Yu Yu Hakusho Fan Fiction ❯ Shattered Gates ❯ Chapter: Complications and Scholarly Persuits ( Chapter 9 )

CHAP 8

The next morning, they awoke much the same way as they had over the last month, Karyuu's soft voice pulling them gently, but firmly out of sleep and into wakefullness at the crack of dawn.
Eventually, they mannaged to drag themselves out of bed and trugged toward the kitchen, where their bowls of depressingly nutritious cerial would be waiting for them on the table, set out the night before by a thoughtfull Yukina.
However, when all of them had settled down to their cold cerial, (minus Hiei, who opted for a cup of hot tea), it became obvious that Kurama's guess had been correct, and when they gathered that morning for breakfast, the opal-eyed Servant set out the new order of things.
As they listened, she informed them in a no-nonsence kind of way, that she would be staying up at night to watch over them in the event of another attack.
When they protested, she assured them it was only temporary, and that soon everything would return to normal, promising not to 'over-tax' herself in the process.
But several weeks passed in which the Urameshi Team trained, and still Karyuu kept up her nightly vigil over them while they slept, and as far as they could tell, she haddn't had a solid night of rest in that entire time-period. She seemed fine, but eventually even Hiei was beginning to feel at least a little guilty about making her watch over them at night, only to wake them at the crack of dawn the next morning and work steadily through their arguous training at a seemingly inexaustable pace...
*****
Finally, the four banded together while she took up what had become her customary place in the forrest outside of the Temple gates, and decided that if she insisted on taking up a watch at night, the least they could do would be to devide the time between them, allowing everyone to get a decent amount of sleep at night, while making sure that if there was another attack, there would be someone awake to let everyone else know about it.
And so, on the fourth week since the Bone-Devil's attack, Yusuke and the others gathered together and formulated a plan in which their newest member would be able to get some rest without sacrificing her rest for their sakes. Eventually they came up with a suitable course of action, (despite less than helpfull suggestions from Hiei to just let Karyuu do whatever she wanted, so long as it didn't interfere with their training), and decided to lay down the law, so to speak the next day when the elfin woman woke them just after dawn.
*****
As planned, Karyuu woke the Urameshi Team for their training in the wee-hours of the morning and after breakfast, she began to set out the course of that day's training, surprising them all with an unforseen change of plans.
"Okay... in light of last month's less than possitive events, I think it might be a good plan if we take today to rest, and then move on to the next Element tomorrow..." The elfin woman said seriously.
There was a breif pause before the others began to protest.
"But Karyuu, we haven't really go the hang of this stuff yet..." Yusuke protested with a frown. "I still keep blasting my targets into little piles of ash and stuff..."
"I know, but I think it might be better if we cover the basics of drawing on and controlling each Element before we get down to combat-specifics," she said. "Then we can cover the fighting-side of things. That way, you might have a better understanding of how things work and you'll have an easier time learning to apply it in more non-conventional means. What do you think?"
Kurama knew as the others did that the elfin woman's motivations for speeding their training along was more due to the unexpected appearance of the Bone-Devil the night before, than any true theory of general training before specifics, but he also knew that it was unlikely that their training would suffer because of it.
"Well, if you think that's best, Karyuu," Kurama said with a slightly worried frown. "Then I suppose it might be the best course of action..."
She looked around at the others and they all gave nods of assent, deciding without speech to take the red-haired demon's lead, their compliance making her smile a little in releif.
"Alright... then we can -"
"One moment," Kurama murmured, cutting her off in mid-speech. "There's a contidition the four of us would like you to agree to before we continue."
The elfin woman raised an eyebrow at him.
"What is it?"
"We though it might be a good idea to start taking turns on watch," Yusuke said, stuffing his hands in his pockets. "That way, there'll be sombody awake to give the alarm if another Hell-monster thing decides to pay us a visit, and you won't have to stay up all night."
Instantly she frowned at him and seemed about to protest, but Kuwabara cut in.
"We're set on it, Karyuu," the tall warrior said firmly. "You're gonna' burn out if you don't get some sleep, and the least we can do is let you get some sleep like the rest of us, since you spend all day training us and everything."
"Guys... If I let you do that, you'll just get yourselves killed... You aren't strong enough to handel Hell-spawn just yet -"
"Firstly, you have no authority to stop us or let us do anything," Hiei said calmly. "Secondly, no one said anything about taking them on. We simply said that it would be better to let you sleep and raise the alarm, than to have you nod-off eventually and get yourself killed and take us along with you."
Kurama gave Hiei as slightly disaproving look, but refrained from comment, returning his emerald eyes to her as she struggled to find something to battle their unanimous decision.
"You'll wear yourself out if you keep this up," the fox-demon said in a reasonable tone. "Even a Servant of Gaia needs to sleep, do they not?"
She looked up at him, seeming more than a little uneasy, but seeing the looks on their faces told her that any further protests would fall on deaf ears.
They had already made up their minds, and anything she said would only further their desire to continue with their plan.
Ah... the joys of having stubbourn good-hearted people as students...
"Alright, alright," she sighed defeatedly, making them smile at her. "We'll take turns if you want..."
Yusuke grinned and patted her on the shoulder with a light laugh.
"Aw, c'mon, Karyuu," he said as she looked up at him. "We're guys... we can't let you stand guard over us all the time... It's against the rules or something like that..." She scoffed, but didn't seem to be offended by the statement, just annoyed that they were being so stubbourn over the issue. "Anyway... you said something about us getting the day off?"
She smiled at him in an exasperated kind of way and nodded, greeted with a whoop and a sudden dash toward the Temple, the brown-eyed Spirit Detective laughing maddly as he ran.
"Where're you goin', Urameshi?" Kuwabara demanded, looking at the back of his quickly retreating friend.
"I'm gonna' watch tv!" He yelled over his shoulder. "See ya'!"
Hiei muttered something about 'baka Ningen', before turning and strolling off into the shadows before taking up his customary place within the shady bows of the tree growing near the red arch by the stairs where he would probably spend the rest of the day sleeping.
Kurama looked down at Karyuu and then cocked his head to the side, eyes inquisitive.
"What were you planning to do with your day off, Karyuu?"
She shrugged and began moving toward the kitchen as he walked by her side.
"I was planning on making dinner... give Yukina a break..."
The fox-demon laughed quietly and slipped his hands in his pockets.
"Yes, but aren't you supposed to be relaxing as well?" He asked pointedly.
The elfin woman smiled up at him.
"I am relaxing," she replied. "I like cooking for people... besides, inflicting strange, foreign foods on you guys will be entertaining."
He blinked at her, looking slightly alarmed at the thought of what she might have in mind and she laughed at the expression on his face.
Kuwabara stood where he was for a long moment before he shoved his hands into his pockets and then moved toward the stairs at a quick walk, his honest face thoughtfull as he began to quickly jog down the long flight of stone stairs that lead from the forest to the Temple courtyard.
The others might be having fun... but he had something he needed to do...
And so, as the orange-haired warrior dissapeared out of sight, a pair of ruby eyes followed his progress before dissapearing along with their owner in the direction in which Kuwabara was traveiling with barely a whisper of rusteling leaves to denote the fire-demon's departure from the tree.
*****
An hour later, Kuwabara arrived in the city, moving off in the direction of the Tokyo Library as the bus began to pull away, sapphire eyes flickering absently over the faces of the normal, every-day people that bustled around him on the sidewalks.
'I'm probably just wasten' my time...' he thought absently, a small frown touching his face. 'I shoulda just got Kurama to come down here... He's better at this sorta stuff than I am...'
He came to a halt in front of the revolving door that lead into the library and with a sigh, he stepped inside, pushing the steel frame along until it released him into the building and with a slight pause, he moved off in the direction of the dozen or so computers lined up against the far wall.
He crinkeled his nose as he sat down, wincing slightly as the (comparitively) tiny plastic chair creaked alarmingly as he took a seat before the last un-occupied unit.
'Man... I hate the smell of old books... Makes my nose all tingly and stuff...' Using his right hand, he covered the little mouse with his palm and quickly brought up the program he'd need to find what he was looking for, silently hoping he could find it soon so he could get the heck out of there, the looks aimed at him by the creepy old librarian at the desk on his left making him shift nervously. 'I sure wish that old lady'd find sombody else to stare at...'

Almost two hours passed without sucess, his goal no nearer than it had been when he was back at the Temple...
'Damn... I knew I shoulda just told Kurama my idea... He'd probably have the answer by now and at least that old lady wouldn't be staring at him like he was gonna' steal this junky peice of -'
"What are you doing here?" asked a quiet voice in his ear, and Kuwabara jumped about three feet out of the tiny chair he'd been occupying to whirl around in his seat.

The person who had verbally goosed him, all five feet (including the extra height provided by his spiky hair), was Hiei.

"What the hell are you doing here? Trying to kill me without the others around?" The orange haired warrior snapped loudly, earning a hissed "Quiet!" from the librarian.
The big man winced slightly and grumbeling to himself, he returned his attention to the flickering screen in front of him.
"Hn. I was curious to know what a moron was doing in a place of scholarly learning," the fire-demon replied blandly, looking at the words on the screen with minimal interest.
Kuwbara huffed and scrolled down, searching for anything that might tell him what it was that he wanted to know, inwardly releived to see that the demon had not entered the library wearing his sword. Even he realized that most normal people would get pretty freaked at seeing somebody carrying a big knife around.
"I thought of something a couple of days ago," he said primly. "Sit down, Shrimpy, and I'll explain it."
Hiei's lip twitched at the word 'thought', though, having his curiosity sufficently piqued, he did take a seat next to his orange haired team-mate, choosing to ignore the 'Shrimpy' thing in the intrest of learning what it was that could have possibly motivated the tall young man to forego a day of loafing around the Temple to come to a place in which he would have certainly rather avoid. "That Bone-Devil thing that attacked us two weeks ago said it was lookn' for somethin' called the 'Quintessence', right?" Hiei didn't reply, and folded his arms, looking bored, but Kuwabara seemed not to notice, and he continued, his rough voice lowered to a whisper barely audiable to Human ears. "And Kurama said it was some kinda' rock that made gold outta lead and turned you immortal..." he paused as a paragraph caught his attention and then frowned, squinting at something on the screen before continuing on. "But that didn't really make sence, you know? So I got Karyuu to spell it out for me, and I came down here to look it up. Maybe there's somethin' else called a Quintessence that monster was lookn' for..."
Hiei frowned and sat up straight, ignoring the quizical looks he was getting from the librarian and the other Ningen idiots tottering about the library, his ruby eyes focusing on the flickering screen.
'I'll be damned... the Baka had a good idea...'
"Have you found anything?"
Kuwabara paused and glanced at the smaller man, surprised that he haddn't made some smart-ass remark concerning his intellegence.
"Not really... there's a lot of stuff about the rock... and there's some kinda' kid's-book with some guy named Harry Potter about it... but nothing that really makes any sence..."
"Hn."
There was a breif pause, and a rediculous young Human female of about twelve came up on Kuwabara's left and tapped him irritably on the shoulder, an ill-tempered pout on her face. She was dressed in a skirt that was way too short, and a top that was far too tight, presumably in an attempt to show off her newly developing attributes, great ammounts of make-up smeared all over her pale face, accenting the dull, unintelegent quality of her small brown eyes. Surprised, the tall warrior turned to look at her, his usual expression of amiable puzzelment on his face as she glared at him, an expression that made Hiei raise an eyebrow at her before he shook his head and closed his eyes, ignoring her.
Better to let the Baka deal with her...
"Are you just about done?" She demanded in a huffy little voice that both young men found infinitely irritating. "Cause I gotta' check my e-mail."
Kuwabara frowned at her.
"Why don't you just go do that at home?"
Her eyes narrowed at him.
"Cause I'm not supposed to!" She snapped, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. "Now get off!"
"Sorry, miss, but I've got more important stuff to do than check on a kid's e-mail," the orange-haired young man said flatly.
She laughed shortly, folding her arms accross her chest, and cocking a hip to the side in what she presumeably must have thought of as an intimidating pose.
"Get off!" She commanded shortly. "Or I'm gonna' tell the librarian you and your little freak boyfriend are lookn' up pictures on this thing, and then, you'll be thrown out!"
Kuwabara's eyes widened a little, stunned that a twelve-year-old had made that kind of threat, and was saved from defending himself by the deep quiet voice of the demon sitting next to him, who was familiar with, (at least the concept of), the rediculous accusation the Ningen twit had just made, a quiet laugh escaping him.
"What's so damn funny?" She demanded, turning her dull little eyes on him.
"Hn. You are, Ningen," he said in his deadly quiet voice.
"What did you call me?"
"A Ningen... a Human..." he said shortly, opening his ruby eyes to look at her, the bloody hue making her recoil slightly, looking a little less sure of herself. "And an idiot as well, aparently... Now leave, or I'll feed your soul to the Dark Dragon of the Demon Realm."
This threat, although more than a little obsucre to a Human girl of twelve who had no knowledge of anything more complicated than the latest fashion trends, was decidedly unnerving none the less as she met the steady burning gaze of the fire-demon, who, while giving into a more dramatic side of himself, allowed his eyes to flash red at her for half a beat before retrning to normal as he bared his sharp neat white canines at her, looking positively preaditorial.
That was more than enough motivation, and with a strangeled gasp, the rediculous girl stumbled backward, her dull little brown eyes going very wide, her face pale as she turned and ran as fast as her bony little legs could carry her out of the library and onto the sidewalk, bleached blond pigtails flying behind her.
Kuwabara laughed, and had to cover his mouth with one broad hand to muffle his laughter as the librarian raised her eyes to give him a warning glare from behind her sequinced specticles. Hiei's face had gone instantly back to the expressionless mask, though his eyes sparkeled a little in amusement, inwardly having enjoyed terrorizing the Ningen child...
He haden't been a villian before just because of his prefference for black...
"That was great, Hiei," Kuwabara whispered, after he had gained some control over himself, turning to grin at his team-mate.
"Hn."
And then a thought came to him, and Hiei frowned suddenly.
"Are there books of words here?"
The orange-haired young man blinked at him.
"Huh?"
Hiei sighed irritably.
"I don't remember the Ningen term... There are words... and the meanings of the words are there next to it."
Kuwabara blinked at him blankly for a few seconds and then understanding touched him.
"Oh... you mean the dictionary..."
"Hn."
"Yah, there are... none of them even have the word 'quintessence' in them..."
Hiei nodded at the computer screen.
"What about in there?"
Kuwabara turned to look at the computer, frowning.
"I don't know... I'll look..."
The tall young man quickly typed in 'deffinition quintessence' and hit the button labeled 'ENTER'.
After a moment, a new page of text appeared and after a breif inspection, Hiei watched as Kuwabara moved the little plastic thing that was attatched to the box (which he was fairly certain was called a 'mouse'), and selected one of the results. Almost instantly, they were met with a large section of text that instantly told them what they had wanted to know, Kuwabara reading the information in a hushed whisper for Hiei's benifit, knowing that the fire-demon couldn't read it for himself.
"... Quintessence: 1). the purest and most concentrated essence of something... 2). the most typical example or representitive of a type... 3). An extract for anything containing its rarest virtue, or most subtile and essential consituant in a small quantity; pure concentrated essence... This is all the same kinda' stuff I found everywhere else..." he paused and frowned, scrolling down further, the frown deepening the thought-lines in his honest face. "Wait a second... there's more here... 4). (archaic) the fifth and highest element after air, earth, fire and water. Beleived to be the substance composing all heavenly bodies... The fifth or last and highest essence or power in a natural body... The Greeks recongnised the four elements, earth, air, fire and water... The Pythagorians added a fifth element and called it 'nether'. They claimed that it flew upward at creation and out of it the stars were formed... It was beleived that 'nether' the fifth element, bonded all of the other four elements together, maintaining balance between them thoughout the cosmos, existing as a perfect balance in itself... Other cultures reffered to the fifth element as Spirit, which forms the basis, or central-core of the Quintessence that binds the other four elements together..."
The two stared at it for a moment and then slowly turned to meet one another's gazes.
"Urameshi..."
The Bone-Devil had been talking about Yusuke...
Hiei nodded and then got to his feet.
"Just wait a minute... I'll print it out..." The tall warrior mumbled and hitting a button, a little machine several feet away began to hum and immit high-pitched whining noises, before ejecting a peice of white paper bearing the same text they'd just seen on the computer.
Hiei watched with a mild degree of intrest, admitting silently that the boxes did seem to have some degree of usefullness.
Quickly, Kuwabara went to the librarian and payed her for the print-out as she glared at him irritably. Too distracted to really care, he left quickly with Hiei at his side, moving down the street at a quick walk.
"This is weird, Hiei," Kuwabara said within the silence of his friend's mind. "I mean... Urameshi's strong... and he bonded with all of the Stones... but how'd that thing know who he was?"
"It's possible that it senced Urameshi's abilities... But I find it unlikely, since it claimed to have been sent by it's 'Master' and asked which one of us was the quintessence," he said with a depening frown. "And knowing what we do now, I find it unlikely that Karyuu was unaware of what it meant."
Kuwabara frowned at him.
"You think she was lieing?"
"Hn."
"That doesn't seem like Karyuu..." The tall man said almost defencively. "I don't think she'd do that... not if she'd thought Urameshi was gonna' get hurt..."
"You're certain of that, are you?"
Kuwabara hesitated.
Normally he would've said yes, but what they'd just found out... It did make it seem as if the opal-eyed woman had been holding back... and he couldn't figure out why...
"Hn... At least you aren't quite that foolish," the demon said with an odd note of something that sounded almost like aproval.
"So what'd we do?" Kuwabara asked after a moment, his hand tightening on the folded peice of paper in his pocket. "Do we talk to Urameshi... or... do we just tell Kurama and see what he thinks first?"
Hiei considered it.
"We tell the Kitsune, but not Urameshi... assuming Karyuu has a good reason for keeping what she knows to herself, then we should refrain from bringing it into the open before we know what's going on..." The smaller man paused and Kuwabara came to a halt beside him, ignoring the quizical looks aimed at the two from passers-by. "Give me the paper. I'll take them to the Kitsune."
The orange-haired young man obeyed, handing over the information, watching as the ruby-eyed demon slipped it into an unseen pocket within his cloak before looking up at him, his normally expressionless face betraying a hint of worry for their leader and the danger he might be in.
"Get back to the Temple quickly."
And then he blinked away, leaving Kuwabara to run the rest of the way to the bus station to catch a ride to the Temple... And hopefuly the answers they needed would be waiting there for them...

** Author's Note ** Yay! Another reveiwer!

Thank you for the support, constantdreamer! About my spelling... I know it stinks, but the program I'm using to write this fic is ancient, and dosen't have a spell-check on it, so it's up to my deeply deffective vocabulary for corrections, so please, be paitent... squint, and the words look better... >-<

Anyway, much thankies to constantdreamer for the reveiw, and to everybody else who read!