A/N: It's been a while since I've hit the Yu Yu Hakusho scene…yikes. I missed this pairing, I really did. I don't actually have a distinct point to this fic, but it was personal and otherwise in character. I started thinking on Kurama's personality and his flaws and came up with this. Tell me what you think!
Disclaimer: I do not own these characters, nor did I create them. I use them for entertainment purposes only.
…
Kurama shifted where he sat in the center of a large clearing, surrounded by the trees. They were the only ones who could protect him in his moment of weakness. It was fitting, he supposed, that the one place that haunted him would in the end be his liberation.
He missed the Makai.
The day was a hot one, and for the first time in his long life the proud Youko had skipped classes. School just wasn't something that he planned on dealing with today. There were too many other things to distract him.
Kurama's bright green eyes softened as he took in the scenery. Maybe he would stay the night as well.
All day he had been contemplating human emotions, and he wasn't any closer to understanding them. Why had his mother loved him so? Truthfully, he wasn't even her child. He agonized, minute after minute, wondering if she only loved him because she believed that he was her son. It frightened him to think that the soul was so blind. If that was true, then how could anyone trust their own feelings? Shiori trusted that he was her son, Suiichi...but that was only half of him.
A half that was dying.
With each new enemy, and each new mission; after every trip to the Makai, Kurama had begun to notice that the Youko in him was much easier to hear than Suiichi. The slender, red-head wasn't of any use in battle. There was no need for him. Only when they returned to the Ninjenkai did the boy appear again.
It's what he had wanted, from the beginning. From the day he was forced to hide among the human race; to become one of them. He had waited to be himself again.
But it wasn't to be.
He was no longer Suiichi, and no longer Youko. In a way, he'd killed them both. And now, this brand new being that he had created to survive was nothing less of a conundrum to him. It was like being a Jack-In-The-Box: a peaceful tune on the outside, and something surprising and frightening on the inside.
Kurama. That was his name. But he didn't have a real personality, not even his own body. Kurama was stuck in between an end and a new beginning. Stuck inside of it.
The thoughts came and went, making him more and more confused and frustrated. Eventually he thought perhaps it would have been better to be caught the day that he failed. But he understood now that those thoughts had never once crossed his mind in his previous personality. The Youko was proud and defiant, he answered to no one. Suiichi was kind and gentle, he was friends with everyone.
Kurama was neither. He'd lost himself somewhere in his own mind. It was unfair, he decided, that in order to save himself he had needed to sacrifice his soul. That was why he had decided that if he had known the consequences back then, even The Youko would have chosen to be imprisoned instead.
Suiichi would have been happy to have been left out of it all. He was missing out on his own life. When the others were asleep, he cried to himself. What else could he possibly do?
The Youko dreamt of the past. And Kurama? He thought of them, but never of himself. He had stolen both of them and hidden them away deep in his chest, in the very heart of his being, and left them both to suffocate. When he was frightened he called on The Youko's courage, and when he needed answers he borrowed Suiichi's intelligence. He had nothing to call his own, save for one thing. A name.
They say a name can define your being. But Kurama wasn't his birth name. It was a nick name that he'd given to himself simply because neither Youko nor Suiichi could ever possibly be true to his person. But if that was the case, now that he'd thought about it, did he have a real name?
It was like diagnosing himself with an incurable disease. He had no name, no personality, and therefore no soul. He was a charlatan God.
Ironically, it was true, what they say about the truth: it hurts.
Leaning back, he laid down in the grass, and closed his eyes. His back ached from sitting up all day. For a moment, Kurama tried to find peace with nature, but it only served to remind him of yet another thing that he could not call his own. It was The Youko who controlled the Earth, not him.
A small flicker in the back of his mind alerted him to a familiar Ki. Sitting up, he waited for the Koorime to join him.
"Good evening Hiei."
"You're mother is worried about you," he told him flatly, walking into the clearing. "She's been looking for you all day."
"The school called her then?" The fire demon nodded.
The redhead looked away. After a moment of silence, he leaned back into the grass again. Hiei's crimson eyes flashed in slight confusion.
"What's on your mind kitsune?" Kurama sighed.
"Too much."
"I'll leave then," the smaller demon replied, turning to go. He wasn't good at fixing other peoples problems, unless it involved slaughter, and he highly doubted this was the case. Otherwise, he and Kurama would be back to back in battle right now.
"Hiei?" The whisper made him stop. Glancing over his shoulder, his large eyes widened at the tears streaming down Kurama's upturned face. Patiently, he waited for the kitsune to continue.
"Hiei," he began again. "If I were to ask you to kill me now, what would you do?"
The Koorime tensed, his brows furrowing in confusion. "Do you want to die, or is there something else you're trying to tell me kitsune?"
"Answer the question first," he smiled.
"I'd tell you to deal with whatever the hell you're dealing with, and to not expect others to take responsibility for your pain." Kurama pondered this answer.
"Are you saying I should kill myself?"
"I'm saying that you need to take responsibility for your own suffering kitsune," he clarified, crossing his arms over his chest. "If death is your only answer, then so be it."
"It would be easy then, to let me go?" he asked his companion sadly. Hiei dropped his stance and observed his partner before answering.
"Why speak of these things Kurama? Death is the coward's way…I never expected it would satisfy you."
"It was only a question Hiei."
"A question is always asked for a reason."
Sitting up, the redhead regarded the fire demon seriously. "What if there is no logic or reason? A question asked then, would simply be curiosity…haven't you ever been curious about death?"
"What do you want me to say Kurama?" For a long time, both of them were silent.
"Would you miss me, if I were to die?" the kitsune asked slowly. Hiei didn't answer right away. Instead, he came to sit down next to the redhead, crossing his legs and laying his katana in the grass by his side.
"You are worried, aren't you Kurama?" When his wide, green eyes demanded an explanation, Hiei continued. "You are worried that your life is insignificant."
The kitsune shook his head. "I am worried that I have not been living at all."
"Why would you think that?"
With a sigh, the slender male lowered his gaze to the ground. "I am a bruise on the Youko's perfect cheek, and the chain around Suiichi's neck. I am a murderer Hiei. And I am nothing at all, just the same." The Koorime was startled by this answer, but made no indication of it.
"What you just said makes no sense Kurama."
"You wouldn't understand." Hiei frowned.
"Perhaps you don't understand," he countered after a short while. "You are letting doubt taint your thoughts."
"No Hiei, it is simply that I see the truth now."
"That you are nothing and always will be?" he whispered. The kitsune's green eyes flashed.
"I don't even know my own name," he answered back. "How am I to know who I truly am, if I don't even have a name?"
"Your name is Kurama."
"But why? Is it because that is how I introduced myself to you when we first met here?" he cried out desperately. "I don't know who he is!"
"When you called yourself Kurama, you became him." Hiei answered firmly. "Now, he is you." After a pause he added, "And he would be missed, were he to leave this world. His mother misses him now."
"My…name is…"
"Kurama." The fire demon finished for him, without hesitating. His eyes held a light of wisdom that the demon fox had never noticed in him before.
When he didn't respond right away, Hiei stood up, taking his katana with him. Slipping the weapon into his belt, he faced the kitsune. Looking up at him expectantly, the former Youko waited for him to continue.
"Kurama is a beautiful name, my friend. Don't lose it."
And with that, he was gone.
Startled, the redhead choked on a gasp. He stood quickly, but after a moment he relaxed again. He wasn't alone. His large green eyes locked with a shadow passing through the trees. With a small smile, the redhead wiped his tears away with the back of his hand, and began making his way out of the clearing.
He was going home.
…
A/N: Thinking back to the Dark Tournament, I was struck with this nifty little idea. I was trying to convey the fact that Kurama, in my mind, is not Suiichi being controlled by Youko, or The Youko trapped in Suiichi's body. That didn't make sense to me because his character has been created of both of them, not one stuck in the other. And so, I decided that Kurama was a completely different person, and that is how this fic came into the picture. There is Youko, the handsome Demon Prince of Thieves, there is Suiichi, the intelligent and kind son of Shiori, and then there is Kurama…the being created when both of these personalities melded together. This is confusing, because suddenly he has nothing of a soul to call his own, and of course Hiei explains to him that he is wrong for thinking that. And…yes. That is my insanity…I'm not just going to take a confusing character and rob him of his soul, NO! I am going to make him ten times more confusing to do it!
In any case, the fact that Hiei chooses Kurama over The Youko in him, or Suiichi, was symbolic of the fact that he has come to respect Kurama over both of them. Come to respect him and cherish him. We aren't quite to love yet, but it's a start right?