Let me just say that I'm beginning to hate the holidays. I work part-time in a certain fast food joint located inside a certain large chain mega-store. Because I'm in school, I usually only get about nine to twelve hours a week. That's fine; I only need enough money to pay for gas and manga. I'm a very spoiled girl, as it so happens.

Well, this past weekend I got nearly thirty hours. I am very, very tired. And cranky, but what else is new, really? Let me just put in my plea. People of the world: I know that holiday shopping is stressful. You, too, get tired and cranky. But please, please try not to leave huge messes at your tables or snap the head off the helpless blonde taking your order at a fast food joint. You never know what someone else is going through in their life - please try to be polite. Isn't that what this time of year is all about?

I'm really beginning to lose all respect for humanity.

Warnings: AU, Yaoi, and not mine. Sigh.

"He seems to be excelling…finally coming into himself. Don't you think?" A soft smile, a hint of pride. "I've never seen him so comfortable. He is really thriving."

Hiei snorted contemptuously, indulging himself in one of his great (and secret) passions in life - cooking. "Must we talk about the detective?" He demanded in irritation, sprinkling some garlic over the ingredients in the frying pan.

Kurama stood from his seat at the table, coming to the stove to carefully wrap his arms around Hiei and ignoring the way the smaller demon froze at his touch. Hiei actually hesitated a moment before leaning backwards into the embrace – something which had not happened since…well, Kurama didn't think his small lover had ever hesitated at his touch before. Hiei was a cuddle-slut and always had been.

"I know you're feeling frustrated…perhaps embarrassed." Kurama said quietly, frowning slightly as he nuzzled his lover's hair fondly. "I know it's difficult for you to be making so little progress, but you mustn't be too concerned; after all, it's only been a few weeks. Despite everything, I thought our arrangement was going comfortably."

"It is comfortable, damn it!" Hiei snapped. "And what makes you think you can say those things about me? What gives you the right?"

"I know you better than any living being ever has or ever will." The fox said quietly, soothingly. "I can read you so easily…"

"I hate that."

"Mmm, yes. I know." He murmured affectionately. "Yet nevertheless you expect Yusuke to have the ability to read you as well as I can."

"What the hell are you talking about?"

"He can't read your signals, my dear. He had no idea whatsoever that you're even interested."

He snorted. "There's no way you could know that, fox. Not for certain."

Reluctantly, Kurama drew back. Hiei turned to face him, challenge in his eyes.

"We discussed you last night, actually." The fox admitted, slightly uncomfortable. He knew quite well that Hiei would not appreciate any attempt at "help," and neither would he be happy with the thought of anyone speaking about him behind his back. "He refused to believe that there was any chance whatsoever that you could come to care for him one day…he still finds the fact you aren't going to seek revenge on him for sleeping with me difficult to grasp."

"He deserves a good ass kicking, anyway."

"I would like to see that." Kurama laughed, too polite to say that he doubted kicking was what Hiei had in mind for the young detective's ass.

"Did you have a point in initiating this conversation, or did you just want to piss me off?" Hiei asked sharply, turning his attention back to his cooking.

"I am merely trying to be helpful." He answered as innocently as he could manage.

"The only time you're helpful is when there's something you want."

"You know what I want." Kurama murmured, leaning over Hiei as he reached to dip a fork into the skillet on the stove. His chest was comfortably against Hiei's back, one hand on the smaller man's waist, and his breath against his ear, as he speared a vegetable and brought it to his lips, breathing on it to cool it. "You and me and the detective, all together in a tangle of limbs and a cacophony of moans and labored breathing…"

Hiei shivered, elbowing him. "Horny bastard." He growled.

"Honestly now, Hiei, can you not just admit that this is what you want as well?" Kurama asked logically, amused, as he leaned against the counter. Tentatively, he took a small nibble off the vegetable he had stolen, testing its temperature. "You want me. You want him. Why not have both at once?"

Hiei's glare shot to him and he couldn't fight off an impish smile as he popped the vegetable into his mouth. As with everything Hiei cooked, it was perfect.

"Fighting is rather useless, my dear."

Before the glaring demon could answer, Yusuke came bounding down the stairs, taking them two at a time. He jumped over the final three with a loud whoop, hurrying into the kitchen. "Kurama!" He called jubilantly. "Hiei! We got a mission!" The smile spread across his face was jubilant – his I'm-going-to-get-to-cause-trouble face; it was an expression Kurama had not seen from him in a long time. "It's about damn time!" The dark haired boy laughed.

After the "binky" mission, followed by a humiliating "bath-time" mission and the still terrifying "babysitting" mission, Kuwabara had stopped answering summons to the toddler's office. Try as Botan may to "persuade" him to come to spirit world, he refused to budge.

Until now.

Kuwabara looked uneasily at the note in his hand. It had frightened him to no end when a three-foot-tall vampire had leapt through his window and dropped the small square of parchment off with a cackle and a delighted "bleh," but he couldn't bring himself to give up a mission when obviously such trouble had been put into getting the message to him. Surely this time it would be something important, right?

Right?

As Kuwabara paced up and down the sidewalk, debating the wisdom of agreeing to another mission when he just knew it was going to end in another disaster, an apple-green mustang pulled up and parked in a nearby parking lot and three men climbed out. Two were familiar to Kuwabara, and their presence surprised him, along with the fact they had arrived in a car.

"I didn't know demons could drive." He said as the three approached.

Kurama cast an amused glance at the slightly shorter, dark haired boy beside him as Hiei shot Kuwabara a death glare.

"What are you doing here?" The small demon demanded.

"I got a letter 'bout the mission." Kuwabara answered, shaking the crumpled note in the short demon's face. He smiled smugly – despite the fiascos he had been forced to endure so far, there were still bragging rights available. And if Kurama and Hiei and whoever-the-hell the other guy was were being called in, then it had to be a real mission this time. "I guess I'm the new detective since Urameshi went missing."

The strange boy with them gave a start, frowning at Kuwabara. At a closer look, there was something familiar about him, but the large human boy couldn't pinpoint what. He had certainly never met anyone who looked like him. He was of average height, just a little bit shorter than Kurama with brown eyes. His black hair nearly reached his shoulders and was pulled back at the nape of the neck into a very short little ponytail and he was dressed in a pair of baggy silk black pants, Chinese shoes, and a sleeveless black Chinese shirt.

Definitely a friend of Kurama, then.

Kuwabara pulled his eyes away, frowning suspiciously at Hiei - he really hated that guy. "But what are you all doin' here?" He asked. Maybe they knew something about the mysterious mission…maybe they could give him some clue that he could use to make it look like he actually knew what he was doing… "And who's the new guy?"

"We were invited as well." Hiei spat, hands stuffed into his pockets. "And as for the other…"

"If Kuwabara wants to be an idiot, it's his own problem." The new guy interrupted in a familiar voice.

"URAMESHI?" Kuwabara cried, leaping back. "What in hell happened to you?" He shook his head furiously. "Nevermind that, where have you been? No, scratch that, if you're here, than why did they call me?"

"We decided to keep the old team together." Botan's voice answered lightly as she stepped out from a dark alley. "You four work well together, and this is an important mission." She grinned as if expecting them to cheer or thank her for reuniting them.

"Well, you gonna' spill it, or we just gonna' stand around here all day?" Yusuke demanded after several moments passed in silence.

Botan blinked, then squinted at him, noticing the change in his appearance for the first time. "Wow, you look really good, Yusuke!" She exclaimed. Kurama raised an eyebrow at her and she blushed lightly and began to babble. "I was a little worried when you disappeared. Luckily, Koenma was able to borrow his father's trackers to find you!" She laughed.

Yusuke's answering laugh held little warmth. "You mean that little vampire freak? I'll make sure you know where I am from now on – just promise never to send that creep after me again. I was getting out of the shower, and he handed me a towel. Pretty scary. I thought it was Hiei at first."

Botan tilted her head to the side, watching him, as everyone ignored Hiei's growl. "Still," She said finally, embarrassment gone. "You do look good."

A shrug. "I know."

"What happened?"

Yusuke shrugged again, exchanging an amused glance with Kurama. "What's the mission?" He asked, rather than answer her question.

Botan blinked at him a moment, then shook herself. "Oh!" She gasped. "Oh! I can't believe I almost forgot!"

"I believe it." Hiei muttered darkly. "Airhead…"

She shot him a halfhearted glare, not quite brave enough to take full offense. Nevertheless, she directed her words to Yusuke alone, pretending the small demon had ceased to exist.

Hiei didn't seem to mind, truth be told.

"I need you four to go to the demon plane for me to investigate a string of murders."

Yusuke only blinked at her a moment.

"Don't people get killed over there all the time?"

"Yes, but not entire villages!"

Yusuke scowled dangerously – the same Yusuke Kuwabara remembered. "Don'tcha think you should have mentioned that first?"

"Well…"

"How the hell are we supposed to investigate something like that?" He demanded hotly.

Red rose in the young ferry-girl's face as she began to lose patience. "Use your head for once Yusuke!" She snapped.

Hiei snickered quietly.

"If you would bother to listen for once instead of jumping to conclusions," She continued, "You would have given me the chance to tell you that there were a few survivors; shepherds, farmers, and merchants who were lucky enough to be outside the village walls when whatever happened happened. Questioning them would be a good place to start, don't you think?"

"Not if he can help it." Hiei muttered.

"Do you even understand how important this mission is?" She demanded, still ignoring the small, dark man. "What these occurrences could mean?"

"Well, you're gonna tell me, aren't you?" He sighed.

"Yusuke…!"

"Well, I'm ready." Kuwabara announced, puffing out his chest. A real mission at last. Urameshi was being difficult; this was Kuwabara's chance to show his worth.

Kurama and Hiei exchanged a look and a nod. The fox placed a hand on Yusuke's arm and the young fighter broke his glare from Botan and turned his attention to the two demons.

"All right," He sighed finally, defeated. "All right, fine. Let's do this, then."

"All right then!" Botan agreed cheerily, anger forgotten. "Follow me!" She announced with an expressive wave of her arm, leading them down the very ally she had appeared from in the first place.

They followed her as expected, even as it became apparent that the ally was not only full of trash, but a dead end as well.

"What's a weak point doing here?" Hiei asked, wrinkling his nose and glaring as if blaming Botan for the presence of a failing in the veil between the worlds in such a distasteful place.

"We've been saving it for a time when we needed to send operatives to the demon plane in secret." She answered brightly. "We're going to close it up after you all go through."

"Why would you need to keep it secret? You got spy problems?"

She shot Yusuke a glare. "Of course there are spies in Spirit World; there would be no way to get rid of them. We know that and all we can do about it is be careful that nothing too important is leaked out."

"And this is important?"

"I told you it was, didn't I?" She snapped.

"Can we get on with this, please?" Kurama asked with a placating smile.

The small blue-haired girl sighed, then nodded. "Okay," She decided with a smile, touching a brick on the wall that seemed to be just the slightest bit discolored when compared to the others. "Everyone please just concentrate a little bit of your energy right here." She instructed. She shot Yusuke a warning look. "Just a little bit."

"Yeah, yeah. I got it." He groused, reaching forward.

Hiei reached at almost the same time, not seeming to notice as his hand brushed the detective's.

Yusuke blinked at an almost green sun, yellowish clouds drifting across a bleached-out sky. Prickly lime green grass poked into his palms, rustling dryly underneath as he stood. Kurama was just sitting up. Yusuke reached down to offer him a hand and the fox smiled - one of his rare, real smiles - and accepted the help.

"So this is the demon plane, then?" Yusuke asked, peering at his strangely-colored surroundings and trying to pretend that the fact Kurama held onto his hand just a moment longer than necessary didn't affect him. "No wonder you like to stay in the human world."

Kurama gave a small chuckle, dropping his hand at last and reaching to run his fingers through Yusuke's short ponytail. The fox was very approving of Yusuke's decision to grow his hair out.

"I stay for my mother, my dear; you know that." He murmured, standing so very close. It was wonderfully distracting. "It may be difficult to believe from here, but there are places within this world which are more beautiful than you could imagine. Perhaps, if there is time, I will show you one of my estates. Or Hiei's – his are quite lovely as well."

"I've been trying to get him to move here for years." Hiei spat from behind them.

Kurama let his hand fall from Yusuke's hair as he turned to give Hiei one of his rare, enthralling, genuine smiles.

With a groan, Kuwabara began to stir and Yusuke quickly stepped away from his housemates, not quite ready to let the oaf know just what had been going on while he had been "missing." He glanced quickly at Kurama, who offered him a slight smile of encouragement; he understood, at least. Oddly, it was Hiei that was offended that Yusuke was somewhat reluctant to let his change in relationship with Kurama to become common knowledge.

Botan began to stir as well, blushing when she realized that she had landed on top of Kuwabara. The two scampered backwards away from each other, Kuwabara running straight into Yusuke's knees while the youth was still distracted, accidentally knocking him down.

Yusuke cursed loudly. "Kuwabara, you idiot!" He yelled, kicking at the larger boy. "Why don'tcha watch where you're going next time?"

Hands grabbed him and pulled him roughly to his feet, one hand covering his mouth. "This is a bad place to raise your voice, detective." Hiei's voice hissed in his ear, his arms holding him in grips of steel against his small body as the scowling Kuwabara picked himself up from the ground. Yusuke tried to pull away, and if anything, Hiei's grip on him only tightened.

Yusuke grew very still as he felt the dark haired demon's breath brush his ear.

Abruptly, Hiei released him, shoving him at Kurama, who caught him easily.

"Keep your pet quiet." He snarled.

"Bastard." Yusuke seethed, rounding on him.

Kurama's hand came down gently, comfortingly, on his shoulder. "Easy, my dear," He cautioned quietly from behind, other hand coming to rest on Yusuke's hip. "Hiei is most correct. This is not a good area to be looking for trouble in. I believe we would not like the fight we would find here."

Yusuke shook him off, but didn't go after Hiei. Botan and Kuwabara both blinked in surprise.

"Whoa, major tension!" Kuwabara laughed. "Since when do you listen to reason Urameshi?"

"Bite me."

"The villages that were attacked were all north of here." Botan informed them, shooting the two humans warning looks. "There's only one town between here and there, and the majority of the survivors should still be there if you manage to get there quickly enough – it's normally a five-day walk."

"You couldn't have gotten us any closer?"

She ignored Yusuke's question. "I'll be popping in from time to time to bring you supplies and check your progress. Be careful," Her oar appeared in her hand and she managed a stern look before taking into the air, "And behave yourselves!"

The four exchanged glances.

"Let's get some rules down before we begin, shall we?" Hiei stated quietly, glaring at everyone in turn. Kurama looked like he may have been fighting laughter at the look; Yusuke wouldn't have been surprised. "The detective may be the," His lips curled into a sneer, "Leader of our little group, but Kurama and I know this place the best. So here's what I propose. Unless there is a battle, Kurama and I are in charge. Got it?"

"No! No way!" Kuwabara objected explosively. "Ain't no way we're followin' you two! Tell em' Urameshi!"

Everyone looked to Yusuke, who smiled coolly and shrugged.

"Lead the way, then."

Kurama nodded his approval while Hiei merely smirked. They began to walk, leaving Kuwabara gaping. After a few moments he seemed to realize that he was being left, and rushed to catch up.

"Hey! Hey wait! You guys aren't leavin' me behind! Hey! Urameshi? Hey, I said get back here!"

Yusuke sat outside watching a reddish moon rise in a purple sky, cold blue stars twinkling. As the sun had begun to set, Botan had arrived with camping supplies - enough sleeping bags and pillows for everyone, flashlights, matches, food, pots and pans, and two tents. She had promised to return in the morning to take it all back so they wouldn't need to lug it around. They could make better time without being weighted down, after all.

Kuwabara approached, sending glares back at the dramatically tilting tent he had just erected. "Get off your lazy ass and come help me, Urameshi." He ordered.

Yusuke ignored him, continuing to chew nonchalantly on a stem of grass.

Kuwabara glanced at the tent Yusuke sat beside, for the first time noticing the quiet but unmistakable noises that were coming from the makeshift dwelling. His face grew very pale as realization began to register on his face. "Are Hiei and Kurama both in there?" He asked slowly.

"Yup." Yusuke drawled, unconcerned, tossing away the grass blade.

"What are they…" Kuwabara cleared his throat nervously. "Are they…?"

"Yup."

"You mean they're…?"

Yusuke raised an eyebrow, smirk tugging at the corners of his mouth. "You mean you didn't know?" He asked tauntingly

Kuwabara shook his head slowly in bewilderment.

Yusuke's smirk grew; he was beginning to have some fun. "Well, they are." He informed the taller man smugly, watching his face redden. "Oh yeah, definitely." His ears perked as the noises from the tent began to dim.

"C'mon, Urameshi, don't sit there anymore." The large boy pled. "We'll fix our tent and sleep on opposite sides like normal strait guys."

He had been hesitant to let anyone know of the nature of his relationship with Kurama – he was still getting used to the idea himself, really, even after all the weeks they had been together. But he could forget his own confusion and insecurities if it meant a chance to make Kuwabara uncomfortable.

"Nah. No thanks."

The oaf blinked at him. "Huh?" He asked, voice rising just slightly in panic. "What the hell do you mean?"

The tent flap opened and Hiei stepped out. "I'm going for a walk." He informed Yusuke without bothering to look at him. "I'll be back in an hour."

"An hour?" Yusuke exclaimed, leaping to his feet. "Oh, come on! I gave you more than an hour!"

"That's because you are a fool, detective." Hiei answered, still upset that Kurama had insisted he see them both that night. Share his lover he might be willing to do, but sharing his night with his lover he was strangely reluctant to agree to. He had only relented when Kurama had promised that they would all three be sleeping together (oddly, he hadn't seemed too concerned that Yusuke was included in this. Yusuke despaired of ever understanding the small warrior.)

"You don't play fair!" Yusuke complained.

Hiei's chin lifted proudly, a slight smile tugging at his lips. "I know." He answered, walking away. "One hour, detective." He called sternly.

Glaring after him, Yusuke poked his head inside the tent. "Kurama, Hiei's being an ass. He only left us an hour; you wanna' just wait until tomorrow? You're probably tired anyway, right?"

Kurama pulled him into the tent and into his arms, smiling into his surprised eyes. "I love camping." He whispered, smile becoming rather mischievous.

An hour later, Hiei returned from his "walk," slipping into the tent silently. A pleased smirk crossed his face at the sight of the two forms wrapped around each other in the bedrolls.

Kurama opened one eye as his longtime lover climbed into the pallet beside him, smiling as the smaller demon's arms wrapped around him and closed him in between his two lovers.

"I knew you weren't really angry." He murmured quietly enough not to wake Yusuke.

Hiei would never forfeit his snuggle time.

"Shut up and go to sleep." The small demon growled dangerously.

Yeah, you probably noticed by now that this chapter is very similar to chapter (three? Four? I don't remember and don't care enough to look it up…) of the original. Much of this was copy, paste, edit. Fun fun. You may also have noticed that the mission has changed. Hmmm….

Lessee…notes…

I still don't like Kuwabara; can't you tell?

I'm afraid the "camping" thing makes Kurama look very slutty, but I'm too fond of it to cut it out. I actually have a valid excuse for his behavior, but I'm not certain there will ever be the chance to work it in, so here it is: Firstly, they're in the demon plane now. Kurama gets extra power from sex, and he needs all the power he can get in Makai. Secondly, and more pertinent for the whole "camping" thing, is that when one goes camping, one is outside. There are less boundaries between man (or demon) and nature, which also has its effect on our fox.

Plus, I happen to like slutty Kurama.

Hope that makes sense.

I still despise the new response feature, but I'm giving it a try even though I feel so silly using the stupid little "respond" button for signed in reviewers. Somehow I feel like not responding is rude. If youhate recieving responses, pleasedon't tell me!I really enjoy getting to talk to you all…what really needs is a forum…yeah. I would enjoy that. See you next week, I hope! I've already started on the next chapter, and I think it's going to be one of my favorites!