The Girl, The God, and The Demons

Chapter Fifteen: The Separation

Disclaimer: I do not own anything related to YYH. Can't stop me from writing, though!

"God, I have such a headache right now... It's almost as bad as that hangover I got once..." Diana moaned piteously as she forced herself to sit up. "Huh? Why am I in a bed?" She spoke aloud as she scanned her surroundings. She was lying in one of two occupied identical white beds, one of which was currently empty but had ruffled sheets, showing that its occupant was probably 'out to lunch' at that moment. They were two of dozens of beds that filled the all-white room. Looking down at herself, the emerald-eyed teen could not help but screech.

Back in Koenma's office, the Reikai Tantei heard a shrill screech from within the infirmary and rose quickly, heading to Diana's rescue, Kurama in the lead (although Hiei was not far behind.) When the four entered, Koenma walking in seconds after them, they saw no threat. They saw only a lump of sheets that was Diana, whimpering pathetically.

"Show yourself, demon!" Hiei called out menacingly, a dangerous edge to his voice. The girl-lump whimpered more audibly than before. She muttered something from within her covering, but none of the group could understand her. Kurama sighed and pulled the sheets off of the girl with quite an effort, for she did not want to be uncovered. Diana, now free of her disguise, tumbled off of the bed, opened one emerald eye, took in her audience, and closed the eye once more.

"Give them back!" She shouted from the cold, shiny ground, hugging her knees tightly. "And I'm not a demon! I may be evil, but I'm no demon. I'm just twisted is all." Yusuke rolled his eyes.

"We weren't talking about you, American!"

"Well, then who were you shouting at, huh? I'm the only one in here, stupid! And I resent that comment!"

"We were talking to whatever scared you, Di," Kurama intervened before the argument could continue further. Knowing Diana, it could have gone for hours.

"What the hell are you taking? Nothing attacked me! This isn't, like, some science fiction movie or something! Now give me back my sheets!"

"Why?" Hiei challenged, grinning. Kuwabara gave him a funny look and mouthed, 'How can you mess around at a time like this?' Hiei ignored the ningen.

"'Cause the almighty Diana says so!" Yusuke, Kurama, and Hiei especially flinched, remembering Artemis and all her sadistic torture. "Now give them!"

"You are a fool, human. Get up off the ground," The little demon commented in a derisive voice. Diana huffed indignantly.

"I'm not no fool!" Diana retorted indignantly in a slight drawl as she pulled herself onto her bed, casting a longing look at the floor as she resettled herself. Wiping an imaginary tear from her eye, she muttered, "Goodbye, shiny linoleum tile," and then turned her attention back to the Tantei. "Now give me back those sheets so I can cover myself up and at least try to retain some dignity!"

"That's what you screamed about?" Koenma's jaw was open in disbelief. "Your clothes!"

"More like the embarrassing thought of being seen in this skimpy hospital thing, really. Got a problem with it?"

"Well, not a problem exactly... More like confusion…"

"Too bad for you, then." Kurama handed back the girl's sheets and she wrapped them around herself tightly. Relaxing, she opened her eyes. "Jesus!" She screamed as the room nearly blinded her. "God! Repaint this stupid room, will ya?" Kurama and Hiei made eye contact, then looked away and shook their heads. Koenma cleared his throat and all stares, even Diana's, although she was currently rubbing her eyes in a fruitless attempt to see better, gravitated toward the dark-haired prince.

"Um... Shall I start to explain, or would you?" Kuwabara's hand shot up into the air, as though in school.

"I'll do it!" The others rolled their eyes and gave the orange-haired boy center stage. Diana even stopped rubbing her eyes (although that may have been because she poked one of them rather hard and it was now red and watery.) "Okay, so... I woke up and I thought, 'Hey, why not call Urameshi?' So I called him an' his ma said that he had left late last night. So I called Keiko's house-"

"What are you suggesting!" Yusuke yelled at the boy.

"Shut up, stupid Japanese child!" Diana yelled at the brown-haired spirit detective, weakly shaking her fist. She did not expect her threat to work, but Yusuke quieted. The girl looked at her fist, as though checking to see that it hadn't grown some intimidating deformity. Shrugging, she indicated for Kuwabara to continue.

"Well, point is, Yusuke wasn't anywhere I thought he'd be, so I wrote a note to my sister and left for school. When I got there, I quickly found out that both Kurama and Yusuke were gone. I asked Keiko and my beloved Yuki-chan-"

"Stay away from her," Hiei growled at the boy. Diana shushed him immediately.

"Um... well, none of you were there so I left to look for you. I was then struck with an idea-"

"Musta been pretty hard to process, huh?" It was Diana who interrupted this time, contradicting herself. Both Hiei and Yusuke shushed her. She stuck out her tongue at the two, but still shut up.

"I went to Hiei's tree and it was all black an' crispy, like someone had used it to roast marshmallows or something. So I traveled a little further and tripped on something. I looked down and saw a lock of red hair-"

"You tripped over hair!" Koenma interjected and was immediately bombarded with pillows from the infirmary beds, courtesy of Hiei, Yusuke, and Diana.

"No, I tripped over Kurama, who was lookin' a mess, asleep against some battered tree. Urameshi was close to him, not as messed-up but still lookin' pretty bad. Since he wasn't yet asleep, but gettin there pretty dang fast, I shook him awake. He looked horrible, man, all battered an' bruised an' stuff. At first I thought the Kasane guys got to 'im-"

"I could take those punks with my hands tied behind my back, fool!" Yusuke was now the one to be pelted with pillows. Koenma glance down nervously at his watch before his realized that it was only for show and did not work.

"Hurry, will you? I've important things to do, you know," The prince implored impatiently. Steam had begun to rise about him, indicating that his time as a "cool teenager" was about up. Diana shot him a confused glance, pondering fruitlessly why the hell a teenager would have steam rising from within him, but shrugged.

"Fine, fine. Geez, no time for anything..." Kuwabara muttered to himself. He was pelted with a pillow.

"Shut up and talk! And give me back my pillow, thief!" Kurama unsuccessfully stifled a laugh and tossed a pillow to Diana, who caught it perfectly, then flexed, as though catching a pillow from a distance of less than a yard was something to celebrate. (Though, in her condition, it probably was.)

"Well... Basically I found the shrimp, even Urameshi thought it'd be a waste of time to look, and he was sprawled out on the ground, lookin' like absolute crap-"

"I look better than you on my worst days, baka," Hiei growled with a cool edge to his voice. Diana laughed. Kuwabara chose to ignore this comment.

"Anyways, I got the shrimp and went back to the other three-"

"Three?" Diana asked, curious. "Who else was there?" Kurama whispered something in her ear and she nodded comprehendingly. She then seemed to freeze. "WHAT! Why was I there! This is CHILD ABUSE, I tell you, CHILD ABUSE!"

"How is it child abuse?" Hiei questioned, eyebrows raised. He instantly regretted this comment as he felt his Jagan burn painfully and memories flooded both himself and Diana. He could not explain how he knew that Diana, too, saw this, but he knew. Covering his third eye with his palm, the demon suddenly dropped to his knees, wincing horribly.

Diana, meanwhile, had gone still. Her eyes glazed over and suddenly changed from their shining emerald to a vengeful turquoise. Mirthless laughter issued from her mouth, a laugh completely not her own. Kurama, Kuwabara, Yusuke, and Koenma went as far away from her as they could as she pushed herself out of the bed and stood up, completely unscathed.

"It took me fourteen years to accumulate enough energy to possess this pathetic child, and the only thing stopping me from doing it again is that accursed boy!" Diana, or rather, Artemis pointed a finger at Yusuke, who bristled as she walked closer to the trio. (Kuwabara had mysteriously disappeared, Koenma was reaching for the door handle, and Kurama was apparently frozen with shock, emerald eyes wide.)

"Hell yeah I stopped you, you sick sadist! You'd've killed us all!" As Yusuke spat out his retort, the door locked and Koenma cursed under his breath.

"SO? You deserve to die, all of you, after the crap you've put Diana through!" Yusuke was about to argue back when Koenma signaled for him to shut up. Artemis grinned in her special, fearsome way.

"What, are you afraid that you little bitty spirit detective can't handle me, Koenma? Of course, you probably couldn't handle me either, come to think of it. But don't think just because you are way below my radar doesn't mean I haven't been watching you." Her turquoise eyes narrowed with hate. Hiei groaned pitifully from his spot on the floor and with a glance, Artemis rendered him unconscious. The small demon's comrades were too in shock to respond, other than staring open-mouthed and wide-eyed at the goddess, whose sadist smile appeared once more, sending a spasm of horror through both Kurama and Yusuke. (Whose was worse was anyone's guess, though Kurama seemed especially terrified, his eyes so wide that they threatened to occupy his entire face.)

"I can't now, since I'm stuck in Diana's body, but the time will come when there will be no Diana, though there wasn't supposed to be one in the first place." Here Artemis paused for effect, once again, and it was plain that she enjoyed the looks of fear and confusion on the boys' faces, most especially Kurama's.

Walking closer to the boys, the goddess stared directly into Kurama's eyes. Emerald met turquoise and soon Kurama was on his knees, quietly muttering "no!" to himself in obvious agony. Artemis looked at the boy and laughed, shooting him a quick glare. He fell limply to the floor, exactly as Hiei had done. Finished with the fox, the goddess approached Yusuke, who was paralyzed as well, though with anger. Artemis greatly relished this fact, if her smirk was any indication.

Now mere centimeters away from the Spirit Detective, the goddess stroked his cheek with one finger and whispered into the boy's ear, "She wasn't even supposed to be alive, you know. She wasn't going to ever love…" Suddenly, Yusuke snapped.

"Or hate!" Incensed, the Detective fired his reigun at the goddess, who dodged with intense mastery only a deity could possess. Reaching toward the blast, the brunette caught it with her bare hands and sent back twice as powerful as before.

It hit the boy in the stomach, and he spat out blood as he doubled over in pain.

Smiling triumphantly, Artemis cornered the boy, effortlessly blasting away Koenma as he attempted to thwart her. "Scat, Chibi." The Prince was blown away by a stream of crimson energy, sent flying into a wall, breaking it as his now-unconscious form fell limply. "Now, revenge for last time…"

However, as she drew closer to the boy, a tall, orange-haired shadow crept up behind her…

"What do you think you're doing, ningen?" Artemis snapped, turning sharply to face the boy as he attempted a surprise attack.

Kuwabara was clearly startled and responded by the way he knew best: violence. He summoned his Reiken and prodded Artemis's face with it in a rather sharp motion. The goddess let loose an unholy scream as the boy watched in horror and backed away hurriedly, tripping over her own two feet and landing in Diana's disheveled bed.

The goddess glowed with a crimson energy, an energy which enveloped her in seconds, winding about her in the same fashion as Hiei's would be coffin had wound about him. Crimson light flooded the room as she rose into the air, suspended by nothing save the power which surrounded her.

Then, just as suddenly, the light died and the room returned to normal. Well, almost normal. Diana was still floating, still surrounded by crimson. A shadow flew out of her chest and into the atmosphere, and the glow surrounding the girl diminished considerably. As it disappeared entirely, she fell, headed for the linoleum tile, but was caught in the nick of time by newly-awakened Kurama, who hugged her tightly.

"Um... Kurama? You can let go now," The girl gasped, and the fox demon released her. The others began to stir and all stared at Kuwabara in awe, including himself. Koenma was in utter shock.

"Oh my God..." He whispered quietly, eyes wide as he stared at Diana. (She and Kurama quickly distanced themselves.) "MDAS..."

A/N: The end of this story is so close I can taste it! Of course, it doesn't matter that I'm eating my fanfic notebook... J/K! I don't actually eat paper, but I think there's some Korean paper or something that is edible... That seems pretty interesting... ANYway, I'd like to apologize for some of the prior chapters, like, the first few. Those sucked. I just hope these newest ones make up for them. Also, I tried really hard to keep them in character, so please comment on that! R+R like always! Ta, and Thanks!