Yu Yu Hakusho Fan Fiction ❯ The Battle Lord Chronicles: Of Truths and Lies ❯ Of Telepathy, Bait, and Kuro ( Chapter 16 )

Disclaimer: I do not own Yu Yu Hakusho. Kiara is owned by Yusuke'sSister.

 

Claimer: I do own the plot line, the Kuro Tournament, Kristy, Jason, Jessica, Chris, Bashere, and Rhurac.

 

(1) - Reikai Tentai means Spirit Detectives

(2) - Kuro means black (so it's the Black Tournament)

 

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Of Truth & Lies

 

Chapter 16
Telepathy, Bait, and Kuro

 

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(Back in the arcade)(Kristy's POV)

 

About five minutes after Yusuke, Kuwabara, and Kiara leave, Chris and I find ourselves hopelessly bored. Chris groans and lets his head rest tiredly on his arms while I lean back in my seat with my arms crossed and stare blankly ahead. We continue to stay like this until I suddenly start to grin.

 

"Hey!" I exclaim. "Guess what Chris! Guess what!"

 

Chris' head jerks upward and he blinks for a moment before giving me strange look. "...what?" he finally says.

 

"I'm bored!"

 

Chris head falls forward again and smacks the table as a shocked expression covers his face. Bringing his head up again, Chris glares at me and an anime vein starts to throb on the side of his head.

 

"That's what you wanted to tell me!" he seethes. "Can you not tell that I'm bored out of my mind as well?"

 

I simply shrug with a grin still in place. "Whatever," I reply. "Let's just get out of here; I don't think that Yus and the others are coming back."

 

Chris nods in agreement, his anger already forgotten.

 

And so the two of us quickly walk out the arcade and begin strolling down the sidewalk in God-knows what direction. We walk for several minutes, when we suddenly reach a small park that we had never seen before. It was one of those children's ones, but had a few dense trees.

 

Chris and I stop in front of it and exchange glances before we both shrug and continue forward; it's not like we have anything better to do. We walk through the trees through the other side when I suddenly freeze in place with wide eyes. I could feel an demonic energy close by, but the thing was that I recognized it!

 

It was Rhurac's!

 

I look over at Chris and see that he can feel it as well. We share confused and wondering looks for a moment before we both nod again and take off in the direction of the energy. It takes us several minutes before we finally reach the entryway to an alleyway, but there is no doubt about it; Rhurac is somewhere in there.

 

We cautiously stalk inside and out of the light. With my enhanced vision however, I can see that this is part of a connection of back alleyways and that it goes several hundred meters along before it turns its first corner...And Rhurac is around that corner.

 

/He's around the corner/ I telepathically say to Chris, deciding to test out my new power.

 

Chris jumps slightly and he wildly searches around the alley until his wide eyes finally rests on me. "K-kristy!" he asks.

 

/Yeah?/ I reply, making him jump again.

 

"How can you do that?" Chris asks, amazed.

 

"Well," I answer. "As you know, I am part psychic demon as is my brother, so he has been teaching me how to speak telepathically. It can really come in handy sometimes.

 

Chris raggedly shakes his head. "Not that!" he says. "I knew that Jason was going to teach train your psychic and telepathic powers, but how did you get past my defenses? I didn't even sense you get into my mind!"

 

I stare at Chris confusedly. "Defenses?"

 

"...Yeah, defenses. Hasn't Jason taught you that yet?"

 

I shake my head still confused. "No," I tell him. "He only just started my training yesterday."

 

A look of wonder spreads across Chris' face. "Then how were you able to get past my mind's defenses? I have very strong mental shields that I've been building up for years! And even if a very powerful psychic tried to enter my mind, let alone a beginner like you!"

 

A frown settles on my face and my brow furrows. Chris was right, how was I able to get into his mind like that if he had these so-called "defenses" around his mind. I shrug it off uneasily, deciding that I would have to ask Jason later.

 

/Well anyways/ I say telepathically to Chris, reopening a mind-link directly through his memories to his thoughts with ease that I was now conscious of. /There is a corner just ahead and Rhurac just down it/

 

Chris nods silently, though I can still feel some of his amazement drift from his mind. /Yes/ he replies. /And I suppose we should start to get a little serious about this, eh?/

 

He turns his head to me and I can clearly see a grin on it.

 

/Exactly my thoughts/ I reply with a smirk.

 

Shutting the mind-link and closing my eyes, I begin to focus my energy. I soon feel that familiar warmth envelop me and reopen my eyes to find myself in my demon form and Chris in his beside me. We share another grin and continue down the alleyway.

 

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(Kiara's POV)

 

I stay frozen on the ground still in a daze, my mind too shocked at what just occurred to answer my body.

 

Botan, Kuwabara, my brother, and I had just been standing there talking when this huge green-skinned demon came dropping down form nowhere and snatched Botan up. We had tried to warn her, but he was to fast and had Botan out before we had a chance to do anything.

 

Catching the two Spirit Detectives (Yusuke and Kuwabara) completely off-guard, the demon then swiped at them, knocking the two back and rendering them unconscious. I had been slightly hit as well, but only enough to leave me dazed.

 

Shakily, I stand up and stumble over to Yusuke and Kuwabara to feel their pulses. After a moment I let out a sigh of relief; they're fine, but will probably be out for while.

 

Worriedly, I stare in the direction that the demon that had taken Botan had gone. What happened to her? Is she all right? After a moment of debating internally, I stand up again begin to cross the street to the alleyway that the demon had entered. I cannot allow anything to happen to Botan.

 

I follow the alleyway in a few yards until I see a corner up ahead. I feel out with spiritual senses and immediately freeze up as I realize that there is not just one, but three demonic signatures around the corner.

 

Realization dawns on me.

 

These must be three of the five demons that the Reikai Tentai(1) have been searching for! I bite lip and stare at the corner nervously. What am I going to do!

 

Slowly I edge down the alleyway and take a peek around the corner. I just barely hold back a gasp.

 

An unconscious Botan is leaning against a wall with the demon that kidnapped her standing next to her. The other two demons have their backs to me, but I can easily tell that they are glaring at the green-skinned demon.

 

"So now you've reduced yourself to picking on innocent humans, Rhurac?" growls the first of the two new demons in a female voice. She is obviously an ookami youkai, with long sleek sliver hair and silky wolf ears and tail that are silver with black tips. She certainly is majestic looking.

 

"Of course not," says the green-skinned demon, who I now know is called Rhurac. "I just needed some bait to draw you out."

 

"Bait!" spits out the second of the new demons. He has spiky ice blue hair and I can tell that he is pretty strong from the visible muscles beneath his shirt. He also has a cool aura around him, allowing me to identify him as an ice youkai.

 

I can't help but to stare wide-eyed as I watch this exchange. This proves that this Rhurac is an enemy of these two demons, but what about the other two unidentified demons that we've been looking for? And do the ookami youkai and the ice youkai really mean no harm?

 

This also puts forward another question. Rhurac had said that he was just using Botan as bait, which would mean that he didn't know that Yusuke and Kuwabara are the Spirit Detectives. So is it all really just a coincidence that Botan was kidnapped?

 

I start to feel a headache coming on as all of these thoughts fly around my head. This is turning out to be very strange.

 

"Well you've drawn us out," the ookami youkai suddenly says, bringing me out of my thoughts. "Now prepare to suffer the consequences!"

 

She immediately lunges forward, a ball of fire appearing in her hand.

 

"Ah ah ah," says Rhurac with a grin as he jumps back and out of the way, leaving Botan where she is against the wall. "I'm not here for a fight."

 

"Then what the hell do you want?" the ice youkai growls out, a spear of ice - which I just noticed - resting in his hands in a menacing way.

 

Rhurac tosses something at the two, which the ookami youkai instinctively catches. From where I am I can just barely make out that it is an small envelope.

 

"What's this?" the ookami youkai asks, looking back up to Rhurac.

 

Rhurac continues to grin insanely. "You've been wanting to meet my master, yes?" he asks. Both the ookami and ice youkai narrow their eyes at the green-skinned demon. "Well, he believes that the time may have come."

 

With that Rhurac throws back his head and begins to cackle loudly as a cloud of green-tinted smoke surrounds him. When the smoke finally dissipates, he is gone and I can no longer feel his energy signal.

 

The ookami youkai begins to jump forward after him, but her companion holds her back, shaking his head gently when she looked at him questioningly.

 

"Well," the ice youkai says, looking over at Botan. "What are we going to do about her?"

 

The ookami youkai lets out a sigh. "There isn't really anything we can do except pray that when she wakes up she'll think this was all a dream or something."

 

The ice youkai nods in agreement. "Then lets get going," he says, looking at the envelope apprehensively. "We need to find out what's in that."

 

And with that the two demons begin to run down the alleyway and out of site.

 

I turn my attention to Botan and begin to approach her, only to jump back slightly when she shifts and looks up at me.

 

"You've been awake!" I cry out.

 

She just nods and glances down the way that the two demons had gone. "Well that was certainly...interesting..." she says.

 

I nod in agreement.

 

"Botan! Kiara!" a voice suddenly calls from behind me (in the direction that she had come from).

 

I whip around, taking up a defensive position, but relax when I see that it is just Yusuke and Kuwabara.

 

"Don't worry!" Kuwabara calls out heroically when he sees us. "I'll save thee fair ladies!"

 

Yusuke, Botan, and I just ignore him.

 

"What happened?" Yusuke asks. "Where's the demon?"

 

I open my mouth to tell him about what happened, but Botan quickly cuts me off. "Kiara saved me," she says. "But the demon got away."

 

I blink slightly in surprise, but just nod in agreement to my brother, deciding to just go along with Botan's story.

 

"Well we better go and tell Koenma what happened," Yusuke says and starts back down the alleyway.

 

Botan and I silently follow him and Kuwabara. I wait until we Yusuke and Kuwabara are caught up in another of their stupid arguments before I lean over towards Botan and whisper, "Why did you do that?"

 

Botan blinks at me. "Do what?"

 

"Lie to them!"

 

Botan shrugs lightly. "I'm not entirely sure," she answers. "Something is just telling me that we shouldn't tell them; not yet."

 

I give Botan a strange look and then just shrug it off. My thoughts are still on the two demons though. I'm not sure why, but something about them seems almost...familiar...but I'm sure that it's just my imagination.

 

...Right?

 

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(Kristy's POV)

 

"So this is the envelope he gave?" asks Jason, looking down at said envelope. Chris and I had just finished telling him and Jessica about our encounter with Rhurac.

 

Chris nods while I say, "Well, open it!" enthusiastically.

 

Jason brings it up to his nose, sniffing it slightly. "Well it seems okay," he says hesitantly before he slowly begins to open the envelope. Out of it falls a folded piece of paper.

 

"It's an invitation," Jessica says, looking over Jason's shoulder.

 

Jason nods absently, his eyes scanning over the contents of the letter.

 

"Well?" I ask impatiently.

 

"Bashere is inviting us to..." Jason begins slowly.

 

Chris, Jessica, and I wait expectantly for him to finish, but he just trails off as his eyes widen in shock.

 

"Well?" I repeat, even more eager now to find out exactly what had shocked my brother so badly.

 

"...To the Kuro(3) Tournament..."

 

"Huh?"

 

Jason turns his still-shocked gaze up from the letter to our three confused faces and sighs. "Kristy, you know about the Dark Tournament that I've told you about?"

 

I nod in response, still confused.

 

"And Chris, your father has told you, correct?"

 

Another nod and Jessica quickly says when Jason's gazed turns to her, "He told me as well."

 

Jason nods in satisfaction and then continues his explanation, "Well, the Kuro Tournament is nearly the exactly same thing as the Dark Tournament, and not just in name. You see, it too is basically a death tournament, only much worse.

 

"Where as nearly anyone can compete in the Dark Tournament, the Kuro Tournament is invitation only, and believe me, only the very most powerful demons are invited.

 

"The Kuro Tournament however, was banned from the Makai several thousand years ago because having so many powerful demons together, battling, in one place could upset the balance of the three worlds. So in the end I really don't understand how there could be another one.

 

"However, from what I can understand of this invitation, Bashere is the one sponsoring the tournament. That would really explain it all, eventhough I'm sure that that makes this tournament illegal. And that of course means that if we attend, we'll have to watch out for Reikai police, spies, and/or detectives."

 

Shocked silence seems to echo around the room.

 

"...So are we going?"

 

"Kristy!" Jessica scolds, slapping my arm. "Jason just finished telling us how dangerous and illegal this tournament is and all you want to know is if you're going to get to fight!"

 

"...Basically..."

 

SMACK

 

"...Owie..."