Gundam Wing Fan Fiction / Yu Yu Hakusho Fan Fiction ❯ A Thief in One Life, A Thief in the Next ❯ Glory of the Fight ( Chapter 11 )

A/N: Insert clever author's note and disclaimer here. It's 4:47 in the morning. I'll too tired to be clever.

A Thief in One Life, A Thief in the Next

Chapter Eleven

Glory of the Fight

Fighting down a blush, Hiei muttered an embarrassed “Baka” before, to the humans’ eyes, vanishing in a blur of black. Kuronue whistled. “So that’s why they call him the flying shadow. It’s a name well-earned, I’d say.”

“Come on, we’d better get moving if we want a chance of catching up to him,” Yusuke said, swinging up onto Puu’s back so that Trowa and Quatre were sitting behind him. Hold on tight, kids.”

“Is this how you normally travel?” Wufei asked, clinging to Kurama’s back as the kitsune ran, dodging the odd tree with lightning fast reflexes. Kuronue flew above them, and Puu just ahead, high enough to be out of the treetops.

“Most of the time,” Kurama said, jumping a river without so much as a blink. “Unless you have the advantage of numbers, it’s best to move quickly if you want to get anywhere without being attacked at least a dozen times.”

“It feels like shopping with Maxwell on L2,” the Chinese man grumbled, wincing when he jarred his leg wrong. “Sometimes I wonder if he was actually born here, and not on that damned colony.”

Kurama laughed, spotting a dark shape moving ahead of him in the trees. “There’s Hiei. Looks like he’s letting us catch up.”

“Took you long enough,” Hiei said, smirking as his mate came up alongside him.

“Well you aren’t carrying anyone,” Kurama defended playfully.

“You’d still be slower even if I was,” the hi-koorime teased back, running backwards with his arms crossed behind him to add to his point. Wufei glanced between the two. With such childlike demons acting as their guardians, he wondered if they would reach the promised city in one piece.

Above them, Heero was giving Kuronue the silent treatment while fighting a blush. Kuronue, on the other hand, was trying his hardest to see that blush. “Really, you are lovely, Hee-chan. I know several demons who’d kill their own teammates to get a lover like you. Blue eyes like a deep lake, oh-so kissable lips, adorably messy hair and that’s not mentioning that you have one of the cutest butts that I’ve seen in a long time. If Kurama hadn’t gotten himself a mate, I wouldn’t leave you alone with him for a second.”

Heero had his face turned away from him so that Kuronue couldn’t see it, but the tell-tale flush across the back of his neck and the redness of his ears told the demon all he needed to know. “Hey, maybe once you’ve all healed up, we could go off on a little trip together and ‘get to know each other better.’”

That got Heero to whip his head around in order to glare at Kuronue, his face still red. To make matters worse for the pilot, he couldn’t even fight the chimera or move away from him since he was carrying the human. “Do you ever stop talking?”

“No, not really,” Kuronue said, smirking playfully. “I like talking. It’s a hell lot better that silence, and I know silence. Was dead for a couple of years, you see. Happened about two hundred years ago on a heist. Lost my taste for bamboo, that’s for sure.”

“What happened?” Heero asked, glad for a change in topic.

“See my pendant?” Kuronue asked, waiting until Heero had nodded to continue. “That thing is all that allows me to control my most deadly attack. We were fleeing from a heist when the chain snapped. Of course, I went back for it, and got caught by the bamboo traps. One of them went straight through my stomach. Most painful thing I’ve experienced in my life, I’ll tell you that.”

“Your most deadly attack?” the pilot wondered out-loud.

“Don’t worry about it,” his companion said. “Unless we’re in a seriously bad situation, you won’t ever see it. Me, I prefer to use my scythes, much more dependable, and a heck of a lot safer to the people that I don’t want hurt. There’s a reason that chimera are so rare these days, and it’s not because we-” The chimera cut off as he landed softly on a tree branch, ears perking. “There’s a battle ahead.”

“I don’t hear anything,” Heero said, straining his senses.

“You wouldn’t.” Stilling his wings, Kuronue closed his eyes and concentrated on simply listening. “At least a dozen, six pairs of wings… Kurama’s fighting them.” Purple eyes snapped open as he left from the branch, slinging Heero over one shoulder while the other hand unhooked a scythe from his belt. Moments later, a streak of silver became visible down on the ground through the trees. “Hey Kurama, just like old times, eh?”

“Just like old times,” the kitsune agreed. Heero’s embarrassment at being carried like a sack was mollified slightly at the sight of Wufei receiving the same treatment, the Chinese man yelling Mandarin curses at his guide. A white blast of energy shot down an attacker before it could slash Kurama from behind, having used its fallen comrade as a distraction. “Thanks Yusuke.”

Above them, Quatre watched in horror from his place on Puu’s back, sitting behind Yusuke, who’d just fired the sniper shot. Trowa placed a reassuring hand on his partner’s shoulder, keeping a sharp eye on his two fellow pilots trapped in the battle. “They’re used to fighting one-handed.”

“They’re the best thieves in Makai, what’d you expect?” Yusuke asked, firing a second shot into the fight. His target jumped back at the last second. “Damn, I missed. Wish the trees weren’t so fucking thick so we could get in there and help.”

One dark shadow stood at Kurama’s back while another danced around the pair, leaving behind a trail of bloody corpses as he avoided enemy attacks and stayed out of the way of whip and chained scythe.

“They never stood a chance,” Quatre whispered, staring as Kuronue stepped over half of a body, the other half laying several feet away. Memories of the last time he’d seen Duo fight with his scythes floated to the surface of his mind. Human or demon, the results had been the same.

“Looks like some of your old colleges,” Hiei said, prodding one with his shoe. “Pathetic bandits. Didn’t even know who to avoid picking a fight with.”

“So close to the border too,” Kurama added, shifting Wufei in his arms back to a more comfortable, not to mention more dignified, position as Kuronue did the same for Heero before the human could think to pull on his wings.

“We can worry about that later,” Kuronue said, flicking blood from his weapon before replacing it on his belt. “We’re burning daylight here.”

The other two demons nodded in agreement, starting in the direction of Konchuu once again.