Disclaimer: I do not own any part of Yu Yu Hakusho or anything else so do not sue me for lack of reason. I am practically broke!
Hello Fanfiction Readers! This is my first ever fanfiction story so please please please be nice. My story may be a little hard for some people to comprehend at first but I will try my hardest to let the story be understood.
Another note: I have not worked on this story for a couple of years now. However, I seem to have gained the spark again for this particular story so I am editing it as well as finishing it. Yes, you heard me.
FINISHING IT!
I hope to get it done as soon as possible. My writing style has probably changed slightly, but nothing to worry about. I must send a warm thank you to my readers and reviewers. And to everyone who just likes to read and not review, kudos for reading anyways. I am guilty of lurking as well.
Chapter 1: Dreams
Kurama's eyes snapped open as he awoke tangled up in his sleeping bag. Perspiration covered his shaky body and his breath was hitched. Tear tracks streamed down his face, surprising him. The only sounds he could hear were coming from his ragged gasps. Where was he? His emerald orbs scanned the room. Then he at last remembered. He was in his living room.
The teen tried to sit up. No such luck. He was wrapped from head to toe in that bag like a butterfly in it's cocoon. The difference was that the caterpillar, soon to be butterfly, encased itself voluntarily. Kurama would never admit to it, he would rather die than tell anyone, even his friends, that he had a phobia of this sort of thing. Constricting things around him, making simple breathing a task because of the straight-jacket effect. Both arms were sufficiently pinned underneath him, legs stuck together. Frustration built up as well as trepidation.
He would never, ever, ask anyone in the room for help. Not about this anyways, even though the tight blanket around him made his already racing heart to pound erratically in his ears. Why was this psyching him out? It was just a stupid blanket! He could face any demon, even the ones that could crush him into smithereens, yet where this lousy sheet was concerned, it could push him to panic. He bit his lip and concentrated on something else. The dream. Or nightmare, rather.
God, why was he having these nightmares? He carefully moved to the edge of the couch to pull his numb hands out from under him. They slid out and shook unsteadily. He sighed. Just having freed arms was a relief. Once the slightly tanned hands were held up in front of him, they tingled back to life, pinpricks of irritation running the length of his arms as needed blood circulated through.
For the past two weeks, he had been waking up from different dreams, all of them focused directly on his lies. More specific, the lies he weaved to his mother, the woman who should by all rights now everything about her beloved son. Yet he had a past, a terrible past that no one, especially his mother, should know.
Of course, his friends knew, but he could not prevent that anymore than he could prevent his dreams. Inevitable. That was the word.
In them, he saw himself doing ordinary things; at school working on a biology lab, doing his homework, cleaning the house. When suddenly, he would feel himself start to change into that person he once was.
It was almost like a second person inside of him. Yearning to be bad, to fight the law, to turn on everyone he cared about and just…leave. Of course he fought this side of himself with a passion. Leaving would get him no where in life.
But no matter what he did, in his dreams he would become Yoko once again. The worst part was that his friends and family would not know it was Yoko, not Kurama, not Suichii. They always ended up in the same place, before he woke up. They would be in a cold gray building, much like an interrogation room he had seen on a recent cop show. He would be strapped to a table as they attempted to save him. But as they thought they at last brought back their friend, Yoko would take over one last time. They would die, all of them, by his hand no less. It brought him to tears, and last week the images had been so disturbing he had actually gotten ill.
He forced the thoughts out of his mind. They were just dreams.
Snapping himself out of his reverie, he continued his efforts to heave himself out of the sleeping bag. First he attempted the method of rocking back and trying to grab the zipper all the way at his toes. This only resulted in hitting his head on the couch arm. He hissed a profanity to the silent room.
Nearby, Kuwabara grumbled something in his deep slumber. Kurama froze. He waited for a minute before starting again.
One time when he woke up from the nightmare, after he threw cold water on his face in an effort to clear his mind, he could see sparks of gold in his emerald eyes. Another time his hair had turned completely white. He could almost see ears sticking out from his mass of hair. But by morning, the abnormalities disappeared. They always did.
This time he did not want to see himself in a mirror. He was guessing his eyes, ears, and hair were all that of Yoko's, his past life.
Yusuke, Kuwabara, Hiei, and he were having a sleepover at Kurama's house. His mother was out of town for a week so he had to take care of the house himself. Chips and cans of Mountain Dew littered the living room, which did not make the red head very pleased, but it could be worse. Maybe. Hiei slept on the windowsill and Kuwabara slept on the floor, since Yusuke and Kurama called the couches.
The moon illuminated the room from the large window, shyly pushing away the shadows that crept inside the house. A full moon. How quaint.
He finally rolled over and grasped the zipper. It immediately zoomed up the side. The teen felt the bag slacken and he began to slide to the edge of the couch. He tried to move back towards the back of the couch. Too late, he realized. Kurama slipped off the couch and onto the hard floor with a crash, landing on his back. Rustles of movement alerted him to the other boys waking up.
Kurama growled as he heard snickers come from the couch to his right. Silence was followed for a few moments until Kurama tried to stand up. His foot was caught under the sleeping bag and he slipped and fell back on his back. This time there was an uproar of laughter from Yusuke as well as Kuwabara.
Kurama's eyes flickered to gold and his spirit energy spiked significantly. He felt compressed into his own mind as Yoko started to take over. 'NO!' he screamed mentally. 'You can't do this.' He was now sure that Yoko was no longer a thought in his mind, but a separate person completely.
"You think that is funny?" Yoko's cold voice asked the teens. White robes replaced the red pajamas that the old Kurama wore. The people in the room all tensed. Hiei jumped down from the window and landed next to the now standing Yusuke and Kuwabara.
"Whoa Kurama, we didn't mean it seriously," Kuwabara explained hurriedly, obviously scared of the fox demon. They all backed away a few steps. Yusuke focused closer on Kurama's face.
"Have you been crying Kurama?"
Yoko pulled out a death plant letting it grow out of his palm. "When you die I will remember that." 'Leave them alone Yoko!' the red head mentally yelled at the demon. Then the two sides of Kurama fought mentally for the body.
Using his strength, Kurama started to gain control. His hair shortened and turned back into a crimson red. The white toga disappeared and his red pajamas were back. He felt Yoko get contained in the depths of his mind. The only thing that remained unchanged was his golden eyes.
He watched as the death plant turned back into a seed, which he stored in his hair. The fox looked up to see fear-stricken faces of the teen detectives and one very surprised face of a fire demon.
There was a moment of dreaded silence until "What is going on?" Kuwabara exclaimed. "Why were you doing that.
"I-I-I am very sorry." he said softly. No one replied.
He stepped toward them, but all of them took a step backwards, fear still on Yusuke's face. "Kurama, what is the matter with you?" Yusuke's comment made the red head's face turn pale. "If you do not want our company then we will go. You obviously have some inner issues." Hiei just stood there in silence, though it was just as hurtful as the other comments.
"It really wasn't me. It was…" he trailed off. "Me". He could not tell them about the dreams; they would probably go ballistic.
It was so stupid, for him to get angry, yet it wasn't really him that was angry. To him, when he fell it was rather funny. Why did he allow Yoko to get upset! He could have killed them all without wanting to.
"I-I am sorry. Please forgive me." No one answered.
Kurama fought back the wave of guilt bombarding him. He felt nauseous. Why couldn't they just say, 'It's ok Kurama, we know you are going through bad dreams and forgive you.' Unrealistic. He had suddenly become a threat to his friends. Who knew what would happen next time.
He grabbed his jacket and disappeared through the front door, not looking back.
