by Queen Yokozuna
 
 

Part 7: The Alternative
 

"What in the world was I thinking?" Hiei wonders aloud.

Botan, walking to his left, turns to him an indignant look. "Hey listen here, dickhead," she tells Hiei, "I'm not exactly relishing this too so the hell with your comments. The only reason why I agreed to this is Kurama begged me, so I'm doing this for him, not you."

"Okay, Botan, that's enough," Kurama says, walking to Hiei's right. "Hiei, please cooperate. You want this to get over with already, don't you?"

Hiei sighs. "Alright, alright."

Kurama smiles at him and Botan, and the three continue to walk to the lake where they're supposed to meet Yukina.

Yukina had asked Hiei out yesterday on a boat ride in the lake, but Kurama and Botan are tagging along because Hiei had requested this to Yukina. The excuse he gave? The more, the merrier. But the real reason why he did so is so that he can already execute the Plan B he and Kurama had talked about.

As the three near the lake, Botan announces, "Hey, I see Yukina now."

Sure enough, Yukina is standing there by the edge of the lake, looking at the many little fish swimming in the water.

Kurama then tells Hiei and Botan, "Alright, guys, start the act!"

Hiei takes a deep sigh, then puts his arm around Botan's waist.

"Hey, Hiei, not so tight," Botan says, herself now putting an arm across Hiei's shoulders.

Kurama smiles to himself, looking at the unlikely couple to his left.

Yukina now catches sight of them, then smilingly waves her hand.

"Yukina!" Kurama calls out, "sorry we're late!"

"It's okay," Yukina says, wondering at why Hiei and Botan are walking too close to each other.

As the three stop by the lake, Botan cries, "Hiei, honey, the water looks nice!"

"You called him honey?" Yukina clarifies.

"Yeah. My honey, as in sweetheart," Botan tells her, nuzzling a wide-eyed Hiei. "Why, you didn't know?"

Yukina simply shakes her head, seemingly unable to believe it.

"What? You mean no one's told you about us yet?" Botan asks, as if truly incredulous.

Yukina shakes her again again, this time looking earnestly at Hiei, like she's asking him to tell her exactly what's going on.

Hiei shows her a sheepish face. "I thought you already knew."

Kurama bites his lip, half-expecting Yukina to cry.

But Yukina's lips form a smile and tells Hiei and Botan, "Well, you two look cute together."

Hiei can strongly detect the hint of sadness in his sister's voice.

"Thank you," Botan gigglingly says.

"So," Kurama declares, relieved that Yukina didn't cry, "you all ready for the boat ride?"

"Yeah! C'mon, honey!"

Botan clutches Hiei's hand and takes him to the boat waiting nearby.

"Hey, do you have to call me honey everytime you open your mouth?" Hiei hisses at Botan.

"Yes, honey," Botan says, giving him a fooling smile.

As Botan gets into the boat, Hiei looks at Kurama and Yukina walking towards them. The moment he sees Yukina's sad eyes, he suddenly doesn't feel good about getting on with their act anymore.

While the lake is placid the entire time of the ride so far, in the boat it's rocking with activity. Since getting into the boat, Hiei and Botan have been constantly holding hands, leaning onto one another, stroking each other's hair, stuff like that, as they have practiced it last night (under Kurama's direction). Botan seems to be enjoying the act, especially whenever Hiei secretly shows her an irate look, while Hiei can only ask himself how long he can still take making Yukina sad.

Quite understandably, Yukina seldom talks, and she just mostly looks either at her folded hands on her lap, or at the still water. In an effort to lighten her mood, Kurama keeps on cracking some jokes, even though he's wary that Yukina may cry any moment now.

As the boat passes underneath a brige, Kurama senses something moving in the water. He slows down his rowing and tries to see what it is.

"What's up," Hiei alertly asks him.

"I don't know," Kurama answers. "Something's moving near us."

Everyone looks at the water surrounding them, trying to get a glimpse of what Kurama's talking about.

"There, look at that," Hiei tells them, pointing at the boat's right.

Slowly, two eyes, followed by a long, toothy mouth, emerge from the water.

"It's a crocodile," Kurama softly says.

"Yeah, a crocodile," Hiei agrees. "Like the ones we saw at the zoo."

Before Yukina can say anything to that, Botan asks Hiei, "What's a crocodile, honey?"

"It's an animal that can get real vicious when it's hungry," Hiei says in a tone meant to scare her.

"Yikes!" Botan cries, clinging to Hiei.

Yukina hastily looks away from them.

"I didn't know crocodiles lived here," Kurama says, his eyes not leaving the reptile.

The crocodile swims about a meter away alongside the boat, posing no real threat. After a minute or so, however, the group begins to sense danger. About a dozen more heads emerge from all sides of the boat, surrounding them.

"Kurama, row faster," Botan nervously tells him.

As Kurama is about to row faster, they feel a hard bump to the boat from underneath.

"What was that?" Botan cries.

The boat rocks again, now harder. Yukina almost goes overboard.

"The bastards are trying to overturn us!" Hiei angrily says.

Before they know it, the other crocodiles are already nudging the boat with all their might.

Hiei and Kurama punch the crocodiles' heads, but it's too late. The sheer collective strength of the beastly pack is enough to make the boat overturn and everybody in it to go right into the water.

Using their own sheer strength, Hiei and Kurama fight with every crocodile that tries to lunge at them, amid Botan and Yukina's (mostly Botan's) terrified screams.

From the corner of his eye, Hiei sees one of the larger crocodiles threatening to snare a helpless Yukina with its big mouth.

"Yukina!" Hiei shouts.

He quickly swims towards her and gives one fatal blow to the croc's head, but just after its tail makes a big splash to Yukina's direction. Hiei rushes to take a semi-conscious Yukina into his arms, and then carefully takes her up to the ground.

Kurama rescues Botan from another croc, and together they follow Hiei and Yukina.

Hiei lays Yukina on the soft grass. Relief crosses his face as Yukina begins to open her eyes.

"Are you alright?" he asks her, concern evidently showing in his eyes.

Yukina looks at him sitting there by her sie looking down at her, and smiles. "You saved me," she happily says. "You saved me. I knew it, you care for me more than anybody else, right?"

Hiei doesn't know what to say. "Uh...uh..."

"Why then did you save me instead of Botan?"

Hiei doesn't think he can give a reply. He glances at the dripping Kurama and Botan before him. Both look just as stunned and speechless as him.

"Uh..." Hiei says, "you were nearer to me."

Yukina continues to smile. She pats Hiei's left cheek and tells him, "It's okay. I know you don't want to admit it."

Hiei is, at the very least, just totally dumbfounded.
 
 
 

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Part 8