Yuu Yuu Hakusho Fanfiction BookstoreArmageddon: World's End chapter 4 by Kristin Huntsman Armageddon: Worlds' End part 4 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- New moon, same story. At least we have a slight breather between battles; it always takes the lords of the Makai a little while to get together another regiment to send after us. Unless they've gotten better at recruitment, we have a few more days. So for now, we rest. Our new hiding place is far away from the old, far away from the concentration camp where Botan is held. This place, too, is silent and peaceful. Or it will be until they find us. I look around. This place reminds me of Genkai's temple. It should; we're in the mountains near it. The hottest part of a summer day is upon us, and we rest near a cool stream. The buzzing of cicadas drones us into a semi-trance state; it's too hot to do anything.... Kurama opens his green eyes slowly and gracefully stands. On silent feet, he walks over to the stream and splashes water on his face. Then he shrugs off his shirt and dips it in the stream so that he may cool himself with it. Urameshi and I are startled out of our apathy by what we see. Wrapping around Kurama's right arm, curling down from his shoulder and twining around his arm several times, are the markings of a black dragon. He has Hiei's Ensatsu Kokuryuha?! Urameshi and I look at each other, startled. Apparently Hiei gave Kurama more than just his youki; his powers were included in his final gift to his soulmate. Kurama shrugs his damp shirt back on, innocent of our stares, and softly pads back to his place in the shade. "Kurama--" I say, but am cut off by a sharp cracking sound. The three of us instantly snap out of our drowsy waiting and grab hold of our weapons. Urameshi remains hidden in the branches of the tree he was sitting in, a knife in each hand, ready to throw. Kurama silently slides his staff out to full extension and locks it into place. I grab my sword, and both he and I flatten ourselves against tree trunks, ready, waiting. Simmering kekkai surround the three of us, in subtly tinted translucence. Mine glows gold, Urameshi's blue... and Kurama's swirls in intricate patterns of black and green. Long minutes pass as we wait for our attacker to draw nearer. There is only one; I can sense him, and the direction from which he approaches. I catch Kurama's eyes, and silently indicate that the hunter will pass between our two trees. He nods, and we prepare ourselves. I reach out with my mind, and touch the hunter. Odd... he doesn't feel like a youkai... in fact, he feels... human? As he steps closer, Kurama springs from behind the tree, and directs his feral blow towards the intruder's stomach. Where it is neatly blocked by another staff. Kurama looks at his opponent. His eyes widen. "Shuuichi-kun?" he asks. "Oniisan?" They stare at each other for a second, obviously not having expected to run into one another this way. Then Kurama gives a short laugh, and pulls his younger brother into an embrace. The four of us sit and talk. Shuuichi knows about his brother's true name and nature; when the Makai started invading the Ningenkai, Kurama had no choice but to reveal himself in the defense of his family. Around then, though, things had been so hectic that what they would have been unable to comprehend just a few months before they had accepted almost without question. Shuuichi had even begun a little training of his Rei powers before the final battle at Genkai's temple, when Kurama had made the deal with Yomi that kept his family safe. "How are Kaasan and Tousan?" Kurama asks. "Alive," Shuuichi replies. "Or at least they were when I left. They've adjusted well to being in the Makai City; Kaasan has charge of the gardens there, and Tousan keeps the city running smoothly." "And you?" Kurama wants to know. Shuuichi's eyes harden. "I trained with their army. I became strong, and then I left, looking for you." "Why?" "I want to fight alongside you. I hate the Makai for what they've done to the Ningenkai." Kurama shakes his head. "Impossible. Do you think I traded my powers for your life just so you can go and waste it, getting yourself killed?" "Your powers seem to be in good working order," his brother observes. "I saw that kekkai around you earlier." Only Kurama's eyes betray his pain at the reminder. "My powers are gone; those were Hiei's." "Hiei?" Shuuichi looks around and fails to spot Hiei. "Where...?" "Dead," Urameshi says for Kurama. "Kurama's right. He's already lost his best friend from our battles; he shouldn't have to lose his only brother as well." "I'm going to fight the Makai, with or without you guys," Shuuichi retorts. "I stand a much better chance of surviving if I'm with you, though. Give me a chance." Kurama's eyes harden, and I sense that he's about to be as stubborn as his brother. "You hate the Makai?" he asks softly. "You hate youkai? You want to kill us for what we've done to the Ningenkai?" His form shimmers whitely, and when it clears, his youko body has taken the place of his human one. "Would you kill me?" he asks Shuuichi in a voice that sounds nothing like his human voice. It's much deeper than the light tenor he usually speaks in, and far more authoritative. "After all, I'm a youkai, and if not for a twist of fate, I'd have been helping to take over *your* world." I wonder if Shuuichi will pass this testing. Shuuichi stares at him. He's never seen Kurama as a youko before, never seen the attitude change that occurs when Kurama shifts bodies. Finally, he speaks, saying "This isn't you, Oniisan." "This is very much me," Kurama replies. "More so than you could ever imagine." "Maybe once, but not now," Shuuichi says quietly, and I sense a wisdom beyond his fourteen years. "This isn't who you are anymore." Kurama pauses, then smiles at his brother's cleverness. His form shimmers again, and returns to being human. "So what are you good at?" Urameshi asks. Kurama gives him a look, and he shrugs. "I tracked the four of you here, didn't I?" Shuuichi asks. "I'm okay with a staff, and I can make Rei blasts." "Kurama?" Urameshi asks. Kurama looks at Shuuichi, his eyes steady on his younger brother's. "Don't throw your life away," he asks. "I don't have a life," Shuuichi quietly replies. "It was destroyed two years ago." Kurama studies him for a second longer, then sighs softly. "You've grown up, Shuuichi. I can't force you to go home, so you might as well be with us, where I can keep an eye on you." Shuuichi's face lights up. Obviously, he hadn't expected Kurama to agree. "Arigato, Shuu-on... Kuram...." He flounders, not knowing what to call his brother. "Either," Kurama reassures him. "Come on, let's see if we can find something that'll make a good dinner." Getting up, the two Shuuichis nod to Urameshi and me, and head to a shady pool a little ways downstream, one that seems like it might hold fish. "Think this'll be good for him?" I ask Urameshi. "Kurama? Probably. I don't see how it could be bad..." he replies. We watch as Kurama and Shuuichi search the shadows for fish. Kurama asks something that I can't quite hear, and Shuuichi grins. Kurama's body spins down into its kitsune form, and Shuuichi kneels on the ground, watching as Kurama carefully moves forward into the pool. With the flash of a silver paw, Kurama scoops a fish out of the water. It lands on the shore, flopping around, and Shuuichi hurridly catches it before it can flop itself back into the water. Kurama turns, and even from this distance, I see his liquid gold fox eyes as he looks at me, and I know that something like this moment will never happen again in his lifetime. A painful sadness settles in my chest, for I know in that moment that destiny will soon come knocking on all of our doors. That night, Kurama holds watch, but I can't sleep. I get up instead, sitting down across the fire from him. Kurama sits patiently on his heels, eyes closed, listening to the night. I take the chance to examine him in the faint flickering light of the dark fire. His clothing loses color, but his face is cast in an eerie blue glow from a source I can't identify. It looks like black light, almost. I glance at the fire. Nah, couldn't be. Slowly, his eyes open, the same non-color as his clothes. We sit in mutual silence for a while, the only sounds the soft, distant gurgling of the stream, and the sound his braid makes as it brushes the ground. I watch the silent black flames dancing in the darkness for a while before I speak. "It's coming soon, isn't it?" Kurama looks into the fire, and raises a hand to caress a flickering tendril of flame. It doesn't burn him. "Yes." "When? How soon?" I ask. I have to know. We need to prepare. "Soon. Very soon." I sigh in slight frustration. I know Kurama can't give me a date, but it's irritating. "Do you know anything else?" Kurama frowns. "... Yes," he says finally. "What?" Kurama doesn't answer, but merely reaches out his hand to the fire again. As he touches it, it becomes the same glowing blue as the light cast upon him. The same color as Hiei's Jyagan, I realize with a start. Inside the blue fire, a picture begins to form. A battlefield, filled with corpses. Hundreds? Thousands? All youkai, certainly. Except-- As my field of vision is swept past the bodies, it suddenly stops, and focuses in on one in particular. "Shuuichi?" I ask, horrified. Kurama's brother? This.... "There's more," he murmurs, and guides the focus of the picture a few feet away. I don't recognize him for a second, because he's in his youko body, but when I figure it out, I'm horrified. "You mean--" I stutter disbelievingly. "Shuuichi and I are both going to die in the forthcoming battle," he says calmly, with absolute surety. He draws his hand out of the fire, and the blue light fades entirely. "I don't know about you and Yuusuke, though. I can't see past my own death. The two of you may survive." "But you and Shuuichi...." Kurama frowns. "I won't let him get involved in this battle," he says firmly. "I'll make him go, somehow. As for me...." He shrugs slightly. "I'm willing to die, if that's what it'll take." "I'm so sorry, Kurama," I say, upset. Then I try to deny what I saw. "There has to be another way, another path...!" "No," he says. "It's like Hiei said - I chose my own path. I chose my own death." "You think you can be with him again if you die?" I ask. "Is that why you're giving up?" "I'm not giving up, Kuwabara-kun," he replies. "I'm being realistic. And... and yes, I hope I can be with him again that way." His voice is quiet, serious, and full of heartache. I can't find it in myself to try to talk him into avoiding the battle, not if it will give him what he wants so badly. He watches me carefully. "You'll survive," he says, laying a hand on my shoulder. "You have to survive. You need to build a new world, Kuwabara-kun. You need to do it for those of us who can't." "I just wish you were going to be there," I say, looking into his piercing eyes. "I know," he assures me. "I know." A little while later, I make my way back to my blankets and lie down. I clutch Yukina's pendant in my hand. Maybe, I think, if I just wish hard enough, Kurama won't have to leave me, too. I spend all night wishing, until I finally fall asleep. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Author's Message: The history behind Armageddon is that in the first part, it started out as a simple descriptive writing exercise. Then I wanted a twist on it, so it changed to be Kuwabara looking at them instead of me. Then it needed a deeper reason for why the scene was so sad (and why the hell Hiei was actually holding still long enough to sleep,) so it became a war story that refused to behave itself and end in three parts or so. Please send comments to my true address (not this borrowed one,) 71411.1046@compuserve.com. << chapter 3 chapter 5 >> back to Conflicts >> undefined undefined More... undefined [Close] undefined [Close] undefined