White Noise : Track Eleven (Hiei)

How are you doing? What time is it? I think my leg's broken. Can I have one of those? Oh my god that's so cute! Some one help me!

'Where are my bells?!' Aria thought wildly.

Beep! You stupid bitch! AhhhhHHH! Price check in aisle three. Today there will be a slight chance of rain. I love you. Dinner's ready. Que' eso? Can anyone hear me!?

'Make it stop.'

Did you hear what Beverly did? Are you listening? Donde' esta'? Don't tell my husband. Liebe liebe! Mommy will you tuck me in? Go die. I love oranges. Konichiwa! Get out of the way! What? Hahahah!

'Too much. Make it stop!'

Aria curled herself into a tight ball as all the noise of the world seemed to be attacking her ears and she clutched her head trying to block out some of it. She could hear everything, every breath anyone within a 50 mile radius took, every heartbeat, every word, everything. She squeezed her eyes shut and let out a loud scream, releasing a whole mess of spirit energy along with it. The windows to the building shattered instantly and the support pillars cracked slightly. Yusuke and Kurama were shoved back by the force of it but Yusuke managed to grab Botan who was also being grabbed by Kawari to keep her from being flung into the wall, while Hiei managed to dig his sword into the ground to keep from moving and Tokukawa turned to mist.

The fight in the room immediately stopped, noticing that she was awake.

'I want it to stop! I want them all to stop making so much noise. Stop talking. Stop breathing. Stop living!'

Then her whole world went white. She didn't know what she was doing as she sat up. All she knew is that she wanted all the noise to stop and she was going to make it happen.

“Oh Hell, I knew this would happen.” Kawari whimpered, backing up a few more steps.

“What?! What's happening?!” Kuwabara asked, watching as the girl whom when he'd met seemed like a sweet and innocent young girl, was now doubled over in obvious pain, screaming, and the floor by her feet was being torn up by the sheer force of her yell.

Kurama remembering what Hiei had told him decided to answer the question, deeming that Kawari was panicking far too much to respond. “It's her bells. Hiei told me that sound demons go insane if you remove their implements which are her bells. I don't really know anything other than that.” Kurama said, watching Aria, seeing what would happen.

“That's right.” Kawari said, “She goes nuts. The last time this happened was the Kaichou Massacre.” He said gulping. “And I'm not gonna' be a victim. Forget this!” Kawari said, changing back into a bird and fleeing through one of the windows Aria had shattered.

“Is it safe to be here?” Botan asked fearfully, staring at Aria.

“Maybe it would be best if you got out of here. Kuwabara, take Botan and go.” Yusuke ordered.

Kuwabara didn't need to be told twice. The old building didn't seem to be able to take much more and Kuwabara didn't want to be there when it had finally had enough. Yusuke was the spirit detective not him. Let him handle the demon stuff. Kuwabara grabbed Botan and ran down the stairs to get as far away as fast as they could.

As Botan and Kuwabara left, Aria's screaming becan to fade away and she got to her feet, now humming, walking towards Hiei and Tokukawa.

Yusuke gulped, almost wishing that she would go back to screaming. Her humming was way too creepy. It looked normal, but at the same time the look in her eyes, which was a mixture of intense pain and blood thirst, just gave it a morbidly eerie tone.

“Go back to your spot girl!” Tokukawa growled, charging Aria, but before he could reach her Aria raised an arm, holding a hand out to him, and opened her mouth, now singing instead of humming. She sang one note and it was hauntingly beautiful but at the same time it caused the foundations of the very building they were in to rattle and quake. If it hadn't made the ground at his feet quake, Hiei would have almost thought that her voice was beautiful, but the life endangering aspect of it kinda' put a damper on that notion.

Tokukawa doubled over in pain, yelling and clutching his ears.

“Where are they?” Aria asked, almost too calm as Tokukawa screamed, her voice echoing about the room.

“You stupid bitch!” Tokukawa snarled at Aria, not moving from his spot. It felt like his skull was splitting open and all he could hear was the girl's voice and that insane humming which was just making it worse.

Hiei was shocked by what he was seeing. Neither the Aria he remembered or the Aria he had met just a few days ago seemed like the type to do something like this. Resolutely he pushed into her mind but immediately doubled over, yelling and dropping his katana.

“Hiei!” He heard Yusuke yell, but it didn't really register.

Hiei struggled, but finally managed to pull himself out of Aria's mind. It was way too loud. He couldn't take it. He thought how her mind was normally bad...now he had a whole new perspective. Her mind at that moment made every other time he'd thought the noise in her head seemed bad look like a walk in the park.

“Aria!” He yelled out, but she obviously didn't hear him.

“We need to do something!” Yusuke said, but Kurama held him back and shook his head no.

“Let's just see what happens for a bit.” Kurama said calmly.

Yusuke looked at Kurama skeptically but stayed put, trusting the ex-thief's judgement. "If you say so Kurama. I just hope you know what you're doing." Yusuke muttered, turning his attention back to Aria.

Hiei darted over to Aria and pinned her up against the wall, pinning her arms to the side of her head.

“Aria!” He yelled at her, “You idiot. Focus!”

Aria just started yelling again, the ground by their feet started cracking again but Hiei didn't seem to notice.

“You can hear me. I know you can!” Hiei yelled, just as Aria's screaming started to not only tear up the ground but him too. His pants around his feet started to get torn to shreds and so was his skin but he ignored it. Hiei grit his teeth and took the pain. Pain wasn't exactly a foreign concept to him so he knew how to handle it. He was just focused on getting her back to herself so he could get some answers.

Buh-dum.

'What's that?' Aria wondered sitting in her world of white that was inside her head, oblivious to what was going on in the real world and what she was really doing. 'Is that a heart beat?'

Buh-dum.

She started to run towards the sound of the pulse, but as she did the sounds of the world got louder as she got closer. She didn't mind it as much as she normally would have since now she had something to focus on.

Buh-dum.

Finally she seemed to reach the noise and just as she got there, her world changed back into the world of the waking as the sound dragged her out of her own mind.

In the real world, Aria's yelling quieted down slightly as tears started pouring down her face. She then turned her head to look at Hiei, now completely silent. “My head hurts,” She muttered with tears streaming down her face and looking up at Hiei desperately. Her voice still echoed about the room and had the same eerie tone to it but at least it wasn't breaking anything.

“Just focus.” Hiei said gruffly, though inwardly he was thankful that at least she was responding. It was definitely a step in the right direction.

The ground started crumbling from the earlier damage and Yusuke and Kurama had to back up a few steps to stop from falling through the floor to the ground below. “Hiei!” Yusuke yelled, “The building's coming down, just grab her and get out!”

Hiei pretended not to hear him as he focused all his attention on getting Aria back to her old self.

“Hiei knows what he's doing. We'd better just get out of here.” Kurama said, grabbing Yusuke by the arm and pulling him towards the door. Yusuke nodded and followed without too much protest.

Tokukawa finally seemed to recover from Aria's attack. He vanished in a cloud of mist just to reappear right behind Hiei.

“You stupid b**ch. I thought they said you were useless without your bells.” He growled, snatching Aria away from Hiei by the arm and punching her across the face.

The moment she was snatched away, the sound of the pulse left again and the noise started to overwhelm her again, but before she could slip back into the comforting world of white inside her head, Hiei grabbed her with one hand and with the other grabbed Tokukawa's face.

Hiei felt anger pouring through his veins. How dare that idiot try to take her when she still needed to answer his questions!

“Just shut up.” Hiei snarled and the next moment Tokukawa's face was engulfed with black flames. The crime lord yelled and clawed at Hiei's arm, desperately trying to escape. He was in too much pain to even change into his mist form and soon fainted. As soon as Tokukawa dropped to the ground, Hiei knelt down next to him and riffled through his pockets before finally finding Aria's bells.

He pushed the bells into her hand. Aria deftly closed her hand around the bells, not really knowing what she was doing, and the moment the bells touched her skin she collapsed with a small almost inaudible sigh of relief.

Hiei huffed and rolled his eyes but still caught her before she hit the ground. 'And here I had thought she'd gotten stronger as she got older. How disappointing.' Hiei thought to himself. “Go to sleep, but the moment you wake up you're answering some questions.” Aria just grinned and clutched her bells tighter.

"Thanks." She muttered right before falling into a deep sleep while listening to Hiei's heart beat.

Hiei grumbled as he moved to lift her into his arms in order to take her back to Kurama's house. He then noticed something he had forgotten in all the commotion....Aria wasn't wearing any clothes except for her underwear. His face flushed red and he took off his cloak to wrap it around her shoulders. "Stupid girl." He muttered under his breath. This whole thing was bringing back memories of past times he'd spent swimming with her when they'd been younger...actually, to be more correct, it was more Aria stripping down to her skivvies, leaping in the water to splash around and leaving Hiei to huddle, mortified by her lack of inhibitions, on the shore while trying not to look....just like he was at that very moment as he wrapped her up so nothing was showing.

Hiei huffed and picked her up, finally realizing that the ground by his feet was crumbling. In a flash he was out of there, racing to go find the others, leaving behind Tokukawa unconscious on the ground just as the building crumbled in on itself.