Disclaimer: I don't own Yu Yu Hakusho, but I wish I owned Kurama... takes
a moment to drool over what would happen if she did and I wouldn't mind
owning Karasu... Yes, my mind is a dark and scary place... at least
according to most of my friends.
This is my first semi-darkish fic (with the exception of Fallen Angel, my Cowboy Bebop fic), so please go easy on me with your reviews. Takes place after series, Kurama is in college.
Kurama walked out of the small apartment, locking the door behind him. He yawned after yet another night of nightmares. The lack of sleep was beginning to affect him visibly as well now. His fair skin was marred by slightly darkened circles under his eyes. Not enough for people to question him because people usually just assumed it was college life, but he noticed. He had planned to spend that night, after classes, relaxing.
He decided that if it came down to it, he would just have to make a potion for a dreamless sleep; he really was hoping to avoid that though. He had seen the effects of even a few dreamless nights on others, and it was not something he wanted to go through. Some became very distant from the world, almost as if their waking life was a dream that they were just gliding through, unaware of anything going on around them. Others suffered more severe effects though. Instead of their life becoming a dream, it was their nightmare; sometimes it became the one they had been trying to avoid while sleeping. He did not want to become either of those. But if the nightmares did not stop, he was afraid he might even without the potion.
This was why he planned to spend the night relaxing. He was almost praying that the nightmares had been due to stress and just spreading himself too thin, with his classes in college and working to pay his rent and buy food. He had been offered room and board with his college scholarship, but he needed more privacy than a college dorm could provide, especially with a roommate.
As he walked out the door of the apartment complex, Kurama took a deep breath, attempting to clear his head. He had about an hour or so before his first class of the day, and he did not want to waste it indoors. He decided to visit the gardens on campus. Letting his mind wander, he was unable to stop it from going back the nightmare, the same and yet different every time. It always started out the same, the phantom pain from the long-healed injuries caused by Karasu during their battle at the Dark Tournament. Then, as he would lie on the ground, bleeding, Karasu would turn his back to him and the image would shift ever so slightly. Karasu would stand just a bit different, his outline would waver and a change would take place... but from the distance it was barely noticeable. With Kurama's sharp eyes, even after watching numerous times in the past few weeks since the dream had begun, he still could not quite determine what exactly the change was, just that there was one... From that point on, things were different every time, save one small fact; Karasu did not speak at all until Kurama woke in the same cold sweat every night.
But tonight's dream had ended much differently. Karasu still hadn't spoken, but now Kurama wasn't even sure if the second figure was Karasu at all. In previous dreams, it had always continued from that distance, but this time, the figure had approached him. The walk had more of a sway in the hips than Karasu's, and when he saw the face... It was not Karasu's face. Yes, it was similar, but not his. In fact, this face was far more feminine, the eyes were... not necessarily kinder, but they were much less cold and cruel. This person had also been much shorter than Karasu. 'No,' Kurama concluded. 'This person is not Karasu... but then who is she?'
When he entered the gardens, he went over and sat on his favorite bench... located near the roses. He decided to try to occupy his mind with observing the other people in the garden. A couple sitting in the grass, another up on the hill, yet another locked together at the mouth on a bench a little ways away, and a single person sitting on a bench facing away from him. Why did this person draw his attention? 'Probably because they're the only other one not staring into another person's eyes...' he answered himself. But there /I something different about this person. The person was dressed in all black with long black hair, not exactly uncommon in Japan. But was that a glimpse of red fabric? 'Calm down, Kurama. That dream is making you paranoid.' He looked away just as he noticed the figure standing up, not wanting to be caught staring. So, he, instead, attempted to deeply involve himself in examining a nearby blossom. That is, until a still shadow blocked his light. He slowly turned his head, almost afraid of what he would see.
"K-Karasu," he managed to make the words come out not sounding too strangled. He sat transfixed by the specter from his dream.
The eyes, the only part of the face visible over the mask, squinted slightly in a smile, and a feminine voice spoke, "No, that would be my brother. But people often get us confused. Is this seat taken?"
Kurama could not make his mouth form words so he just shook his head vaguely, earning another, assumed, smile. The woman, he could now tell by her figure, sat beside him on the bench.
"So, you've met my brother and survived?" she continued. "I don't mean to be offensive, but how? You look like someone he'd take an... 'interest' in."
Lack of sleep was taking its toll on Kurama's composure. "I-... I'd really rather not relive it." He could not stop staring at her. He eyes were definitely the ones from last night's dream, and her clothes... The red scarf around her neck made the whole outfit very unnerving, especially coupled with the mask over her nose and mouth.
"Oh, alright. I just thought it was rather odd... Oh, how rude of me, I'm Mitsukai," she held out a black-gloved hand. "I just transferred from Osaka." Noticing his hesitation to take her hand, she tried to reassure him. "Don't worry, I'm nothing like my onii-chan."
With that little bit of prompting, he was able to take hold of her hand with a decent grip. "Shuuichi Minamino."
"Nice to meet you, Minamino-san," she smiled again. At least, Kurama was pretty sure she was smiling.
"So, um... What's your major?" Kurama asked, trying to be friendly.
"Nuclear physics, and I minor in bio-chemistry."
"Really? I double majored in botany and bio-chemistry," he saw that they had something in common.
"A double major? Well, I can see that you have an interest in biology," she laughed slightly.
"You could say that," he gave a small smile. "And I can't exactly say that I'm surprised by your choices."
"Yes, shocking aren't they?" They sat in uncomfortable silence for a few minutes before Mitsukai spoke again. "Gomen ne, but I just can't stop thinking about it. Why did my brother let someone as pretty as you live?"
"You don't know? I'm sorry to tell you, but I killed him," he said softly, half expecting to hear a number of explosions any minute. He most definitely was not expecting to hear her laughing. "What's funny?"
"You couldn't possibly have killed him," she said between breathing deeply, trying to stop laughing. "You certainly don't have the level of reiki strength. When was your encounter with my I dear /I brother?"
"A few years ago. I watched my plant drain his blood," he said, but then thought 'So, I passed out for a moment. No one else said anything about his body getting up and leaving.'
"Well, for one thing, he's an Immortal, as in: he can't possibly die. The same goes for me, but anyway the other reason, which completely blows your statement out the window is: I saw him last week and spoke to him only this morning." This revelation sent renewed waves of fear coursing though Kurama.
"You must be joking me. I watched him die," he did not mean for it to come out quite so desperate sounding as it did. He took a deep breath to calm himself. "I'm sorry, I haven't been sleeping well recently." He did not know why he was telling her this, but for some reason, it made him feel a bit better, eased his mind on the matter a bit.
"Really? I have been having some rather odd dreams lately, but I most definitely know for a fact that Karasu is alive and well. Maybe not mentally well, he never was all that normal, but he is fine, physically." She glanced as the large clock on the building at one end of the garden and gasped. "Oh, damn, I'm going to be really late for class if I don't get moving. Sorry, maybe we can talk another time." She hurriedly gathered her bag and raced off in a blur before Kurama could utter another word. Then, he realized, he was about be just as late as she, and he could not move quite that fast.
He swore and ran in the same direction she had been going. He had started out being early and ended up being late. He slipped into the lecture hall to see students filing up to the front and sighed in relief, hoping to be able to just slide in unnoticed and turn in the thesis paper due that day. When he got to the front, he put the paper on the pile and smiled as pleasantly as he could at the teacher but wound up gritting his teeth for a second when asked, "And where were you when class began 5 minutes before you came in?"
"I was delayed. The door to my apartment was jammed this morning," he replied smoothly. He had waited a beat before answering, so it didn't seem like he was making up and excuse, and he had looked the teacher in the eye, unblinkingly. He knew how to lie very well. It saddened him slightly that he had perfected his lying skills on his mother when he was younger. But that was partially true; his door had gotten stuck earlier that morning. 'The best lies are 75% truth... or some such nonsense.' "It must have been this recent humidity that caused the wood to expand. Sumimasen, Professor."
"Right, right, take your seat," The professor simply went back to collecting theses.
When Kurama took his seat in one of the upper rows, he put his forehead in his palms and closed his eyes, telling himself to stay awake. Of course, the lights went out for the presentation shortly followed by his consciousness. The fog rolled in and a familiar figured stepped toward him. Kurama was standing in a vast expanse of nothing, but somehow, there was solid ground under his feet. For a moment, he thought the figure before him to be Karasu, but the mists cleared a bit and he took an odd feeling of comfort and relief in seeing that it was Mitsukai. But that feeling was quickly washed away by dread when she reached up and removed the mask from her face.
"I suppose you will have to stop me from breathing, then, " she seemed to be taunting him. But he knew she was right in a sense. If he died in the dream realm, he would die in the real world. So, he did the first thing that came to his head, besides 'Run, you fool!' He covered her mouth... with his. Her lips tasted sweet, like honeysuckle and her scent reminded him of sakura blossoms and lavender. It vaguely registered that he should not be able to taste or smell in this world, but at the moment, he didn't care. His tongue licked at he lips, begging entrance, which she immediately granted. He plunged into the depths of her mouth, tasting all he could. At the same time, his arms had found their way around her body and he crushed her to him. Her right arm went up around his neck, under his hair; the fingers of her left hand became entwined within the red tresses. Kurama's hands wound through he dark locks and wandered over her back, traveling down to the curve of her lower back. Suddenly, he heard a sharp gasp as she was roughly torn from his arms. He looked up to see her struggling against the steely grip of Karasu.
"Let go of her!" he yelled at the creature that had haunted his dreams for far too long.
"If I cannot have you, my little fox, no one can, not even my dear little sister," Karasu laughed both at his silly demand and the futile struggles of his captive sibling. He then held his blood-red claws to her neck and before Kurama could take a step toward him, he slit her throat at the jugular vein and dropped her to the ground at his feet. He appeared behind Kurama and- prodded him with a pencil eraser.
"Wha..." he crack one eye open.
"I said, class is over, you can wake up now," spoke the voice of the woman he had watched die in his dream. She was the one poking him with a pencil. "Looks like you missed all the notes too, huh?"
"Too? What do you mean?" he asked, becoming a bit more awake. He was surprised to find that he actually felt rested, despite the nature and ending of the dream.
"I dozed off about 3 seconds after I sat down," she grinned. "But I got someone to let me copy theirs, care to join me?"
"S-sure, I suppose so," he said. Normally, he would have declined such an offer, but he had a feeling she had some idea what was going on with his dreams for some odd reason or another. "You fell asleep? Did you have any interesting dreams?"
"As a matter of fact, I did and I was quite enjoying it until somebody threw an eraser at my head..." she trailed of grumpily. "What about you?"
"Yes, mine was rather odd, but it turned into a nightmare..." Why did he keep telling her these things?! So, he attempted to turn the conversation in another direction. "When do want to get together to finish those notes?"
"Have you got any free time today?" she seemed rather hopeful.
"I'm taking tonight off from work, so I'll be free the rest of the day after 1 o'clock. What time is good for you?" he told her, relaxing just a hair.
"This is my only class today. Let's say the campus café about 1:15?" she suggested.
"Alright, I'll give you my cell number, just in case." He ripped off a piece of notebook paper and quickly wrote the number for her.
"Right, here's mine," she offered him the small slip of paper. Oddly enough, his was neater than hers. "You'd better get going, or you'll be late for your next class as well."
"See you at the café," Kurama called behind him as he hurried off.
Next chapter: A visitor in the café. "My, my, I come to surprise my little sister, I get my own surprise. I had no idea this day would turn out so well."
This is my first semi-darkish fic (with the exception of Fallen Angel, my Cowboy Bebop fic), so please go easy on me with your reviews. Takes place after series, Kurama is in college.
Kurama walked out of the small apartment, locking the door behind him. He yawned after yet another night of nightmares. The lack of sleep was beginning to affect him visibly as well now. His fair skin was marred by slightly darkened circles under his eyes. Not enough for people to question him because people usually just assumed it was college life, but he noticed. He had planned to spend that night, after classes, relaxing.
He decided that if it came down to it, he would just have to make a potion for a dreamless sleep; he really was hoping to avoid that though. He had seen the effects of even a few dreamless nights on others, and it was not something he wanted to go through. Some became very distant from the world, almost as if their waking life was a dream that they were just gliding through, unaware of anything going on around them. Others suffered more severe effects though. Instead of their life becoming a dream, it was their nightmare; sometimes it became the one they had been trying to avoid while sleeping. He did not want to become either of those. But if the nightmares did not stop, he was afraid he might even without the potion.
This was why he planned to spend the night relaxing. He was almost praying that the nightmares had been due to stress and just spreading himself too thin, with his classes in college and working to pay his rent and buy food. He had been offered room and board with his college scholarship, but he needed more privacy than a college dorm could provide, especially with a roommate.
As he walked out the door of the apartment complex, Kurama took a deep breath, attempting to clear his head. He had about an hour or so before his first class of the day, and he did not want to waste it indoors. He decided to visit the gardens on campus. Letting his mind wander, he was unable to stop it from going back the nightmare, the same and yet different every time. It always started out the same, the phantom pain from the long-healed injuries caused by Karasu during their battle at the Dark Tournament. Then, as he would lie on the ground, bleeding, Karasu would turn his back to him and the image would shift ever so slightly. Karasu would stand just a bit different, his outline would waver and a change would take place... but from the distance it was barely noticeable. With Kurama's sharp eyes, even after watching numerous times in the past few weeks since the dream had begun, he still could not quite determine what exactly the change was, just that there was one... From that point on, things were different every time, save one small fact; Karasu did not speak at all until Kurama woke in the same cold sweat every night.
But tonight's dream had ended much differently. Karasu still hadn't spoken, but now Kurama wasn't even sure if the second figure was Karasu at all. In previous dreams, it had always continued from that distance, but this time, the figure had approached him. The walk had more of a sway in the hips than Karasu's, and when he saw the face... It was not Karasu's face. Yes, it was similar, but not his. In fact, this face was far more feminine, the eyes were... not necessarily kinder, but they were much less cold and cruel. This person had also been much shorter than Karasu. 'No,' Kurama concluded. 'This person is not Karasu... but then who is she?'
When he entered the gardens, he went over and sat on his favorite bench... located near the roses. He decided to try to occupy his mind with observing the other people in the garden. A couple sitting in the grass, another up on the hill, yet another locked together at the mouth on a bench a little ways away, and a single person sitting on a bench facing away from him. Why did this person draw his attention? 'Probably because they're the only other one not staring into another person's eyes...' he answered himself. But there /I something different about this person. The person was dressed in all black with long black hair, not exactly uncommon in Japan. But was that a glimpse of red fabric? 'Calm down, Kurama. That dream is making you paranoid.' He looked away just as he noticed the figure standing up, not wanting to be caught staring. So, he, instead, attempted to deeply involve himself in examining a nearby blossom. That is, until a still shadow blocked his light. He slowly turned his head, almost afraid of what he would see.
"K-Karasu," he managed to make the words come out not sounding too strangled. He sat transfixed by the specter from his dream.
The eyes, the only part of the face visible over the mask, squinted slightly in a smile, and a feminine voice spoke, "No, that would be my brother. But people often get us confused. Is this seat taken?"
Kurama could not make his mouth form words so he just shook his head vaguely, earning another, assumed, smile. The woman, he could now tell by her figure, sat beside him on the bench.
"So, you've met my brother and survived?" she continued. "I don't mean to be offensive, but how? You look like someone he'd take an... 'interest' in."
Lack of sleep was taking its toll on Kurama's composure. "I-... I'd really rather not relive it." He could not stop staring at her. He eyes were definitely the ones from last night's dream, and her clothes... The red scarf around her neck made the whole outfit very unnerving, especially coupled with the mask over her nose and mouth.
"Oh, alright. I just thought it was rather odd... Oh, how rude of me, I'm Mitsukai," she held out a black-gloved hand. "I just transferred from Osaka." Noticing his hesitation to take her hand, she tried to reassure him. "Don't worry, I'm nothing like my onii-chan."
With that little bit of prompting, he was able to take hold of her hand with a decent grip. "Shuuichi Minamino."
"Nice to meet you, Minamino-san," she smiled again. At least, Kurama was pretty sure she was smiling.
"So, um... What's your major?" Kurama asked, trying to be friendly.
"Nuclear physics, and I minor in bio-chemistry."
"Really? I double majored in botany and bio-chemistry," he saw that they had something in common.
"A double major? Well, I can see that you have an interest in biology," she laughed slightly.
"You could say that," he gave a small smile. "And I can't exactly say that I'm surprised by your choices."
"Yes, shocking aren't they?" They sat in uncomfortable silence for a few minutes before Mitsukai spoke again. "Gomen ne, but I just can't stop thinking about it. Why did my brother let someone as pretty as you live?"
"You don't know? I'm sorry to tell you, but I killed him," he said softly, half expecting to hear a number of explosions any minute. He most definitely was not expecting to hear her laughing. "What's funny?"
"You couldn't possibly have killed him," she said between breathing deeply, trying to stop laughing. "You certainly don't have the level of reiki strength. When was your encounter with my I dear /I brother?"
"A few years ago. I watched my plant drain his blood," he said, but then thought 'So, I passed out for a moment. No one else said anything about his body getting up and leaving.'
"Well, for one thing, he's an Immortal, as in: he can't possibly die. The same goes for me, but anyway the other reason, which completely blows your statement out the window is: I saw him last week and spoke to him only this morning." This revelation sent renewed waves of fear coursing though Kurama.
"You must be joking me. I watched him die," he did not mean for it to come out quite so desperate sounding as it did. He took a deep breath to calm himself. "I'm sorry, I haven't been sleeping well recently." He did not know why he was telling her this, but for some reason, it made him feel a bit better, eased his mind on the matter a bit.
"Really? I have been having some rather odd dreams lately, but I most definitely know for a fact that Karasu is alive and well. Maybe not mentally well, he never was all that normal, but he is fine, physically." She glanced as the large clock on the building at one end of the garden and gasped. "Oh, damn, I'm going to be really late for class if I don't get moving. Sorry, maybe we can talk another time." She hurriedly gathered her bag and raced off in a blur before Kurama could utter another word. Then, he realized, he was about be just as late as she, and he could not move quite that fast.
He swore and ran in the same direction she had been going. He had started out being early and ended up being late. He slipped into the lecture hall to see students filing up to the front and sighed in relief, hoping to be able to just slide in unnoticed and turn in the thesis paper due that day. When he got to the front, he put the paper on the pile and smiled as pleasantly as he could at the teacher but wound up gritting his teeth for a second when asked, "And where were you when class began 5 minutes before you came in?"
"I was delayed. The door to my apartment was jammed this morning," he replied smoothly. He had waited a beat before answering, so it didn't seem like he was making up and excuse, and he had looked the teacher in the eye, unblinkingly. He knew how to lie very well. It saddened him slightly that he had perfected his lying skills on his mother when he was younger. But that was partially true; his door had gotten stuck earlier that morning. 'The best lies are 75% truth... or some such nonsense.' "It must have been this recent humidity that caused the wood to expand. Sumimasen, Professor."
"Right, right, take your seat," The professor simply went back to collecting theses.
When Kurama took his seat in one of the upper rows, he put his forehead in his palms and closed his eyes, telling himself to stay awake. Of course, the lights went out for the presentation shortly followed by his consciousness. The fog rolled in and a familiar figured stepped toward him. Kurama was standing in a vast expanse of nothing, but somehow, there was solid ground under his feet. For a moment, he thought the figure before him to be Karasu, but the mists cleared a bit and he took an odd feeling of comfort and relief in seeing that it was Mitsukai. But that feeling was quickly washed away by dread when she reached up and removed the mask from her face.
"I suppose you will have to stop me from breathing, then, " she seemed to be taunting him. But he knew she was right in a sense. If he died in the dream realm, he would die in the real world. So, he did the first thing that came to his head, besides 'Run, you fool!' He covered her mouth... with his. Her lips tasted sweet, like honeysuckle and her scent reminded him of sakura blossoms and lavender. It vaguely registered that he should not be able to taste or smell in this world, but at the moment, he didn't care. His tongue licked at he lips, begging entrance, which she immediately granted. He plunged into the depths of her mouth, tasting all he could. At the same time, his arms had found their way around her body and he crushed her to him. Her right arm went up around his neck, under his hair; the fingers of her left hand became entwined within the red tresses. Kurama's hands wound through he dark locks and wandered over her back, traveling down to the curve of her lower back. Suddenly, he heard a sharp gasp as she was roughly torn from his arms. He looked up to see her struggling against the steely grip of Karasu.
"Let go of her!" he yelled at the creature that had haunted his dreams for far too long.
"If I cannot have you, my little fox, no one can, not even my dear little sister," Karasu laughed both at his silly demand and the futile struggles of his captive sibling. He then held his blood-red claws to her neck and before Kurama could take a step toward him, he slit her throat at the jugular vein and dropped her to the ground at his feet. He appeared behind Kurama and- prodded him with a pencil eraser.
"Wha..." he crack one eye open.
"I said, class is over, you can wake up now," spoke the voice of the woman he had watched die in his dream. She was the one poking him with a pencil. "Looks like you missed all the notes too, huh?"
"Too? What do you mean?" he asked, becoming a bit more awake. He was surprised to find that he actually felt rested, despite the nature and ending of the dream.
"I dozed off about 3 seconds after I sat down," she grinned. "But I got someone to let me copy theirs, care to join me?"
"S-sure, I suppose so," he said. Normally, he would have declined such an offer, but he had a feeling she had some idea what was going on with his dreams for some odd reason or another. "You fell asleep? Did you have any interesting dreams?"
"As a matter of fact, I did and I was quite enjoying it until somebody threw an eraser at my head..." she trailed of grumpily. "What about you?"
"Yes, mine was rather odd, but it turned into a nightmare..." Why did he keep telling her these things?! So, he attempted to turn the conversation in another direction. "When do want to get together to finish those notes?"
"Have you got any free time today?" she seemed rather hopeful.
"I'm taking tonight off from work, so I'll be free the rest of the day after 1 o'clock. What time is good for you?" he told her, relaxing just a hair.
"This is my only class today. Let's say the campus café about 1:15?" she suggested.
"Alright, I'll give you my cell number, just in case." He ripped off a piece of notebook paper and quickly wrote the number for her.
"Right, here's mine," she offered him the small slip of paper. Oddly enough, his was neater than hers. "You'd better get going, or you'll be late for your next class as well."
"See you at the café," Kurama called behind him as he hurried off.
Next chapter: A visitor in the café. "My, my, I come to surprise my little sister, I get my own surprise. I had no idea this day would turn out so well."