Yu Yu Hakusho Fan Fiction ❯ Just Outside the Light ❯ Chapter 9 ( Chapter 9 )

Disclaimer: I own a headache, an unfinished report, and a used sick day. Little more than that.

Author: Letta

Rating: Probably R.

Warnings: Violence, slight OOC, possibly AU- it's up to you, a loosely strung together `plot'

Pairings: Hiei/Kurama? Any others?

"speaking"

/thoughts/

Title: Just Outside the Light

"Hiei?" Yusuke pressed.

"There's nothing special about the necklace, except its engraving."

"Engraving?"

"It's engraved with initials."

"Oh. Well, whose are they?"

"If I knew that, someone who's still alive would be dead right now."

"What if it's more than one person?" Yusuke asked innocently, unwittingly bringing a new, obvious possibility to the mind of the jaganshi. Hiei had to keep his face from showing that he hadn't even considered it. Usually he was more suspicious.

"Then it'd be more dead people."

Yusuke grinned. Having Hiei on your side could be very safe.

"So what are the initials?"

"A. I."

"What about the gash on his head? Think it's a head wound causing all of this?" Yusuke asked, unconsciously scratching at his own skull. Hiei momentarily debated telling the detective what he knew before deciding that Yusuke would probably find out on his own, anyway.

"Yukina had told me that she couldn't heal it."

Yusuke started, looking hard at Hiei.

"Wait, you mean he had that when we got back from Makai, or Yukina healed him since then?"

It was Hiei's turn to be startled.

"You mean you hadn't noticed it?"

"Well," Yusuke began, shifting his weight, "no."

A look at the fire jaganshi caused Yusuke to add, "Not until he tried to kill me anyway."

~`~`~`~`~`

Yukina rushed over from her seat on the couch, kneeling down next to Kurama worriedly.

"What happened to Kurama?" she asked, voice shaking as she brushed away silver hair from his face.

"Yusuke said he just went crazy and tried to kill him. When I got there, Hiei had his sword to his throat. Then he knocked him out."

Instantly, Yukina's eyes snapped up, peering around.

"Where are Hiei and Yusuke? Are they all right?"

"Yeah, they're fine," Kuwabara said, glancing down at the youko, "they had me bring Kurama here while they talked about something."

"Thoughtful," Leiko said, looking down at the prone kitsune emotionlessly. This wasn't exactly what she had expected to find on her second visit to the Ningenkai. A slight frown tugged at her lips as she remembered she still hadn't gotten her money from Hiei. She'd have to make a note to harass him about it when he showed up.

"Should I… should I heal him?" Yukina asked quietly, looking directly into Kuwabara's eyes.

"No," Genkai said, speaking for the first time as she elbowed her way to Kurama. Kneeling, she grabbed his chin and looked intently at his face, occasionally tilting it to one side or the other. Satisfied with her inspection, she spoke. "We should restrain him in case he wakes up. Then, we wait for Hiei and the Idiot."

"How are we going to do that?" Kuwabara asked, curiosity spreading across his face.

"Easily," Genkai replied sternly.

~`~`~`~`~`

"So," Alika began, innocently poking at the ember of a fire with her stick, "did Kurama go psycho and kill his friends yet?"

"How should I know?" Yukio grumbled. He was still sore from his latest mission involving the kitsune. The former thief surrounded himself with powerful allies, it seemed.

"Well, you were the one who was supposed to take care of that."

He was silent, watching as she grew bored with the ashes and stood up, almost skipping away. He had never been able to understand how such an airhead had become so powerful. It wasn't as if she ever trained, and he could only remember seeing her fight once. She spent her days sleeping, eating, and grinning stupidly.

Yet, he was the one working for her.

He wasn't even sure why he was working for her. He didn't like her. She was an idiot. He could easily get paid more somewhere else. It's not as if she would hunt him down if he left. He didn't stay out of fear. The missions she sent him on were usually pointless.

The only thing that stuck out was why this had never occurred to him before.

He didn't see himself getting up and leaving, though.

There had to be some reason.

Suddenly, he remembered. The food. He had never eaten finer cuisine in all of Makai. Alika may be one of the stupidest demons he ever came across, but she had one hell of a cook.

~`~`~`~`~`

Yusuke and Hiei walked into the temple, looking around for anyone to update them on Kurama's condition, in the hopes it had changed for the better. What they saw was a demoness dressed in white lounging on a couch.

"What the hell are you doing here?" Hiei demanded.

"I couldn't find a thing. Fox-boy didn't give me enough information."

"Where is Kurama?" Yusuke asked.

Leiko thumbed behind her. Yusuke's gaze followed the direction she pointed in before heading that way. Before he left the room, he turned and winked at Hiei, smirking as he turned back around and walked through the door.

Hiei almost snarled. The spirit detective abandoned him with the kitty-cat lunatic. This supposive friendship thing was overrated, or a sham. Narrowing his ruby orbs, he stared down the white-haired demoness.

"Where's…"

"I don't have you fucking money!"

She sighed.

"I was going to ask where my `hello' was," she said, condescendingly.

"Like hell."

"So I lied, big deal," she shrugged. She turned her back on him, a gesture that clearly said she did not consider him a threat. In Makai this could both be an insult and a warning.

Hiei snarled, hand immediately going to the hilt of his katana.

"Oh Hiei-kun! You're here!"

Ruby-red eyes snapped up to see Yukina rushing towards him from the doorway Yusuke had left from. Instantly, Hiei forgot about his intentions of kitty-hacking.

He silently waited while she ran up to him, worry and seriousness twisting in her eyes.

"Genkai wants to see you."

~`~`~`~`~`

Yusuke looked down at his friend.

Kurama was unconscious still. Silver hair dangled down from his limp head. The kitsune had been strapped down to a chair of sorts. It looked like a twisted lump of wood and stone.

He didn't like it. He didn't like any of this. Kurama was not the one who should be restrained. Of the Reikei Tantei, the kitsune was the one who needed to be tied down the least.

He wasn't even sure what they had tied the youko down with. It didn't look like any rope he had ever seen.

He didn't even bother to think about that very long. He didn't want to know.

"This is all so stupid!" he yelled, fisting his hands in his pockets.

Life sucked.

Absently, he clutched at his injured arm. It had now stopped bleeding, and didn't even really hurt anymore. It had grown to half-remembered numbness as a result of other things crowding his head. It wasn't even a serious injury, just a bit deep and a lot of blood.

Glancing down, he noticed for the first time, really, exactly how bloody his arm was. His jacket sleeve was torn in dark crimson shreds down to his wrist. His hand was sticky and drying.

For the life of him, he couldn't figure out why he had thought he needed to grab his jacket before going outside to die.

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A/N: Whoo, lo-o-o-o-ng wait. Sorry. That was mean of me.