Yu Yu Hakusho Fan Fiction ❯ Balance ❯ The Sky was Made of Glass ( Chapter 1 )

Dreams are still in italics.

Because it's convenient for me, this story takes place in a semi-AU after the end of the Makai Hen saga, meaning they're not Tantei anymore. The AU-ness will be pertaining mainly to Kurama, as in he can still take his fox form and he goes to college. And…anything else that makes this easier for me to write along the way.

Disclaimer: you know that fox I got for my birthday? His name is Shiro.

Balance

Chapter One: The Sky Was Made of Glass

A light shone above him, vivid and yet pale in the same manner. He tried to walk to the left, to the right, to watch as it followed him, but walking was impossible. He could not stand on nothing, and he could not walk where he could not stand.

The sky surrounded him, the sky which was nothing that could be named, and truly it was not a sky so much as water lacking substance, or fire lacking heat. It was nothing that should be.

The sky that gave birth to this light, this invisibly pale vivid white light that called to him, that whispered his name in a scream, that drew him towards it and still tugged itself away as it did so. This light that truly was death and life.

He reached towards it, his arms lengthening, his fingers grasping at the air, not certain what would happen if he did touch it, but unwilling to risk not.

A wall to his left shattered, a loud cracking sound that broke through the air and sliced through him, cutting into his skin and leaving gashes that shed no blood and holes that would not mend.

The sky was made of glass, and the shards were sharp.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

"What I want to know," Kuwabara said thoughtfully, "is where these guys are coming from. I mean, so far, we've seen that one little D-class creature, and at least ten bugs. Wasn't the peripheral field closed after we cut-"

"You cut."

"Yeah, after I cut it down?"

"I thought so…"

Yuusuke snatched another bug out of midair, crushing it against his palm. He glared around at the sky, as if daring it to house any more of the bothersome pests.

"We should go to Kurama's," Kuwabara voiced. Yuusuke jerked his gaze away from a colorful plant growing before him that reminded him too much of Makai.

"Huh?"

The carrot top nodded as he spoke. "Kurama went home, right? I bet Hiei noticed the bugs around-you know, he notices things like that, and he probably went there, because, you know, you're hanging around me, and he doesn't like me, but he would want to know if we knew anything."

Yuusuke looked down at the remains of yet another bug in his hand and frowned. "Yeah, okay. In a few hours, the city's bound to be swarming again; better we're all together when that happens."

"You bet we will be…"

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Kurama had closed his window to keep the bugs out, as they appeared to be attracted to creatures who would see them, for some reason. Hiei disliked the confinement, but disliked the bugs even more, and so he tolerated it.

"Do you think we should speak with Koenma?" Kurama asked. Hiei scoffed, leaning back on the sill.

"I think you know my answer to that."

Kurama nodded. They waited in a thoughtful silence for a moment, Hiei's head tilted back against the glass and his eyes closed, Kurama's hanging down and his hands clasped before him.

Minutes later, Kurama perked up a bit, raising his gaze to the open door leading to the hallway, and Hiei opened one eye a slit.

Bin-bon.

"I'll be right back," Kurama told Hiei.

"Hn."

Shuffling to the door, Kurama fluffed his hair, completely out of instinct, and smoothed a hand down his shirt.

'Still a vain kitsune, I see…' his mind murmured, sounding oddly self-satisfied. He sniffed in the air.

Opening the door, he cut straight past any formalities or trivial greetings.

"Yuusuke. Kuwabara. You two noticed the bugs as well, then?"

They marched in, kicking off their shoes. Yuusuke nodded. "And one low-class little youkai; D-class, I think it might have been."

"Hmm…that isn't good at all…"

"Yeah, you're telling me," Kuwabara put in. "I've had the shivers since we first saw those creepy bugs."

Kurama nodded. "Would you like some tea?"

Shaking his head, Kuwabara walked towards Kurama's living room. "Nah, thanks… Is Hiei here?"

"Does that question really warrant an answer?" came Hiei's snippy voice from where he sat on the couch.

Kuwabara jumped a bit, but glared at the back of the youkai's head, instead. "You weren't there a minute ago…" he muttered in response. Hiei just snickered softly.

"Well," Yuusuke interrupted, before the argument got out of hand (because it surely would). "What do we do now?"

They all moved to sit around the various chairs in the living room space; Kurama shared the couch with Hiei, and Yuusuke and Kuwabara sat opposite them, each in their own chairs. They all looked thoughtful and serious-except for Hiei, who flickered between concern and the more common moody nonchalance.

"Let's lay out what we know so far," Kurama said. "Makai bugs are infiltrating Ningenkai. According to Yuusuke, small, low-class youkai are coming, as well. The numbers are steadily increasing. Now, what can we infer from that?"

"I bet Koenma doesn't know about the insects," Kuwabara said slowly. "He would have called a Tantei in by now."

Yuusuke looked surprised at his friend's deduction, but nodded nonetheless. "Good point." Not to be outdone, he searched his mind for something he could contribute, as well. "I bet…that the peripheral field hasn't been opened."

Kurama nodded once, but titled his head. "Why would you think so?"

"Well, because no C- or B-class youkai have crossed over. We would have sensed them for sure, if they didn't come around and attack us head on."

"The peripheral field only prevents A- and S-class youkai," Hiei said coolly. Yuusuke glared.

"I know that, but when they get to B-class, they get smarter. More B-class would come over if they were following A- and S-class and not just coming over by themselves."

"Hm…"

Running over the facts again and again, Yuusuke and Kurama came to the conclusion that Koenma didn't know about the bugs, that their abundance probably did mean that the peripheral field was about to be breached, and that they should inform him as quickly as possible.

"Iie," Hiei said instantly. Kurama lightly slapped his wrist.

"You don't even know what I was going to say," he berated. Hiei snorted.

"I can guess. I'm not going to talk to that brat-my sentence was expired long ago, and I'm no longer a Tantei."

Yuusuke chuckled. "So don't. Just come along; you want to stay informed, ne? You don't even have to speak once." Kuwabara nodded in agreement. A surprising move, but unquestioned.

Hiei glared around at them all, then melded into the red cushions of the couch and pouted.

"Hn."

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

"I don't like this…"

"It's just Botan's oar. You've done it before."

Kuwabara clung tightly to the oar's paddle, his knuckles turning white. Botan wasn't the most trustworthy pilot, and they all knew it.

The oar bucked and spun in tight corkscrews, completing several loop-the-loops.

"Just get us there," Hiei hissed through gritted teeth.

"Aw," Botan pouted, "you're no fun."

"I don't care. I want to get there and get off this…this carpool."

Kurama smiled behind one hand. Where Hiei had picked up the word "carpool," he had no idea, but the scene of Hiei in a minivan with Yuusuke, Kuwabara, Botan, and himself that was forming in his mind was quite an entertaining one.

The oar lurched, and he leaned forward, grasping the handle.

Botan laughed gleefully, weaving in and out of clouds, before finally reaching a suitable point in the sky for a portal.

"Reikai portal, open!" she shouted, smiling and flinging her hands out. The misty pinkish light of the portal opened itself before her, and they were sucked into Reikai.

As they all landed on shaky legs-Yuusuke even fell flat on his face-Hiei moved to speak to Kurama.

"'Reikai portal open,' what sort of nonsense is that?"

"I don't know, but I certainly wouldn't be the one to ask her."

Hiei snorted. "Ch."

"Excuse me?"

Yuusuke righted himself and shook his head. "Who said that?"

"I did."

The raven haired teen peered forward curiously at Koenma, squinting his eyes. "Koenma? What're you doing in the hallway?"

The toddler sighed. "It appears Botan has brought you straight into my office. Care to explain that one? Not to mention, what are you doing here? I haven't seen you in two years."

Botan sweated. "Eheheh, not really, sir! But we have a matter of great importance," she tried to cover, "and Yuusuke-" she shoved him forward "-wants to tell you about it."

Koenma tilted an eyebrow skeptically. Yuusuke rubbed the back of his head, his expression shifting to seriousness.

Leaning forward on the desk and carelessly shoving a few papers aside, he stared Koenma down evenly, not much of a feat when the latter of the two was only about a meter tall and sitting in a chair.

"Makai bugs in Ningenkai."

Koenma fell out of said chair.

"W-what?" he sputtered. "That's impossible! The peripheral field was closed, and-wait, how many bugs?"

"We only counted about twenty bugs, and one D-class youkai," Kuwabara fielded. "Dunno how many there'd be by now, though."

Climbing back into his seat, Koenma flipped up the panel controlling his monitor, clicking to a pan shot of a school they didn't recognize. Bugs swarmed everywhere around its entrance, nested in students' and teachers' hair and clothes, trees, potted plants, and generally taking over.

Kuwabara gasped. "Wow…"

"Mm…" Koenma closed down the monitor and turned to the Tantei. "Something must be done. I want you to try to find the source of this problem and shut it down. Report to me at any point you see fit. I will be doing all that I can here."

"Right."

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Kurama padded forward on weightless paws, sniffing the ground and occasionally hiding from the random bystander. Hiei followed him closely, watching out for more bugs that could indicate the direction of their origin. So far, they had found few. Only three, as a matter of fact, out of the now hundreds that plagued the city.

Tails twitching, Kurama darted off in a seemingly random direction, Hiei running in his footsteps. They quickly arrived at a back street crawling with bugs, the concentration so thick you could barely breath, let alone see.

Slinking under the thinnest cloud, Kurama found the hole and transformed back into his ningen form. He laid a seed over the crack in the pavement and sprouted it; a plant resembling a Venus Fly Trap grew and began eating each new bug to fly through to the surface.

As Kurama spread a thin shield of reiki over the plant to protect it, Hiei slammed a shock of fire into the ally and destroyed all the bugs hovering there.

"That was easy enough."

Kurama tossed his head and sniffed. "For you, maybe. I was the one sniffing around on this filthy street among ningens who would certainly notice how odd it was to see a kitsune, of all things, in this city. Not to mention, a kitsune with five tails."

Hiei tossed him a sidelong glare. "Don't be so arrogant."

"Hmm…"

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

"See anything?"

"Iie…"

Yuusuke watched the sky warily, and Kuwabara occasionally knelt to examine the ground. Having no fox noses to sniff out the source, they were choosing random directions and walking until the concentration of insects became thicker, then trying to proceed to an even greater one, and so on.

Progress was slow.

"Why don't we just try to sense out where Hiei and Kurama are?" Yuusuke suggested.

Kuwabara glared at him, skeptical. "How would that help?"

"I don't know…"

They continued on in such a manner for nearly a full half hour, before Yuusuke perked his head up and ran off to the right.

"C'mon! I sense something this way!"

Stopping short over a deep ditch in the ground (presumably meant for construction), Kuwabara made a sound of deep disgust and Yuusuke shivered slightly.

Bugs coated the surface and were spilling out of the hole in droves. The two friends shared a look of understanding, nodding once.

Yuusuke shot a small shock of energy into the ditch, demolishing each and every last bug. Kuwabara summoned his Reiken and sliced through the crack in the pavement, covering it entirely with layer upon layer of dirt and concrete.

"That oughta hold 'em."

Yuusuke nodded. "Let's meet back up with Hiei and Kurama."

"Lead the way."

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Bin-bon: sound of a doorbell ringing

Kitsune: fox

Youkai: demon

Tantei: detective

Makai: Demon World, Hell

Ningenkai: Human World

Iie: no