InuYasha Fan Fiction / Yu Yu Hakusho Fan Fiction ❯ The Real Folk Blues ❯ Vexation ( Chapter 13 )

[ X - Adult: No readers under 18. Contains Graphic Adult Themes/Extreme violence. ]

Title: The Real Folk Blues
Author: Adorkablebanana
Genre: Crossover.
Rating: M
A/N: Life gets in the way. I haven’t forgotten TRFB or any other of my fictions. I’m working on the next chapter as we speak. Read and review please. Thank you.

"No more messes, please," said Kurama, cryptically. He sat by his desk in his room as he finished a cover letter for a program he planned on enrolling for as his life as Minamino Shuuichi. "You understand, Hiei?"
"As you say," replied the hybrid fire youkai with much lack of concern or genuine consideration. His answer was the type of answer you would expect to hear as a simple yes or no response to a waitress writing down your order, asking if you want eggs to go along with your meal.
"The clean was excruciatingly difficult when it came to mother's white carpet and the drapes. I rather avoid scrubbing with a cocktail of cleaning detergents to get the stains out when you know how nauseating the fumes can be to my senses."
"I repeat; I understand, fox," Hiei replied, once more. From his spot on the foot of the kitsune's bed, Hiei folded his arms across his chest.
"Then, that is good to know," said Kurama, slanting him a coy smile that earned him a glare from Hiei's end.
"When do you have to return?"
"To the University?" Kurama appeared thoughtful for a moment. "You just reminded me; I have a lunch date with one of my fellow classmates that I can say is a close acquaintance of mine. He's in town for a day or two. I promised to take him up on the offer of lunch."
Hiei looked at Kurama in a way that said he didn't give a flying fuck about it.
Hiei shrugged.
Kurama checked his planner for the time and place he was supposed to meet up with his classmate.
"Any new updates on our leading ladies?" Kurama asked, off-handedly.
"There's still that one missing. No new leads on her."
"Koenma continues to lay the pressure down in order to 'encourage' all of us to track the demoness down. Dilly dallying is what we do best, after all," said the fox with a touch of sarcasm. He ran a hand through his tresses.
"There has been more killings of human females. The bodies continue to pile up. The rate we are going with this it won't be easy to cover it up and hide the evidence from the police."
"Yes, that is quite true I suppose." He regarded Hiei with a serious, but blank expression. "Shall we resume further investigations tonight?"
"It looks like we have to. The killings occur the most during the night. If I want to get that wretched thumb-sucker off my back, I need to work this through the bone." Hiei sighed, a tired and exasperated quality to his eyes and the tightness around his mouth revealed how much of a toll this particular mission is costing him.
<...>
For the past couple of days, Kagome spend most of her time at home in her room sleeping, watching television or reading old manga comics she collected since grade school. She rarely stepped out of her room. The few times she did were for the essentials such as to take a shower, eat and use the toilet.
Oh, and for the rare phone calls she got from Eri, Houjou, Yuka, and Ayumi. Yukimura Keiko sometimes called, but she was mostly with Yuusuke, at school or working in her family's ramen shop.
Kagome didn't press anyone to call her and the majority of the time during her phone conversations, she didn't necessarily add or took from the conversation. She was mostly silent, switching from the default responses: "Hmm", "Yes", "No", and or the occasional, "You don't say."
Atsuko and her mother were a bit worried for her. Her mother thought she might have a case of depression going on.
She thought of taking her to a psychiatrist to prescribe her something or at least talk to her to get whatever that's plaguing her out of her chest.
For some reason or another, Kagome simply felt tired and lost in her thoughts. In her dreams the world was much more alive and closer to the home she felt more in tune with as weird as that sounded.
The dreams were mostly reliving the times she spent in the feudal era with everyone. She missed them all so dearly.
How could she explain to anyone her feelings of the situation?
No one could necessarily relate.
Kagome felt out of place and alone. Although she met some nice new people to occasionally go out to a movie with and talk to, the Kuwabara siblings are great, but it’s not the same. Her heart belonged in another place that wasn’t here in her time. She felt alienated.
Kagome sighed, sulking in the comfort of her bed. Sinking her face into the pillow, Kagome closed her eyes and felt her eyes stinging around the edges. She squeezed her eyes shut. ‘I’m not going to cry, I’m not going to cry, I’m not going to cry and that’s final!’ If she allows herself to cry, the tears will not stop and the pain will be overwhelming.
After what felt like forever, Kagome drifted off to sleep. And in the world of her dreams, she immediately found herself in a forest that stretched on forever. There are tall, marvelous trees with red flowers swaying with the soft breezes of the wind. In the circle of these trees stood a pond that glittered under the sunlight—the scenery resembled a painting. It was a sight for sore eyes. Kagome walked out of the shrubs to take a closer look. The water was still as glass. The clearness of the pond’s water made all the smooth pebbles and tiny fishes visible.
Kagome peered at the smooth surface and her reflection stared back at her. “What is this place?”
In a few instances, the smooth surface of the pond rippled, distorting the reflection. Kagome glanced over in the direction the ripples were coming from. A beautiful woman with milky white skin and long raven hair dressed in the traditional priestess robes entered the pond. Kagome blinked a few times and it came to her attention that woman stepping in the water was Kikyou.
She was slowly making her way toward Kagome.
As most dreams go, suddenly the scenery slightly changed. The small, quaint pond expanded into a never ending ocean. All the red flowers started slowly raining down on them.
Kikyou appeared before Kagome. She extended a small, pale hand out to her. Kagome didn’t hesitate to reach out and grab it. Kikyou guided her into the water and submerged in the ocean with Kikyou, Kagome floated side by side alongside the priestess.
Not once did they release one another’s hands.
“Danger lurks in the form of a mask. Keep your eyes open,” warned Kikyou.
“Wait—why? When is this going to happen?”
Before any of her answers could be answered Kagome opened her eyes and she was back in her room, lying on her bed next to Buuyo, her lazy fat cat.
<…>

"Fucking stupid sonofabitch!" I growled, gritting my teeth. This is perfect! Just fucking perfect! The whole fucking shit place called the world is giving me a fucking hard time again!

I grabbed the imp-youkai by the neck holding him up close and at the same time a good distance away from my face. When was the last time this fucker took a bath? He stinks like a load of shit. I thought. "Where is the demoness known as the Hime of the Pit?" I asked for the final time, glaring down the squirming whatchamacallit, who was currently clawing my wrist for freedom. Like hell I'll let him go.

"I-I d-don't know w-where she went. I w-was told to ambush you, n-nothing more! I swear it!" the puke green thingy croaked, quivering. Great, another goal completed. This leaves us back to square one. We're getting nowhere on this stupid mission. It’s been weeks since we made any progress. I’m tired of this crap already.

Unable to stand the bile waste babbling his idle threats, I tossed the sucker to a pretty aggravated Jaganshi. Hiei caught the vermin in one hand, squeezing out the green from the poor demon. At least red looks better on it than green did. "Tell us or die an excruciatingly slow death," his ghastly voice threatened, squeezing more for emphasis. Leave it to him to get straight to the point faster than I can.

Kurama, who been quiet for pretty much the whole passing day, spoke up. "Hiei, he won't be able to give us any information if you keep strangling him as you are now."

Hiei shifted him a glare as he was considering the fox's options.

Kurama did have a point. What good is a dead demon to us anyway?

"Yeah, drop the stinker on the ground—unless you want the stench of shit to stick to you," I added. Hiei immediately dropped the demon to the ground. The thought of foul odor sticking on him sounded unsanitary. I don't blame him. It’s pretty much the same reason why I tossed it away. Shit smells better than the imp does.

I pressed a foot on its head, asking nicely for the last time. "Look, my patience is running short, tell me now where the demoness went to." I added more pressure down on the heel of my foot, the demon-imp screeched his pleas, asking for release.

"Okay, okay. I will tell you, but stop stepping on me!" it screeched. I lifted my foot to step on one of its’ arms in case he might make a break for it. The demon-imp didn’t look satisfied.

"So where did this bitch get to?”

"I only know where one of them left to—and you caught her—the other is a mystery to me, I swear it!" he begged, whining for us to spare his life. How pathetic is this? First the ego inflated youkai boasts about how superior he is to us weaker “Reikai scum,” then the imp-shit has the balls (wait, what is he (It? Male or female? I took a short examination, cocking my head side to side. The others shot questioning stares.

"Urameshi, what are you doing?" asked the ever helpful Kuwabara. Red and Short-Stuff are probably wondering the same thing too.

Hmm…Screw that. I’m not that curious of this demon’s gender to go out of my way to find out. Where was I before? Damn it, I lost my train of thought again.

(Oh, never mind. I remember now.)

Youkai who can't back up their words and then beg for mercy in the end seriously piss me off. When will they learn to be a badass you need to stay a badass all the way through.

Idiots these days.

"Nothing, just thinking,” I said to him.

"It appears we're never going to get our answers from this demon," Kurama said, in a soft spoken way.

And sadly he was correct. He’s always right.

I sighed, I’m tired.

"I don't have time for this." Hiei marched over, kicking the imp loose and smashing the abused thing in the nearest tree trunk. The demon hit the trunk hard, rebounding, landing on the rural ground. That was brutal. "I already wasted five minutes of my life I won't get back, tell us where the bitch went so I can move on with my day—otherwise you will die a painful death I would be most enthusiastic to provide," Hiei barked, the chill lacing his youki did not conceal his haughty mood.

Kurama quirked a brow, oddly surprised by his friend's behavior or should I say “boyfriend”. Nah, I kid, I kid!

"The shrimp's right. We all got better things to do, like my study session with my tutor. I got a test tomorrow and failing it won't look good on my average so speak up, you little snot!" Kuwabara urged in a very ape-like way, crossing his arms over his chest impatiently.

Randomly I thought, ‘The demon does look like a booger.’ A squashed booger the way Hiei's grinding the sole of his boot on its head, burying further inside the ground.

Hiei slanted another one of his “I’m-going-to-fuck-you-up glares to Kuwabara. It happened a lot whenever Kuwabara recited love poetry he dedicates to Yukina or whenever the nickname “shrimp”, “midget” and other height-related jokes comes out of his mouth. “Shut up, useless human."

"Hey! Quit telling me to shut up, shrimpy midget!" Kuwabara retorted, falling into yet another verbal brawl with the witty Jaganshi.

"Hn. How clever. How long did it take you to come up that one? How original. The stupid Neanderthal can't even come up with a proper insult." He grinned in his creepy Hiei-way.

Oh, Hiei's in a baaad mood today.

"Why you—Listen here, midget, I can come up with a lot of names about you, ones you will regret. So can it!"

"Right.” He rolled his eyes. “Thus proving my point."

"Both of you, can it!" I shouted. I was tired of being set to the sidelines. As amusing as it is to see dumb and dumber argue, finding what's-her-face bitch takes priority now.

"Fuck it, Yuusuke! I'm not letting this asshole here get away with calling me stupid!" the beet-faced, tensed Kuwabara snapped.

I sighed. ‘Why can't he shut it for a change?’

"But you are stupid, dumb-ass."

Here's the part where Kuwabara grabs my shirt, threatening to smash my face against his fist. "Quit calling me stupid!"

"Then stop acting stupid, stupid!" I bit back, sticking my nose high in the air arrogantly. It's a fact, duh!

We traded insults for a prolonged 5 minutes as well as beating each other a few times, throwing punches and kicks. The asshole hit me square in the shoulder, knowing youkai claws buried themselves there earlier. The blow hurt like hell. I wanted to beat him more for that.

"Pft! I kicked a lot ass today and I can do it again, Urameshi. Don't tempt me." He wiped the small portion of blood trickling his lip away. He stood there acting all cocky and proud like a smug bastard.

"You've got no right to be smug. I killed more than you did today." Interjecting into our little quarrel, Hiei rolled his red as ruby rock eyes as he was draping his black cloak over his shoulders again.

Hearing the comment I busted out laughing while Kuwabara, on the other hand, bitched at me and the “dwarf”.

Before it got ugly (and I'm not talking about Kuwabara’s face here) Kurama cleared his throat, gathering the two nimrod's attention. "We all have responsibilities to complete. I have to visit mother today. Watching the three of you fight is not very productive." Kurama sounded rather on the beast side.

Maybe the Youko in him set off during our usual antics? Who knows?

"During your quaint little scuffle, the demon mentioned where the last of the demonesses’ fled to," the fox concluded smoothly, summoning a spiraling vine tying the struggling imp. "Botan might want to turn it in to Spirit World."

We must look pretty stupid standing there bickering when our genius fox friend uncovered the answer under three minutes. How lame can we be? Stupid, brainy, girly-boy.
<…>

"Nothing new today it would seem," said Koenma, sighing disappointedly, leaning back, exasperated, against his chair. He suckled harder on the pacifier, dragging a hand through his brown hair. The stress clearly is resurfacing to light. He send Botan to collect us to go searching for the demoness or to check the town for rampaging youkai working for the wenches. Koenma sat there, pensive, lost in his thoughts.

This silence is deafening. I can't stand things like this. "So what now? We went searching this bitch for two days. Two days, Koenma! I can't be traveling back and forth like this. My social life does count too, ya know."

"Doesn't the tag name “toddler” sound ridiculous now?" he said, quirking a brow as he rest his jaw on his propped palm.

The remark drew in Botan’s attention in a bad way. She was giggling in the background.

Sometimes I want to grab her magical flying oar and whack over the head with it.

(You know I can’t do that for obvious reasons.)

Calling the Koenma toddler doe kind of come off ridiculous when Koenma's wearing his teenage guise, but a hobby is a hobby. These things don't die easy. So I’ll take my sweet-ass time trying to remember not to call him a toddler.

"Koenma, didn't the interrogation with Oki go well? Didn't she have any information regarding this current situation?" Kurama brought the question to face. Oki, more like the slut-on-the-go, is residing under lock and key in the barbed prison in Spirit World’s special detainment unit, under surveillance. Oki is one of the shape shifter youkai’s that was caught first and forced to expose the relations she has to the other demons that we caught so far and still looking for.


"No. She refused to say a peep. She even went as far to lock her spirit under a comatose state, avoiding contact whatsoever along with dashing our chances to dig up info to ashes," the Reikai Prince groaned, holding his head between his hands. "My father's going to kill me now."

"What now?" I said.

There's no rerouting the plan anymore. Koenma appears to be too stomped to come up with a fix. He’s too worried over the fate of his soon to be spanked bottom.

Kurama and Hiei and even Kuwabara are beyond the limits of patient.

We were obliged to hunt down these whores, but did we find them? Yes and no. We two out of the three and the third one is still missing. So far we found a big fat NOTHING.

I knew breaking the mirror in the bathroom last week would bring bad luck.

The tension enclosed in the office fired up to plain aggravation.

Hiei and Kurama’s faces showed their exasperation, including anger, in crystal clarity. I, for one, don’t look forward to continuing this mission.

But by the pained moan erupting from Koenma's lips told us the answer was there.

Damn it. Can't things get more complicated as it is?

"As much a thrill it is to sit around doing nothing, I need to get back or else Keiko will hack me to pieces. An angry girlfriend is what I don't need on my shoulders." I said my peace and with that, I snapped a finger, cueing Botan to open a portal to home.

Kuwabara proceeded after me, pulling his sports jacket on. "I gotta go, too. My tutor won't be waiting on me. The girl goes animal on me for missing. Sorry, Koenma," he waved apologetically.

“Have a pleasant evening,” added Kurama, bowing his head and then stepping through the hollow hole, biding his farewells. We ignored the shrieking, indignant cries our boss blew; demanding we stay this instant.

Fat chance that’s going to happen. Enough is enough.

Hiei hopped into the portal to the Makai faster than a speeding bullet. He's out for the day, too.


<...>

Kuwabara ran to the library ten blocks down from where we were dropped off, mumbling a speedy goodbye, making a fast track on the pavement. He's gone now. Hopefully his tutor isn't already waiting for him at the library. From what he mentioned to me she is supposed to be one tough chick that doesn’t like to wait on him.

It was just Kurama and I left.

"Going to Shiori's, Kurama?" I asked the leftover coconut remaining on the tree. Just the two of us.

"Yes, I am. The weekend is free for me from school; visiting Mother is on the agenda for the time being." He smiled.

We made our way outside the park gates. The redhead asked me my “to-do” list options.

"I'm going to see Keiko perform her ballet show in an hour. If I don't then you'll know why you won't see me on the next mission. Buried six feet under where's I'm going end up next." I say nothing, but the truth.

Kurama smiled, chuckling behind his hand. A trait he acquired in order to hide his laughter from others. It’s annoying since he can pull it off so well. "I see. Congratulate Keiko for me then."

"Yeah, I'll tell her."

"Goodbye, Yuusuke."

"Staying in town?"

"Yes."

"All right then, see ya." We went our separate ways.
<…>
Higurashi Kagome has been tutoring Kuwabara for the last few weeks. Occasionally they go to Wac Donald’s to grab a bite or catch a flick at the local theaters.
Kuwabara often tells Kagome of his amazing beautiful girlfriend. A girl named Yukina. The devotion and all the poems he wrote proclaiming his undying love for Yukina brought to surface underlying feelings of loneliness and the burning love she still felt for InuYasha.
The way Kuwabara went on and on about Yukina, she kind of wished she had somebody as well. She wished InuYasha was here beside her right here right now, but she knew that was unlikely.
InuYasha could be dead for all she knew?
And seeing youkai walk around in broad daylight in this day and age seemed very unrealistic.
It brought back memories in a rush. At one point during the session Kagome needed to excuse herself to the bathroom. She went in the library bathroom and stared at the reflection in the mirror. Tears went down her check. She felt alone in the world and lost. She blinked the tears out of her face and staring back at her was no longer her reflection but the reflection of Kikyou. Kikyou’s somber face stared into Kagome’s wide, alarmed eyes. She placed a hand against the glass.
Moments later, the odd feeling inside Kagome compelled Kagome to reach out and press her palm against the mirror, against the hand pressed flat on the glass.
Much uncertainty and confusion, Kagome allowed something inside her to let go and she placed her hand over Kikyou’s. The instant she did that, there was a twinge of warmth that spilled from the hands touching. Oddly enough, a feeling of liberation and belonging came over her and although the tears continued to flow the isolation she felt dissolved a bit.