Chapter 19: Turpentine Nocturnal

The attacks had stopped, and it was debatable whether that was a bad thing or not. Without the constant bangs of exploding missiles, the migraine-inducing whining of the cracked rear wheel axle was painfully audible and, with one side window blown out, the sounds of both the motorcycle engines and the glugging sound of the fuel gradually seeping out of the fuel tank were becoming increasingly predominant. Kuwabara had moved to the back corner of the cabin furthest from the broken window, Yusuke was loitering by the broken window, watching the scene behind them in the wing mirror and occasionally daring to stick his head out the window for a better look and Hiei was standing at one side of the driver's chair, clutching to the padded leather back support. Kurama was trying to keep his eyes on the road ahead, but, even when he did manage to stop himself from glancing at the fuel dial for any length of time, he could still see the evidence of their worsening situation on the edge of his vision and ahead of him he could see the sun sinking lower and lower in the sky, which was just as foreboding a sight as the already past halfway fuel gauge.

Kurama glanced in each of the wing mirrors in turn: their pursuers had fallen back a little, but they were still keeping pace with them. After Yusuke had shot a couple of demons who had been brave enough to attempt to board the vehicle and Kurama had swerved to run over any who dared ride too close, the remainder of the group had fallen back, and they were now just biding their time. The fuel leaking from the tank not only had a pungent odour obvious to even the least sensitive of noses, but it was so thick it did not immediately soak into the ground, meaning that, as they moved ahead, they were leaving a very blatant, glistening green line behind that traced their route even more obviously than the tracks the large, ridged wheels were biting into the ground. Kurama had already resigned himself to the fact that they were eventually going to be forced to leave the vehicle and get into a hands-on fight with their pursuers, but he was hoping to cover as much distance as possible before that outcome came to pass, if only to increase their chances of shipping some of the ice maidens back to Arbeinia via Puu – which was starting to seem as though it was their last remaining option for saving the ice maidens from total extinction.

"Do you have a plan?" Hiei asked, his voice strangely light and barely audible. "You always have a plan don't you Kurama?"

"I'm considering our options," Kurama replied.

He felt one edge of the back-rest curl away from him as Hiei gripped his fingers deeper into the leather.

"Will they kill us?"

Kurama shifted his focus from the road ahead to the translucent reflection of Hiei in the windscreen in front of him. Worryingly, he found Hiei looking every bit as apprehensive and unfocused as he had sounded.

"They'll try to kill us as quickly as they can," Kurama told Hiei's wide-eyed reflection. "We are of no interest or use to them, they will want to dispose of us swiftly so that they can have free access to our passengers."

"What will we do?" Hiei asked.

"We'll try to hold them off," Kurama replied. "We have no other choice."

"We won't run away and leave the ice maidens behind?"

"Why would we do that?"

"I don't know. I just thought that might be your plan after what you said before about making a difficult decision after Yusuke said we should fly away on Puu."

Kurama stared at Hiei's reflection as long as he felt he could before returning his attention to the road ahead. Hiei really was quite exposed and raw lately with his emotions, and it was difficult even for Kurama to imagine how he was feeling about being in such a situation with the family who had thrown him out so long ago. Kurama had always known that Hiei was harbouring some sort of inner conflict about how he truly felt about his people, but he had never expected it to manifest itself so prominently. Hiei had always managed to keep his emotions in check – or at the very least, turn them to pure rage, as he had done when Sensui had killed Yusuke – but suddenly he seemed to have lost his ability to mask his feelings, and Kurama again found himself thinking that Hiei seemed vulnerable and exposed.

"I don't feel as strongly as you do that the ice maidens should simply be returned home," he said carefully. "And because of that, I also don't feel that Kuwabara or Yusuke should be made to endanger their lives for the cause. If the odds look insurmountable, I would advise that the four of us escape on Puu, yes."

"What if those men stopped chasing us before we ran out of fuel?" Hiei asked. "Would we be safe then? How would we continue our journey?"

"If we could somehow out-run those bikes, we could continue until the vehicle stops completely, whereupon we could take turns watching guard until daybreak, at which time the battery would function again and we could continue on to Arbeinia," Kurama replied. "However, if we are facing this level of opposition here and now, we are unlikely to manage to pass through Arbeina and return the entire population of the ice village to their homes unhindered."

"But we could protect the ice maidens and return them to their village if those bikes stop?"

"Of course. That was always our plan, wasn't it?"

"Okay."

Kurama watched, stupefied as Hiei's reflection moved away behind him.

"Where are you going?" he asked, daring to glance back over one shoulder long enough to see Hiei run from the cabin altogether.

"What's his problem?" Kuwabara muttered, jerking a thumb in Hiei's direction.

"Go after him, Kuwabara," Kurama replied, returning his attention to the road. "I think he might be about to attempt something reckless involving the Dragon of the Darkness Flame."

"Shooting those guys was my idea!" Yusuke complained.

"Shooting them risks detonating their missiles, but banishing them into the darkness eliminates both the soul and the weapon in one easy step," Kurama pointed out.

"So why don't we just let Hiei do that then?" Kuwabara asked, loitering by the doorway hesitantly.

"Because he's not strong enough to launch or control the dragon right now," Kurama said. "If he tries to do either, he will likely kill himself, which will unleash the dragon unrestrained, and it could turn on us all."

"Fair point," Kuwabara said before hurrying off after Hiei.

Kurama watched Kuwabara's reflection disappear out of sight before turning his attention to Yusuke, who was already watching him in the windscreen.

"What are we really gonna do when we have to stop?" Yusuke asked him as their eyes met.

"Fight for as long as we can," Kurama replied.

"Those witches aren't even grateful for our help, you know," Yusuke pointed out.

"I don't think that factors into this," Kurama said. "Whether or not they approve of us, our methods or our interference is irrelevant: we're not doing this to win their affection, we're doing this because it's the right thing to do."

"I thought you said leaving them behind to cure the sick was the right thing to do?"

"Alright, we're doing this because Hiei thinks it's the right thing to do, and, as his friends, we're supporting his decision, rather than leave him to attempt to tackle this problem on his own and doubtlessly get himself killed."

"I guess it's the same old story for us. Nobody was grateful when we saved the earth from Sensui's demon tunnel either."

Kurama forced a smile for Yusuke's benefit before both looked down at the fuel gauge in time to see the needle glide into the red part of the dial. Kurama looked up and saw that the sun was almost touching the horizon, and nightfall would be upon them within minutes of the fuel drying up. He looked at Yusuke's reflection, preparing himself to issue one last warning to his friend about how they should proceed when the inevitable did eventually occur, but he found Yusuke with his head and most of his upper body stuck out of the missing window, something he had not done for a prolonged period of time since nearly falling out of the opposite window earlier. Kurama moved his eyes to the wing mirror by Yusuke to see what had caught the mazoku's attention, almost losing control of the vehicle in shock at what he saw.

Botan dropped onto the couch with a sigh of frustration. She had been searching high and low, but she could not find any trace of her communicator, and she had a very desperate need for it. Since leaving spirit world and returning to living world, Hiei had been trying to tell her something telepathically – and it had been a long time since he had last invaded her thoughts so persistently – but he had gone quiet during the last few hours, and she had reached a dead-end with her investigation. She had been hoping to call him on her communicator again to ask him what she should do next, but apparently, when she had abandoned the device somewhere after growing weary of hearing it constantly ringing with a call from her boss that she had no intention of answering, she had done too good a job or hiding it or else simply forgetting where it was, because, now that she did need to use it, it was nowhere to be found.

She held up the notepad she had been scribbling on, running her eyes over the symbols there one more time and feeling as confused by them as she had the first time around. Hiei's messages were garbled and unclear – and occasionally completely irrelevant and nonsensical, like the one image he had conveyed to her of Yusuke ruffling Yukina's hair and then sniffing his fingers – but there were a few points Hiei had been consistently repeating: Yukina was in trouble, and the only way to help her involved deciphering a series of ancient characters that Botan could not read, and somehow connecting them back to the mixing bowls Hiei had indicated would be in the old tree by the temple steps. Although Botan could not read the characters, she did know that they were part of an ancient language, and that a translation guide for the language had a home in the spirit world library – and, if Hiei did not contact her again soon, she realised that she may be forced to return to spirit world to find the book in question.

Botan did not even know what the strange letters had to do with Yukina's dilemma – or in fact what Yukina's dilemma even was. Hiei had been a little vague on exactly what sort of peril Yukina was in, and most of his anger about it seemed to be centred around frustration, so perhaps he himself did not really know what Yukina's problem was. Botan wanted to ask him where Yukina was and why she could not just go there and get her, but his telepathy only worked as a two-way means of communication if he let it, and usually he denied it, and without her communicator, she was unable to call him to ask her questions outright.

Botan stood up again and started towards the bedroom she usually stayed in when she spent a night at Genkai's temple; since Hiei was beyond her reach, she was going to have to choose an appropriate disguise so that she could enter spirit world undercover.

"We never thought of that," Yusuke said. "Spirit gun shots are no good because they could ignite the rockets, but blades of ice don't have that problem."

"I can't believe they're offensively attacking!" Kurama said, watching in awe in the wing mirror by Yusuke as the bikers chasing them fell one by one. "And that they're working together so cohesively!"

"I guess Hiei knows how to put the fire up their asses," Yusuke said, smirking to himself at his rather unimaginative pun.

"Perhaps we misjudged them after all," Kurama said, ignoring Yusuke's interlude entirely. "Perhaps they do feel strongly enough about some things to actively fight for them. Perhaps their love of their own families has been enough to motivate them to retaliate. Perhaps they even want to help us now because they can see that we are helping them."

"I wouldn't go that far…" Yusuke muttered.

The vehicle lurched and chugged momentarily as the fuel tank was drained of the last drop of fuel and there was a brief lag before the auxiliary system fully took over powering the engine, but Kurama barely noticed, his attention still mostly on the images the two wing mirrors were reflecting in towards him: unbelievably, a gathering of around twenty ice maidens had stepped out onto the landing deck at the back of the vehicle and they were aiming blasts of wintery air and lethally sharp shards of ice at their pursuers, gradually picking off each rider. In mere minutes they had halved the number of armed motorcycles still following, and those that had yet to be knocked down had fallen back considerably, a few of them trying desperate tactics to avoid being hit and inadvertently crashing into each other.

The only thing more amazing than seeing the ice maidens actually fight back effectively and helpfully was the idea that Hiei had inspired them to do so.

"I don't see any kids out there," Yusuke said.

"No, it would be too dangerous for them," Kurama replied.

"But there are a lot of women out there," Yusuke pointed out. "And we know there are at least six kids. How many of those ice chicks do we have with us now?"

Kurama tried to count through the number of ice maidens he could recall rescuing: there had been six in Arbeinia, eight in Illyria, seventeen in Daldani and at least twenty-five at Enki's temple.

"More than fifty, I think," he concluded.

"Fifty?" Yusuke echoed.

"Fifty-six, to be precise," Kurama replied. "Unless Hiei managed to flush any more out of Enki's temple than those we saw in his gardens."

"Fifty-six?"

"That's including all the children."

"Holy crap, how the hell can we fit them all in here?"

"This is a big vehicle Yusuke, and they seem to want to keep to themselves, I don't imagine spending one more night with them will be an issue."

Kurama heard Yusuke make a strange noise that was somewhere between a whimper and a groan, before he stomped across the cabin to stand beside the driver's chair.

"What was that last part?" he asked.

"They keep themselves to themselves," Kurama replied, glancing up at Yusuke, who was standing almost unreasonably close to him. "It is their way, and in this case, that's definitely a bonus. It would be incredibly difficult for all concerned if they decided that they wanted to… Mingle with us…"

"No, not the part about how they're a bunch of stuck-up, anti-social bitches, I meant the part where you said we have to spend the night with them," Yusuke said.

"Well yes, we will have to spend another night with them," Kurama replied. "The sun is setting and we've already switched to auxiliary power. In about half an hour, this vehicle will stop functioning, and we will be forced to wait until the sun rises again before we can continue our journey."

"But it's already freezing in here," Kuwabara complained from the back corner of the cabin. "Those women make the air really cold, and it's even worse now there's so many of them. We'll die of the cold if we stay with them overnight!"

"We can just stay up here and put on the heater like we did before," Yusuke told him.

"I thought Kurama said the battery stopped working when the sun went down?" Kuwabara responded.

"It's always worked in the dark before," Yusuke said.

"We always had fuel in the dark before," Kurama said solemnly. "This time we will have neither fuel nor battery. Kuwabara is right, I'm afraid: we won't be able to use the heater until sunrise."

Yusuke cursed and kicked the base of the chair. He moved back over to the window and stuck his head out, surveying the scene behind them. Kurama checked each of the mirrors and saw that there were only six motorbikes still giving chase, and they had fallen so far behind, they were starting to fade out of sight through the swirling winds of ice crystals billowing freely from the landing deck at the back of the tank. They would soon be free of capture, but, as he turned his attention to the front window, Kurama worried that it might not be soon enough. They needed to disappear from sight of anyone and the ice maidens needed to stop generating so much energy, because at the moment, they were an obvious target. They needed to be inconspicuous as they took advantage of the last remaining minutes of daylight to get as far away from Dardani as they possibly could. If they remained conspicuous for much longer, it would be easy for anyone who had been tracking their movements to figure out where they were travelling to, and arrange a blockade ahead of them.

Smuggling six ice maidens had been difficult, though still relatively achievable, but smuggling the entire race was another matter entirely – not to mention the pandemonium likely to have broken loose across the infected cities as the news of the ice maidens' disappearance reached the truly desperate. Realistically, Kurama thought, Enki would be well within his rights to order their arrest and execution for what they had done – he only hoped that Enki's fondness for Yusuke and his generally benevolent nature would spare them such a fate.

As the last of the bikers following them vanished from sight, the ice maidens finally did ease off their attack, opting to gradually lessen the storm they had been creating rather than stop abruptly, probably because they wanted to be absolutely sure that none of their pursuers would take advantage of a sudden lull in activity and strike a counter-attack. Although the wing mirrors did not allow Kurama a full view of the landing deck, he could see the women starting to filter back inside, and so he turned his attention fully to the road ahead and the setting sun.

Kurama managed to continue along the road for another ten minutes before the bulk of the sun had dropped below the horizon and, despite him pressing harder at the accelerator pedal, the vehicle began to slow, the additional systems inside the vehicle letting out a collective, descending whine as they all began to power down. Kuwabara began unfolding the remaining blankets he had gathered from the supplies closet and Yusuke started attaching lengths of bandages over the broken window, sticking them into place with medical tape in the vain hope of containing what little heat there was inside the vehicle.

"Shouldn't we be saving the medical supplies?" Kuwabara asked him.

"We've got a whole damn army of nurses on board, if one of us gets hurt, surely at least one of them would help us out," Yusuke flatly replied.

Kuwabara muttered a sceptical response but Yusuke ignored him. The vehicle continued the slow until finally the engine began to falter. Kurama steered off of the road and into the vegetation, pulling up alongside a craggy rock formation as the engine died completely. The vehicle continued moving, momentum carrying it on a little further, before it eventually came to rest, the side with the broken window neatly alongside the rocks.

"So what now?" Kuwabara asked.

"We should move to the upper deck," Kurama suggested. "It's probably warmest there, and we can take it in turns to move outside and watch guard."

"Puu's back," Hiei said as he rejoined them in the cabin.

Kurama paused, his eyes wandering over Hiei curiously. He was slightly out of breath, his face was slightly flushed and his entire body was glistening with tiny ice crystals.

"Were you out there with the ice maidens during their assault?" Kurama asked.

Hiei looked momentarily guilty before shaking his head and shrugging.

"I was just making sure they didn't fall off or mess it up," he said. "Huh, you know how weak they are, right?"

Kurama nodded slowly, though he was less than convinced by Hiei's obvious lie. Apparently Hiei's concern for his people was only growing stronger, but he was risking humiliation.

"You're being incredibly naïve and myopic, Hiei," Kurama said, no longer caring for tact in light of Hiei's recent secret conversation with Botan. "They rejected you for a reason, don't think that you can win your way back into their good graces now with a few petty displays of power and bravado."

"You don't know what you're talking about," Hiei quietly replied.

"I'm trying to save you your dignity," Kurama said. "I remember a time when you valued it."

"I haven't done anything undignified," Hiei said, his voice still oddly hushed. "I have no regrets."

"You're not as mature as you would like to think that you are. A very childish part of you still thinks that making peace with those women will bring you peace within your own soul. You're wrong. You're wasting your time. If you thought you were disappointed with what you saw when you returned to the ice village, expect to feel that disappointment tenfold if you insist on trying to make amends with those women here and now."

"You don't know what I felt when I returned to the ice village. No-one does. And you don't know what I'm feeling now."

"I'm trying to warn you. As a friend."

"Your tone isn't very friendly."

"Okay, stop," Yusuke said, stepping between Hiei and Kurama. "Seriously guys, this is a moot point. Tomorrow morning, those women go back to their floating rock of misery and we'll never see any of them again, so what they've done and said in the past few days is meaningless, right?"

"If he continues to show weakness like this, they will exploit and abuse it," Kurama said.

"Come on Kurama, he can't help it," Yusuke replied, turning his back on Hiei to face Kurama directly. "Just back off. We're all tired and hungry and pissed off, but let's not fight with each other. And besides, I think you're maybe just looking for an excuse to goad him into a fight because he was talking to Botan earlier."

"I'm not that petty, Yusuke," Kurama answered him.

"I'm not in love with Botan," Hiei said, side-stepping past Yusuke to bring Kurama back into his line of sight. "I don't want her, and if you really do care for her – which, I can see now that you do – then you can have her."

Kurama narrowed his eyes, putting a hand on Yusuke's chest and gently pushing him aside to clear the space between himself and Hiei.

"This isn't a trivial matter," he said.

"I never said that it was," Hiei replied. "And I swear to you, I don't want Botan as a lover."

"I understand."

"Do you?"

"Yes. You don't want her, but you don't want me to have her either."

Hiei's face twitched slightly, but otherwise he did not respond.

"Your silence speaks volumes," Kurama said.

"Okay, let's wrap this up guys," Yusuke interrupted. "We need to get food and we need to do a sweep to make sure nobody snuck onboard or is still hiding outside waiting for us somewhere."

"I've seen Botan show her interest in you, but you've never expressed the slightest hint of interest in her," Kurama said, pushing Yusuke back again. "In fact, you've been dismissive of her. Why is that?"

"I told you already, I don't want Botan," Hiei insisted.

"Then why do you protest to my liking her?" Kurama asked.

"I can't tell you that just yet."

"Can't or won't?"

"Both."

Kurama was unsure if he understood the situation any better than he had before. Hiei looked like he was warring with his emotions, but he seemed to genuinely mean it when he said he had no interest in keeping Botan for himself. And clearly he was hiding something, and it was unclear if he would ever reveal what it was.

"Excuse me?"

Hiei turned around and stepped back as Mizore stepped into the cabin, looking slightly sterner than usual.

"Why have we stopped here?" she asked, folding her arms over her chest.

"We can't continue until daybreak," Kurama answered her. "Our fuel was drained during the battle to escape Dardani, and the auxiliary power system only operates during daylight hours. We will depart again as soon as the sun rises."

"It seems dangerous to linger here," she said.

"It is dangerous," Yusuke said. "But it looked like you could handle yourself back there, so I don't think there's a problem."

"I did what I had to back there," Mizore said. "And now there is something else I must do. Lady Tsubara is aware of your presence here, and she has asked me to convey a message to you."

Hiei touched a hand to his chest, visibly surprised that she was referring to him. When she nodded he stepped forwards from the others, looking up at her expectantly.

"Lady Tsubara wants you to know that you are not welcome to return to our village with us, and that she tolerates your presence on this transporter under much duress," Mizore said.

"Tell her the tissues are in the little girls' room!" Yusuke snorted.

"Regardless of how humbled your leader feels to be accepting assistance from one she ousted from her own clan, she is, nonetheless, at our mercy," Kurama added. "Thank her kindly to keep any future revelations she may have to herself from now on."

"I haven't finished," Mizore said tightly. "Lady Tsubara also asked me to tell you this."

Hiei frowned. He started to ask her what the second part of her message was, his words breaking in a cry of alarm as she backhanded him across the face. He stumbled back a step, keeping his head turned, touching shaking fingers to the point of impact.

"Miss Kurama," Mizore said, turning her attention to Kurama. "I appreciate what you and your two associates have done for myself, my family and my people. Please don't take this creature as an example of what the ice maidens are. Contrary to what this miserable wretch would have you believe, we are not a race of dirty, lying, treacherous monsters."

She turned and made to leave but Kurama pounced forwards, grabbing her arm to stall her exit. She stopped, looking down at his hand on her arm before slowly lifting her eyes to his.

"I don't think you are in a position to accuse anyone of being treacherous," he told her in a low voice. "And if this "monster" is to be the only ambassador of your race outside of your cloistered village then you should consider yourself lucky, because the image being portrayed of your people is one of loyalty, determination and honour."

"Unhand me," she said, tugging her arm from his grasp.

"You are the ones who should be hanging your heads in shame," Kurama said. "You've turned your back on the sick in this world – in exactly the same way you turn your backs on helpless infants you cast from your village without a care."

"Yeah, take that back to Lady Subaru, bitch!" Yusuke added.

Mizore gave a small growl and marched briskly away, exuding a draft of bitterly cold air behind her as she went.

"She's scary," Kuwabara whispered.

"This is exactly what I feared would happen," Kurama said. "This is what I was trying to warn you about all along."

He turned to Hiei, who had his head down, his hand still pressed against the side of his face where Mizore had hit him.

"I have a great way to fix all our problems right now," Yusuke said, clapping his hands together.

"Does it involve all those weird things we found in that room on the top deck?" Kuwabara asked.

"Yes!" Yusuke said, looking far too cheerful.

"I'm out," Kuwabara said.

"No, not those things!" Yusuke said, shaking his head. "Not all those weird things we found under the bed, the things we found in the closet!"

Kurama glanced back and forth between Yusuke and Kuwabara, the cunning grin on Yusuke's face contrasting a little too drastically with the sickened fear draining the colour from Kuwabara's face.

"We should do as you said earlier," Kurama said, hoping to maintain some degree of order. "We should check outside for food and any spies that may have managed to track us."

"This thing must be Enki and Kokou's personal limo," Yusuke said, ignoring Kurama entirely. "Because when we were up on the top deck earlier, me and Kuwabara found their honeymoon suite. It has more rubber than a Pirelli factory, but it has something you won't find anywhere else in demon world. Follow me, men."

"I'd rather not," Kuwabara said. "I'm still repressing my memories of the first time round."

"Get up the ladder and stop being such a pussy!" Yusuke snapped.

Hiei suddenly moved forwards, striding rapidly across the cabin and through the door beyond. Yusuke hurried after him, grabbing his shoulders as he tried to continue past the ladder and dragging him back. Hiei kept his head down, keeping his face out of sight, but he allowed Yusuke to steer him towards the ladder, and he made the effort to ascend it ahead of the mazoku.

"What's really up there?" Kurama asked Kuwabara as they approached the base of the ladder together.

"Lots of terrible things that might be used for sex or torture or maybe both," Kuwabara replied. "And something called poitin."

Kurama leapt at the ladder, hurriedly scaling it. He heard Kuwabara following him, but he was more concerned with catching Yusuke and stopping him. He reached the top of the ladder in time to see Yusuke pushing Hiei through a doorway, and by the time he had cleared the upper floor and dived through the door himself, Kurama found Yusuke standing in front of a cluttered wardrobe filled with dubious clothing, frightening footwear and an entire shelf of poitin.

"This is Kokou's secret stash!" Yusuke said to Hiei, waving a hand at the array of bottles packed onto the shelf. "And they're all full and sealed!"

He grabbed one from the shelf and worked off the cork, taking a small sip of the contents. There was a short delay before he began coughing and hacking and his eyes watered.

"This stuff might be the most lethal drink ever brewed!" he concluded. "I bet one drink of this would be enough to take away all your worries… And possibly dissolve a hole in your stomach…"

"Give me that," Hiei said, snatching the open bottle from Yusuke's hand.

"Hiei, don't!" Kurama warned.

"Don't tell me what to do," Hiei growled at him. "I'm not a child, despite what you all think of me."

He lifted the bottle to his lips and threw back his head, leaving Kurama cringing and Yusuke beaming. Kuwabara joined them then, his jaw dropping open as he watched Hiei drinking from the bottle. He was spluttering and shaking, but he kept drinking for as long as he possibly could before lowering his head to cough and quiver pitifully.

"You should never drink poitin," Kurama said, taking the bottle from Hiei. "Even someone with your constitution could be left paralytic after consuming an entire bottle of this. And, depending on the grade, it may only take the smallest amount to incapacitate you."

Kurama turned the bottle around, but found no label, and so resorted to taking a sip himself. The liquor made his gums throb and his throat burn, and at first he could not taste anything for the awful buzzing sensation his entire head was filled with. He took another, longer swig, the pain a little easier to process the second time, and finally he began to taste something of the flavour.

"This is at least a grade five," he concluded. "No-one should drink any more of this, no matter what."

"That bad?" Kuwabara asked. "Can I smell it?"

Kurama handed the bottle to him and he cautiously sniffed at the opening, wincing and coughing almost immediately upon inhaling the noxious vapours.

"That's awful!" he said in a strained voice. "It smells like turpentine, how could anyone actually drink that?"

"You have to try it," Yusuke insisted.

"No way, Urameshi!" Kuwabara said.

"It burns," Hiei said. "It burns all through my body and… What happened to my voice?"

"You've probably burnt your throat," Yusuke replied. "Listen to me, I sound like Kuwabara already and I didn't drink nearly as much as you did!"

Hiei blinked curiously at the bottle in Kuwabara's hands.

"Alcohol is so bad for you," Kuwabara told him. "This is the stuff that crazy Kokou lady was drinking back at Enki's place – if you drink this, you'll be as crazy as she is."

Hiei grabbed the bottle, tugging it from Kuwabara's hold and taking another drink before allowing Yusuke to take it from him. Yusuke took another small mouthful before holding the bottle out towards Kurama.

"Your turn," he said.

"I'm driving," Kurama replied. "And I don't recommend that anyone else continue drinking that either. Even if we split that one bottle fairly between the four of us, we would be incapacitated and unable to defend ourselves should we come under attack."

"Do they have drink driving laws in demon world?" Yusuke asked.

"No, but I know I would be unable to drive in the morning if I did indulge," Kurama replied.

"Okay old man, your loss," Yusuke said, moving the bottle towards Kuwabara. "Your turn, Kuwabara."

"Absolutely no way!" Kuwabara yelped. "I'm not even gonna taste that stuff! Why would I? Look what it did to Kokou? Anyone drinking that would have to be out of their mind!"

"Sir, Sir, Sir!"

Koenma's head jerked up from his desk, a single sheet of paper clinging to one side of his face. He hurriedly clawed it back down and shook himself off, hoping to look alert as George burst through his office doors.

"Sir, I have urgent news!" the ogre announced as he skidded to a halt before Koenma's desk.

"It had better be good news, ogre," Koenma warned him.

"Sir?"

"You never come in here to tell me anything nice, and I'm getting sick of it. I'm in here, working all night to cover for the mess in living world with no ferry girls to tend to matters there, not even getting a single wink of sleep, I don't need you barging in here with more bad news!"

George peered at Koenma's desk.

"Sir, isn't that the same room service breakfast request form you were filling in when I was last here five hours ago?" he asked.

"Get to the point, ogre!" Koenma snapped, banging his tiny fists against the desk.

"Sir, a book is missing from the library," George said.

"Well that's hardly an excuse to wake me up in the middle of the night, is it?"

"I thought you said you were already awake and hard at work, Lord Koenma…?"

"A late library book isn't really just cause for waking up the prince of spirit world, ogre!"

"But Sir, it's one of the ancient books, one from the reference section. It's not meant to be borrowed, but someone has removed it."

"Again ogre, this is hardly a portent of the next dark age. Get out of my sight, or I will personally beat you until everyone calls you the purple ogre!"

"You should look at this first, Sir."

George placed down an open file on Koenma's desk and the prince begrudgingly looked down at it, scanning through it for anything that might make the ogre's otherwise highly pointless disruption seem worthwhile. The file was open at a page for signing out books from the library, and only a few had not been signed back in, the last of which eventually caught his eye. The title of the book made him forget all about sleeping that night, and the words in the "Sign Out" box sent him into a blind panic: in a row of large and rounded characters that could only have been written by Botan were the words "this little kitty wanted to have an adventure".

"This is a bad thing," Koenma said quietly. "Do you know what that book is about?"

"It seems to be some sort of language book, Sir," George replied.

Koenma groaned.

"You're an idiot," he said.

"Some people do say that, Sir," George replied.

"What? Oh, never mind. This book contains details of some ancient talismans, capable of very powerful illusions. If used in the wrong combination, they could be deadly and have catastrophic consequences. And Botan checked that book out three months ago! I need to find her right now!"

Koenma grabbed up his remote control, switching on the television at the communication channel and trying one last time to reach Botan via her communicator. To his amazement, a face appeared on the screen after just two rings; but unfortunately it was not Botan.

"Yusuke?" Keiko said, staring blankly out from the screen. "Are you there, Yusuke?"

"Keiko?" Koenma said. "Why do you have Botan's communication mirror?"

"Yusuke?" she shouted. "Can you hear me, Yusuke?"

"I'm not Yusuke!" Koenma snapped.

"She doesn't have heightened spiritual awareness like Kuwabara and his sister, Sir," George pointed out. "She can't see or hear you in your current form."

Koenma was surprised that the ogre had actually said something sensible and helpful for once, but he did not bother to commend his minion, instead switching off the television and terminating the link to Keiko.

"If Botan doesn't have her communication mirror with her, there's only one way I can reach her now," he said instead. "I'm going to have to go to living world."

"But Sir, aren't you supposed to stay in your office until the SDF return from their mission?" George asked.

Koenma removed his tall hat, leapt up onto his desk and jumped up from there to deposit his hat onto George's head.

"Cover for me, ogre," he said.

"But Sir!" George protested.

"I won't be long!" Koenma called back over his shoulder as he scurried out the office doors.

Botan had reached the conclusion that she had run out of options: without her communication mirror, she would have to return to spirit world and locate the translation book to figure out what the runes Hiei had communicated to her telepathically really meant. She knew it would be risky, and that she would probably be caught, but she had to try. She stepped out onto the lawn, looking around the night sky forlornly as she summoned her oar. In the same moment that she sat down onto her oar she saw a brief flash of light by the temple steps, and, despite the darkness of night, she clearly saw Koenma, in his adult form, appearing at the temple gate.

Without thinking clearly, Botan shot up and back over the roof of the temple, turning until she saw a familiar point in the forest and then rocketing towards it. The transition from one world to another was relatively easy, and on the other side of the portal Botan almost felt at ease: she had left one black, starry sky for another, and there was nothing too unsettling about that. She even allowed herself to smile as she glided through the still night air: but her complacency was short-lived, as a blinding bolt of lightning tore through the sky ahead of her, followed by an angry roar of thunder. In her temporary blindness, Botan lost her balance and started to spiral downwards, only then remembering that her oar was still missing part of the blade, and in her panic she lost control completely and began freefalling towards the ground.

She hoped she would land in a safe, friendly part of demon world.

Next Chapter: Yusuke really ought to notice that something's up with Hiei after getting a little too close and personal with him, but he's unfortunately a little intoxicated, and not really noticing much of anything. Botan lands in a fortuitous location – and not just as far as she is concerned. And when Kurama hears a pair of ice maidens being especially friendly with each other, he loses his last fragile grip of self-control. Chapter 20 – Totally Noxious