Chapter Text
"I love you." She whispered, violet orbs filing with tears. "But... I don't know if you love me. You abandnoed me for Yukina. I know she's you're sister, but..."
Hiei swept the emotionally fragille physically mighty longhaired beauty into his chiseled arms.
"You are the only one for me!" He exclaimed, crimson hues bright with love. "Yukina means nothing to me compared to you!"
She sniffed against his strong manly shoulder. "Even though I'm halfdemon halfhuman with a vampire for a grandmother?" She asked tearrfully.
"Yes." He sollemnly intoned, wiping her bangs (deep raven purpl-black with blood red highlights) out of her bright blue and purple and green rainstorm-colored eyes. "I would give up my life for you. You are beautifull and strong and I will protect you the way you're dead parents never could. You have had such a tragic life. Let me be your night in shinning armor, Amora Lestina Hathway."
"Oh, yes." She cried, and with a giggle she added "Not that I need protecting. I'm the ruler of the demon world! That tournament was a cinch, and your my king!"
And with a smile Hiei kissed her because he had never met anyone as perfect as Amora before and it goes without saying that they lived happily ever after.
The End.
As I picked my way through an author's note that was longer than the fic's final chapter, I felt my temples begin to pound.
How the shit do people write this swill, let alone have the balls to put it on the internet? I thought as I opened the review box. With hands sweaty from clutching a plastic computer mouse for more than an hour (at one hundred and ten chapters, this fic had been long, pointless, and painful to get through; clutching at the mouse in desperation was to be expected) I typed out a review. A scathing one.
This fic is a bastardization of both Yu Yu Hakusho and Hiei's character, I wrote. I can't even begin to count the ways this fic is bad, but let me try. The word 'orb' is not a substitute for 'eye', and neither is 'hue'. 'Hue', for the record, means 'color,' not eye, and "your" and "you're" are two TOTALLY DIFFERENT WORDS. Your dialogue is not formatted correctly, either, so pick up a freaking book and see how it's really done! Also, Hiei would never act like this because he would never A), talk that much, or B), talk in such a poetic, romance-novel sort of way. He's not tender and sweet; he's gruff and straightforward! Plus, no Mary Sue like yours would ever interest him! She's too chipper and bubbly, and that tragic past of hers? HA! Don't make me laugh. Hiei’s own past puts hers to shame. What makes you think that aqua eyes and that god-awful hair color could ever be pretty or natural? And her HERITAGE: nothing screams MARY SUE like having a vampire for a grandma. Vampires aren't even in YYH canon! And the worst atrocity? YOU SAY THAT HIEI DOESN'T GIVE A CRAP ABOUT YUKINA. You and your story have major issues to work out. Grow the hell up and get the hell out of that fantasy world of yours, please, and come back to the REAL world of Yu Yu Hakusho.
My mouse hovered over the 'submit' button for a long time before I moved for the delete key, holding it down until my entire work of angry criticism disappeared from existence letter by letter. It took many moments of deep breathing to get into a (barely remotely) state of Zen, but once I could look at the review box without grinding my teeth or spouting off profanities I began to type anew.
Great job sticking with this fic until the end! I typed. You write fairly well, but all of us can improve more. For instance, you use the word 'hue' instead of 'eye', but 'hue' actually means 'color,' not 'eye!' Whoopsies! I've made that mistake before, too! Also, about the format of your dialogue...
After forcing out that more neutral dose of helpful criticism, I clicked 'submit.' The familiar orange writing telling me that the review would take a while to show up made me sigh. How long had I been doing this pointless, endless perusal of bad fanfiction? Three years? Four? I was too lazy to actually check the date on my profile, but I nonetheless wondered what drove me to subject myself to such bad writing and then make nice about it year after year after year.
I clicked the author's profile link on a whim and was assaulted by the typical "If-you're-the-one-teen-who-doesn't-smoke-pot,-copy-and-paste-this-into-your-profile!" kind of junk. Scrolling through it proved to be a forty-second process, one that led me to author’s fifteen posted fics. I lingered on the review counts. The atrocious 'Bleeding Heart Felt Love' I had just reviewed had two hundred giggling comments. The discovery made my heart sink. My own fic (singular; I only had one) had less than fifty reviews ranging from the constructive to the rude to the infuriatingly vague. Sure, my fic only had a dozen chapters or so at this point, but it was better written and had a more original plot than what I’d just read... right?
I'm minoring in creative writing, I thought. Of course my writing is better than this.
Pulling my backpack from under my seat, I stood and slung the bag over my shoulders. Heavy textbooks painfully tapped against my spine as I reached for my cane; with a whistle I headed for the library doors.
"Happy birthday, Dani!"
I shot a smile at the boy behind the library checkout counter. He, like me, was a second year college student and a fellow music major, and we shared a Japanese class to boot. We had been friends since freshman orientation, ever since he had carried me up a flight of stairs after someone had stolen my cane (lots of people did that before I told them it wasn't just an eccentric accessory and that my left foot and calf were actually shriveled from a birth defect).
"Thanks, dude," I replied, smiling.
"How old did you turn?"
"Twenty, so no, I'm not an alcohol source yet, David."
"Dammit," he swore, snapping his fingers in mock disappointment. His expression turned from amiability to confusion when I signed the computer check-in list. "Hey, I thought you had a laptop."
"It broke," I said. "Damned keyboard quit working on me."
"That must suck! Hope it gets fixed soon."
"Me, too."
"You gonna be all right walking home?" he said, glancing at the big glass doors leading outside. Night had fallen an hour or two earlier.
"Should be." I looked at the watch on my right wrist and frowned. "Gotta go pretty quick, though. Mom's supposed to call me tonight."
"Be careful out there," he said. "You sure you don't wanna call Campus Safety and have them drive you home? It'd be faster." He reached for the phone on the checkout counter, but I shook my head.
"I'll be fine." I tried not to look peeved. I hated being babied. "See you tomorrow."
"See you," David said as I walked away, and after giving him one last cheerful smile I left the building.
The sweet spring air felt damp in my mouth, and my cane slipped over slick cement. It had been raining earlier that day, making walking around campus both treacherous and a pain, but I didn't really mind. I liked the feel of the breeze as it ruffled through my unbound hair, the feel of the pavement beneath my good foot as I walked. There wasn't much on my mind. I had reviewed a story that needed it, my homework was done, my application to an ultra-competitive composition workshop with noteworthy guest professor was finished, my mother and my best friend were going to call me that night in my dorm room because it was my birthday...
The way back to the dorm took me past the athletic track. With a wry smile I stopped to look at the red paving material and the white stripes differentiating the running lanes. A train whistle blew in the distance.
"Hmph," I huffed. “Never gonna be me out there.” I squeezed the aluminum grip of my cane tight. My bum leg had kept me from sports since my birth, but that didn't matter to me much. At least I had music, and writing.
Far away but coming closer, the train whistle blew again, but this time it sounded... odd, somehow, and I felt a chill make the hair on my arms stand up. A higher, more desperate sound undercut the typical shrill keen of wheels on track; I assumed I was hearing things.
"Aw, shut up," I said to the annoying whistle and its odd undertone, but then the screaming sound continued on its own even after the train had passed. Alarm blurred the edges of my vision and adrenaline pumped as I recognized the scream as...
—was that a person?
It took me a moment to remember how to move. With growing apprehension I trekked across the track, walking toward the bleachers at the far side of the field as if pulled there by a magnet. I flinched when the screaming started again, no train-sounds masking it this time, and when the scream abruptly cut off I tried to move a little faster, straining my neck as I looked around for the sound's source.
I spotted something moving in the shadows beneath the bleachers. I held my breath as I approached the crawlspace under the seats, peering into darkness through narrowed eyes and knit brows. As my eyes adjusted to the shadows I made out two vague shapes, one pinned and one pinning. The one on top straddled the other's waist, holding her hands above her head with one strong arm, and it took me a moment to recognize the pinned person as one of my classmates—a girl whose long blonde hair was mussed and fanning around her as she lay sprawled on the ground, mouth opened wide as she let out another terrified screech and twisted her body hard.
For a moment I couldn’t figure out what was happening. My brain didn’t want to make the connection. But then the man kneeling atop my classmate fumbled with the button on his fly, and I knew what was going on. I took two steps into the under-the-bleachers darkness, raised my cane, and hopped forward on my good foot. My walking stick connected with the side of his head with a resounding 'thwack'; he grunted, went limp, and slumped forward. My classmate shoved her assailant away with an anguished cry—for the life of me, I could not recall her name as she ran past and collapsed to her knees on the pavement.
I turned around. The young woman wretched, expelling the contents of her stomach.
"You okay?" I asked, realizing as I spoke that my feeble words were totally inadequate.
To my surprise, however, my classmate looked up at me with tear-streaked eyes and whispered: "Thank you, thank you, oh my god, thank you."
I held out a hand, hoping to help her get to her feet. "Let's get out of here and call the cops," I said as she reached for me, but then her eyes went wide, so wide, and her face went from grateful to horrified in a blink of misplaced time. A low moan and a curse drifted through the air, and as I slowly turned around I saw a large black shape lurch toward me.
Fire blossomed down my side, then, and someone—was it me making that horrible sound? Was I the one screaming?
I stumbled backward, saved from falling only by the grace of my cane. I looked down. The handle of the knife between my ribs glistened like oiled leather. When I drew breath, blood bloomed across the pale pink fabric of my t-shirt in a sweet-smelling stain.
My classmate let out a wail. I heard her feet pound away into the night. My killer pulled the weapon from my burst heart and ran, too.
I put a hand to the wound as I watched him go. My fingers came away black, the color of my blood lost to the dark. I fell to my knees. I was cold. I was getting colder.
My last protests were born as thoughts as my reality disappeared in a numbing rush: But today is my birthday.