Yu Yu Hakusho Fan Fiction ❯ My Downfall ❯ The Jagan ( Chapter 2 )

A/N: I don't own Yu Yu Hakusho or any of the characters herein, they are all the property of Yoshihiro Togashi.

 

Recap: Botan arranged a meeting for the old spirit detective team, but when she went to demon world to find Hiei he refused to go with her.

 

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Chapter 2: The Jagan

 

“Knock, knock!”

 

Botan pretended to knock by the open door before stepping into the room the others had gathered in. She smiled at them cheerfully in greeting, but her expression slowly shifted as she realised that they were all staring at her with looks that ranged from fearful to shocked.

 

“Everybody alright?” she asked tentatively.

 

“Botan!” Koenma blurted out.

 

“Yes,” she responded. “I'm sorry Lord Koenma Sir, but Hiei refused to come back here with me.”

 

Koenma stared back at her with wide eyes but said nothing.

 

“I tried my very best!” she added, pulling a kitty face and pawing at the air coyly.

 

“I can't believe you made it back here alive!” Yusuke said suddenly.

 

Botan turned to him, tilting her head to one side curiously.

 

“I told you we could trust Mister Hiei to take good care of Botan!” Yukina protested.

 

“I wouldn't trust that little pest as far as I could throw him,” Kuwabara muttered. “Hey wait, that analogy doesn't really work for a small-fry like Hiei, because I could probably throw him clear through three dimensions…”

 

“Botan, I'm really sorry,” Koenma said, stepping forwards from the others. “I shouldn't have sent you to demon world, it would have made a lot more sense to send Kurama or Yusuke.”

 

“Sensible planning never was one your greatest strengths,” Yusuke muttered behind him.

 

“Well it was a little scary being there all on my own!” Botan laughed. “But I found Hiei, and although he helped me get back here, he refused to help us.”

 

Koenma sighed.

 

“That's just not good enough, we really need his help on this one,” he said. “I expected him to refuse at first, but hopefully we can change his mind.”

 

“Here goes,” Yusuke said. “Get a load of this guys: he's about to send Botan back to demon world.”

 

Koenma turned to Yusuke but before they could commence an argument, Kurama stepped forwards, holding up a hand to halt their words.

 

“I suggest we proceed with our plans without Hiei,” he said calmly. “If we find that his assistance will be essential, I will talk with him at a later date. For now I think it would be prudent to discuss our plans and move forwards as though we will not have Hiei's aid.”

 

“Well, I…” Koenma began, trailing off as he caught Yusuke glaring at him and noticed that Kuwabara was still muttering to himself, trying to find an appropriate comparative joke for how little he trusted Hiei. “Okay, that sounds good,” he resigned.

 

“So then out with it: why did you bring us here?” Yusuke responded.

 

“We have reason to believe some former criminals in demon world are harbouring humans who have accidentally passed into their world and they are planning to stage some sort of ransom of their release when the preliminaries for the next demon world tournament begin,” Koenma replied. “And that is why it was imperative we got Hiei involved, since he is supposedly responsible for returning all humans who cross over. Apparently he hasn't been doing his job.”

 

“How do we know Hiei isn't the one taking hostages?” Kuwabara asked.

 

“We don't,” Koenma replied.

 

“Taking humans hostage to use them as ransom is beneath Hiei,” Kurama interjected.

 

“Pfft, oh yeah?” Yusuke snorted. “It wasn't beneath him when I first met him. He took Keiko hostage to get the three spirit world artefacts. He even tried to turn her into a demon, remember?”

 

“That was a long time ago, and Hiei has never given us a reason to distrust him since that time,” Kurama replied.

 

“I guess not, but we don't know what he's been up to lately,” Yusuke said. “He never comes to any of our reunions. He does tend to turn up just when we need him, but this time it looks like we need him right at the start, and he's not here!”

 

“We can manage without him,” Kuwabara said. “He hates helping us anyway, and obviously none of us trust him.”

 

“Okay, we need to consider how we start looking at this,” Koenma said, hoping to bring the discussion back to the matter at hand. “Botan, Yukina, for your own safety, I need to ask you both to leave us alone for this next part.”

 

Botan arched her eyebrows questioningly at her boss but he merely ushered her towards the door.

 

“I'd rather keep this one on a need-to-know basis,” he told her as she stumbled back out of the room. “If you know too much, you could be in danger of being kidnapped by somebody who wants to read your mind. It's safer for us all if you don't know too much about this.”

 

“But Lord Koenma, I can-” Botan began, stopping short as Koenma sharply slid the door shut between them. “Help…” she added quietly.

 

Botan sighed and pouted dejectedly, but quickly recovered her cheery disposition as she caught sight of Yukina at her side, watching her worriedly.

 

“Come along Yukina, let's go outside and watch the sunset,” she said with a smile.

 

Yukina smiled back at her and nodded, following her through the temple towards the back door. As they walked, Botan was glad that Yukina remained two steps behind her, as she could not stop herself from smirking as she considered the irony of Hiei and Yukina being siblings: she could not think of two people more different in character and even in their powers. She started to wonder why Hiei would not tell Yukina that he was the brother she was looking for, but Botan then remembered that the last time she had spent any amount of time on such thoughts, Hiei had appeared in her mind, using his powers of telepathy to issues death threats to her should she accidentally reveal his secret to Yukina. So she shook the thoughts from her mind, instead allowing her thoughts to linger on her disappointment that Koenma was hiding part of the mission briefing from her.

 

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

 

Botan slept restlessly that night. After watching the sunset with Yukina, she had found Koenma, Yusuke, Kurama and Kuwabara still deep in conversation and not wishing to be disturbed, so she and Yukina had made up some beds for them all and found a room for themselves for the night. They had found two bedrooms nearby where the others were having their meeting and made up two beds in each, deciding to leave it up to the boys to fight out who shared with who. But Botan and Yukina had only been able to find two more bedrooms, and both were on the upper floor: one had been Genkai's room, which they had agreed they would leave undisturbed, and the other, the room they chose for themselves, was a very small room that looked like it might have once been a part of the attic. Yukina had fallen asleep quite quickly, but Botan had laid awake for some time, mainly because every time she had started to relax she had heard a sudden outburst from Yusuke, Kuwabara or Koenma from downstairs, their voices too far away to be clearly heard as anything other than a muffled cry, yet every time they did shout out Botan was instantly wide awake.

 

Botan could not even remember how or when she had eventually fallen asleep, remembering a particularly heated exchange reaching her ears and leaving her especially worried and then suddenly finding herself lifting out of a sleep, a sense of anxiety cutting into her thoughts and rousing her. With a groan of complaint and exhaustion she wriggled onto her back and opened her eyes, looking up at the ceiling above her. It was still dark but she could no longer hear voices anywhere else in the building. She waited for several seconds, expecting to hear a sudden indecipherable curse from Yusuke or Kuwabara at any moment, but the silence continued.

 

She turned her head towards the bed across the room from her, where Yukina was still sleeping so peacefully that it made her jealous to watch. The moon must have come out, Botan mused, as a pale blue square of light had appeared over Yukina and the wall behind her. The room had a sloping wall at one side - the side Botan was sleeping on - and a large window on the sloping section that looked up to the stars outside. There had been no blind or curtain to cover the window with, but since Genkai's temple was in such a remote location, they did not have the problem of streetlights shining in at them, and so they had not bothered covering it. The light now illuminating Yukina made her look all the more peaceful and relaxed and made Botan all the more envious of her contentment.

 

“This is silly…” she muttered to herself, turning towards Yukina and snuggling into her bedding in an attempt to find a position that was as comfortable as Yukina's appeared to be.

 

Botan began to blink heavily, telling herself that everyone else had gone to sleep and she had no reason to stay awake, and that doing so would only make her feel terrible the next morning. She finally closed her eyes but before she could drift easily into the sleep she had been sure was finally within her grasp her eyes snapped open again as a light tapping sound resounded somewhere above her head. She watched Yukina, but still the little ice demon slept peacefully with a blissful little smile on her face, apparently oblivious to Botan's pains and the noise. Botan tried to tell herself that it had probably just been a bat or some kind of nocturnal animal, but something felt distinctly amiss; and as she watched Yukina, she saw something that made her entire being freeze stiff where she lay.

 

The square of light in the room slowly changed shape as a shadow moved across it. Botan watched, holding her breath and not even daring to blink, as the shadow slid across the lower part of the window before coming to a stop near the middle. The shadow was almost shapeless, but as it came to rest, Botan noticed that it came to a point at the top, somewhere on the wall behind where Yukina lay. Before the thought could fully form in her mind, Botan sat up abruptly and twisted her head up and to the side to look out the window, feeling only vaguely surprised to see the barely visible demon looking back down at her from his position perched on the roof by the window.

 

“Hiei?” she said aloud, despite already knowing that he would not be able to hear her through the closed window.

 

Even though he was cast in shadow Botan clearly saw his face twitch and twist angrily, and a moan from her side alerted her to his concerns: she turned abruptly to Yukina, who was suddenly frowning and wriggling a little in her bed. She moaned out something unintelligible and rolled over, turning her back to Botan and the window, and then settled back into her deep slumber. Botan sighed silently in relief before turning back to the window, where Hiei was still glaring down at her.

 

“Sorry!” she whispered, mouthing the word clearly so that he would understand.

 

He bared his teeth at her, an action all too clear as the moonlight glinted off of his teeth. He then pointed at Botan, made a yapping gesture with his hand, pointed at Yukina and then pointed at himself, his sword and then Botan again.

 

“What?” she echoed, frowning up at him in confusion.

 

“Mmb-Botan?” Yukina muttered.

 

“Oopsie!” Botan yelped, clapping a hand over her mouth and turning to Yukina in alarm.

 

Yukina was sitting up, rubbing lazily at her eyes, and as she watched her, Botan saw Hiei's silhouette drop out of sight.

 

“Botan?” Yukina said, regarding her through half-open eyes that were still hazed with sleep. “Did you say something?”

 

“Me?” Botan echoed. “Oh goodness, was I talking in my sleep again? I'm so sorry Yukina, it's a terrible habit!”

 

“What were you dreaming about?” Yukina asked her.

 

“Um…”

 

Looking into Yukina's open and innocent face, Botan found herself completely unable to lie to the girl. She silently prayed there and then that Yukina would never ask her outright if she knew anything about the brother she was looking for.

 

“Were you dreaming about the demon realm?” Yukina asked.

 

“Yes!” Botan quickly replied.

 

Botan had been dreaming about something during the brief time she had actually been asleep, but she could not remember anything about the dream upon waking, so she felt able to tell this half-lie at least.

 

“Don't worry about it now Botan,” Yukina said, smiling gently at her.

 

“Yes, you're right!” Botan replied. “You go back to sleep now. And again, I am so sorry that I woke you with my silly rambling!”

 

“You should go back to sleep too,” Yukina said, lying down again.

 

“Yes, yes I will. I haven't been sleeping very well, but I'm going to try to get some sleep now.”

 

“Goodnight Botan.”

 

“Yes goodnight Yukina. Again! And hopefully for the last time, this time! Hopefully I won't be rambling on in my sleep any more and keeping you awake!”

 

Botan's face dropped as she heard a vindictive voice suddenly speaking firmly and a little too loudly inside her head, telling her: “your rambling is keeping us all awake, just shut-up and go to sleep”. Botan mechanically turned her head towards the window again, but Hiei was no longer there. In her moment of panic she had almost forgotten that he could reach people through telepathy, and she then began wondering how long he had been “listening in” on her conversations with Yukina, not just that night but any other time they had been alone together.

 

“Sorry!” she whispered, lying down again.

 

“It's okay Botan,” Yukina sleepily replied, her voice slightly muffled by her pillow.

 

Botan opened her mouth to correct Yukina but then thought better of it. She was beginning to suspect that Hiei's earlier mime act had implied that he would turn her into another notch on his cutlass if she told Yukina that he was there, so she decided to remain silent about her discovery. Instead she lay down again and shuffled about in an attempt to find a comfortable sleeping position. She failed at her task, eventually settling for a tolerable one, her mind still too occupied to let her sleep.

 

She smiled to herself as she realised that Hiei was in the living world and at Genkai's no less: apparently he was going to help them, but as Yusuke had suggested, he was making a late entrance. Good old Hiei!

 

“Shut-up and go to sleep!”

 

Botan's entire body jerked in alarm as Hiei's voice once more yelled impatiently around the inside of her head, louder and clearer than any of her own thoughts. She angrily righted her position again, pouting and hunching her shoulders as she thought about how cruel it was of him to invade her thoughts without her permission and to even have the audacity to complain about them, especially when they had been good thoughts about him.

 

“That's no way to treat a lady, Hiei,” she muttered into her pillow.

 

Botan tried to push all thoughts about Hiei and the others from her mind to stop Hiei from interrupting her thoughts again, closing her eyes and trying to relax so that she could get some more sleep. But even as she lay with her eyes closed in a reasonably comfortable position, Botan knew that she was not going to get much more sleep that night, no matter how hard she tried.

 

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

 

Botan opened her mouth and yawned openly, loudly and shamelessly.

 

“Are we boring you, Botan?” Kuwabara sneered at her.

 

Botan turned to him, quirking an eyebrow in amusement at his remark.

 

“No…” she said slowly. “Are we boring you?”

 

“No!” Kuwabara hurriedly replied, his face slowly turning pink. “I'm never bored when I'm with my darling Yukina!”

 

“Indeed…”

 

Botan cleared her throat and rocked on her heels before looking about herself in a slow and deliberate action.

 

“Did you finish that post-breakfast meeting with Yusuke and Kurama?” she asked, folding her arms and narrowing her eyes at Kuwabara suspiciously.

 

“No, it just started when we left,” he said, looking at her as though she was the one talking nonsense.

 

“I see,” Botan said, nodding slowly. “The important meeting Yusuke called, the meeting he told Yukina and me that we could not be a part of, the meeting between Yusuke, Kurama and you is going on right now?”

 

“Yes,” Kuwabara replied. “And your point is?”

 

“Shouldn't you be at the meeting?”

 

Botan arched her eyebrows at Kuwabara expectantly, but he merely narrowed his eyes at her and jerked his head in Yukina's direction. Botan glanced at Yukina on his cue, finding her attempting to coax a squirrel out of a nearby tree.

 

“I can't let you take Yukina out into the woods all alone,” Kuwabara whispered to Botan. “Something might happen, I need to protect her.”

 

“And you don't think that I am capable of protecting her?” Botan asked.

 

Kuwabara faltered, turning slightly pinker, his mouth working through several silent words.

 

“I'm not as defenceless as you think I am, Kuwabara!” Botan reminded him. “I have my oar to escape danger, and I may not have a fantastic spirit sword like you do, but I do have this!”

 

With a flick of her wrist Botan summoned her trusty baseball bat, smirking darkly at Kuwabara as she wiggled it in the air.

 

“Could you fight off a demon with that?” he asked sceptically.

 

“One well-placed blow would buy us enough time to escape on my oar,” she replied.

 

“Maybe against a weak demon, but what about a big scary one?”

 

“We're hardly likely to find any big scary demons out here, Kuwabara. Not any more, anyway.”

 

“Oh yeah?”

 

“Yes.”

 

Kuwabara and Botan leaned closer to each other, each glaring at the other in a way that suggested they did not want each other to be there.

 

“Kazuma, Botan, look!” Yukina said, interrupting their war of wills. “There's something up in this tree!”

 

Kuwabara hurried over to look up the tree and Botan dismissed her bat with a wave of her hand before joining them.

 

“Maybe it's another squirrel, Yukina,” Kuwabara suggested.

 

“Don't be silly!” Botan scoffed. “It's far too big to be a squirrel!”

 

“Maybe it's the mother!” Kuwabara argued.

 

Botan rolled her eyes but resisted the urge to remind Kuwabara that squirrels were small creatures, and the shapeless shadow above them was far bigger than any squirrel.

 

“Maybe it's a little kitty!” Kuwabara said.

 

“Did you eat an extra bowl of stupid this morning?” Botan muttered. “That's no cat!”

 

Apparently though, Kuwabara did not hear her.

 

“Here kitty, kitty!” he called up into the tree. “Come on kitty! Kitty, kitty!”

 

The branches above them rustled a little as the shadow shifted slightly.

 

“Come on kitty!” Kuwabara called.

 

“It's not a cat, Kazuma,” Yukina said quietly.

 

A branch groaned, creaked and finally snapped above their heads.

 

“Then what is it, my love?” Kuwabara asked her.

 

“It's-”

 

Yukina stopped as the shadow fell abruptly, landing hard behind them in an ungraceful pile of black and white.

 

“Mister Hiei,” she finished, pointing at the tangled mess by their feet.

 

“Ayie!” Kuwabara cried, recoiling from the fire demon, his face twisting fearfully.

 

“Is he alright?” Yukina asked, taking a step closer to him and frowning down at him in concern.

 

“I don't think so,” Botan commented, scratching at her head as she took in Hiei's slumped form. “It's not normal for him to fall out of trees head-first in a sort of plummeting fashion. Usually he leaps out of trees and lands quite gracefully on his feet.”

 

Yukina took another step closer to Hiei.

 

“Mister Hiei?” she said.

 

She took another step forwards and Botan moved over to join her, both girls bending over to peer down at Hiei. He had landed in an uncharacteristically ungainly heap, his arms and legs sprawled at his sides and his body twisted slightly at the waist. His head was lolled back, his eyes closed and his lips slightly parted. To a casual observer he looked to be in a peaceful sleep, but his slightly dishevelled appearance told otherwise: his bandana was absent, the bandages around his right arm were unravelling and his scarf had come loose, hanging over one shoulder.

 

“Oh dear…” Botan muttered.

 

As she and Yukina leaned closer still, their concern growing as they concentrated on Hiei's unusual state, they suddenly found themselves glaring in confusion and disbelief at Kuwabara, who had appeared by Yukina.

 

“Is he… Is he asleep like that?” Kuwabara asked, poking the stick he held at Hiei's hip.

 

“Kuwabara! Stop that at once!” Botan scolded him.

 

“Is he hibernating?” he asked, ignoring Botan and moving the stick to Hiei's chin.

 

He jabbed the end of the stick against the underside of Hiei's chin, forcing his head back a little further. It was then Botan's turn to squeal and leap back fearfully as she anticipated a sudden and violent response from Hiei; but none came.

 

“Oh dear!” she said again, edging back into her former position by Yukina's side. “He's either sleeping very deeply or he's…”

 

Botan's voice trailed off and she glanced nervously at Yukina and then Kuwabara.

 

“Do you think he's dead?” Kuwabara asked. “Ew! I touched him with this!”

 

Kuwabara threw the stick away and staggered a few steps back from Hiei as Botan began telling him off for not being more supportive of a former ally and friend. Yukina meanwhile took a more sensible approach and knelt by Hiei's side, slipping one hand under his scarf to feel for a pulse, placing her other hand by his mouth and nose to feel for his breath.

 

“He's alive,” she announced.

 

“There you see!” Botan said smugly.

 

“But his heartbeat is unusual and his breathing is irregular,” Yukina added. “I think he's sick!”

 

“I could have told you that without checking his pulse…” Kuwabara muttered.

 

“We have to help him, Botan!” Yukina said.

 

“Of course!” Botan agreed, kneeling down beside Yukina. “Now let me just see here…”

 

Botan moved one hand towards Hiei's face, pausing as she realised that her next action was not going to be as simple as she had expected. She had been about to lift one of his eyelids to check his state of consciousness, but the idea occurred to her that he had three eyes, one of which was linked more closely to his subconscious, which left her unsure if she ought to check one of his original eyes or the jagan on his forehead.

 

“Um…” she muttered, sweating a little as she remembered his death threats from the night before.

 

He could awaken at any moment, she thought darkly, and his first action could well be to put his hand around her throat. She took a deep breath and tried to push her fears out of her mind, concentrating instead on how innocent and boyish he looked when he was unconscious. She smiled a little, deciding that she liked him better this way. Then she screwed up her face as she realised what she had just concluded. Then she turned pale and her eyes doubled in size as the idea came to her that Hiei might still be able to read her thoughts in his current condition.

 

“Let's see if he's fully unconscious or not,” she said aloud, trying to focus herself by commentating on her own actions.

 

She gently pressed her thumb against the corner of his eye nearest her, pushing up his eyelid.

 

“Ah well,” she said, closing his eye again. “That looks like he is unconscious. Now…”

 

She cautiously touched her thumb to the corner of the jagan eye on his forehead, her hand shaking a little as she eased it open slightly. She yelped and retracted her hand after only opening it to a thin crack, the sight of the purple eye staring straight up at her taking her by surprise. She had been expecting the jagan eye to look the same as his own eyes did: rolled back into his skull.

 

“Ew!” Kuwabara said over her shoulder. “Creepy!”

 

“Well that's fine,” Botan said awkwardly, pressing her thumb against the eye again.

 

She let out a small noise of surprise when, instead of the jagan closing, it opened slightly wider.

 

“What are you doing, Botan?” Kuwabara wailed.

 

“I can't get it to close!” she wailed, pressing harder at Hiei's forehead.

 

Botan and Kuwabara both yelped and leapt back from Hiei as his jagan eye opened fully, staring up at them, the pupil dilated and unfocussed.

 

“That's so weird!” Kuwabara said. “Botan, you're sick!”

 

“Excuse me?” Botan echoed. “I was checking on his condition!”

 

“We should take him back to Genkai's,” Yukina suggested.

 

“Yes that's right, we should,” Botan agreed. “Pick him up, Kuwabara.”

 

“Do what now?” Kuwabara echoed.

 

“Pick him up!” Botan repeated impatiently. “He is clearly incapacitated. You'll have to carry him back.”

 

“Why do I have to do it?” he whined.

 

“Because neither Yukina or I have the strength to carry him all the way back!”

 

Kuwabara eyed Botan over carefully before looking briefly at Yukina, as though considering the idea of either of them carrying Hiei.

 

“But he's just a little guy, and you said that you were tough, Botan,” he eventually said, meeting Botan's eyes.

 

“That's despicable!” Botan argued.

 

“Excuse me?” Yukina said, distracting them from their argument. “I think Mister Hiei has a fever.”

 

Botan lowered her head, feeling instantly humbled when she saw that Yukina had not been as foolish as she and Kuwabara were being, touching her hand to Hiei's forehead, her fingers all around his jagan eye without a second thought.

 

“Get to it, Kuwabara,” Botan said quietly, slapping Kuwabara's arm and pointing down at Hiei.

 

“You're a nag!” Kuwabara moaned.

 

“Please, Kazuma!” Yukina pleaded.

 

“Of course Yukina my love!” Kuwabara said, dropping to his knees by her side.

 

“Thank you,” she said sweetly, rising to her feet. “You have such a good heart.”

 

She touched a hand to his shoulder and leaned forwards to kiss him on the forehead, bringing a goofy grin to his face. He continued to gaze dreamily up at her until Botan cleared her throat loudly and obnoxiously, bringing his attention back to the situation at hand.

 

“Right,” he muttered, turning back to Hiei.

 

“Come along Yukina, we'll go ahead and prepare a bed for Hiei,” Botan suggested.

 

“Right!” Yukina agreed.

 

Yukina took off at a sprint towards the temple, but Botan hesitated, a grunting sound behind her distracting her. She suspected that she was not going to like the source of it, but forced herself to turn around regardless, her jaw dropping at what she saw.

 

“Kuwabara, how could you?” she yelled.

 

Kuwabara snorted amusedly, but did not stop what he was doing: which was holding Hiei's head up by his hair and using his other hand to manipulate one of Hiei's fingers up his nose.

 

“He's picking his nose!” Kuwabara laughed. “I wish I had a camera!”

 

“Stop that at once!” Botan snapped, stamping a foot at him.

 

“You're no fun, Botan!” he groaned, dropping Hiei's hand.

 

Botan flicked her wrist in the air, her baseball bat reappearing in her hand.

 

“I'm on it,” Kuwabara said hurriedly, gathering Hiei up and positioning him over his shoulder.

 

“You'd better be!” Botan warned him.

 

To make sure Kuwabara did not try any more silly games, Botan followed behind him as he walked back to the temple, keeping her baseball bat in her hand. By the time they had reached the temple entrance, Yukina had already brought Yusuke and Kurama there to meet them.

 

“What the hell happened?” Yusuke asked as Kuwabara neared him.

 

“The little guy fell out of a tree,” Kuwabara plainly replied.

 

“He's sick,” Yukina added.

 

“I could have told you that,” Yusuke muttered.

 

“That's what I said!” Kuwabara said with a grin.

 

“Stop that!” Botan warned him.

 

“Take him to my room,” Kurama suggested. “You can put him in the bed Koenma slept in last night.”

 

Kuwabara obediently took Hiei to the bed Kurama had suggested and dropped him onto it a little roughly before joining the others to kneel at his side.

 

“Ew!” Yusuke moaned as he knelt down by Hiei's head. “Is that thing always open?” he asked, pointing at Hiei's jagan eye.

 

“No,” Kuwabara replied, kneeling down opposite Yusuke. “Botan opened it!”

 

“Botan!” Yusuke cried, turning to her. “What is wrong with you?”

 

Botan huffed and tapped her bat against the palm of her hand threateningly.

 

“I think he has a fever,” Yukina said to Kurama.

 

“The best thing for him at this time is rest,” Kurama replied. “I think we should leave him here for now. If he does not awaken or his condition does not improve, we will revaluate the situation later.”

 

“Can it see us?” Yusuke asked, waving a hand in front of Hiei's open eye.

 

“I dunno, but it sure is creepy!” Kuwabara replied.

 

“I dare you to poke it,” Yusuke said to him.

 

“Ew, that's disgusting! No way, Urameshi! You poke it!”

 

“You poke it! I'll give you five thousand yen if you poke it.”

 

“I dunno, he might kill me…”

 

Kurama sighed patiently.

 

“I said the best thing for Hiei right now is rest,” he repeated, raising his voice slightly. “I think we should leave him here for now. Alone.”

 

“It hasn't blinked since Botan opened it,” Kuwabara said, ignoring Kurama entirely.

 

“It never does blink,” Yusuke replied.

 

“Seriously?” Kuwabara echoed. “Huh… No, I don't think I have ever seen it blink. That's so sick!”

 

“Boys!” Botan snapped. “Kurama just told you that we need to leave Hiei alone to rest!”

 

Kuwabara suddenly jabbed a finger at Hiei's forehead, the tip of his finger briefly touching Hiei's exposed eye. He withdrew his hand as quickly as he had moved it forwards, shuddering and moaning to himself.

 

“Damn, it didn't even flinch!” Yusuke said, leaning over Hiei. “I thought it might shrivel, like a snail when you poke its eyes.”

 

“It was wet,” Kuwabara whined. “And warm!”

 

“Kuwabara, you're disgusting!” Yusuke said, shaking his head.

 

“Hey, you were the one who said I should do it!” Kuwabara argued.

 

“You don't have to do what I tell you to.”

 

“You owe me five thousand yen, Urameshi!”

 

“I don't have that kind of money on me.”

 

“But we made a deal!”

 

“Well let's make a new deal: I'll make sure Hiei never finds out you poked his jagan eye and in return you pay me ten thousand yen.”

 

“Urameshi, you…!”

 

“Stop it, both of you!” Botan snapped. “Go on, get out of here and let poor Hiei get some rest!”

 

“Fine by me,” Yusuke said through a sigh.

 

Kuwabara stood up across from him, scowling at him angrily. As they left the room they threw a few punches at each other, leaving Botan shaking her head as she watched them go.

 

“They haven't grown up one bit since the day I first met them!” she said, turning back to Kurama and Yukina.

 

Kurama smiled sympathetically but said nothing.

 

“I think we should take off Mister Hiei's coat,” Yukina said.

 

“I'll leave you girls to it,” Kurama said, standing up and nodding politely to each of them in turn. “Let me know if you need anything.”

 

“Thank you Kurama,” Botan said to him as he passed her. “At least we can always rely on you to be the voice of reason!”

 

Botan watched Kurama leave before turning back to Yukina, who was in the process of removing Hiei's scarf, being careful to disturb him as little as possible with her actions. But as Yukina slid the scarf from Hiei's neck, Botan's eyes grew as she spotted the two chains by his throat. The stones on the end of them were still concealed beneath his coat, but Yukina would notice them shortly if she did not intervene, and memories of Hiei's death threats to her regarding allowing Yukina to learn her relation to him were still fresh in Botan's mind.

 

“Yukina!” she blurted out a little too urgently, diving down to Yukina's side.

 

Yukina looked over her shoulder at Botan, her face impassive as though she was accustomed to Botan randomly yelling and pouncing on her.

 

“Why don't you let me do this?” Botan asked, grinning a little too widely. “Why don't you go and start making some more of that lovely soup you made us last night, so that when Hiei wakes up, he'll have a nice meal ready for him!”

 

“Oh what a nice idea, Botan!” Yukina said sweetly.

 

“Yes, isn't it?” Botan said, inwardly thanking Enma that Yukina was so naïve. “Run along then.”

 

Botan got to her feet again, pulling Yukina with her, and ushering her towards the door.

 

“And remember to put in extra amounts of Hiei's favourite ingredient!” Botan sang as she gently pushed Yukina out of the room into the hallway.

 

“Which ingredient is his favourite?” Yukina asked, stumbling slightly as Botan released her.

 

“Um… I don't know!” Botan laughed. “Don't you know?”

 

Yukina shook her head, and Botan realised that she had never actually seen Hiei eat - ever.

 

“Oh well, make it just the same as you did before then!” she said, before sharply sliding the door shut between them and sighing in relief.

 

She then made her way back to where Hiei lay, kneeling down beside him. She quickly removed the hiruiseki stones from around his neck, turning from side to side as she tried to think of a sensible place to stash them until Hiei woke up. When inspiration failed her she shrugged and pulled the chains over her head, tucking the stones under her shirt out of sight. She then set about removing his coat, which proved more difficult than she had expected it to, as she was forced to push and pull him about quite a bit to get it off, all the while terrified that he might awaken and be furious to find that she was manipulating him like a rag-doll.

 

Once Botan had successfully removed Hiei's coat she sighed with relief and folded it neatly, placing it next to his bed. She then turned her attention to the bandages around his right arm, which had come loose over his hand. Apparently the wrapping had been severed just above his wrist, exposing a small part of the skin around the base of his hand. She reached over and wound the dressing around the exposed areas before tying the cut ends in a little bow across his knuckles, mentally reminding herself to cut it open again before Hiei realised she had tied a pretty little bow in the dressing he wore to cover his greatest weapon.

 

Botan then tried pinching at Hiei's forehead to make his jagan eye close, only giving up after several failed attempts. She withdrew her hands and tilted her head to one side as she regarded him, silently wondering how she was going to go about putting a cold cloth over his forehead when he had a giant open eye in the middle of it.

 

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

 

Next Chapter: Hiei wakes up and isn't too happy with Botan, especially when he discovers that she has his precious hiruiseki hanging around her neck: but his attempts to recover them don't go exactly as planned, leaving one confused Botan. Chapter 3: The Misunderstanding.