Before you read further, yes, Shiro is a little OOC. I tried to capture his natural desire to be a hero without completely changing his personality. If you don't like that, don't read.
Fujimura was more than happy to talk to Atsuko about having Yusuke transfer to the junior high in Fuyuki. Apparently the idea of helping out someone most people considered a 'worthless' teen who was nothing but trouble appealed to her inner teacher.
Atsuko agreed to it, since getting a fresh start might be more beneficial, even if the transfer wouldn't take place until after he left Genkai's house.
Keiko wasn't happy, but when she got a list of reasons why Yusuke decided transferring to an entirely new school was worth it, she reluctantly agreed. It wasn't like he was moving after all.
In addition to possibly changing schools, Botan had found and spoken to Hiei about possibly extending the area of his 'house arrest' and being given free room and board while he searched for his sister.
Hiei showed up at Genkai's temple to speak to Shiro directly before he considered the open offer. After a spar with the teen using wooden swords since Genkai was not healing cuts because they were being idiots, and he agreed to staying with Shiro.
Mostly because he had been mildly impressed with the boy's sword skill, even if his style was borderline suicidal.
When Shiro returned back to his home at long last, after six grueling months training with Genkai, he was very ready to sleep in his house again.
But first he had to deal with one minor problem.
The attack of the starving Tiger known as Fuji-nee. Hiei damn near skewered her when she barged in demanding food. Her roar surprised him that much.
"SHIIIRROOO!" whined Taiga, hugging him to her chest tightly.
"I'm home Fuji-nee," said Shiro.
"It's about time! Who's your friend?" asked Taiga eagerly. When she heard he was heading home, she had personally restocked the fridge and pantry in hopes that he would cook her something good.
"This is Hiei Jaganshi. He's been searching for his younger twin sister for several years now, and when I heard his story I offered to let him stay here until he finds her. He's been sleeping in trees and on benches up till now," said Shiro. It was the truth, but not the full story.
"You and your 'hero' thing," said Taiga with fond amusement.
"You'll be happy to know that my sensei beat out some of that from me," he said dryly.
"Story later, food NOW!" said Taiga.
Shiro chuckled tiredly as he made dinner.
Hiei spurned Taiga on to new heights of stealing food before everyone else, as he had come to enjoy Shiro's cooking like anyone else. There was also the fact that Shiro had accidentally discovered the fire demon's weakness...he had an absolute sweet tooth, especially for ice cream as the boy had once come across the demon stealing some from Genkai's large freezer.
After that Shiro found the recipe for simple ice cream and the demon had been hooked. If he hadn't convinced him to use one of his spare rooms through their spar, then his home-made ice cream would have done the trick as well.
Once the food was devoured (and Shiro had the common sense to put aside his meal before he put anything on the table) Taiga decided to hear the full story about what he had done at Genkai's place.
Shiro gave her the bare bones, mostly it was martial arts training along with sparring with Hiei. While Yusuke recovered from his 'training' (Genkai was a total sadist and admitted as much) she taught Shiro what she could about magic.
Imagine his surprise when he found out that he was a rare kind of person... an Incarnation of a sword. It was the main reason he had so much trouble learning anything but reinforcement, structural analysis and projection.
Genkai said that as far as magic went, he would be considered a prodigy 'faker' by magus standards, but outside of that he would have better luck learning spirit techniques than trying to deviate from his origin and element.
(Strangely enough, Genkai's origin and element tied into her psychic ability to the point that it made creating her spirit orb a lot easier... Her origin was Soul and her element was Ether. She was as close to an Incarnation as she could get without getting a sealing designation.)
Taiga did have some good news...Yusuke had been accepted into the junior high, mostly because of the one teacher who didn't hate him on sight and the fact that the Fujimura family had greased a few palms.
Well, that and the fact that Shiro had managed to make learning interesting for Yusuke enough that he had gotten a passable score on the mock test Taiga had sent him.
Yusuke would begin his new school in a week, once the paperwork was filed and done with. He would also be in Shiro's class, since one of the conditions the school had set considering his history was that he be paired with Shiro, who had a reputation for keeping people like Fujimura Taiga in line. In other words, it was all on Shiro to keep Yusuke's juvenile delinquent tendencies from affecting his schooling.
A few days after his return from Genkai's temple, Yusuke found himself on a new case.
Only this time Botan tried to nab him from his new school and Shiro happened to be there to stop it.
"Hold up. Is there any chance that this plan will end the world before school is over with?" asked Shiro.
"No, but the number of bugs will increase if we don't leave right now," said Botan.
"About how long would it take us to reach the portal? And how many bugs are we talking about here?" asked Shiro.
Botan looked exasperated as she explained things to him.
Shiro however, was not convinced the the world would end if they didn't at least finish the last class of the day. He could probably get out of Taiga's rant if they hurried, but the headache of answering why they had ditched class was not one he wanted to deal with. Not after all the trouble they went through to get Yusuke into his school.
However Yusuke had a better idea.
"Can you get mom to fake a heart attack and get us out that way? Since Shiro is supposed to be my 'minder' (Yusuke had finger quotes when he said that) it would excuse him as well and we wouldn't get into any trouble later with the teachers," he suggested.
"You do realize this would mean bringing your mother into the fact you work for the spirit world, right?" said Botan.
"Better now than having her dragged in at the worst time," said Shiro.
Botan looked frustrated, however there was an available demon who could help explain things to Atsuko.
She needed to grab Hiei anyway.
A few hours later Yusuke and Shiro were called into the principal's office and told that Atsuko had fallen ill suddenly. They were excused from classes and it gave Shiro time to grab a few things before they booked to Tokyo.
It took them another hour to reach the portal to the demon world, and from there they jumped into the thing.
Ten minutes later they were in a bit of a jam because of the minor demons who had picked up their scent.
Fortunately Hiei was rather overprotective of the one who could make homemade ice cream better than store bought brands.
"So Yusuke, who's your new friend?" asked Kurama.
"Emiya Shiro. Judging by that red hair I take it you're Kurama?" asked Shiro carefully.
"You've talked about me?" said Kurama in surprise as they walked.
"More like Hiei mentioned you," said Shiro.
"I was somewhat expecting Yusuke's other friend, the orange haired one, to be here," said Kurama.
"Shiro was the one who helped me get into another school, since the one I was in sucked. I had to come up with a reasonable explanation for why we were ditching class, which is why it took us so long to get here," explained Yusuke.
"Atsuko was more than happy to fake an illness once Botan and Hiei explained what was going on with her son. Apparently she had noticed he had been going out more than usual," said Shiro dryly.
"Which school do you now attend?"
Shiro told him.
"Isn't that over an hour's ride away?" said Kurama in surprise.
"Yeah...commuting to it is a bitch and a half, but at least in Fuyuki they don't automatically assume I'm there to cause trouble," said Yusuke.
"It helps that Fuji-nee is a new teacher and that we're both willing to help him muddle through school work. And that the school has ties to the same yakuza that Fuji-nee is the granddaughter of. Yusuke wouldn't have had a chance to transfer if his mom wasn't drinking buddies with several of the Fujimura family's higher-ups, or that he's friends with me," said Shiro.
"I've been wondering...are you by any chance a Magus Shiro-kun?" asked Kurama. His spirit energy was barely acceptable, but there had to be a reason why Hiei wasn't complaining about him.
"A third-rate one, though thanks to Genkai-sensei I might make second-rate so long as I continue visiting her on breaks," admitted Shiro.
"What's your specialty?" asked Kurama. They were nearing the gate.
"Shiro here is a sword," said Hiei bluntly.
"A sword?" blinked Kurama.
"Genkai-sensei helped me find out what my origin and element were. According to her I'm what's known as an incarnation, specifically a sword. Unfortunately that means that if I'm found out the best I could hope for is that I obtain 'Hermit' status. Incarnations are given sealing designations automatically because they're considered so dangerous."
Kurama hmmed.
"If you were to raise your spirit level more, you could pass yourself off as a psychic with an odd inclination towards magecraft," suggested the fox.
"That was the reasoning Genkai-sensei had for training me in spirit powers. So far I've managed to at least get to D ranking in power, but it would take some serious work for me to get any higher than a C since I'm not inclined towards reiki," said Shiro.
"That or the suicidal tendencies I notice when we sparred at Genkai's temple will raise it for you," said Hiei sarcastically.
They had to cut their discussion short as they reached the other end of the gate. It took several agonizing moment of Shiro reinforcing his body through prana for Hiei to free them from the 'Gate of Betrayal' and he was thanking every god he could think of that it was one of the magics Genkai had all but pounded into his head during his six months with her.
He had to brush up early on human biology for it to work to the full extent she wanted, but it was worth it to be able to survive her bone-crushing blows with only bruises.
It was also one of the few things that he could do considering his status.
"So who or what are the four Saint Beasts? I mean outside of the legends?" asked Shiro.
"The Four Saint Beasts are actually demons. I have no idea whether they are the basis of the four gods or simply took their names, but I do know that they were particularly annoying before they were sealed," admitted Kurama.
"You mean like you and Hiei were named after the mountains in the human world?" asked Shiro.
Kurama blinked.
"What?"
"You didn't see the odd connection? Mt. Hiei and Mt. Kurama?" said Shiro. He had noticed that oddity after Hiei mentioned a friend of his who lived in the same city Yusuke did and wondered if there was a connection.
Kurama chuckled.
"You know I've never actually thought about that until now? But my name isn't from that mountain. I am after all Yoko Kurama, a noted thief. It would be rather odd for a thief to be named after such a spiritually significant place," said Kurama.
"Yoko...so you're really a kitsune then?" asked Shiro.
"A famous kitsune thief of the Makai," confirmed Kurama.
"Explains the plant smell you give off," said Shiro.
"Pardon?"
"Magi tend to be sensitive to active magecraft, or in my case prana and spiritual ability, usually through one of the five senses. In Genkai-sensei's case she can see magic through her eyes if she uses prana to reinforce them. My father Kiritsugu once commented that I must be part bloodhound because I could smell magic," said Shiro.
Kurama looked rather intrigued.
"What does Hiei smell of then?"
"Fire, ice and steel," said Shiro without hesitation.
"I can get the fire and the steel, but why ice?" asked Yusuke.
Hiei looked a bit disgruntled.
"None of your damn business," he said gruffly.
Shiro sniffed.
"Weird...I'm getting the smell of dirt and stone up ahead," he said.
"Must be Genbu," said Kurama.
Shiro quickly put what little he knew of healing with spirit energy to use after Kurama was hit by Genbu's tail. It wasn't much, but it did help enough that Kurama could move easier.
"So...who gets the next one?" asked Yusuke.
"Depends on his ability. I take it all of our opponents are guys right?" asked Shiro.
"Yes. Why, have a problem with hitting a girl?" asked Hiei snidely.
"This coming from someone who is equally freaked out over Fuji-nee's cursed shinai?" countered Shiro.
"Tch."
"Wait, what's this about Hiei being scared of a shinai?" asked Kurama with a light teasing tone.
"My guardian Taiga, has this cursed shinai that practically radiates bloodlust. The only way I can get her to drop the damn thing is to threaten not to cook for her anymore," explained Shiro.
"It has youki that a mere human, and believe me I had the spirit world double check, can use," shuddered Hiei.
"Taiga is one scary as hell chick, but for a teacher she's pretty awesome!" said Yusuke.
"Taiga?" said Kurama.
"Fujimura Taiga, granddaughter of the Fujimura yakuza and new teacher at the high school. Remember that series Gokusen? Well she's similar to the main character only she doesn't have nearly as much interest in keeping up the family name," explained Shiro.
"Yeah, she talked to me about my 'history' in Tokyo and said that as long as I kept my habits out of Fuyuki and kept up my grades, she couldn't care less what I had done in the past. She even said that if I persisted in being such a 'bad role model' for Shiro (here he snickered as Shiro scowled) then she would see about recommending me to her grandfather once I graduated high school," said Yusuke.
Yusuke was a good kid, but there were very few career opportunities for someone with such a colorful past, unless he was able to grow out of it first. As such Taiga and Shiro would feel more at ease if he at least had an available option for after graduation.
Being part of the yakuza wasn't a good thing, but it was better than being arrested for his bad habits when he was too old to be sent to juvie. At least as a yakuza his habits would have an acceptable outlet.
