Chapter Seven: Araku's Order

Both teams waited patiently for Araku's council to come to a consensus. The new breed participants had not been part of the original plans therefore there was no rule against them, but the question of "fair play" had come up. Since none of the youkai (or human) competitors had known about the added twist several teams wanted retribution.

"Gods." Yusuke muttered for second time and the young woman nodded.

"Yep." Amaya replied examining her finger nails.

"You mean like…gods?" Yusuke asked again to clarify.

Amaya sighed. "Let me know when it sinks in," She said as she sunk down to sit on her heels, her favorite stance.

"And you're telling me that it's your job to track 'em down and arrest them." Yusuke's disbelief was starting to get on the girls nerves.

"That's the jist of it." Amaya nodded. "And unlike you knuckle heads I have the equipment to do it."

"Like what you did earlier." Yusuke still wasn't convinced. "To make the dragon girl give up?"

"Only that's sort of a onetime deal." Amaya confessed. "They'll be on their guard now."

"But you're right," She said after scratching her head with her good hand. "Gods'is a bit too strong of a word and what we are facing now are not gods, but the children of so-called 'gods'." She glanced meaningfully at Yusuke, "Again humanity's past returns haunt us."

"I am seriously missing youkai cases." Yusuke moaned.

"Ah!" Amaya clapped her hands excitedly. "That's it!"

"What's it?" Kuwabara chimed in. "Youkai?"

"Yousei." Amaya nodded pleased with herself. "We can call them 'yousei'."

"Oh, okay." Yusuke rolled his eyes. "I'm not sure what that has to do with anything." But it was already obvious that Amaya had fallen in love with the term.

There was a moment of silence.

"What do you mean 'one time deal'?" Kuwabara asked.

"I pulled rank on her," Amaya explained cryptically. "But there's no way I'd be able to do that to every yousei we meet. I can't even generate mana," Amaya replied. Yusuke frowned not sure what she meant by "mana".

"You guys just do your thing and I'll do mine," the young woman said in a determined fashion. "Besides, the fans aren't here to see me anyway."

"I don't know," Kuwabara looked around pointed. "It looks like you have at least a few fans in the audience."

"Huh?" This was news to the former masked fighter. She glanced at where Kuwabara was pointing.

Off in one of the rows was a small group of finely dressed gentlemen all in black suits and sunglasses holding up a sign of encouragement dedicated to the masked fighter. Standing in front of them was a princess-like figure in a beautiful flowery dress waving his arms like a mad person until the blond gentleman sitting in the next set smacked the beauty with the large stack of documents he was looking over.

Team Urameshi could almost literately see the mask fighter's spirit leave her body. After a few seconds of utter horror marking every line of her body the mask fighter regained her senses and grabbed Kurama by the front of his shirt to bring the man down to her level.

"You called them?" She demanded furious.

"They got her faster than I expected." Kurama commented lightly.

"Do they have a camcorder?" Amaya asked in dread. She was unable to muster the courage to look for herself.

Kuwabara shielded his eyes against the sun to get a better look. "I can't tell from here."

"They have a camcorder." Hiei confirmed.

"Ah! Dammit, foxy! What'd I ever do to you?" The outraged woman squeaked as she released her grip.

"Well, now that you mention it," Kurama began to say, but the girl was already gone.

"I know this isn't the last time I'm going to asked this today," Yusuke growled. "But what just happened?"

"Hey, how did-? Where did-?" Kuwabara was looking around frantically. Hiei was the one to clear his throat as he and Kurama pointed to the audience. In the dark glasses section the girl in question had the beautiful figure by the collar of the dress and was shaking him violently. The motivational banner was in shreds and the imposing figures in suits were backing away from Amaya carefully trying not to make any sudden movements.

"How could you embarrass me in front of my team like that?" Amaya shouted angrily as she shook Chiyoko violently. "And you onii-sama! How could you let him out of the house like this? It's an embarrassment!"

"H-help me onii-sama!" Chiyoko pleaded in a voice of mock distress.

"That was a battle I gave up a long time ago." The blond gentleman replied, "You have to admit, it suits him." Akihiko, king of the tengu, ignored his servant's blight and continued to focus on his pile of documents.

"She's in a rebellious phase," Chiyoko sighed like a doting parent. "But it's good for young people to have a lot of energy."

"All that band work has made her lazy though." Akihiko observed. "For you to pull thattrick."

Amaya blushed and released the cross-dressing tengu.

"Were you at least happy to see us?" Chiyoko inquired as his tilted his head in a bird-like manner. It was easy to see where Amaya had picked up the habit.

"Y-yeah," Amaya nodded and hugged her two guardians. "Thanks for coming."

The referee glanced over paper with Araku's decision on it carefully, but it was obvious that she was nervous.

"B-b-both t-t-teams will be allowed to continue," She read. "However, the terms of the match have been changed. We'll hold it in the normal style. The f-f-first match point will go to Kiyoshikodomo-"

"Say what?"

"D-d-during the match," The referee swallowed. "The masked fighter got a ring out and took more than ten seconds to return to the ring."

"Araku can kiss my-" Yusuke was about to say, but Amaya (who had replaced her damaged disguise with her normal battle costume) cut him off.

"Just be glad they didn't disqualify us." She told her team captain. "I had to pull a lot of strings for even that miracle."

"Whatever," Hiei drawled. "I'll be going next."

"Don't underestimate them just because they're kids," Amaya warned.

"Remind me again why you're even here?" Hiei taunted.

"What?" Kuwabara had to lean in closer to hear what Amaya was saying.

"I said," Amaya pooled down her mask so they could hear her better. "Don't bother me, I'm doing my job!" Then in a grumble she added, "Geeze, if you could afford an extra eye you could have at least gotten your ears checked too!"

Kuwabara smothered a laugh as Hiei glared at them.

"What's going on?" Yusuke asked when he returned to the side.

"The usual." Kurama replied with a shrug. The other three stopped their arguing faked looks of innocence.

Hiei's opponent stumbled forward into the ring and nearly tripped over her kimono. The lovely red headed lady was slightly over dressed for the occasion. Her inner kimono was a light cream color and the outer one was bright red with leaves panted on it.

"Is this some kind of a joke?" Hiei asked as the lady formally bowed.

The lady fighter's clothes looked terribly impossible to move in. No matter how you looked at it, the beautiful garments were the last thing you wanted to wear to a fight thus leaving onlookers quite puzzled. Her smile, however, was sly and suggested that the fairer sex should not be underestimated. Amaya's senses were on high alert.

"Aargh," she said. "And I just warned him-"

"Hiei can hold his own," Kurama told her.

"Don't tell me that punch fogged up your memory." Amaya frowned. "You should know what we're dealing with.

"They're young and inexperienced," Kurama replied. "They don't strike you as being over confident?"

Amaya glanced at his face to try and catch any subtext. She gave up after a few moments and replied, "Maybe they have every reason to be."