Finally, after what felt like several decades of training, she let him have his sword back.
"Try not to kill yourself with it. I've put too much work into training you."
Not the most encouraging of words, perhaps, but she was the one saying them. If she had given him his sword back, she thought he was strong enough to handle it.
Shishi grasped the handle of his erstwhile sword, trying to brush aside that now-familiar glow. And this time, when he felt that familiar rush of power, it didn't threaten to drag him under with it.
"Chorus of a Thousand Skulls!"
Power erupted out of the sword. Shishi directed it toward the target he was supposed to be destroying—but his newly increased power levels threw him off, and he overcorrected.
"What the hell do you think you're doing?!" shouted Genkai.
Oh, hell. Oh hell, NO!
The ghostly skulls had veered off course when he tried to direct them, and were now headed straight for the first target to present itself: Rinku.
The only one of them who still wasn't strong enough to defend himself against this attack.
"Stop," he muttered, focusing all his attention on trying to control the sword. "Stop!"
With a yell, Shishi lifted up the sword and buried it nearly to the hilt in the ground. The skulls stopped emerging from the sword, but the ones that had already escaped were still trying to drag Rinku away with them.
Touya had gotten to Rinku first, and was holding up a wall of ice in front of a younger demon. A particularly violent ghost lunged towards them, threatening to break through, and, in desperation, Touya threw an energy shield into his ice to strengthen it.
It should have been enough to hold it off—but it didn't exactly hold it off.
When the ghostly skull hit the shield, it was completely absorbed into it, leaving nothing but a swiftly dissipating trail of spectral mist.
Much as Shishi wanted to know what had happened, he really had to get the rest of those skulls under control before they killed somebody. So he closed his eyes and threw himself into the task of battling the wills of demon ghosts through his magic sword.
A few minutes—seconds? Ages? He had no idea—later, Shishi dropped, panting, to his knees in front of the sword.
He did not want to do that again.
Why the hell had he ever thought it was a good idea to use this thing before he had enough strength to control it?
"Dimwit! I assumed I didn't have to tell you not to aim it at your allies!"
"I'm sorry! I overcorrected!"
He didn't realize it until later, but that was the first time he had ever apologized for anything in his life.
Apparently those few days of relative normality had been the calm before the storm, at least as far as whatever the hell was going on in his head was concerned.
Something was very wrong, and for the life of him, Shishi couldn't figure out what it was.
That was why he was lying there on his bunk, staring at the ceiling, trying in vain to ignore the existential itch in his soul.
It was fast moving from confusing to frustrating, and even edging into unbearable. The damned thing wouldn't let him sleep!
On the plus side, he was at least able to channel his constant frustration into improving his training. That at least earned him a few half-compliments of the "not entirely terrible" variety—though those, again, only served to increase the general weirdness that surrounded him.
This was getting completely intolerable, and Shishi had no idea why.
He rolled over for the hundredth time and tried not to think about it.
What the hell was wrong with him? Why was he acting this way? For that matter, what was this way he was acting? He'd never felt anything quite like it. All he knew was that this weirdness had started somewhere inside his own mind, and that Genkai had something to do with it.
No, no, no. He wasn't thinking about it. He was sleeping. Preferably an hour ago, but now would do.
Shishi concentrated on ignoring the thoughts wheeling through his head—the Dark Tournament, his training here, that odd feeling whenever he saw her—and tried to sink into sleep.
He was almost there, in that odd moment of unreality right before consciousness slips away, when the pieces slipped into place, and he knew.
Without any fanfare, he suddenly understood exactly what was going on.
His eyes shot open.
Holy hell.
Shishi stared at nothing in shock as his mind caught up to the realization.
He had long since passed the tipping point, days ago, maybe weeks, and had somehow missed the memo.
Half the weirdness of the past few days was made up of being in a state of unrecognized denial, and the other half…
Shishi shook his head, trying desperately to clear his mind of the uncomfortable conclusion it had finally forced him to face.
It was too late.
It was much, much too late.
This particular truth wasn't going anywhere, and he had exactly zero chance of slipping back into his previous state of unawareness—he'd learned that much the last time he'd tried.
With a feeling somewhere in between loathing and liberation, he was forced to admit to himself the truth that he had just learned.
Shishiwakamaru was definitely, and irrevocably, in love.
He'd somehow hoped that the morning's light would help him out of his predicament, but no such luck. Knowing what that odd feeling meant only increased its power, even as he did his best not to even think it to himself. He couldn't even look at her.
Well, hell. This was even worse than before. Then he'd only been in a state of frustrated confusion—now he knew exactly what was going on with him…and absolutely, positively could never let anyone catch on. Ever.
He glanced around suspiciously, suddenly concerned that someone might notice something, but if anyone did, they weren't showing it. Rinku and Jin were chatting excitedly over something or other, Touya had on his best frozen poker face, Chu was rather tipsy, and it was Suzuka's turn for one-on-one training.
As for Genkai herself, he was afraid to look.
"Ok, dimwits, let's get going. The clown's with me, Chu's on his own, the rest of you, sparring time. Hand-to-hand only, no teammates. Jin, you're with Rinku. Touya, prettyboy there."
Shishi twisted his lips. Oh, this was shaping up to be a wonderful day. Couldn't they just do solo work? Like, forever?
Touya was moving into position, so he mirrored him, waiting for the signal.
"Start!"
Punch, dodge, counterattack…by this point, it was easy enough to fall into a rhythm that only required a small portion of his mind to focus on it. Unfortunately.
He tried forcing himself to think only about what he was doing, but all that did was throw him off his rhythm.
Dammit. Don't think about it!
Why the hell did he have to fall for her?
Dammit, dammit, dammit.
Why did he have to fall for someone that no one would ever think of for him. Why couldn't he have fallen for one of his fangirls? They would understand that. They were young, and beautiful, and…
And shallow. Vain. Superficial.
Just like him.
Yes, that would be a match made in heaven.
"Oof!"
He'd failed to block a punch, and Touya had hit him straight in the stomach.
Touya jumped back, giving Shishi a second to pull himself together before they come back together.
"Careful," said Touya. "I'm not planning to pull any punches."
Shishi didn't respond, just set his face in a ferocious glare aimed at nothing in particular. He really should have done better than that.
Nor were they the only ones to notice.
"Oi, prettyboy! Get your head in the game!"
She, of course, was perfectly capable of keeping tabs on everyone while sparring and throwing insults at at least three different people.
Shishi turned halfway toward her, intent on throwing some sort of snarky comment in her direction. Unfortunately, she was still looking at him, and he accidentally met her gaze.
"What do you think you're looking at, prettyboy?"
"Nothing!" Too fast, too defensive. Hell.
Some half-formed instinct caused Shishi to spin out of the way of a blow aimed for his head, and it was back to sparring.
Oh, yes. This day was going to simply wonderful.
That night, Shishi snuck out to the porch for some much-needed moping time.
He was dead on his feet, but he still couldn't sleep.
Damn it all. The training was an exhausting enough arrangement even without the extra energy he was wasting being an idiot about someone who would never look twice at him. She had made it clear enough that she though he was a worthless, self-absorbed dimwit who didn't stand much of a chance of gaining anything from her training.
He stared up at the stars, so different from those of his homeworld, and sighed.
Then, dammit, why couldn't he stop looking at her?
Every time he even heard her name, it was like he'd won a prize, or found some sort of treasure hidden in plain sight. It was that unmistakable feeling of having finally found what he was looking for in the midst of everything that didn't matter…which was odd, since he hadn't been looking for anything. At least, he hadn't thought so.
She…she was everything he wasn't.
She was honest where he was deceptive, said what she meant when he carefully chose his words for their impact. She was old where he was young, and young where he was old—he was older than she was, but he was still a young man by demon standards, while she was in the winter of her life. She had sharp tongue and a dry sense of humor, while he was constantly trying to have a smooth tongue and found very little truly funny.
It was that honesty, more than anything else, that had finally won him over. He could see that now, however well he'd hidden it from himself before.
Even in the Dark Tournament, she had baldly told him that she wasn't a hero, she was just there because it suited her purposes. She really didn't care at all what people thought of her.
He, on the other hand, did nothing but.
Well, he called it honesty, but…she did say things she obviously didn't mean. She hadn't really regretted not killing him. She really did think they'd gotten better under her training, no matter how many times she said they were hopeless.
And yet, she somehow seemed more honest when saying things that were completely untrue than some people were when they spoke the complete truth.
Shishi leaned his head on his hand, trying to rub away the headache that was slowly forming due to lack of sleep.
"What are you doing out here, dimwit? You should be sleeping!"
Her gravelly voice made him jump, straightening up automatically.
"I'm not tired." He was well aware of how much he sounded like a petulant child, but he couldn't help it. Dammit, he had several centuries on her…why did he have to feel like the child?
"Heh. And I'm not old."
She was right, of course. He was exhausted.
But he couldn't very well admit that now.
So he twisted his lips into a pout she couldn't even see and waited for her to make him leave.
What he got instead was a long silence, followed by a sigh.
"Dimwit."
He started to scowl, but was brought up short by the feel of something soft being draped around his shoulders.
"Get some sleep, prettyboy."
Did she have to keep calling him that?
"I'll be getting you up at the crack of dawn."
Dammit.
After what seemed like several hundred years, the end of their training finally drew near.
Despite what had felt like ages of making no progress whatsoever, everyone had improved tremendously.
Shishi had been able to improve the strength of his Chorus of a Thousand Skulls attack about tenfold, and started calling it the Chorus of Ten Thousand Skulls.
Touya improved upon is newly discovered energy draining technique, naming it Ice Absorption. Jin had had learned Tornado Fist Explosion. Suzuka strengthened his Rainbow Cyclone technique until it colored most of the sky when he used it. Chu developed a headbutt that could shatter mountains. And Rinku did, in fact, master his toe-yo-yos.
So when Kurama returned for them, they were ready for him.
"And how are my fighters doing?" he asked Genkai when he arrived.
"Better than when you dropped them off, that's for sure. With any luck, they'll all be over a hundred thousand of whatever the hell you use to measure power levels in Demon World. If they're not, it's not my fault." She glanced over at them, and Shishi could have sworn that her gaze lingered on him.
Which didn't even begin to be fair. He was still stronger than both Rinku and Suzuka, he was sure of it. Couldn't she at least acknowledge that?
"Seems like it," said Kurama amiably. "Shall we go, then?"
"Bye, dimwits. Try not to get yourselves killed right away." With that, Genkai turned with a half wave and walked back into the temple.
Arriving at Yomi's palace was a relief, despite the fact that Shishi didn't care one whit for Demon World politics.
Well, he hadn't cared at all—though it didn't take all that long after they'd arrived for the Urameshi boy to go and make things a little more interesting. He still didn't care enough to declare himself on the boy's side, but he didn't have any particular loyalty to Yomi either. "Undecided" had seemed a perfectly valid response under those circumstances, though certain others on his team hadn't seemed to think so.
Still, Urameshi's idea had proved wildly popular among essentially everyone else, and Shishi had eventually signed on for the Demon World Tournament.
Not because he had any interest whatsoever in becoming the next ruler of Demon World—no, what he wanted was the chance to show off some of his hard earned power against some strong opponents.
Well, that, and, if he was honest with himself (which he was having a much harder time avoiding lately), he could really use the distraction.
At least now he didn't have to face her every day, pretending he wasn't a lovesick puppy dog, but still…nothing he'd tried had been able to keep his thoughts away from the temple on the mountain and the woman who lived there.
Because of course it was a good idea to go into potential life-and-death situations when you couldn't get your head on straight…
Shishi planted his face firmly in his palm.
"An' wha' be your problem?" asked a familiar Irish brogue behind him.
"Nothing whatsoever," said Shishi, raising his head again and pretending to be his normal, arrogant self.
"Ye be worried about the preliminaries?"
"No," said Shishi, truthfully, for once. He hadn't had a chance.
Jin cocked his head to the side and stared at him for a moment.
"Aye…an' then why be your wind all mixed up and confused?"
"None of your business," snapped the shorter demon, stalking off.
Damn Jin and his perceptiveness. Why couldn't he be either oblivious or respectful of his privacy, like the others?
The preliminary round was harder than he expected, but he got through it.
Unfortunately, that did him little good, since it took him almost no time at all to be defeated in the first round.
And by being tied up with someone's neck! Ew.
Still, it was hardly the most embarrassing defeat he'd ever suffered…
He shook his head, hard.
He was NOT thinking about her!
"Are you quite all right?"
He glanced over.
Oh, seriously.
Was he being so obvious now that even Touya was asking about it? What next? Was Chu going to start spontaneously offering him advice about girls? He didn't think he could survive the indignity.
"Fine," he snapped, walking away.
Still…if he could think of exactly what to ask…some advice might not be a bad idea.
What did he want?
Shishiwakamaru was sitting outside the stadium, no longer caring which of the competitors won.
He'd warmed up to the idea of asking for advice…but…
How the hell was he supposed to ask anyone about anything when he had no idea what he was asking for?
What did he want?
Did he want to simply stop being hopelessly in love with someone who would never love him back?
He should say yes. But he couldn't.
Shishi sighed deeply.
"What is it?"
Shishi didn't even bother to look up this time. Kurama's voice was recognizable enough.
"Nothing." He couldn't even work up the enthusiasm to snap at him.
Kurama didn't leave. Shishi could feel his eyes boring holes in him, and he didn't care.
Finally, the fox spoke.
"You were off your game for the whole tournament. You should have been able to do better. So what is it that's distracting you?"
"Why do you care?" asked Shishi, sullenly.
Kurama chuckled.
"Perhaps I still feel some responsibility for you as part of my team. Or perhaps it's simply curiosity…you have been remarkably single-minded in the past."
That earned him a glance. Single-minded? That was probably his polite term for "bull-headed idiot."
Still, maybe he could learn something of value…if he could figure out what to ask for.
"I was wondering…about human customs."
Kurama's eyebrows rose at that.
"A sudden interest in cultural anthropology caused your distraction?"
Shishi just scowled.
The fox sat on the step next to him.
"What were you interested in, specifically?"
Shishi's mouth went dry. What was he supposed to say now?
"I was…wondering about…human relationships," he muttered. As a matter of purely academic interest, of course.
Kurama was silent for too long, so he risked a glance over.
He wished he hadn't.
The fox's eyebrows had completely disappeared into his hair, and his eyes held a mixture of surprise and calculation.
"So…you want to know about dating?"
Shishi nodded. He wasn't entirely sure that was what he was asking about, but his mouth was too dry to talk.
"Very well."
Shishi learned a lot that day, but whether any of it counted as useful he still wasn't sure.
Well, at least he now knew that "dating" referred to a social outing involving a prospective couple, and that the objective was to get to know the other person and find out if they were anything like a good match. Kurama even gave him some pointers on how to act in such a situation, despite the purely academic nature of the question.
Kurama even continued his lecture on to include such topics as proposals and wedding traditions, which Shishi thought a waste of time. After all, it wasn't like he wanted to marry her!
Not that he knew what he did want…
Through it all, Kurama emphasized that what worked for one couple didn't work for another, and that part of becoming a successful couple was working out what worked and what didn't.
Still, almost all of what he said seemed to apply to human teenagers or young adults…which made sense, since that was how long he'd been a human.
"Did that satisfy your curiosity?"
Shishi blinked, and then remembered that he was supposed to say something.
"I suppose that was satisfactory," he said, falling back into his normal patterns of speech as he stood and turned to walk away.
But something stopped him.
"And…" He grimaced. "Thank you."
He didn't want to say it.
But the instant he had started to walk off, he had heard Genkai's gravelly, beautiful voice shouting in his head, calling him an "ungrateful bastard".
Dammit.
He went back to the Human World.
What choice did he have? Either way, he was going to hear her voice telling him to stop being an asshole, and he found that he rather preferred her real voice.
But when he had gotten almost to the top of the stairs to her temple, his steps slowed to a halt.
What was he doing here?
No, seriously. He might have stayed here for interminable months while training, but he hardly had the right to just come whenever he felt like it.
But where else would he go?
So he stood there.
"Planning to just stand there all day, dimwit?"
The sound of her voice actually made him crack a smile. He hadn't realized how much he missed it.
And, pressed for an answer, he took a page out of Hiei's book.
"I was hoping to spar with you," he said closing his eyes to go with his smile, and spreading a hand rather grandly…for form's sake.
"Hrmph. You think you've gotten any better at all than you were last time I beat your face into the ground?"
No.
Out loud, of course, he only said "We'll see," as his smile grew wider.
"Chorus of a Thousand Skulls!"
"Hrmph, you think that's going to work better than it did last time?"
Without bothering to answer, Shishi took the opportunity to leap over her, sword crackling with energy.
"Oh, seriously, you already know what's going to happen!" Genkai stepped forward and clasped the Banshee Shriek between her wrinkled hands.
"Spirit Reflection BLAST!"
By the last word, her voice had changed, losing its gravelly edge.
The wave of energy knocked him backwards, throwing him down on the ground.
And before him stood Young Genkai, pink hair blowing in the breeze.
Their gazes met and locked, holding for too long.
"You…did that on purpose," said the young woman, slowly.
Shishi couldn't respond.
"You just wanted to see my young self again."
He absolutely could not interpret her voice. Was it annoyance? Flattery? Anger? Confusion? Resignation? Was she offended? Pleased? What?
But in any case…
"No."
Genkai blinked. "No what?"
Shishi forced his voice out through vocal cords that felt like sandpaper.
"No, not…just. I thought…you might…like it."
Genkai stared at him, her expression changing slightly, but to something equally uninterpretable.
Shishiwakamaru stared at the ground while Genkai stared at him, until Shishi started to wish that he hadn't escaped from that giant demon that had eaten him.
Finally, something like a dry chuckle escaped Genkai's lips, sounding more like the Genkai he had come to know.
"You weren't kidding."
Shishi glanced up, just long enough to register that the still-young face had taken on an expression of wonder, and…was she maybe, just a little, flattered?
She sat down across from him, chin resting on her palm.
"When you said you had fallen in love with me, I assumed it was just something you said to make yourself feel better about suffering such an embarrassing defeat."
"It was," muttered Shishi. "…then."
Genkai's eyebrows rose.
"'Then'?"
The silence stretched out, and Genkai spoke again.
"You do realize that I can't look like this all the time, don't you? Or are you more of a dimwit than I gave you credit for?"
"I know," said Shishi. "I don't care."
They sat in silence for a few more minutes, until Genkai's extra energy faded. Her hair returned to its usual pale, pinkish-gray, her skin wrinkled again, and her voice regained its gravelly edge.
Shishi finally looked up and met her gaze.
Genkai looked at him long and hard, and then shook her head.
Shishi dropped his eyes, defeated. What had he really hoped to accomplish?
"Well, don't just sit there. If you're going to do this, you'd better do it properly."
Shishi looked up again in shock. Genkai was standing, staring down at him, hands on her hips.
She looked like her usual, cantankerous self…but was that a hint of flattery?
"Well?"
Shishi scrambled to his feet, mentally thanking Kurama with all his might.
"Would you care to accompany me to dinner?"
"Hmph. Not like I have anything better to do. Lead the way, Shishi."
Since neither one was particularly keen on taking a train into town, they stayed in to eat, with Yukina (who had gotten quite good at cooking) making them dinner.
"So," said Genkai as she settled into the chair that Shishiwakamaru had graciously pulled out for her, "I must say I'm rather curious. Why me?" Her brow furrowed in confusion.
"Hn, you think I haven't asked myself the same question?" scoffed Shishi, taking his own seat.
"No, I just wondered if you'd come up with an answer," she said. "Though, on second thought, I really didn't think you had the self-awareness to wonder something like that."
"That was your doing. After suffering such an embarrassing defeat, I had to…re-evaluate my life."
"Oh, really? And what did you learn?"
"Mainly that I was a selfish, arrogant bastard who didn't know how to be honest with himself."
Genkai's eyebrows rose. "Looks like you managed to fix that last one, at least."
"Perhaps."
"The rest of them, not so much."
Shishi glanced over.
"So then…why did you agree?"
"I told you, I had nothing better to do." She glanced down at her plate, and then looked up with a sardonic grin. "Besides, it's been a very long time since anyone's taken any sort of interest in me. I might as well enjoy it while it lasts."
Shishi had no answer to that. He wanted to say that it wasn't like that, but…how could he be sure it wasn't?
"Also," continued Genkai, "you never answered my question. Why the hell would you pick me to fanboy over? It's not like you don't have other options."
"You make it sound like I had some choice in the matter."
"Mm-hm. Spill it, prettyboy."
Shishi pressed his lips together.
"You're…everything I'm not."
"What, an old human woman to your young demon man?"
"That's not what I meant. Besides, I'm older than you."
"Pff. In years, maybe, but that doesn't mean much to a demon's lifespan. I'm far closer to the end of my life than you are, and you know it. And that's not even counting the fact that I've already died once." There was an odd note in her voice.
Shishi winced, and then blinked.
"What…was that?"
"What was what? Don't tell me you didn't know about the whole dying-and-coming-back-to-life thing. My own student's done it twice as often."
"I did know that, as it happens. Actually, I was wondering what you were thinking when you said that. You sounded…disappointed."
"Don't tell me you've gone and grown a hint of perceptiveness, too," Genkai scoffed.
"Let's just say I've found a new application for my skills of reputation enhancement. But that doesn't change the fact that I'm right. You…did you really want to die?"
Genkai was silent for a very long moment, swirling her cup of tea absently.
"It would be more accurate to say that I didn't want to come back to life."
"Why? Who wouldn't want a second chance?"
"I didn't NEED a second chance!"
She slammed both palms again the table, sloshing her soup onto the tablecloth.
"I had already done everything in my life that I needed to do. I was finished. And then poof, there I am again. What the hell was I supposed to do? I'd spent fifty years trying to get closure for Toguro, and I'd finally managed to succeed through Yusuke. What the hell was I supposed to do with my life after that?"
The silence stretched out again, this time heavier than before, until Genkai broke it again with a sigh.
"What am I complaining for? I have a chance other people would kill to have. I might as well make the best of it."
"That's how Kurama convinced you to train us."
Genkai gave him a long look, and then let out a breath that might have been a chuckle in a previous life.
"Perhaps it is. The temptation of purpose is a powerful one indeed."
"So it is."
She gave him a sidelong look that turned into a puzzled frown.
"Don't tell me he pulled the same spiel on you."
"Heh. He didn't even have to."
"And what did you have to run from? Don't tell me all your fans abandoned you over one little utter defeat?"
"In fact, most of them didn't. But like I said, you forced me to re-evaluate my priorities. After that… Well, I just didn't find being a big star quite as…fulfilling as I had anticipated."
"Heh," Genkai chuckled. "You and me both, kid."
Shishi scowled. "I'm not a kid, thank you."
"Forgive me, I obviously meant to say 'prettyboy', prettyboy."
Shishi rolled his eyes and let it go. Arguing the point would be too much effort.
"So," said Genkai after a moment. "You can stick around if you like, if you're willing to pull your weight around here. Helpful as Yukina is, I'm just not as young as I used to be. You know where your old bunk is." One corner of her mouth curled up. "You must be rather tired after giving me all that energy earlier."
Shishi twisted his lips. "I'm fine."
"Mm-hm. " She stood and picked up both of their empty dishes. "Get some sleep, prettyboy."
Shishi lay in his bunk, staring at the ceiling.
Well.
It had certainly been quite a day.
He really was exhausted, but his eyes wouldn't close.
Whatever he had been expecting, he was pretty sure this wasn't it. Rather than being rejected out of hand, he had been more or less welcomed back, and even given the chance he had so desperately hoped for.
A chance at what, exactly?
Shishi rolled over, letting one arm flop rather ungracefully over the edge of the bed, not even bothering to try to answer himself.
Genkai.
She'd been going through her own personal hell right in front of him, and he'd barely even noticed.
Why the hell had she been alone? Wasn't there anyone she could have turned to? Why hadn't somebody noticed?
But as he stared at the ground, he found that he knew the answer.
It was much the same as his own.
Genkai was a very private person, so there were very few people she might be willing to confide in—and those few were probably too precious to her for her to burden with her own troubles.
Besides, who could understand a problem like hers?
You did.
Shishi rolled over again feeling a strange warmth somewhere deep in his chest.
Well.
He was back now, and that was enough.