{O-o How'd it go? I'm terrible at testing myself, so I never do as good as I could.... And poo! My bigger brother accidentally closed out of the internet while I was posting! I wanna EAT HIM ALIVE!!!}

"I'm at the arcade near the school- the one near the grocery store." Yusuke answered, raising an eyebrow. He didn't pick up on the crack in Aleron's voice, but he was still suspicious. She was just like him, and if someone was in his debt he'd milk it for all it was worth. Babysitting a dog and a helpless fish demon was not milking it for all it was worth. Normally he'd have counted his blessings and not thought much of it, but in this case the detective found himself anxious. "Alright, you either have Yue waiting to drink me dry or some other prank at your house, or you've decided to be nice.... In which case something's wrong!" He finally said accusingly, heading outside the arcade so he'd be easier for her to find, "So spill the beans! What's going on?!"

Yue was not entirely convinced that Aleron was really alright, but she wasn't about to argue with her friend either; she didn't know much about human nature, so it was very plausible that her worries were unnecessary. It was far more likely that she should worry about herself and being left alone for a prolonged period of time than her friend ever being in danger. So she tried to force such anxiety out of her mind.... But it still lingered for some reason.

{Blah... Baby post- I couldn't remember what I posted earlier....}

((O.o I'd kill my brother if he did that... And it's okay. Baby posts are cool too ^^))

Aleron actually growled into the phone. "Sod off," she grumbled. "It's my own damn life. Now count your blessings that I'm not making you do something worse for me. See you in a few."

She hung up, sitting down and writing the letter quickly. She tucked that in the duffel bag before she slung the bag over her shoulder, picking up her house keys, which were attached to the keys of the motorcycle she owned. She jumped down half the stairs and went over to the front door.

"Yusuke will be coming by, so don't eat him or anything," she said to Yue and Loki both. "I'll be back in a couple days, no worries. Feel free to anything in the house while I'm gone."

With that she left, jogging outside and swinging herself onto her motorcycle without a helmet. She revved the engine before speeding off, winding in and out of traffic.

It only took her a few minutes to get to the arcade, and then she pulled over to the side, letting the bike idle while she scanned the crowd for Yusuke.

"Eat... Yusuke?" Yue blinked as she watched Aleron drive off; still a bit worried overall but doing her best not to let it show for Loki's sake. "Why in the world would I want to do that?" She looked at the dog- he might have tried a bite of her once, but he didn't seem like much of a carnivore all in all either.... "Is that what humans think all demons do? What a funny concept that was! "They have such vivid imaginations.... And they say demons are barbaric!"
She closed the door gently and sat down at the table, her ears drooping a bit; she couldn't shake off the sinking feeling in her stomach- like something was wrong...

Yusuke blinked when Aleron hung up on him... Now he wasn't sure whether something was seriously wrong or she was just messing with him.... But something told him it was the first concept. He was starting to get worried as he kept an eye out for her.
Eventually he saw her motorcycle pull up to the curve... She didn't look like a nervous wreck or anything... But still.... He jogged over to meet her and held out his hand. "So I'm just supposed to keep an eye on the house pretty much, right?" He decided not to press her for questions, something told him she wasn't in the mood and he didn't wanna piss her off in public. "As long as you don't expect me to do any cleaning we're good."

"No, no cleaning. Just keep Yue and Loki company for me, would you? You can drag in Kurama and Hiei and whoever else you want, I don't care." For a brief moment, desperation showed in her eyes. "Just keep everything together until I get back, okay?"

Aleron didn't hold out the keys yet. She still needed to get to the airport, another half-hour away, and then she'd let Yusuke drive the bike back to her house. She'd shown him on the map once or twice before, and if he got lost he could call her.

For a moment while she waited for the reply, Aleron almost thought she'd crack. Too much to keep track of; too many people to worry about. This was why her father always told her to stay aloof from people, except for a very rare few. She was supposed to be a bounty hunter, dammit, not a social butterfly. The fact that she had so many new peopl to think about and worry over pissed her off... and yet, it made her happy too.

((Aaaaand short post. Oh well, next one will be longer))

{Don't worry, my posts aren't exactly Mark Twainish either! XD}

Yusuke had been about to make another sarcastic comment, but something stopped him, and instead he swallowed his words just nodded his acceptance to Aleron's request. Watching over Yue and the dog wouldn't be so bad- he could always push it off on Kuwabara or Kurama if he really wanted to, but somehow he felt like the situation was off. "Are you... Sure you're okay?" He finally asked, a tinge of concern actually making it through the waves of sarcasm that naturally filled his voice. She was acting weird- even he was picking up on it, and he was generally oblivious to such things.

Shit! She wasn't doing her job well enough! If even Yusuke could tell...

"Of course," Aleron said, forcing her normal confidence back into her voice. "Just have to go bail my father out. Something about wine and a one-legged Greek prostitute. No biggie. Now get on the bike. I have to get to the airport, and there's no way I'm leaving my baby there the whole time I'm gone."

Hopefully he wouldn't put up too much of a fight. Soon as he got on though, she would go. The sooner she got to Greece, the better.

Yusuke looked about ready to argue, but he decided not to ask questions. Maybe he was imagining it.... And what the hell did he care what Aleron did with herself? It wasn't his business anyways! He forced his concerns out of his mind as he gave in and climbed obediently on the back of her bike- he had better things to do than be worried. This was nothing.

They took off for the airport at high speed, and the wind roaring in his ears served to block out any further thoughts.

Aleron parked at the curb in front of the international section of the airport. She didn't have a ticket yet, but she wasn't worried. She could buy one inside. Preferably for a plane that left within the next two hours.

"Keys are in the ignition," she told Yusuke as she climbed off the bike, being careful not to hit him. "Call me if you get lost or have any problems or anything. See you later."

She hesitated for a moment, just looking at him sitting on her bike. She would never have expected this to be the last time she saw the annoying detective, but... life happened. She touched his shoulder briefly before she turned and fled into the airport, her duffel bag bumping against her hip as she disappeared into the crowd.

By this point, even Kurama had a bad feeling. He paused in his schoolwork to pick up his phone. He'd gotten Aleron's number, and since Yue didn't have a phone calling Aleron's house was usually a good way to get hold of one of the two of them.

He dialed after another moment of thought. These feelings didn't just come because they felt like it. There was a reason for them, and he wasn't going to ignore a feeling and a potential warning because he thought it foolish. He could always call, talk to one of them, and as soon as he knew everything was fine he would go back to his studies. Perfectly acceptable.

Yusuke stared after Aleron as she left, jaw half opened and his eyes highly confused... Something really did not feel right about this. "It's almost like-" He started the bike, glaring at the vehicle as he did so, "-she doesn't plan on coming back...." He sat there for a long moment, wondering why such a concept bothered him at all. Then he shook his head- the idea was ridiculous! why in the world would she run off to Greece to never come back? The detective didn't care how interesting people claimed the Greeks were, no one just went there and never came home! He revved up the bike and drove off, convinced his line of work was making him paranoid.

-------

Yue had tried to push her worry out of her head, but being alone with nothing much to distract her had left her with a lot of time to think... And thus those things she kept trying to push away kept coming back again and again. She scratched Loki's ears anxiously, wondering how long Aleron would be gone and if things would really be so easy as she claimed. "She acted so strange before she left..." Her ears drooped- the more she thought about it the more she was sure that something was wrong and it wasn't her imagination, and the very thought of there being something wrong and not knowing what it was or how to help was frustrating her more and more.
Yue stood up, intent on finding something to do- otherwise she'd stress herself to tears for sure. Then the phone went off, and she jumped so badly that the chair she'd been sitting in went skidding across the room. She took a deep breath and berated herself inwardly- no matter how many times Aleron explained to her how phones worked she still got startled every time one went off... She'd gotten better though- the first time it'd happened she'd accidentally broken a window.
She looked at the name on the phone to see who was calling, picking it up rather quickly when she comprehended who it was, and pushing the button like she'd seen Aleron do to answer. ...Hello....? She wasn't sure if she'd done it right.

"Yue," Kurama said, a little surprised. He'd never heard Yue answer the phone before. She sounded uncertain. "Is everything alright?" He didn't quite want to explain that he had a bad feeling, not just yet.

A text distracted him momentarily, and he glanced at it swiftly while still listening for Yue on the other line. It was from Kuwabara.

Hey man, everything okay with you? Shizuru's got this bad vibe, and I do too. The text was short and to the point, but Kurama smiled a little and typed a quick reply.

I'm fine. I'm checking with Aleron and Yue. Text Yusuke for me please.

And, because he was Kurama and the fox was used to multitasking, he never even lost place in the conversation.

Yue nearly dropped the phone when she heard Kurama on the other end, and was rather proud of herself that she didn't; she'd seen Aleron talk on one before, but in all honesty she thought the girl had been talking to herself for the longest time. It seemed such a strange concept to talk to someone without seeing their face... Human technology.... She simply couldn't wrap her brain around any of their logic.
"Well...." She considered lying about it; really she didn't have any proof that something was out of place other than a bad feeling and too much time sitting alone thinking, but Yue knew she was a terrible liar- even if she wasn't face to face she knew that Kurama of all people would see right through her if she tried.
"... I think so...." She admitted after a moment, plopping back down in the chair sadly, "Aleron had to fly away to a far away place... And she doesn't have wings so I can't fathom how she'd ever get to Greece anyways... she told me that she was just going to help her father.... But...." Oh dang, she said she wasn't going to stress herself to tears! Yue wiped them away furiously, but her voice still shook a bit. "...I feel like something very very bad is going to happen to her...."

Yusuke pulled over on the side of the road when he felt his phone buzzing in his pocket. He flipped his phone open to a text from Kuwabara: "Yo Urameshi! Did you get into some detective crap without me? Because there's some baaaad vibes in the air, man."
The detective's eyes narrowed. "I guess I'm not the only one feeling off." That was bad- if it was just him he could brush it off as nothing, but Kuwabara was always sensitive to that negative energy sort of crap- if he was feeling it too then something was definitely wrong.
"Tell everyone to meet me at Aleron's house-" He furiously texted back, "- we'll talk there."
Then he snapped his phone off and took off again- this time even faster than he had before.

Kurama's eyes narrowed. "You say she had to go to Greece?" That could be the bad feeling he'd gotten. A text from Kuwabara confirmed that. They were all going to meet at Aleron's house.

"Well, try not to worry, alright?" He could hear the worry in the other demon's voice, and he didn't want her to stress out too much before they even knew anything. "Yusuke and Kuwabara are going to meet me over there. I'll be there soon."

He grabbed his shoes, putting his work aside for the moment. This was not normal, and it worried him. He suspected that Aleron would be fine on her own, but... Just in case...

As soon as he said his good-byes to Yue, Kurama gave his mother a quick excuse and started for Aleron's house. He didn't have a car, so he just ran the entire way.

By the time he got there, Kuwabara and Shizuru were just arriving as well. "What's going on?" Kuwabara demanded. "It feels all weird here." He frowned, unusually serious.

"I believe our friend may have gotten herself into some trouble." Kurama didn't elaborate, just knocked on the door quietly, so as not to startle Yue any more. He had the feeling the poor demon was already half out of her mind.

Yusuke pulled into the drive on Aleron's bike just as the others arrived; had the situation not been as it was, he would have made some comment about how much more style he had than they did, as it was he simply jumped off the bike and grabbed the keys, dashing over to the others at the door with a grave face. The fact that everyone looked so grim didn't exactly help him with that idea of 'nothing's wrong' that he was still trying to nurture. He heaved an exasperated sigh- being so frustrated over something he didn't know made it all the more frustrating.

Yue was relieved that Loki didn't bark when a knock came from the door; she was so jumpy at this point that she'd probably have done much more than break a window if he had. Since he didn't bark though she knew it was the others- he wouldn't have let anyone they didn't know get close to the door without warning. So she shook her head and wiped her eyes again, determined not to look even more silly than she already felt as she opened the door. Seeing the others helped a bit- although Yue wasn't sure what any of them could do, having them around to help figure out what was wrong would probably go better than her continuing to stressing herself over the edge of madness.

Kurama waited for Yusuke to open the door before he went inside, going to go find Yue. He spotted her and frowned a little. She did not look happy. In fact, she looked very stressed. Not that he could blame her, of course.

"Yue? What happened?" He walked over to her, keeping one eye on Loki. The big dog got up and immediately trotted over to Yusuke with a low whine. Kurama felt a brief moment of pity for the dog before he focused on Yue. "Are you alright?" He noticed she looked very upset, stressed.

Yue took a deep breath, absolutely determined not to cry. "I'm okay." She lied after a moment of controlling herself, twitching her tail irritatedly and drooping her ears a bit. She decided to explain what happened so as to divert attention from herself. "Aleron went out to get that paper that comes every day but sunday in the box outside-" She'd forgotten the word 'mail' with how worked up she was, "-And then.... She just started acting strange when she read one of them.... Then she said that she was going to Greece to help out her father.... And just left.... But...." Dang it, she was not going to cry- how many times did she have to tell herself that?! "But it really felt like.... She didn't plan on coming back...."

Yusuke had gone inside after Kurama and made himself at home in one of the seats at the table Yue sat at. After he'd told her story he knew that his idea of 'nothing's wrong' was definitely thrown out the window. Yue was as sensitive to the negative vibes as Kuwabara was- if not more so. She might not have known much about humans, but if she was so thoroughly convinced that something was wrong she was probably right.
"She dragged me to the airport with her-" He added after a moment,"Asked me to watch her dog and.... Yue-" He decided with how worked up she was it was probably better not to call her 'fishy' or 'fish girl' like he normally did, "-Before running off, but she was definitely acting weird...." He shrugged, "But girls always act weird so I tried not to think much of it..."

Kurama frowned. "That does not seem like a good sign," he said quietly. "Do you know if she still has the letter?"

Loki's ears perked up at the question and he took off up the stairs, surprisingly quiet for such a large animal. He returned a few moments later, galumphing back down the stairs with the pad of paper that Aleron had written the note to her father on. He set it in front of Kurama on the table, very carefully.

Kurama frowned as he looked at the notebook. He could see the indents where Aleron had written, so hurried that she'd almost pressed through the paper. He pulled out a pencil and started shading lightly. Soon words emerged from the page, and he leaned over to read quickly.

Father, the note started.

If you're reading this I'm right and you will need to make your way back to Japan. I saw Takeshi not even two weeks ago, so you should talk to him. There's also a demon living with us for the moment. Her name is Yue. Be nice to her; she's really nice. I'm sorry in advance, and don't do anything stupid. My job, remember? Love you.

Aleron

Kurama stopped after reading the note. It had been in English, so he had to translate it, which didn't take long. But the bad feeling tripled when he read the note.

"I think," he said quietly, "that Aleron is going to take a very great risk. And I don't think she expects to see us again."

{As much as I really really really don't want to, I gotta make this my last post before bed. TT^TT I have work tomorrow morning and it's already past midnight.... Orz....}

Yue's face went if possible even paler, and she couldn't stop a sniffle or two as she started wiping away tears again. "Humans are really terrible creatures." she finally stated, with very little emotion in her voice at all, "You'd never see a demon make anyone worry so much, and I've seen many that excel at torture." She wiped her eyes again, feeling silly for being so sensitive; it was so unlike any normal demon, and most humans for that matter- she'd yet to see a human that was straightforward with how they really felt. If she'd known how the teapot worked she'd have made herself something, but an acute fear of the stove kept her where she was.

Yusuke heaved an exasperated sigh, "Girls are such pains!" He pulled all the money he had out of his pocket and laid it on the table, "Seriously, how the heck does Aleron expect me to afford a flight one way- never mind back?!" Even if he raided his mother's savings that she kept in a jar he probably wouldn't get very far... Since she commonly raided it herself for beer.... But he wasn't about to sit there knowing a stupid girl was running into danger without doing anything about it. "We gotta go after her!" He said, petting Loki reassuringly, "It's as simple as that."

((Awww... Okay. Tomorrow then! ^_^))

"If we are going to Greece, I have more than enough money to cover air fare for all of us." Which was true. It would barely even put a dent in his savings if he got them all first-class tickets to Greece and back. But there was something else about this, something that made him hesitate. He didn't know why, but he got the feeling they wouldn't be welcome.

"Perhaps we should think this through," he said carefully, looking at the others. He had the feeling they would ignore him.

"What?! Kurama, Aleron's gone to do something stupid! Even stupider than Urameshi!" Kuwabara glared.

"I'm just saying that we don't know where she went, or why. Even if we do manage to get to Greece, we have no idea where to look for her. We need to find out more before we can go charging off to Greece." Kurama looked at them al evenly.

{Dang... I've no willpower.... last one....FOR SURE! >_<}

Yue coughed. Normally she'd probably brought up the fact that none of them had wings and she probably wouldn't be able to survive any cross-ocean flights, but she was really too distressed to do so. She was even too distressed to consider how money played a role in flying at all.
"Maybe Takeshi knows...." She said slowly. Aleron had said in the letter to her father to see him.... So maybe.... "He is usually at Genkai's when I go to visit...." It was night when she normally went to visit though, she didn't know if that would make a difference, but at this point she was willing to cling to any shred of hope if it took her mind off of the alternatives.

A year ago in a situation like this Yusuke would have reacted rashly and stormed off somewhere. Now took a deep breath. He hated waiting around and thinking before acting- even if it was generally the smarter thing to do, but Kurama was right- they needed answers if they really intended to help at all.... He'd come a long way since he'd first became a detective. "Let's head to the old hag's house then." He said, "It's better than sitting around here till hell freezes over."

{Alright, now I'm really headed to bed! Night Night!}

((Nighty night!))

Kurama nodded. "Perhaps there is a jacket that we can borrow from Aleron's closet for you to wear. So you will be less conspicuous," he said quietly to Yue. He would go look if he had to, but he rather preferred for Yue to look. She was going to be wearing it after all.

It really was a pity that Genkai didn't have a phone at her temple. That would make this much faster.

They could get to Genkai's temple fairly quickly if they had to. Which he suspected Yusuke would feel the need to. If he were honest with himself, he was worried about Aleron as well.

By that point, Aleron's flight was already in the air. She only had another couple hours to go before she would get to Greece, and then... And then she would say goodbye.

{Well, I accidentally woke up a couple hours too early for work.... Long story which involves me being clumsy XD

But now I can squeeze in a morning post!}

Yue had been starting to worry again, which was a terrible habit of hers when something was wrong and she didn't know what it was, so it took a moment for her to realize she was being spoken to. She blinked when Kurama's words registered, then she twitched her wings, realizing he was blatantly right about them being conspicuous. That, along with her tail, made her so conspicuous it made other conspicuous things look.... not conspicuous. "Aleron has a lot of clothes she doesn't do anything with." She finally said, with a small smile at the irony of that fact, "I already borrow them a lot..." She was starting to feel a little better, having the others around was a good thing- especially with the vibrant energy that Kuwabara and Yusuke gave off- they made it difficult to stay sad for too long..... But she was still worried.

Inside Aleron's room, Yue measured her energy to conceal her wings and tail... She didn't like taking on human form very much- to her it felt like she was hiding under a blanket- and it got really uncomfortable really quickly. As such she wasn't the best at it yet... And she never did figure out how to hide her ears yet.... Though with the odd shape that human ears were Yue imagined they couldn't hear very well anyways.
She picked out a lightweight sundress and the jacket that went with it- figuring if she messed up and her wings or tail started showing no one would notice unless they really looked; then she let her hair down instead of wearing it up like she normally did and put on a cute looking hat she'd never once seen Aleron wear. That hid her ears nicely; she looked in the mirror, making sure everything was in place.... Or not in place rather.... Before heading back downstairs.
"Human fashion is so very uncomfortable." Yue grumbled as she walked back into the room the others were in, fiddling with her hat. Human clothes were appealing to look at, but she was much more used to simplistic and loose fitting demonic clothes; at the very least though, fiddling with her outfit gave her something other to do than think about Aleron.... Who she was starting to hope got hit over the head with a really big rock.... or something.... for making her worry so much in the first place!

"Well I know I'd be a lot more comfortable if girls would move faster getting ready!" Yusuke said, already getting back some of his old vigor as he headed towards the door, "Let's go already!" Maybe going to Genkai's wouldn't be any help at all, but at the very least it was doing something, and that made the detective feel a lot better about the situation for some reason.

((Yay for morning posts ^^))

Kurama nodded his approval. She could blend in easily enough, which was good, and he led her out of the house. Loki immediately joined them, having gotten his leash from somewhere and going over to Yusuke, holding out the leash to him. The dog couldn't attach it, naturally, but he knew people got suspicious when a dog the size of a small pony started running around without a leash on.

Kurama had to smile a little at that. He really was an extraordinary animal, that one. Now if only he could speak and tell them what he knew, they might have a better chance.

------

Kurama and the others arrived at Genkai's temple a while later. It did take a while to get there, after all, even though Kurama had used every short cut he knew to get there. He'd taken the copy of the letter with them to show Takeshi. Hopefully Yusuke wouldn't say anything stupid and piss him off...

"Genkai! Have you seen Takeshi?" Kurama asked, as he was the first one up the stairs. Yusuke and Kuwabara were lagging behind a little, since they hated the stairs that led to the temple.

"Last I saw he was inside. Why?" Genkai's eyebrows shot up at the appearance of them all. She recognized Yue and her eyes narrowed a little. Well, that was one way to cover up in the human world. Probably Kurama's idea.

"Aleron's gone." Kurama fished out the letter from his pocket. "We need to see him."

Takeshi appeared a moment later, seemingly out of nowhere. "What do you mean, gone? Where?" he demanded, walking over to them swiftly. Kurama held out the note and he read it swiftly, his brow furrowing. "Oh Aleron..."

"What?" Kuwabara demanded, having gotten to the top of the stairs in time to see this.

"She's gone off to try to save her father. Foolish girl. She should know better." Takeshi paused. "Well, crap. She's going to try to do that and save him and not come back. I hate idiots who don't think these things through."

"What do you mean?" Kurama asked before anyone else could.

"There's a technique I taught her, a way to get rid of your enemies and ensure you can't be taken hostage." Takeshi looked directly at Kurama. "It binds your life force and your spirit energy, and you use the two together to create an explosion. If she did that at full power I estimate she'd take out quite a bit of land. Unfortunately she's probably already in Greece by now." He glanced at his watch. "And seeing as I don't know where in Greece she is, it would be like searching for a needle in a stack of needles. Greece is so old that the barrier between the demon world and the human is weaker there, and energy gathers there, like bees to honey. We'd never be able to find her in time."

((Sorry about the skip, but it seemed more productive to the plotline ^^; ))

{I was actually going to skip over to Genkai's place in this post if you didn't XD So it's all good!}

Genkai had invited the kids inside the moment she saw them; one look at that demon girl Yue's face essentially gave away that something was wrong. She was like an open book- horrible at lying and hiding emotions at all.... Which perhaps was not a bad thing in this situation, but it was certainly abnormal- she needed to learn a bit more self control for the sake of her own sanity.

As Kurama and Takeshi began going back and forth, Genkai served tea to the others; with how much tea she'd been pushing out recently it was a wonder she hadn't run out yet. "Sounds like that girl is as dimwitted as this kid-" she finally stated, gesturing towards Yusuke, "Which means being stupid just comes so naturally she probably doesn't comprehend how stupid she's being." She then walked over to Yue, blatantly ignoring Yusuke's exasperated retorts as she held out a cup of tea for her.

"And you're no better fish girl." She said as she did so, "You look like a nervous wreck- and for no good reason! You're an expert on energy, right?" Yue nodded in response. "Well then you'd know if your friend was in a lot of pain or dead right?"

"Well... I suppose.... But-"

"But nothing kid-" Genkai cut her off, not intending to let her point be argued, "You know more than any of us that as of this moment that dimwitted girl is in perfect health, so why don't you save panicking until you really have something to panic about?"

Yue managed a smile as she accepted her tea. Most humans were so very illogical that she questioned them at every turn, but Genkai was impossible to argue with. She might have been a bit blunt, but the demon girl liked her quite a bit.

"Hey, I've never been dumb enough to try blowing myself up!" Yusuke said defensively, ignoring his tea. "Okay.... Maybe once... Or twice.... Or.... Well dammit I've never been dumb enough to try and blow up Greece!" He crossed his arms, "Either way I'm not gonna sit here on my ass and have a dang tea party while someone I know is in trouble!" He glanced at the letter Kurama had brought along. "How long will it take her old man to get back? He'd probably know something."

"Again, that depends on where in Greece she had to go, and how long it takes her to negotiate with them, if Voron is still in good health..." Takeshi trailed off, his eyes losing focus.

"By the way, I doubt she'd try to blow up all of Greece," he said quietly. "She doesn't take innocent lives. She'd probably just concentrate the explosion in that one area." He smiled suddenly. "We may be seeing Voron sooner than I expected. We may as well sit to wait, since we can't do anything until he gets here."

Taking his tea from Genkai with a nod, he sat and sipped at his tea, apparently supremely unconcerned. In fact he was more than concerned, but he wasn't about to show that. Not yet.

Kurama sighed quietly as he sat down, sipping at his own tea in the hopes that it would calm him down. Someone needed to be calm, after all, since Yusuke was completely the opposite.

Aleron stopped almost an hour later in front of a small, abandoned town on the coast of Greece. It really was beautiful in Greece. She'd always loved coming there. Now, though, she just felt empty. She didn't see any of the beauty around her, and just walked straight for the center of town.

"Hey!" she yelled when she saw three men all in black surrounding a figure kneeling on the ground with his arms tied behind his back. Her father. "You might not want to do that."

Instantly all three turned, looking at her with faintly glowing eyes. "And why not?" one of them asked.

"Well..." Aleron floundered for a moment. "He's older, so he's already peaked off and started his descent in his power, right? Besides, he's a mulish, uncooperative bastard to boot. And he's made lots of enemies over the years, so if someone finds out you have him, you'll be getting hell from people trying to kill him. And I could spread the word real fast." She grinned with confidence she only half-felt.

"I suppose you have an alternative option?" The first man spoke again, looking down at Voron in mild disgust.

"Yeah. Take me in his stead. I'm younger, I'm stronger, I can handle things better than he can. So you release him and you let him get the hell away from here, and I'll do it. I'll cooperate with you." Aleron looked at her father, his normally immaculate black hair falling over eyes gone cold and icy blue with fury.

The three moved a few feet away, talking quickly but quietly before the first turned back to Aleron. "Done." They'd been trying to get Voron to cooperate for a few hours now, and nothing they said or did worked. Besides, the younger one would be easier to manipulate. He freed Voron's arms and pushed him towards Aleron.

"Aleron, what are you doing?" Voron asked, immediately striding over to his daughter. He blinked when he found a duffle bag pressed into his hands.

"That's all you need to know. Get back to Japan, Father. There's a temple nearby, the one you always said we should go visit? You should go visit." Aleron smiled at him and hugged him briefly. "Bye." She turned and walked towards the three men, and Voron stared after her before her meaning sank in. He turned and ripped a portal in the world, stepping through to begin his hike to Genkai's temple.

((Whew, sorry for the huge wall of text but I figured it was the easiest way to keep things rolling ^^))

{Nope, actually this works out- I'm gonna skip ahead to him essentially arriving too... I figure that'll make things flow better.... And I can always change it if you had something else in mind.}

Despite all of them being rather restless- Yusuke especially- there really wasn't much they could do other than take Takeshi's advice and wait; it was truly a testament to how much the detective had learned in his time fighting that he was able to force himself to sit down and not run off.... But boy did he want to run off. Sitting there thinking about it was making him batshit crazy.
No one really made any efforts either, everyone just sat in silence, sipping their tea and looking worried. Everyone was so busy with their own thoughts there wasn't anything to really say aloud.... And so it was that the minutes drove by...

After about an hour of torturous silence, Yue suddenly twitched her ears and looked at the door; none of the humans had reacted to it yet, but she was sure of it.
"Someone's coming up the stairs to the temple...." She said slowly, standing up and going to the door. Maybe it was because she herself only came by at night, but Genkai's temple didn't seem the place to get unexpected visitors often.... Which meant it had to be...

{sorry I didn't post sooner.... My internet connection has been murder today. Ugh. I hate the construction in the basement.}