They were in space again.

Only this time, for the first time they were heading to the home planet, Earth.

Even though they were going to Earth on a serious mission with a deadly band of psychotic mercenaries on their tail, Rin could hardly contain her excitement. She had not been on Earth since she was a child and  the idea of revisiting the home planet added an extra spring to her step, which had the added bonus of IY14 giving her adorable looks of confusion.

Even the mundane task of cleaning up her room was made more lighthearted with thoughts of vast oceans and towering mountains. Earth was unique in that its landscape was so varied, with forests, mountains, deserts, swamps and oceans all co-existed on one single planet, while other planets around the universe tended to focus on one or two of these landscape elements.

Rin glanced over at IY14 who was sitting in front of her computer seeming to just be absorbing whatever knowledge was on it, including the basics of how to use the computer itself. She was amazed at how quickly he picked up and learned new things presented to him.

She giggled as she kneeled down to pick up  all the medical books she had taken out while IY14 had been suffering withdrawal. Her hand hesitated when it rested on the book of old earthen fairytales, she studied it for a moment before picking it up and setting it on her nightstand while she put the other books away.

After placing the books back in her cabinet, she glanced around her now clean room, and her eyes almost immediately fell back on to the book of fairy tales.  She frowned The soothing voice of her mother in her brain, seemingly to edge her toward the book.

She glanced at her time keeper. It was a little while yet before she would have to start making dinner for the crew, so she shrugged and picked up the book. She flipped through the pages looking for a story to read when a piece of folded paper fell out of the book.

Carefully Rin bent down and picked up the paper. by the texture the paper was definitely a page from the book, although it looked a lot more worn than the other pages and was folded up specially, a clear sign that it was a former favorite page.

She gently unfolded the paper which revealed a beautifully painted drawing that made Rin’s jaw drop. It was not the beauty of the painting that caused her such a shock, the heading that told which story the picture corresponded to, it read:

“The Lord of the West," from the story ‘The Orphan and the Youkai Lord.’ ”


And there painted on that page was IY14.

Rin’s head snapped back and forth between the picture and the real live youkai sitting at her computer. There was no mistaking it, the facial stripes, the crescent moon, the golden eyes, the silver hair, they were all there on that printed page and matched the living youkai.

The book dropped from Rin’s hand, the dull thud causing IY14 to whirl around in alarm.

“Are you all right?” He asked, making Rin jump a little startled but snapping her back to reality.

“Yes,” she smiled brightly at him, before bending down to pick up the book, but kept the picture hidden.  “I’m just clumsy that’s all, no worries, go back to what you were doing, you need to learn all you can before we get to Earth.”

He stared at her carefully for a moment, hesitant to take his eyes off her lest something some thing not as innocuous might happen. However, as usual her comforting smile soothed his fears and he turned back to the computer.

When she was no longer under IY14’s intent gaze, Rin looked back at the picture again. It was impossible and yet it all made sense, the youkai, the sword, the resurrection. She had been ripped apart by briar wolves, been clinically dead for twenty minutes, and he had brought her back to life, just as the Lord of the West had done for the Peasant girl.  The military scientists of the Shikon Research lab had brought a fairytale back to life.

***

“Oi! Hiten!” Bankotsu called out to the bartender as he and his three less conspicuous subordinates entered Chehalis’ most popular lounge.

“Well where in the hell have you nutjobs been?”  the bartender greeted the four Shichinintai members as  they sat down at the bar.

“Oh here and there. Dropping off giftbaskets .” Bankotsu smirked.

Hiten chuckled. “Heh. Knowing you, I wager those “giftbaskets” equaled to about 40 mega tons.”

“45 Mega tons, actually” Renkotsu drawled.

“Renkotsu, same as always. So what do you drink nowadays?

“Jack on the rocks.” Bankotsu shrugged.

“Five years and you still order the same thing.”

“Has it really bee that long? No wonder I’ve missed you so much lately Hiten.”  Jakotsu eyed him saucily.

“I see you haven’t changed either Jak.” Hiten laughed, . “I’ve got a girlfriend at the moment.”

Jakotsu’s grin grew more feral. “So? It can be just a one night stand, before we leave.”

“I don’t think that’s a very good idea Jak. Bankotsu might get jealous.” Suikotsu finally entered to conversation.

The whole group laughed.

"So what brings the lot of you around here again?" Hiten quirked an eyebrow.

"We're looking for a guy named Kouga, you know him?" Renkotsu pushed a picture forward for Hiten to see.

"Yeah he's one of the best mechanics around these parts." Hiten studied the picture then frowned. "What trouble is he in?"

"He may have some information on the people we are really looking for." Bankotsu grinned.

"Ah, I get it, an interrogation round." Hiten grinned back then turned serious again. "Could you guys do me a favor and keep things as quiet as possible? Whenever something scares people around here it's bad for business."

Bankotsu's grin grew a little more twisted. "We'll do our best."


***

The crew of the Midoriko brought their collective mind together to work on the plan of how to pass IY14 through the security check at the earth gateway station without arousing suspicion of what he was. Shippou was in the corner with his laptop working on creating a fake passport for IY14.

“Oh come on that’s stupid idea!” Inuyasha snapped.

“What’s so stupid about it?” Kagome snapped back.

The hanyou folded his arms across his chest and putting on an indignant face said firmly. “No one will ever believe that IY14 and I could be brothers!”

“Oh come on! White hair, golden eyes! You could so be brothers!” Kagome mimicked Inuyasha’s indignant stance.

“I have to agree with Kagome on this one Inuyasha.” Miroku spoke up from his place next to Shippou. “ You and IY14 look enough like brothers to at least fool the security checkpoint officer.”

“Keh. I guess you’re right.” Inuyasha snorted in defeat.

Just then Rin came in followed, as all ways, by IY14. “Right about what?”

“Inuyasha and IY14 looking like brothers.” Sango chuckled.

Rin giggled. “We they do, half brothers at least.”

“Okay guys!” Shippou piped up. “Moment of truth, we have to pick a name for the guy because IY14 probably ain’t going to work for the security guards.

Before anyone had a chance to think, Rin spoke up. "Sesshoumaru, I think Sesshoumaru is a nice name for him..."


***

Kouga felt as if his jaw might break under the impact of a punch delivered by the leader of the Shichinintai Bankotsu. The wolf was sent flying into the back wall of his shop.  He looked up through swollen eyes at the four men standing before him, five of the seven deadliest mercenaries known throughout fifty galaxies.

Kouga had been in bar room brawls with four other opponents against him, but these warriors were not the average bar room joes, the Shichinintai were specially trained to maime and kill to complete their mission. This time their mission was to extract information on the whereabouts of the Project IY14, meaning Kouga would have reveal where his old crewmates were going. If there was one thing Kouga would not do it would ratting out on his friends, he was determined to die before he would let one word slip of where they were going. He was just glad that Ayame had gotten away.

“So now that you’ve been tenderized a bit has your tongue become loose enough to tell us what we want to know?” Bankotsu pressed his foot into the wolf hanyou’s chest.

Kouga grunted as his already broken ribs moaned in pain at the pressure Bankotsu’s foot was putting on them. However a defiant smirk crossed Kouga’s face as he growled. “Not a chance.”

“Well, that’s just too bad.” Bankotsu sighed, “Because if there is one thing I can’t stand,” He punched Kouga across the face again. “It’s disagreeable people.”

Kouga spat out some blood that had been pooling inside his mouth. “Yeah well you’ve met the most disagreeable of them all.”

Bankotsu frowned and raised his fist again, when out of no where a wrench flew out and hit Bankotsu right smack in the head. The shichinintai leader staggered dazed into the wall next to him. Jakotsu was at his side in an instant, blocking any other blow that might be aimed at his leader. Meanwhile, Renkotsu dashed into the other room from where wrench had been thrown.

Jakotsu helped to get Bankotsu to his feet, though he kept his gun pointed at Kouga. Suikotsu looked about stand up and check their leader’s head wounds, but Bankotsu waved him off.

Just then Renkotsu brought in Ayame, who was doing her best to make Renkotsu’s life miserable, by kicking and screaming and biting all. While the biting and kicking was mostly blocked by Renkotsu’s armour, her screams were definitely causing his ears much pain.

“Oh you two are so fucked!” Jakotsu snarled, enraged that anyone dared sneak attack Bankotsu.

“You ready with the serum yet Sui?” Renkotsu called over to the doctor hunched over his medical kit in the corner.

Suikotsu held up two large syringes and tapped on them lightly to get all of the air bubbles out of the fluid inside. He then placed caps on the needle tips for safety until they were ready to use, which would not be long. “Ready.”

Jakotsu’s mood quickly swung from rage to psychotic glee. “Now you bitches are gonna be spilling you’re guts whether you can stand it or not.”

Kouga felt his heart stop as the full realization what was going on hit him. Bankotsu hadn’t been beating him up to get an answer out of him, it was to simply buy time until his subordinate could get the “serum” ready.

“The beating the shit out of me was all a joke, wasn’t it?” Kouga growled, trying to sound vicious all though inside he was scared shitless at what they were going to do now.

“Oh look wolf boy, got it” A wicked smirk crossed Bankotsu’s face. “Yeah, even if you had talked while I beat the shit out of you, I couldn’t be sure whether you were telling the truth or not. See this stuff is going to fuck your brains up so much you won’t even remember how to lie.”

Suikotsu walked up to stand beside Bankotsu in front of Kouga. The wolf hanyou felt himself gulp. Suikotsu hadn’t seemed such a threat he had been crouched down the corner of the room for the duration of the fight working on some unknown project. Now the Shichinintai doctor was standing at his full six foot, five inch height, and glaring down out him with a calm smile and empty, emotionless eyes.

Kouga tried to bolt, but Bankotsu and Jakotsu were quick to hold him down, plus his body was partially addled from the beating Bankotsu had inflicted upon it.  Kouga watched in horror as Suikotsu calmly took the safety cap off the end of one of the syringes and tossed it aside, then placing the other syringe in his mouth to free up his hands, knelt down next to Kouga. The doctor quickly stuck the needle into the skin of Kouga’s arm and emptied the syringe’s contents into the wolf hanyou’s bloodstream.

“ Keep holding him down the drug won’t take full effect for another three minutes.” Suikotsu said calmly, before getting up and walking over to where Renkotsu was still holding Ayame.

“Leave her out of this! She had nothing to do with this! Leave her alone!” Kouga screamed, struggling franticly to free himself from the position Bankotsu and Jakotsu had pinned him in, but the drug was already having an effect on him.

“Well if you had been less disagreeable to us.” Bankotsu sighed and shook his head, imitating the face of a disappointed parent. “We might have been more agreeable to you. What goes around comes around.”


Kouga could feel the thoughts in his mind becoming jumbled and uncoordinated, and yet he felt strangely calm and warm as if he had just downed several strong drinks in quick succession.

After finishing with Ayame, Suikotsu came back over and knelt down in front of Kouga again.

“Now then,” Suikotsu spoke in soft, silken tones as a parent would to a frightened child. “Would you please tell us where your friends of the Midoriko have gone?”

Despite the drug Kouga was still coherent enough to register the question in his mind, however with his executive functions dulled considerably, his mind automatically formulated an answer without thought of the circumstances. Despite his best efforts to stay coherent, and close himself off to suggestion, Kouga found his lips uttering the word “Earth”.

***

“So just how badly did you fuck their brains up Sui?” Jakotsu cocked a curious eyebrow at the doctor.

“Oh, don’t worry Jak your little wolf man will be back to normal by day break,” Suikotsu chuckled. “Although I’m sure they will be wondering how they got all of those bumps and bruises since, thanks to the drug, they won’t remember us being there.”

“Brilliant, it will be like nothing happened.” Bankotsu smirked back, then frowned. “Although something bothers me, why would the Midoriko crew be taking the Project to Earth?”

“Simple.” Renkotsu calmly answered. “They’re seeking protection by going farther into regulated space, and what planet is more regulated than earth? If they are really ambitious they may go to the United Systems and inform them about the Project.”

“Shit! If that happens we could really be sunk.” Bankotsu snarled.

Even though the Shichinintai were mercenaries, they had been on good terms with the United Systems for helping out in the war with the Zailuku, and they wanted to stay on good terms with the United Systems. If it was found out they were involved in some illegal activity against the United Systems it could mean big trouble, they didn’t want to deal with. Trouble such as moving in and out of regulate space, getting Suikotsu’s medications, being hunted by the United Systems military. Yes, they could do without those problems.

Jakotsu licked his lips. "Well we'll just have to find them and cut out their tongues before they spill anything..."