Chapter 4 - So Much for Diplomacy.
Music recommendation: Ladytron - Fighting in Built Up Areas.
*-*-*-*-*-*
The next morning Botan awoke with the rest of the girls, who wanted to get to the stadium early to get good seats. She had optimism that perhaps she wouldn't run into Hiei. Or better yet, maybe he would just forget about the whole thing. Today was a new day. On that note, she felt that she should try to forget the whole thing happened yesterday. Yeah, that's it. Smiling to herself, she headed out the door with the others, and found herself being followed even closer by Atsuko. "Hey Botan, what are you gonna do about Hiei?" And there went her plans of forgetting about the whole ordeal. If Atsuko remembered, surely Hiei would. "Now that he knows, you could," as she made a gesture with her pinky finger, "you know," she nudged Botan on the arm. The source of Yusuke's behavior became painfully obvious.
"I don't have to do anything about it."
"Oh, so you're playing hard to get, huh? Good choice," Atsuko laughed, slapping Botan on the back. Her face reddened,
"That's not what I meant!" By this time all of the girls entered the elevator.
"Calm down Botan. I'm sure Atsuko doesn't mean it in a mean way, she's just trying to help. I mean, surely you didn't think Hiei would just forget, and you wouldn't have to deal with it, did you?" Keiko said, unknowingly shooting down Botan's entire plan. The expression Botan made told them all, and Atsuko laughed at her naiveté.
"You should probably come up with a better plan," Shizuru only chimed in because she didn't want to see Botan fall on her face.
"What am I going to do then?" Botan sighed, surrendering to the advice of the other girls. If they could see all of these problems in her approach, surely Hiei would.
"You've got to be more aloof. You panic really easily, and it shows on your face." Shizuru said aloofly, clearly suggesting Botan be more like her.
"That's right," Keiko nodded in agreement, "it's really easy to tell what you're thinking, and we can't even read minds." She laughed nervously, realizing she had just shoved the whole incident back into Botan's face.
"He'll totally be able to mess with your head if he knows what you're thinking, so it's best to think that you don't care one way or another." The wise Shizuru added.
"Of course you could just skip over all of this and get right to it." Atsuko once more suggesting Botan should do something inappropriate. They all looked at her like she had a serious problem, "What?" She asked with little interest, confident in the fact that her approach would work. The elevator rang at the first floor and they all exited into the lobby.
"I'll try my best. But what if it doesn't work? What if something goes wrong?" She said beginning to panic.
"You can't think that way Botan. Remember, keep calm. You can't show the slightest sign of weakness." Keiko said encouragingly.
"Besides, it's not like you could make things any worse," Atsuko laughed aloud, drawing cold glances from Keiko and Botan. By the time they stepped out of the front entrance, Botan felt as though she had been prepped for battle.
"Sleep well?" Botan recognized the voice behind her immediately. She paused, the other girls looked back and saw Hiei leaned up against the wall near the entrance, his arms crossed over his chest. They each gave Botan their own gesture of well wishing which for the most part was a friendly wave, with the exception of Atsuko's crude pinky gesture. They then continued walking to the stadium without her. Botan turned slowly, as if her problem standing behind her was a powder keg that would explode if she made any sudden movements.
"Well good morning Hiei," frantically she searched for something off-topic, "Are you ready for the second round?" She smiled brightly at him, holding her arms behind her back.
"Second round?" his arms still crossed over his chest, "you mean you didn't get enough last night?"
"Wh-what!?" her face pure exacerbation. Hiei laughed to himself, stepping calmly away from the wall to approach her.
"Did you manage to have any dreams where I wasn't violating you?" he began walking around her in a circle, making her quite uneasy. She decided once more to go on the offensive, in the final act of disregard to all of the advice and preparation she had just received in the elevator.
"Yes, as a matter of fact, I did. And even if I didn't, Hiei," here she once more looked down at him as he circled her, "what difference would it make to you? As I recall, you only care about yourself." Self-righteous was her tone.
"Is that so?" He stopped once he was standing in front of her again, "how is your shoulder." Not even posed as a question, it was a statement which served the purpose of reminding Botan of how he had saved her, and helped her back to the hotel the night before. She lowered her head.
"I'm sorry, that was wrong of me." She said sincerely, suddenly feeling ashamed at forgetting this deed he had done for her.
"I wouldn't get apologetic if I were you. I do only care for myself." Now that he had gotten her to feel a fool, satisfied, he coolly brushed away her apologies with a single wave of his hand. She became enraged at this callus relapse into being selfish, and his attempts to avoid admitting he had done something categorically 'good.'
"Hiei!" She raised her head to meet his eyes. Her expression, full of anger, puzzled him.
"You want it?" She was thrown off by this, but tried to ignore it, and continue.
"You did something nice for me yesterday, so don't go on acting so cool about it." She waved her finger in his face. To the people, and demons, who stood outside of the entrance this looked almost like a mother scolding her defiant, spiky-headed child. However, none of them dared laugh at it, for they knew this was the one of the Urameshi Team who had just turned a guy into ash the day before. Hiei scoffed.
"If you're so concerned about it, maybe you should start thinking about how you're going to repay me." Botan was struck dumb-founded. But before she had a chance to think of a response, Hiei was gone.
"Repay him?" She walked towards the stadium with a weight in her chest as these words resonated in her mind. She had no idea what to do. Did he actually expect her to repay him? All things considered, he did help her out a lot, so it wouldn't be so unheard of to show gratitude. In fact, it was almost required! But surely he didn't mean... Why, that's absolutely unacceptable for him to expect such a thing! Although he did get the idea from her mind... On that note, why did she think those things? "Ohh," she sighed once more smacking herself on the forehead. "And doesn't that guy ever wear a shirt?"
*-*-*-*-*-*
Once Botan arrived at the stadium she eventually found the rest of the girls, who sat near Koenma. She was surprised to see Koenma here, in human form no less, "Lord Koenma, what are you doing here?"
"I'm just here as an observer," his attention sternly on the fight.
"So Botan, how did it go with Hiei?" Atsuko said trying to yell over the crowd.
"Oh that," the other girls looked at her greedily, also curious of the outcome, "didn't go so well."
"Hm?" Koenma looked over at Botan, "What didn't go so well? Botan, are you okay? You look like a sweaty tomato."
"Ah! It's nothing, sir," she said frantically waving her hands in front of her as if that would make her invisible to Koenma. He hiked an eyebrow at her, but returned his attention to the match. Botan, herself looked to see the progress of the match. She saw Kuwabara, Yusuke, and the masked fighter fighting against three from the other team. Hiei and Kurama were missing. Her stomach knotted, and she began to feel light headed, eyes starting to well up, "but, where's Hiei?" Even she did not realize how shaky and worried her voice sounded as she blurted it out. The other girls simultaneously looked over at her with evil, animalistic grins, as if she had just been caught stealing from the cookie jar. "It's not what you think!" Again she smiled and did her 'you don't see me' hand wave.
Just then there was a crash, an announcement that a member of the Ichigaki Team had fallen from the sky. This momentarily distracted everyone's attention away, "Hiei!" Botan yelled excitedly, only to find everyone, including Koenma, looking at her strangely. "...And Kurama. Woo, you guys are all right!!" She punched a fist in the air, really trying to sell her celebratory act to the others. The girls still looked at her with Cheshire grins, while Koenma was as confused as ever. Botan sunk down in her seat.
"Botan, just what the heck is going on," he sad through his pacifier, "did something happen to you?"
"It's such a funny story! You see, last night," Atsuko was not able to finish her breath before she found Botan lunged over Koenma 's seat, her hand over Atsuko's mouth.
"No no, sir. Everything in fine. Absolutely nothing for you to worry about," she said, still smothering Atsuko.
"Then could you get out of my lap?" A single bead of sweat trailed down Koenma's face, as he clearly didn't want to go through the trouble of finding out why Botan was being so secretive.
*-*-*-*-*-*
Later that evening Botan found herself once more sitting at her bench near the entrance of the hotel. The crowd again low as everyone was beginning to settle down after the end of the day's fighting. What an eventful day it had been. Two consecutive matches for Team Urameshi, Yukina showing up to find who she didn't know was Hiei, everyone getting a good laugh at Yusuke's spirit beast. Botan began giggling once more thinking about the funny-looking, and utterly non-intimidating Puu. Through all this commotion, she kept finding herself thinking about how cool Hiei was during the fights. Also, she wondered, why had she been so worried when she saw that he hadn't shown up for the second fight? Was she afraid something had happened to him? And how about this whole 'pay him back' business. She was almost too tired to think about it. She leaned over, resting her elbows on her knees, resting her eyes.
"How sweet. You were worried about me?" Her eyes shot open, and before she even looked, she began yelling and waving her arms in the air.
"Would you quit doing that!" Once she actually looked, she saw that Kurama was there with him, and retracted her fists from the air. Kurama covered his mouth with his hand to hide his smile, though it was quite obvious he was laughing at the two of them.
"If you'll excuse me," he said walking off in attempts to spare Botan any further embarrassment. She resumed her bench-sitting, glaring up at Hiei for being a mental terrorist.
"Tell me, exactly how 'cool' was I?" He said mockingly, sitting beside her on the bench. Her only reply was to cover her face with her hands.
"Cool enough," she said trying to terminate that line of questioning as quickly as possible, now pouting off in the other direction.
"Have you used that over active imagination of yours to think of a way to thank me? Or have you only used it to think of more services you want me to perform for you?" This comment caused a spark in Botan. She became tired of him making embarrassing comments, forcing her to try and answer for her embarrassing thoughts. She had tried to resolve the issue, but nothing else seemed to work. Her only solution: facing the issue head-on, with a daring, unwavering resolve. And of course, no fore-thought.
"What do you want Hiei?" She jumped off the bench and turned to face him, her voice almost a shout. This drew the attention of the few nearby people, who wouldn't dare say anything. "You want to read my mind, huh? You wanna know all about the private thoughts going on in there, hm?" Her hands latched onto her hips, and she fired away her imagination.
*-*-*-*-*-*
And so readers, the saga continues. I hope you guys enjoyed the chapter ^_^