Just wanted to drop a little note before we get to the proper reading; from the first "good night", I was listening to this song non-stop writing this entire chapter. So, if you want the same atmosphere I had while writing, please listen to it while reading. ;D (just remember to remove the spaces) http:/ / www. youtube. com/watch?v=gq-NYg3RwtU
The song is called "Headlock", by Imogen Heap.
My brain kick started back to reality. "No," I protested, surprisingly annoyed. "A mean, why would he do that?" I hurried to add with a grin on top. Yusuke mirrored my grin with hands linked behind his head: Seemingly no harm done by my first ferocious tone, and mentally I breathed out relieved, deciding to ignore the confused voice in the back of my mind. I was just a little disoriented after the surprise was all.
"Where's the scarf?" Kuwabara suddenly asked.
"Oh," Botan, jerked back to life and spun around her own axis once. "It's not here," she confirmed puzzled. "I must have lost it somewhere."
"I'll help you look." And so Yukina and Botan took a tour of the house looking while the rest of us helped Kurama tidying wrapping paper and stray plates and glasses no one was sure who had drunk from.
"Hey everyone, look what we found!" Botan came cheering back the living room and firmly slammed something on the table.
"The sca- Ludo?" Keiko wondered taking a closer look.
"Doesn't that bring back memories," Yusuke snickered, sending Kuwabara a sly glance. Kuwabara however countered by exclaiming with pumped fists "I'll beat you this time Urameshi!"
"Let's split up in teams," Botan decided eagerly. "That way we can all play. We can look for the scarf later, right Fai?"
Being eight people dividing in teams was an easy task. Kuwabara immediately volunteered to team up with Yukina, and with Hiei gone, no one denied him that pleasure. Shizuru flopped down next to Yusuke, the two of them having equal glinting eyes aiming for victory. Botan dragged Kurama down to the floor to be her team mate and Keiko and I joined forces with the intention of beating them all.
"Good night,"
"Good night."
"Be careful on your way home."
"With all the training you've gone through, I'd say anyone else out at this hour should be the ones careful."
"Yusuke, you make me sound like you."
"Then again with those shoes?"
"I'll just poke hole in my opponent's chest with my heal," I grinned.
"A little bit of height has got you quite cocky, small one."
"Care to test just how small I am, Yusuke?"
"What, you can reach about, lessee, my chest height now? Isn't that impressive. Sure it's not scary being that high up? You look a little pale-"
"Yusuke, you-!"
"Don't fear Yukina, I will protect you against anything. No one can beat me-"
"Because you won a game of Ludo? Come on."
"Urameshi, you're just angry I won!"
Kurama and I exchanged glances. It was not like it had been Kuwabara's splendid Ludo-luck that had helped them win. Instead everyone had been too soft-hearted to strike out any of Yukina's pieces and so they ended up having a rather easy win –in addition, Yukina had quite the luck in Ludo. No one had seen that coming-.
Yusuke ducked a blow and stuck his tongue out with a snicker, and for a change I really, and thoroughly hoped Kuwabara would hit him for a change.
"Thanks for tonight Kurama," I said.
"Yes, it was really nice," Keiko smiled. "And those cakes were so good."
"That's Kurama for you," Botan cheered and patted him on the chest with the back of her hand. "Too bad Koenma had too much paperwork to make it." She laughed at the thought.
"Almost makes me feel sorry for the little sucker," Yusuke said, hands in pockets and a wide grin on his face. "Almost."
"You're so evil," I commented.
"Thank you so much for tonight," Yukina bowed slightly to Kurama who returned the polite gesture.
"The pleasure was all mine," he assured. And with that as a final bid of farewell, our band of seven left the Minamino residence and headed out into the clear winter night. The snow had stopped falling and left a feather light, white blanket putting the world to sleep. From a nearby house music and voices leaked through a window.
Leaving soundless foot prints in the snow we walked silently, pulling in the cool air. It was a soothing end to Christmas Eve. Right then I wouldn't have minded walking there into eternity. Our breaths made small clouds, the tip of our eyelashes slowly turning white. But the warmth from all the food and presents, games and the last cup of tea before we left as we exchanged memories of the past months together, could not be put out.
Once, a snowplough drove slowly past us. Snow swirled along the ground, around our feet, made our dresses dance.
Only one time did our voice breach the crystal like air, and that was when reached our parting point.
We waved, wished each other a last good night and merry Christmas before walking each to ours. Yukina was supposed to sleep over at Kuwabara's before going back to Genkai. She looked wondrously much like a snow fairy there she walked in her yukata between the two larger humans.
I sighed out into the cold air, watching as the small clouds floated up and dissolved to the starry sky. It was a little nostalgic. When had it been again? November? I couldn't even remember.
That night I had met some human thugs and had been tossed into all of this. I had met Yusuke and the others. And Hiei.
"I haven't had much time to watch the news because of those guys," I noted to no body, face lifted to the sky. Staring at the stars I smiled to myself, then let my head drop to look back at the snow.
"Just as good, I suppose. They only made me depressed anyhow." I stretched. How the world had changed since then. My world at least. "I hope mom won't be angry with me for return so late," I yawned. "Though I did tell her it would probably last for a while, so it should be okay." And I continued walking with my mitten-less hands in my pockets to keep warm. Even though this night I felt like nothing could make me cold.
I wonder where Hiei is. My eyes strayed to the sky again as I walked.Wonder what he is doing. What "business" he had to take care of. I tried to blow smoke rings. Maybe something Koenma told him to do. It didn't look much like rings.But then Koenma would probably have told all of us. Though I would like to believe not even he would be so heartless as to give us work on Christmas eve.
And-
"The scarf." I remembered suddenly. We had forgotten all about it after the Ludo game. Hopefully Kurama would find it.
"You cold little lady? Unfortunately we don't got a scarf on us right now."
I turned slowly.
A gang of five looked at me. My eyebrow twitched. "You got to be kidding me."
This was getting to look too much like that night in November it was almost depressing. Though I had to admit there was one distinct difference this time: Those November guys had not been demons. And from what I could judge, these were strong ones too. Not like those Hiei and I had encountered in the woods some time back. Then again, I had not been lying on the lazy side the last weeks either.
"Can I help you?" Even if I had gotten a little stronger, it didn't hurt trying to play it safe. Maybe pretending to be human gave them some sort of kick and they weren't out to kill people this particular night; never underestimate the Christmas spirit. However, when they smiled so politely at each other and me, that hope jumped out the window.
"Do you know who I am?" I changed approach.
"If you are not one of the spirit detective Yusuke Urameshi's helpers, then we apologise for our grave mistake," what looked to be the leader said. How come the stronger demons were the ones with sense of politeness? Koenma should consider making a demon chart based on their politeness to define their strength, rather than their strength alone. These guys even said the word apologise.
"I'm afraid I don't know what you're talking about," I played innocent and batted my eyelids for effect.
"I'm afraid you do," said Mr. Leader. "And I am also afraid we will be killing you now."
"That is quite straight forward," I commented.
"Have you got any idea how big a bounty has been placed on any of the spirit world detective's heads?" he smiled. I shook my head. "It is quite a lot," he winked. Perhaps that had been a distraction manoeuvre, something in the line of my batting eye lids earlier. Regardless of whatever it was; the next thing I knew I was just barely able to dodge a cross-attack from either side of me. The fingers of one of them graced me. These guys were fast. My heart picked up in speed. Blood trickled thinly from my left cheek.
They gave me no time to regain composure. The next attack was a clean fist-to-stomach. Though in comparison to what a human would have been able to accomplish, I was flung several feet backwards. Training had still not made me capable of following that speed, but I had at least learned how to land, and skidded backward on the snow until I managed to stop entirely. The white snow cloud around me had yet to settle down when they came for me again. But this time I was prepared.
Something swished toward me, I dodged. It sounded sharp and with a bite of my lip I had to acknowledge that they probably had knives of some sort as well as scary speed. I jumped clear of the demon behind me, blocked an attack from the left and was forced to jump flat to the ground the next second. With some luck my dress would escape this with minimal damage. However, no matter what I tried I was not able to touch them. All I could do was dodge. Pressing my lips together I cursed Kurama for focusing on teaching me mainly defence the last weeks. True enough, I was also a supporter of defence being the best offence, but that would not get rid of these demons and I had no chance of outrunning them in these clothes. Even with a fighting robe that would have been a close run. Though I suppose these stupid clothes called for more cursing than Kurama right n-
I fell face flat to the ground. In a moment of bewildering, I spun around to look at my feet. It felt like ice was being poured down my spine: The heal of my right shoe had broken. Broken. Clean off. They had cost me a lot of saving. Dang. And it had felt so nice to be tall too. Or taller.
Two knives, buried not too far away from each of my legs, pinned my dress to the ground. Dang, the dress too. Spotting a demon ahead I twirled around, ignored the agonising sound of tearing clothes, winced as the side of my bare thighs skidded along the cold, sharp snow, spun up on my elbows and kicked him square in the chest. With some spirit energy in the mix it packed quite an impact -that on the loss of being completely open.
I was grabbed from behind and froze as a sharp blade was pressed to my throat.
"This appears to be the end, little missy," the demon whispered sweetly in my ear.
"I'll have to protest," another voice said. The knife cut briefly into my skin before clattering to the ground. The sound was closely followed by the heavier noise of the demon collapsing behind me. It groaned, apparently not entirely dead yet.
"At least try and make yourself useful," the same voice said as a shadow swiftly moved past me, and Hiei was targeting the leader head on.
I got to my senses and grabbed the knife by my feet. Charging for the closest demon I could see, I also snatched with me one of those that had held me pinned to the ground only seconds earlier. With a knife in each hand I made it my sole goal to inflict as much damage as possible –even if I was limping and a little out of balance due to the lack of a heal-. It felt like ages ago now, but I had made a promise I would grow stronger. I had no intentions of making the same mistake as last time. I could do this, I could kill.
That's what I had thought, anyway. With all my heart I had honestly thought I could make a change. How ironic fate could be. The only difference was that this time he was not the only one hurt.
A long gash ran along the side of my face. I couldn't see it but I had a bad feeling it didn't look good. The wound running deep on the right side of my stomach however, I could see, and it looked less than not good. My feet and half way up to my knee were frozen blue. Somewhere along the fight I'd had to kick off the shoes. My vision crisscrossed, became blurry, I forced it back to focus with all my might. Hiei was here somewhere. All I had to do was follow the sounds. My head felt too heavy to lift. I stumbled across something on the ground. A body. I felt the need to throw up making my stomach cold and face warm. But he wasn't entirely dead. His throat was slit half over, gurgling sounds of breath and blood in a death promising mix tangling in my ears.
I broke into a run. It wasn't fast or much of a run at all, but faster than walking. I squinted my eyes. Ahead I could make out the contour of a small figure fighting someone at least two and a half times its size.
"Hiei," I choked. He was beat to the ground. But his stubborn nature had him up on his feet not long after. He would have been better off staying down. The two remaining demons practically used him as a volley ball. Since when had our opponents been this strong? Since when had random attacks on the street forced Hiei to use the dragon on his right hand, with only one of them falling victim to the attack? If that was the future of our fights I was not sure how we were going to make it.
A glint of cold steel winked at me through the darkness. The smaller was kicked out of balance. Hiei. He hit the ground hard, head knocked into a wall. He was cornered. I pulled in air desperately. Willing my legs to work as they should, I flung myself in-between them. Staring into his face I saw shock creep onto his face. "What-?" his lips soundlessly formed.
"Trust in me," I gasped. The knife fell hard on my back. Hiei's eyes widened. It felt nothing like the other times. My thoughts shot like a laser beam into his mind. And for a second I was blinded by white light. It felt like I had been electrocuted. My mouth sprang open though no sound escaped from it.
Instead came the sound of steel against steel.
For a moment I wondered if that was all.
Would we be kept from entering each others memories when I was transformed? From the feel of it Hiei wondered the same. -For the feel of it… No memories rushed before my eyes, no feelings from the past. Instead it felt like I was in the present Hiei. What he was feeling, sensing and seeing stood equal to what I saw, felt and sensed. I could see myself before me. I saw myself through his eyes, though I at the same time still saw Hiei lie on the ground. Perhaps it would be better described as that I sensed or understood more than saw what he saw.
That all happened in less than a second. Then followed the pain. A coruscating pain and I realised with shock that those were his wounds. My own were nothing in comparison. Though regardless of that and regardless of the exhaustion crushing us both, a new sort of energy began pulsing through me. And I knew he felt the same.
The knife had been knocked out of the demons hands, Hiei sliced his arm off with one, clean cut. The demon roared with pain. |Don't look now.| Hiei separated the head from its body. The roar cut short to a deathly silence. The head fell to the ground with a soft thud, followed by its body.
What happened next I was only half aware of: The last demon refused to go down without a fight, though realising he was suddenly defenceless I had a vague memory of him trying to escape.
Hiei hadn't let him. From behind he had buried me through its chest. I could hear the desperate pulse of what was not his heart but the demon's life force all around me. The heave of breath and gurgling sound that followed as I pierced a lung. The rush of blood, the squirming of muscles and intestines. A non ending squishing sound all around me.
Reality was not pretty.
We had run. I could feel Hiei's exhaustion as my own. I was heavy in his hands. Drained for the needed energy to wield me, small, brief stabs of electricity-like pain shot into his hand, chasing further up his arm with each thrust.
From a tall building Hiei had watched. Watched as police cars assembled, inhabitants of the nearby buildings crowded, and the accident that would be the severely unpleasant end to my parents Christmas. -Except he was not aware that just yet.