"Kimiko." said the girl with a flip of her hair.

"Raimundo." This was the boy with brown hair.

"Clay Bailey," said the last, "pleased to meet ya'."

"I am Kurama, and this is my companion, Hiei." Hiei grunted. Fung froze in his seat for a moment, his eyes darting between them. He'd obviously heard of them. Kurama offered a disarming smile.

"We're of no danger to you." he said. The children hadn't picked up on the exchange, but their teacher relaxed at the declaration. It was silent for a moment. Finally, the girl seemed to have enough.

"What did you do with Jack?"

"Kimiko-" Kurama held up his hand, stopping the old man. He turned his flinty gaze to her, biting back the many spiteful things he could say.

"Jack is in good health. You needn't worry about him."

She looked like she wanted to ask more, but a look at Fung had her keeping her mouth shut.

"What is the purpose of your investigation?" said Master Fung.

"We're here to see whether or not you will be allowed to keep your wu. It is our job to evaluate your ability to protect them and use them responsibly."

"You can't do that!" shouted Raimundo.

"Actually," said Master Fung, "They are within their rights to do so." He looked unperturbed by this.

"You're kidding!" he shouted.

"No, we're not." said Kurama.

"Well, I'll be darned." said Clay, scratching at his head.

"For now," said Kurama, "We're just here to observe."

"How long will it take for you to make your decision?" asked Fung, resigned.

"We don't know. That depends on you."

Master Fung nodded. He seemed to suddenly notice Kurama's suitcase. He stood.

"I will see to arranging a room for you to stay during your time here. Perhaps you can satisfy my students' curiosity while I'm gone?"

Kurama nodded. Master Fung left the room. As soon as he was out of earshot, Kimiko started talking.

"You said you were Jack's cousin?"

Kurama nodded.

"Really?" asked Raimundo, "Well… I guess I can see it. With the red hair and all."

"Won't he be upset that you're here?" Kimiko said.

"I'm hoping to be done here before he notices."

"Well..." Clay said, "what can we do to show you we're responsible enough to keep the shen gong wu?"

"Like I said before, we're just here to observe for now. You should simply act as you naturally would."

Master Fung came back in the door.

"We've found a suitable room for you two, if you would follow me?"

-=-2-=-

There was one nice thing about Shuuichi being away, Jack found out after only a couple of days. Kuwabara and Yusuke couldn't keep from arguing for a whole day, which meant he had more free time while they were busy sparring. He'd been neglecting his Jack-bots lately, too busy with his training to spare any time for them. Now was the perfect time to get some work done with the bots.

He put his wrench aside and looked at his newest adjustment to this model. Yes, the ability to sense and then avoid reiki would be useful in a bot. He just had to figure out exactly how to make that happen.

He'd have to do a couple of tests with the new gear, of course, but that could wait for another day. He leaned back in his chair, just taking a moment to relax. It'd been hectic at his house lately, and while he was grateful for the company, it was hard to get any down time.

Idly, he picked up a nail from his work bench. He pushed a little reiki in it, curious as to what it would do. Oddly enough, the metal seemed soak up his reiki naturally.

He stared at it, confused. When he'd been trying to learn from Shuuichi with the plant seeds, it'd felt like he was swimming against a current just to get it to cooperate. This felt… right. Familiar, maybe. He was about to see what he could do with it when his chair was suddenly spun around.

The nail flew out of his hand. Distantly, he heard it clink against the floor as the back of his chair was slammed into his bench.

Wuya leered down at him.

He shivered and scooted back in his seat. Her arms bracketed him, trapping him in his chair. Escape seemed unlikely.

"What are you working on, Jack?" she purred.

"Nothing." he squeaked. She leaned in to look over his shoulder. She eyed the Jack-bot contemplatively.

"Nothing new, at least." she said, turning her attention away from his latest project. She sounded bored. Jack fought of his instinct to bristle at her words. She had him at a disadvantage- angering her wouldn't do him any good. He fought to keep his nerves from affecting him- he could sense just how powerful she was now that he'd become aware of reiki, and it was intimidating to be this close.

"So, to what do I owe the pleasure?" he asked, trying to get her talking. A talking enemy was a distracted enemy, and those would make mistakes.

She smiled. It wasn't a nice one.

"I notice that you're missing two of your guests." she said, "Why is that, Jack?"

"It- it's none of your business." he said, fidgeting in his seat.

"Oh? Hmm, let me see. I think I know the reason," she said, smirk on her face, "Your cousin got bored of you just like I thought he would, didn't he?"

Jack flushed.

"Shut up Wuya!"

Her claws stroked his face. He stayed still. He knew a threat when he saw one.

"No need to be rude, Jack."

She leaned back and gave a put upon sigh. Jack took the opportunity to slip out from under her arms. He put some distance between them, not moving his eyes from her for a second. Wuya just looked amused.

"I told Chase about your friends." Wuya leaned back casually against his workbench. "Do you know what he said to me?"

Jack glared, not bothering to respond.

She laughed. "He told me he wasn't interested in any plot you have going. After all, nothing you do ever amounts to anything, does it?"

"Is that all you came here for? To taunt me?" snapped Jack.

"Hmm. While reminding you of your place is always fun, that wasn't actually what I came here for."

Jack waited.

"I was wanting you to make a little something for me. A small gadget, nothing more."

"What makes you think I'd make anything for you?"

"How about this- If you don't do what I say, we'll see how your house mates fair against my demon's fire." A burst of green flame appeared in her palm.

Jack's mouth went dry.

"You wouldn't." he croaked. He knew that those two knew how to fight, but against Wuya with even a fraction of her power, they didn't stand a chance.

"Oh, Jack," she almost sounded pitying, "you know that I wouldn't hesitate."

"What're you going to use it for?" He tried to sound more confident than he felt.

Wuya disappeared in a roll of green smoke. He felt her nails dig into his shoulders from behind him.

"It's just a little extra insurance against Chase. Nothing more."

He could deal with that. Nothing he made could conceivably harm the man, and even if it did, he would be healed in no time.

"I'll do it." he said. He kept his head bowed, trying not to show her just how relieved he was.

"Good." A small scroll was slipped into his hand.

"See you soon, Jack."

He only relaxed when he could no longer feel her fingers pressing into his shoulders. He made his way back to his chair and took a seat. He opened up the scroll. On it were the details to the tool Wuya wanted him to make. He grabbed a pencil and paper and set to work on the design. He tried not to pay attention to how much his hands were shaking.

He was going to have to pull an all-nighter. He hoped Yusuke and Kuwabara wouldn't be too angry when he skipped training tomorrow.

-=-3-=-

That conversation kept replaying itself in his head. Kuwabara hadn't meant to eavesdrop, but when he'd felt that burst of malignant reiki in the basement, he'd had to investigate. He wasn't sure what to do.

It was obvious that Jack was working with some shady people. That woman registered pretty high on Kuwabara's danger scale. He didn't want to put Jack at risk with a person like that. He also didn't want to chase Jack off by telling him what he'd overheard or interrogating him about it. He was really starting to worry about that kid. Just what had he been doing before they'd come along?

Normally, in a situation like this, he'd ask Kurama for advice, but Kurama wasn't here. He couldn't exactly go to Yusuke, either. He was his best friend, but he was also hot headed and would no doubt try to find and kill that woman without sparing a thought.

So Kuwabara just kept his mouth shut. He wasn't sure what else could be done.

-=-4-=-

Kurama sat at the training grounds, leaning against the tree Hiei was sleeping in at the moment. His friend really was like a cat a lot of the time, always grabbing a nap whenever he could. Although that was likely a habit trained into him from time on the road and in the makai. Sleep was a rare commodity- when there wasn't any danger, the best strategy was to get in as much rest as possible.

He scooted closer to the tree, straightening his back. He was here to observe the warriors, not relax. It'd been a week of near constant observation though, and he kind of wanted to take a break. Still, he'd like to resolve this quickly and get back to his cousin.

Omi was sparring with Clay, and Kimiko was set against Raimundo. Master Fung was a competent master, but it seemed he didn't fully understand how to enhance their powers beyond letting them use the wu. To Kurama, it seemed lazy. If you could only use your reiki when using some enhancer, how were you to survive if you were separated from it?

They relied far too heavily on the shen gong wu, in his opinion. Especially when they had such low security to protect their vault. Kurama had broken in on the first night without any issue- the fact that their enemies hadn't managed to steal all of their wu was a miracle.

At the moment, Clay and Omi were a blur of constant motion. They were both competent fighters they had some gaps in their knowledge, but they were well suited to fight each other. Kimiko on the other hand…

She was a strong combatant- she knew her martial arts and didn't pull punches, but against the wind user, she was doing badly. He kept knocking out her flames with ease. She continued trying to take his winds head on, which was her issue.

Above him, Hiei snorted. Kurama looked up. Hiei had woken up and also seemed to have noticed the errors Kimiko was making.

Kurama looked back at the fight. Hiei dropped from his perch and appeared next to Kimiko. She and Raimundo turned to him in alarm. Hiei looked distinctly annoyed.

"You're using your fire wrong, ningen."

Kimiko glared at him in annoyance. She'd yelled at him a couple times about his use of that word, not liking how he used it. Or, rather, the implication that Hiei himself was not human. Kurama was half certain that Hiei kept saying it just to annoy her.

"What do you mean?" she asked.

Hiei scoffed. "What feeds fire?"

"Oxygen." She said. Her irritation was obvious, but then, so was Hiei's.

"What is your opponent's power?"

"Wind."

"And yet," said Hiei, "you continue to blast fire at him."

"Yes, because we're fighting, if you hadn't noticed." Kimiko growled.

Raimundo was visibly struggling not to laugh. Hiei scowled at her.

"Wind user, attack me." He said.

Raimundo's eyes were the size of dinner plates.

"Um. You want me to what?"

Not bothering to repeat himself, Hiei threw a small fireball at him. He was obviously mimicking Kimiko's power level and technique.

Raimundo used his wind to throw it off course. Realizing that Hiei was serious, he launched an attack at the demon.

Heie pulled up a fire in between his hands. Raimundo kept attacking, and Hiei absorbed his wind into the fire, allowing it to grow and become more powerful. Raimundo looked flummoxed by this development. Hiei waited for Raimundo to stop attacking, then launched the wave of fire into the sky where it couldn't hurt anything.

By this point, Clay and Omi had stopped fighting. The Xiaolin Dragons stared in awe at the powerful blast.

Hiei looked straight at Kimiko. He had a slight smirk on his face.

"Stop trying to fight that wind. Use it to feed the fire. It will work much better for you. Ningen."

A moment later, Hiei was in the tree again. Kurama smiled up at him.

"She's going to hate you within the week, you know?"

Hiei snorted a laugh and ignored him. He went back to sleep. Kurama envied him a little.

Oh well. He'd have time to rest later. He turned his gaze back to the fights taking place.

-=-5-=-

Jack woke up to his blaring wu alarm. He scrambled out of bed. Yusuke and Kuwabara were already waiting for him downstairs. He decided not to call for his Jack-bots this time.

He had a feeling he wouldn't need them.

-=-6-=-

A/N: Here we are with chapter 6. Sorry for the late night update, but it seemed like as good a time as any to post it. I wanted to send a huge thank you to the people still following/commenting on this fic. Thank you so much for the support! It means a lot. I'll hopefully have chapter 7 ready for upload in about a week (although I feel like I'm jinxing myself even mentioning it haha).

Anyway, thank you to those who read this chapter. Feel free to drop in a comment and tell me what you think!