In the Forest, By the Lake
"Meet me by the lake in the forest."
Kurama looked at his former partner in crime and friend, Hiei, with curious eyes. He was carrying a bag of groceries that his mother had asked him to buy afterschool on his way home. The food inventory at home needed some restocking. And while shopping for the supplies, Kurama had noticed Hiei's presence close by but he disregarded to reason an answer. When Kurama realized that being followed was intentional, his cool hardly wavered.
"What for?" the red head asked.
"Just meet me there in an hour." Hiei's expression was void of any emotion but indifference. Yet, to Kurama, a sense of purpose behind his words existed. There was business involved in this unexpected meet-up. Hiei instantly vanished from bodily presence and moved in expert speed on the roofs of the houses and buildings near by. Hiei did not need a confirmation because he knew Kurama would be there.
Before Kurama continued on his path home, he made a quick stop by a phone booth around the corner.
"Mother, I'm home." Kurama called out to his human mother. He removed his shoes from his feet before entering the home. He had to quickly erase the smirk he had on his face from listening to Hiei's random request. Kurama already had a few theories as to why but he preferred to not dwell upon them. He knew what he had to do before going to meet with Hiei at the forest.
"Oh Shuichi, you have the groceries." His mother smiled and then gave her son a warm maternal embrace. "I hope it wasn't too much trouble."
Kurama's viridian eyes gleamed with the love a son could give to his mother. "Not at all."
Suddenly the house phone rang. His mother went to retrieve it.
"Hello? Minamino residence." She answered. "Ah, yes! Shuichi! It's for you."
Kurama thanked his mother then took the phone from her. Through the phone was a familiar voice that needed no confirmation. The caller spoke first: "Hey Kurama, I need some help with a leak that happened in the bathroom. Mind coming over?"
"How bad does it look Yusuke? Do I really need to come over?"
"Uhh, yeah, it looks bad, alright."
"I'll be there soon." Kurama reassured his friend.
Kurama had told his mother of what had occurred and had mentioned he might be a bit late for dinner because of it. She acknowledged his friend-induced duties and told him to take care. Before leaving the home, Kurama had prepared a book bag with an extra uniform and extra supplies. His readiness was of a completely different purpose than what his mother believed. Kurama was on route to rendezvous with Hiei at the forest.
The forest wasn't a stranger to Kurama. He had been through these woods several times and so had Hiei. He knew which lake he meant. The trees grew tall and were probably as old as he was. He was certain several of the trees were. A short brisk breeze came about that caused the tree branches to shake. Kurama looked up at the allies of his element as crimson strands of hair slightly hooded his vision. He allowed a sincere smile to be made on his lips to his surroundings. For that moment: it was bliss. Bliss stirred the youko demon that he was in his very core. But he pressed on to the rendezvous. He had caught Hiei's scent and energy near by. The trees and Hiei were interconnected at this point as Kurama concluded in his mind. Kurama had figured out why Hiei brought him here today.
By the glistening lake, there stood the short and carmine-eyed swordsman. The sun brightly shining exposed the unnaturalness of Hiei's black, soft blue, and spiked hair. Hiei smirked as his former scarlet-headed partner stood a yard from him.
"You figured it out." Hiei told his friend smugly. A light chuckle was Kurama's immediate response. Kurama removed his book bag from his back the tossed it near the pond's edge.
Kurama made a mysterious smirk. "Yes. And I wish you weren't so ominous about it, Hiei."
"Heh," Hiei lifted his head and peered at Kurama. "I wasn't entirely intentional on that."
And that's when it started. Hiei came to Kurama in a rush with the first punch which was aimed to Kurama's mid-section. Kurama blocked it by his own hand. He instantly felt Hiei's element of heat through his burning left punch. Fire wasn't ablaze but his hand was above average demon temperatures. Hiei took his hand back quickly, shifted his position quickly to the far right then made the perfect point for a straight, rapid punch to the side of Kurama's face. But before the initial hit, Kurama took a step away from my Hiei's hit so the power of the punch was reduced by that matter of seconds and readjustment. Kurama turned his body towards the fire demon. In a few still seconds, they stared at each other. The expressions on their faces were ones that were calculating then became lighted hearted of a potential thrill upon them. The fox thief felt no amount of surprise that he was punched in the face by an ally, but rather, he felt intrigued.
"Are you pulling any punches Hiei? I understand that was a warning. You knew I would move." Kurama said as he rubbed his cheek in mocked hurt.
"And you knew better of what that punch meant." Hiei smirked, "Heh."
"Then why did you stop? We both know why we're here."
"For once, I'm thinking of how you are."
Kurama chuckled from the vibrations of his throat, "For now, dismiss it." Kurama ran towards Hiei with a kick to the face as a trade. Hiei was aware of Kurama's sense of vanity and the life he lived as a human being. He held caution of where he would be wounded f he had to step back to that other life as soon he was done with a fight. But why should he care now?
Hiei skidded slightly on the ground and that was enough of an answer for their fist and kick brawl to come at full swing. Ground martial art techniques being swapped by each move. A fight that consisted of at least 75 percent of the movements being dodged from each other. They knew each other's moves by previous observations and knowing the strategies the other prefers to use. After a clashed moment their arms clashed that appeared after they block the others punch from practically opposite areas of aim. They took a leap backwards.
Hiei yelled as he unleashed flames unto his fists and came towards to Kurama at his known great speed. At a close distance, Hiei was to land a flaming punch upon Kurama but he saw this coming as he leapt swiftly out of the way and landed at Hiei's rear. This gave Kurama the short opportunity to bring out his signature Rose Whip. Kurama steadied himself for Hiei's upcoming attack. A flaming punch towards the middle which Kurama dodged the weight of the punch but he was hit. And part of his shirt caught a small flame and made a burned patch on the red head's side that reached only the first layer of his clothes. Kurama knew that this was a ploy. Hiei could've done a lot more if he wanted. He knew he had come for a skirmish but Hiei's intentions were unclear to him. He quickly made a modification to his surroundings, whether it was to fire demon's knowledge, he wouldn't know before he was confronted with an incoming assault.
A burning punch to the solar plexus.
Well close enough to the location and this had sent Kurama a push back close to the edge of the lake. And with a stumble backwards the fox demon had fallen into the lake. The water enveloped his entire body, cooling the embers Hiei had placed on him. He sensed Hiei nearby through the ripples above him. Kurama closed his eyes for a moment in the comfortably cold lake and a heard a loud grunt. He swam to the surface and crossed his arms over the edge of the lake and laid his head upon them. Hiei was in a bind of vines that had risen out of the ground. The vines were the tame version as they were in forest green color and merely seemed as possessed plants that had risen out of the ground. He looked at his friend with an innocent yet mischievous smile that showed through his eyes and lips. He moved some of his soaked bangs away from his vision. The thorns should be gracing Hiei's skin but not enough to suffocate him or damage any vital nerves or veins.
"Those thorns are poisonous, you know." Hiei hardly looked concerned about this bit of possible dangerous information.
"Answer my impending question before I consider you a fool, officially." Hiei had already noticed that the thorns had a purple tip which was the cause of the fox's demon energy.
"As if you would stand in one place for long, Hiei." Kurama closed his eyes and smiled as the thorns released Hiei and returned to the ground. He uplifted himself from the lake to the grassy ground. He then removed his shoes. And thought he should've removed them before the fight.
In Hiei's hand was Kurama's book bag that he had came with. He tossed it to him. "You are still lacking a bit."
Kurama sat down on the ground as he tried to drain the water out of his long hair, "Maybe your punch brought back what was missing."
"You wanted it. Otherwise—" Kurama cut him off. "I did."
Hiei rubbed the back of his head in slight agitation then he sat down with Kurama. He had known for a while now that Kurama haven't been himself lately. He knew confliction was something part of his nature but in the last couple of weeks it had been affecting his moods. His mind would wander else where and his answers would be curt when asked or talked to. Normally Hiei felt he would take care of this issue on his own but when he began to sense Kurama constant shifts in energy, he began to believe that he was restless. And the end result of the fight sparked truth to it.
"You wanted to get punched but you didn't allow yourself to get burned severely. If you didn't allow yourself to fall in the lake, my punch could've done a lot more harm." Hiei stated this fact, nonchalantly.
"I shouldn't take all the credit since you used normal, mortal fire." Kurama removed the top shirt, leaving only his undershirt, to rinse the water out from it. "Demoniac fire wouldn't have extinguished by only water."
They had a brief moment of silence. Hiei decided to break it. "I suppose even you need an ass kicking every now and then."
"You confronted me because you noticed. How kind of you, Hiei."
"Hn, I wasn't being kind. I was annoyed."
"And you want an apology?" Kurama sighed then quickly regained himself, "Perhaps I had been slightly battle hungry lately." He laid out his shirt out dry then he laid down, his back to the grass. He stared out to the sky. Taking in the wound that was pounding dangerously close to his mid section and an old scar he had received from Hiei when he wielded the Sword of Darkness. It would've burn through his first layer of skin. Instead it was a fighting bruise on top of flesh.
Hiei glanced at his friend for a moment. It wasn't often that he witnessed him reckless. His personality and tactics forbade him to possess the trait. The wind blew gracefully and Hiei realized that the plotting-loving fox next to him was almost proud of being roughened up. He wondered if the red-head noticed that himself.
"You should stop denying your demon nature, Kurama."
"I don't deny it." He retorted back smoothly.
"But you fight it." Kurama shifted his eyes to his friend on his left. He knew Hiei was pressing a point and trying to irk him at the same time. Hiei's voice held nothing but a blunt air and contained no intimate emotions. Except it held only a lingering sense of a challenging pride. His eyes narrowed at him.
"I'm not saying you are failing to your demoniac nature. You should make time for it. Your humanity would thank you." Hiei told while looking straight ahead, out to the lake and the forest behind it.
"Hmm." Kurama turned his body to his side, the same side that Hiei was. Kurama's viridian eyes watched the fire demon carefully and observing his reactions. It was second nature to him. "My humanity wishes for me to be a brute?"
Hiei's lip slightly twitched. A twitch that the fox's expert eyes caught. He grunted, "Hn."
"Then, let's make a deal Hiei." Hiei's red eyes stared at his friend's green ones. Unmoved. "Fight me in this very forest every now and then." Kurama's asked in a form of a favor compared to being persuasive. Hiei's eyes closed to the request.
"You sound so human, Kurama. Why should I help you?" Hiei spoke with indifference that mildly had an undertone of arrogance. When in his mind, he wanted to test and try his conflicted friend. It was the only way to have any direct understanding of his thoughts sometimes. His mind was also thoughtful. A fight would be something pleasant for Hiei, if anything else. But he was also considering his friend's intentions that were constantly mixed of human and demon affairs. Hiei was directly useful to half of it, he felt.
Kurama sat up with one of his knees bent and the other crooked underneath. His damp head viewed straight ahead. He took a heavy strand of hair from the front of his forehead. A light breeze passed through them. Hiei's hair wavered as his body stood stoic and waiting for the red head's answer.
Kurama's held no sense of forgiveness when he told him: "I will tell Yukina who you are."
Hiei's stoicism was broken by glaring at the teen next to him and his body was speaking of challenging to the last spoken words. His teeth gritted behind lips. Kurama was unaffected to his change of behavior. "I was joking."
Hiei's eyes rolled then they looked straight ahead, "Don't irk me." His body and state of being returned to what it was before.
Kurama made a small smile, "Then our deal is made Hiei."
"Hn. Just don't be masochistic next time."
Kurama made a knowing smile in response. Words no longer needed to be exchanged. The air that surrounded the both of them spoke enough what the other meant and intended. Yes, they will fight again. Kurama will thank Yusuke tonight for that swift, strange favor that he committed to without any absolute knowledge of what could've happened.
A/N: My initial intention for this story was to have Kurama and Hiei fight. Physically. They are demons after all. And work on some characterization with those two because they had always been a little difficult for me to write about. I was sort of making a hopeful scenario come true and do a writing exercise at the same time. I am not sure if I gave the scenario justice since Kurama was more on the "conflicted"side compared to thinking that this was training and a necessity, you know? Sometimes going into Kurama's head gives me a headache... And it could be fun at the same time since he has that cunning personality to work with. Gahh, now I'm conflicted! Thanks a lot Kurama... Anyway, this story was also to bring some writing up since I haven't in a while! The other yyh story is still in the editing stages and I'm sure to hop to it this weekend. There will be a few more updates from me soon. :)