Disclaimer – "Yu Yu Hakusho" and all known related characters do not belong to me. I get no monetary benefit from this. My benefit is the enjoyment of dealing with beloved characters.

"What Goes Around . . . "
by DragonDancer5150

Chapter 12 – Jurisdictions

Hiei found his way back to the entrance hall, stopping around a corner and scrying through the Jagan. Botan and Kurama only had five guards. The ferry girl's hands had been bound, a strange collar fastened around her throat. With Kurama's one arm bandaged as it was, he had been handcuffed to another of the wardens. He, too, wore a collar. Hiei guessed it to be a Yoki-dampening device like the manacles he had been force to wear too often of late. To his surprise, Batsukuno himself was also present. Hn. Now all we need is Bokuma and -

Surprising him further, he saw Batsukuno smile in self-assurance and turn to look right in his direction. "Come out, assassin, if you value these ones' lives at all." He watched Kurama's guard step behind him, pulling his arm up behind his back and pressing a dagger to the side of his throat. Another made the same move with Botan. Dammit! Hiei thought. This is ridiculous!

"Hold it right there, you jerk!" Yusuke and Kuwabara burst onto the scene from another hallway, Reiki weapons at the ready. The three remaining guards moved to protect the chief admin but were waved off.

Batsukuno turned with a humorless grin. "Ah, Lord Koenma's pet humans. A pleasure. However, this is a youkai matter and therefore beyond your jurisdiction, 'detectives'. You would be best to stay out of this."

"Yusuke, Kuwabara, don't - !" Kurama began.

Batsukuno turned with a snarl and a gesture. "Silence, thief!"

Hiei watched Kurama collapse with a strangled cry, his guard letting him go. He readily passed out from the pain on top of pain. Botan made a small noise but did not rebel, held in check by the dagger at her throat.

"Kurama!" Kuwabara cried.

Yusuke snarled. "You bastard! SPIRIT GUN!"

Batsukuno gestured again and the energy splashed harmlessly across a force field. The youkai glared hard at the two humans. "I will say this only once more - this is out of your power. These offenders are to be returned to the Spirit Realm to stand trial. You should be thanking me rather than trying to defend the ones who coldly murdered so many of your kind."

"Don't lump us with that trash downstairs!" Yusuke snapped. "And they didn't do it!"

"You have proof?" Batsukuno countered derisively. Yusuke could only glare in response.

"Bastard!" Kuwabara raged. "I've got your proof right here! Spirit Sword, get longer!" He skewered the guard handcuffed to Kurama and charged Batsukuno, pulling his sword at the last minute from the guard's chest. The dead youkai slumped to the ground over his prisoner. Kuwabara swung at Batsukuno, who merely parried the weapon barehanded, then gestured contemptuously at the human. The Spirit Sword disappeared as Kuwabara's concentration was broken by the sudden agony that assaulted him. He collapsed to his knees at Batsukuno's feet.

Ignoring both humans, the chief admin turned once again in Hiei's direction, then paused as he realized that the fire apparition was no longer there. Hiei had made use of the distraction to dart in behind Batsukuno and now used that advantage to put his sword through the bastard's chest from spine to sternum. "You're not taking me anywhere," he swore in a low voice. To his shock, Batsukuno spun around with a growl, jerking the sword from Hiei's hand. Hiei easily ducked the backhand swing but did not escape the agony attack. He went to one knee, face contorted as he glared up at Batsukuno in agony and hate. A guard came up behind him with a heavy kick to the knife wound. Hiei grunted in pain, jerking away from him. Distracted and disabled, he did not successfully dodge the guard's next strike, a sword pommel to the back of Hiei's head. The fire apparition dropped unconscious.

8 8 8 8 8

Enraged at the sight of his fallen friends, Yusuke leaped forward, easily dispatching the two guards who tried to stop him with a flurry of Reiki-enhanced punches. The guard over Hiei fell just as quickly but before Yusuke could turn his rage on the leader, he heard a sound like a rifle shot and a force enveloped him, a glowing red mesh blocking his vision. The force constricted, dropping Yusuke unceremoniously to the ground in a web of some kind with his hands trapped awkwardly against his chest. He saw Batsukuno turn toward the source.

"It's about time you showed up again, captain," Batsukuno sneered. "I see you let the assassin escape you a second time. It is well that I came along."

"Oh . . . no . . . you don't!" Fury giving him the strength to fight the torturous fire Yusuke could only imagine was flooding his veins, Kuwabara forced himself to his feet. He held out his hand. "S-spi-rit Sw - "

"Get back down, dog!" Batsukuno snapped, backhanding him across the side of the head.

"Leave him alone, you jerk!" Yusuke could only watch as his friend hit the ground, bucking as if in the grip of death throes. He inched his way around to see the youkai captain and his comrades approach, one shouldering a rifle-like weapon.

"Forgive me, Lord Batsukuno," the captain murmured, bowing. "My men can take charge of the prisoners from here."

"You can take charge of the assassin's blade first," the chief admin snapped in irritation, turning for the captain to remove the sword from his trunk.

"What of the humans?" one guard wanted to know.

Batsukuno glared down at Yusuke, then relented with a shrug. "Leave them. I suppose they cannot be blamed for their actions. Misplaced as the feelings are, I understand they consider the half-breed and even the fire apparition friends of theirs. Of course, they would want to defend them. It is why they were not sent after these two to begin with. Another reason a human Spirit Detective shouldn't associate with youkai - "

"The who and the what?" Yusuke growled. "Listen, buddy, I don't know who you think you are - "

Batsukuno's eyes narrowed in warning. "I am exactly whom I think that I am, human. Learn to watch your tongue. It will get you into more trouble than you can overcome one of these days. I suggest you be sure this one learns the same lesson as well." He nudged Kuwabara with one booted foot.

The remaining guards spread out, shouldering the prisoners and their dead or unconscious companions. The one guarding Botan signaled for her to move as well.

Yusuke gasped. "Wait - what? Botan, too? What the hell - ?"

The captain delivered a kick to his kidneys. "That's enough, human! Don't take such a tone of voice with the Chief Administrator of Justice of the Spirit and Demon Realms."

"Oh, well if that's all he is . . . " Yusuke groaned, feeling the bruise forming across his lower back. He could no more than watch the group depart, Batsukuno opening a periphery portal back to the Spirit Realm.

With that, the spell effect on Kuwabara ended. He paused to catch his breath before shoving to his feet once again. "Why that . . . Lemme get my hands on him just once!"

"Hey, Kuwabara, get me out of this freakin' . . . whatever the hell it is." Yusuke rocked back and forth, struggling futilely against the glowing red cords. The more he fought, the tighter they pulled.

"Spirit Sword!" Kuwabara bent to cut Yusuke free. As soon as the first strands were broken, the entire magical net dissipated.

"Dammit! They got away," Yusuke snarled in frustration as Kuwabara pulled him to his feet.

"Huh . . . now what, Urameshi?"

Yusuke thought about that for a moment. "Unless we can find out what really happened here, that guy's gonna hang Hiei and Kurama both. Even Botan! Dammit!" He ran a hand through his hair, thinking. "The kitchen. That's our only lead. Hiei said there was something in one of the ovens. C'mon!"

The two lost their way a few times before finally making it back to the kitchen. It still lay in the same state of chaos. Stepping carefully over bodies and cookingware alike, they picked their way across to the major appliances.

"Even if we do find something," Kuwabara grunted, trying in vain to ignore the sightless eyes staring at him from disembodied heads here and there, "how're we gonna get it to the Spirit Realm? Without Botan - "

Yusuke cut him off with an irritable wave of his hand. "I'll figure something out! I dunno, maybe Genkai - "

He stopped at Kuwabara's hand suddenly gripping his shoulder. "There's something here," the taller man muttered in an undertone, "and it's not in the oven." He was looking around the room.

Yusuke, too, scanned the room critically. If it were a youkai, maybe Hiei's stronger presence had kept Kuwabara from noticing before. If it were a human - Yusuke's eyes went to the bodies on the floor. He did a double take. There was one body with its head still attached. It lay half under the rice bags where Hiei had been. Perhaps that was why it had escaped notice before. As Yusuke crept closer, he realized that it did not appear to have wounds of any kind. In fact, it should have been coated with flour like Hiei was. It was not. Long hair covered the face but he thought he saw the glint of wetness, like eyes, somewhere behind the thick locks. He had the creepy feeling he was being watched. He inched closer.

"Urameshi, duck!" Kuwabara tackled Yusuke as the room came alive again with poltergeist-like activity, Yoki exploding throughout. A voice shrieked at them, high-pitched and echoing through the enormous room full of flashing metal.

"GO AWAY!"

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