Epilogue

P)P)P)P)

Kurama and Hiei

The shifting light of the sickle moon shone down on a rather modest dwelling, similar in all ways excluding one to a human peasant’s dwelling. A demoness dwelled within.

Specifically, it was the female badger demon known as Melogale, mate of one of Kurama’s ill-fated kidnappers.

A silvery fox crept to the door, soundless as a falling feather. The vulpine demon dipped its head for a moment, depositing something on the dirt before the doorway.

With a flash of shimmering fur, the small demon dashed away from the building, heading back for the forest. At the edge of the tree line the fox stopped, crouching at the base of a particularly large conifer. Tamping down its hind legs, the fox spirit sprung upward into the tree’s foliage. Bouncing from one tree limb to another, the fox made its way further up the tree.

Curiously enough, the tree seemed to bend and shift its limbs to within easy reach of the fox, so where otherwise this would have been difficult, as canines, through a series of biological mishaps, can’t climb trees very high, currently the fox zipped up the plant like it was running along the ground.

With a final leap, small claws scrabbling for purchase, it finally seemed to have found the height it preferred. Circling the chosen spot on the thick limb three times, the fox settled down on its haunches, glittering tails wrapped about itself. Kurama had found himself enjoying this extra time spent in the makai, as it offered more opportunities to spend in his fox form. After more than a decade without using it at all, the kitsune found that he had grown fond of spending some time as a fox.

A pair of large red eyes from the branch just above the fox watched the process, thin eyebrows almost disappearing into a shock of gravity defying hair, A gift, fox? The fire demon’s voice curious, but not inviting lengthy explanations.

The fire demon was reclining on the wide branch, seemingly nonchalant unless one noted that the small demon was carefully angled so his abdomen never touched the rough tree bark. Hiei’s stomach was completely healed from his earlier injury, save for a long pink scar that ran from his naval to halfway about his hip. It was still a bit tender, but was far from the searing agony that he had experienced before.

Yukina had been shocked when he showed it to her, gruffly asking her to heal it. The Ice Maiden, between gentle scoldings, had mentioned that she was surprised Hiei hadn’t bled to death. Hiei had said nothing, allowing Yukina to fuss over him. He also told Yukina not to tell Kurama about his injury, if she insisted on telling anyone. No need to cloud the fox’s fluffy head with ideas of his inadequacy, he’d muttered. Yukina had agreed, on the condition that Hiei be gentle with the wound for a few days.

Golden eyes flicked to his, then to the doorway below. No. Just something I had to do.

Roughly two hours later a figure came staggering up the path, pausing often to give voice to a deep rattling cough. She must have been laboring at the nearby keep of a minor demon lord, trying to support herself after her mate’s demise. The exertion had obviously not helped her illness.

As the demoness stepped through a patch of moonlight, the weak light was enough for the two watching youkai to notice that she must have been quite pretty before illness sapped away her strength. Surprisingly human looking, save a thin coat of brown fur across her body, the demoness shared all the characteristics that humans found attractive, as well as the thick, bushy tail that appealed to her kind. Illness had shed most of her fur and drained her body of excess fat, leaving her as thin as a wraith, but she was still fairly attractive, enough to have snared another mate, should she have wished for another.

Clutching one paw to her chest, Melogale, for it was indeed she, bent down to retrieve the small package laid out before her door, curiously opening the box with the soft snap of oiled hinges. For several minutes the demoness stood stock-still, examining the box’s contents in silence. Then, with a broken sob, the badger demon collapsed to her knees, cradling the box to her chest and whispering prayers of thanks to her mate and any Kami who was listening.

Red eyes, skillfully concealing curiosity, shifted to peer down at the transformed demon. Satisfied, fox?

Those stunning golden eyes swiveled to the side to return Hiei’s look. Yes, Hiei, the kitsune said, satisfaction strongly marking the edges of the thought, I am. Now I’m ready to go home.

P)P)P)P)

Takara, Botan, and Yusuke

“So… Let me get this straight…. You like this?” Yusuke asked incredulously. He was already a bit off balance because off another of Keiko’s patented scolding sessions for being late for his date; now he had to deal with the nutcase.

Yusuke and Botan had been a bit leery of replacing Takara in her body. For one thing, it was a mess. It looked like it had been through a meat grinder. Large red welts streaked down her face, one eye was permanently blinded, and her hand had been amputated. There was also the fact that, to put it bluntly, Takara had gone half-mad from her soul’s prolonged separation from her body.

After exhaustive hours spent coaxing Takara’s unwilling soul from the attic and replacing it in her body, it turned out the psychic preferred her body that way. She could now, as she put it, “focus her powers without the added distraction of the flesh.” Whatever that meant. She did, however, permit the draping sleeves of her grandmother’s dress to conceal her hand.

She had also refused to have her gown sewn up, among other things, one of which was that she would have her eye replaced. When Yusuke cautiously asked her what her eye would be replaced with, she stared at him like he was simple. “A demon’s eyes, of course,” she said slowly, like one would when talking to small children.

“I’m going to open a shop in Kyoto,” the child said in the strange tone that psychics and psychotics shared, as if they were talking to someone you couldn’t see. But Yusuke could see ghosts, and there were none to see in the room. Botan later told Yusuke that Takara’s shop would be monitored by Koenma for years to come. Just in case, she said.

Bowing deeply to Yusuke, the psychic left with Botan, presumably off to Kyoto.

That girl’s going to burn down Kyoto, he thought resignedly. Oh well. Who was he to deny someone a chance at a second life?

Whistling to himself, Yusuke headed back to Ningenkai to waste some money in the arcade.

P)P)P)P)

No, I’m not telling what was in Melogale’s box. I’ll leave it open to interpretation.

I’ll probably do a few one-shots to describe a few things I wasn’t too clear on while writing this, but other than that, this is The End (not counting the sequel, of course, which be equally, if not even more, long and angsty).

To my readers/reviewers: Thank you for any reviews you may have submitted! The reviews really helped keep me motivated during the writing process. I’ll probably start posting the sequel to this in a month or two, after I post a bit in my other stories and muscle a coherent storyline.for the sequel from my head. See you in a month!

If you’re curious about Kuwabara: Don’t be. He spent the week and a half this story lasted bothering his sister and loafing around Genkai’s (to see Yukina, obviously).

Thoughts on ending FWIS- feel free to skip this I must say, it is very odd writing the end. I clearly recall sitting down for two-hour increments while writing this. This creates an odd mixture of feelings. On one hand, I’m very glad that this section of the storyline is finally off my chest (I’ve been making it up since I first saw Yuyu Hakusho about two and a half years ago), and at the same time I’m understandably nostalgic. If I could go back and change anything, I’d probably try to update more often, if anything. And possibly have more Hiei scenes.