Yuu Yuu Hakusho
Shadows and Lies
by Sionna Klassen and Kristin Huntsman
Chapter 11
Someone take these dreams away
That point me to reality
A jewel of personality
That stranger to reality
They keep calling me...
--Nine Inch Nails, "Dead Souls"
"Nnn..."
Yusuke opened his eyes and blinked at the sunlight streaming through
the gaping hole where the wall had been. The cool morning breeze drifted lazily
around the room. Yusuke sat up slowly, aching in every limb. He looked around
at his friends, still unconscious on the floor. The scene was remarkably
similar to what he'd seen when he first awakened in this room, except for the
massive damage the place had sustained since then.
The place - and themselves. Yusuke crawled across the floor to where
Hiei lay crumpled against the wall and shook his shoulder. "Hiei?"
Hiei's brown eyes opened reluctantly. He blinked at Yusuke, then
pushed himself up into a sitting position. He looked around, but made no
comment about the state of the room.
Yusuke said, "You take care of Kurama. I'll check on Kuwabara." He got
up and walked toward Kuwabara, who was on the other side of the room.
Hiei said from behind him, "He'll be fine. He's too stupid to be dead."
Yusuke didn't reply. He shook Kuwabara, hard. "Wake up!"
Kuwabara groaned in complaint. Yusuke shook him again. "Come on, wake
up!"
"All right, all right, I'm awake!" Kuwabara grumbled, then his eyes
popped open as he remembered what had happened the night before. He looked at
his hands, which were still burned and blistered. "Shit."
Yusuke sighed. "Where's that first-aid kit Kurama found in the closet?"
"In the kitchen, I think..."
"I'll look for it." Yusuke got up and left the room.
Kuwabara looked at Hiei. "Hey!" he called, lifting his burned hand.
"You can't even apologize or anything?"
"Why should I?" Hiei retorted. "You tried to feed me to the shadows."
Kuwabara turned red with mingled anger and embarrassment. "That wasn't
my fault!"
Hiei replied acidly, "Well, it wasn't my fault I had to burn you,
either." He got up and walked to Kurama, ignoring Kuwabara completely.
"Jerk!" Kuwabara muttered under his breath.
Hiei felt exhausted, like he always did after using his Raging Black
Dragon power. It took a massive effort of will just to get up and walk the few
steps required to get to Kurama. He fell to his knees again and sighed,
reaching out to shake Kurama lightly. <Damn, are we ever going to get out of
here?>
"Kurama?" he asked, when Kurama didn't respond to the shaking. He
looked closely at Kurama, then bent down and listened at Kurama's chest to see
if he was even breathing. He looked up again, at Kuwabara who was watching
worriedly. "Get Yusuke," he ordered, in a tone that allowed no argument.
Kuwabara, amazingly, didn't even try to argue but ran from the room
immediately.
Yusuke skidded to a halt next to Kurama. "What's wrong?"
Hiei looked up at him. "We've run out of time."
"What?"
"Listen." Hiei placed Yusuke's hand against Kurama's chest. Yusuke
paused, feeling Kurama's weak heartbeat through his fingers, feeling the slight
movement of Kurama's chest as he breathed shallowly.
"Can't you hear it?" Hiei asked.
Yusuke concentrated, and felt a vibration that was just below the
range of hearing, a deep throbbing with its own peculiar rhythm. Yusuke
realized that Hiei was able to hear it, not just feel it. "What is it?" Yusuke
asked.
"The shadow," Hiei said. "Kurama's fading. It's getting ready to take
over his body for good."
"Dammit..." Yusuke muttered. "There's got to be a way to stop it." He
touched Kurama's forehead and then pulled his hand away. "He's _freezing_!"
"He's not shivering," Kuwabara said. "Isn't that good?"
"No," Hiei said shortly. He took Kurama's hand in his, energy
beginning to crackle around him again as he gathered strength. Yusuke reached
out and grabbed his wrist.
"Hiei, you _can't_. You don't have anything left!"
"Shut up and let go of me," Hiei said, his voice deadly calm. Yusuke
reluctantly let go.
"Let me try," Kuwabara said unexpectedly, reaching out to touch
Kurama's shoulder. He concentrated and began to glow with a soft yellow light.
Yusuke stared at him, wondering why the shadow inside Kuwabara was allowing him
to do this. Or did it want him to, so that he would weaken himself and give the
shadow more power? Or did Kuwabara's shadow work in a completely different way
than Kurama's?
Yusuke's head was starting to hurt. He abandoned the questions for the
moment and watched Kurama, trying to see if Kuwabara's attempt to help him was
doing any good.
Suddenly Kuwabara took his hand away, growling in frustration.
"Dammit! The shadow's sucking up all the energy!"
Hiei pulled off his headband and looked at Kurama with his Jagan, the
third eye glowing bright blue. He frowned and then said, "I have an idea."
"Well?" Kuwabara demanded.
Hiei glared at him. "Link us all together," he said, looking
disgruntled at having to let Kuwabara in his mind again. "Show Yusuke what we
see."
"Okay." Kuwabara put his hand forward, and Yusuke took it. Almost
immediately his vision changed. He could still see his surroundings, but it was
as if shifting miasmas of color had been overlaid onto the surface. Hiei
reluctantly put his hand on top of Yusuke's, and another level was added to
Yusuke's vision, another dimension of depth as he looked through the Jagan. As
one, they all looked at Kurama.
The shadow throbbed contentedly, pulsing with the beating of Kurama's
heart. Yusuke felt sick looking at it, and not just from the thought of the
creature hiding underneath Kurama's skin. The shadow radiated satisfaction,
knowing that it had won.
"I'm going to kill that thing," Yusuke said tightly.
"Do you really want to do that?" Hiei asked, looking at him.
Yusuke sighed. "No."
Hiei paused, then nodded. "Good. You've got to persuade it to stop
sucking up all of the energy we're giving to Kurama."
"How?"
"How else?" Hiei shrugged. "Your Rei power. You wanted to hurt it; go
right ahead."
"But..." Yusuke started.
"Why do you think I'm lending you my eyes?" Hiei demanded, disgusted
at Yusuke's denseness. Yusuke realized with a start that he was reading Hiei's
emotions as easily as words on a page. Kuwabara's psychic power had never been
so powerful before. Oblivious to Yusuke's thoughts, or more likely just
uncaring, Hiei continued. "Try just to hit the shadow. At this point, we've got
nothing left to lose. If this doesn't work, yes, Kurama will die - but if we
don't do anything, he'll be dead in minutes anyway."
Yustke bowed to Hiei's logic. "Okay." He put his hands on
Ktrama's chest aod sent a tiny pulse of Rei power at the shadow. Through Hiei's Jagan he
saw it squirm in pain, but Kurama gave no outward indication that he felt
anything. <Damn, he's really far gone...>
<Are you going to behave?> Yusuke asked the shadow, sending another
pulse of power at it. Kurama twitched as the shadow flinched. <Well, are you? >
Reluctantly, the shadow pulled back slightly, revealing a green
glimmer of light that had been smothered in its dark embrace. Yusuke
immediately let his power dissipate.
"Good," Hiei said shortly. "Now leave the rest of this to us." He
didn't pay attention as Yusuke disconnected himself from them and sat against
the wall, watching. Hiei and Kuwabara sat next to each other, cooperating for
what would probably be the only time in their lives. Energy crackled and flared
all around them, pouring from them and into Kurama. Yusuke wondered what it
looked like to them, if the tiny green flame was growing into something
stronger or if they were wasting their energy.
It wasn't a waste, he realized, as Kurama stirred and breathed deeply,
his eyes slowly opening. He sat up carefully, looking at his friends. Yusuke
relaxed and grinned, but the smile faded as Kurama asked quietly, "Is this ever
going to end?"
Yusuke looked away, unable to meet Kurama's eyes.
* * *
The day passed as all the days here did; in utter boredom. Kuwabara
made a new deck of cards to replace the ones that had been burned when Hiei
unleashed his Black Dragon power. Kurama slept in the baking heat of the sun,
warm at last and for once untroubled by dreams. Hiei vanished early on, but
Yusuke found him a few hours later, sound asleep and curled up like a cat on
the roof. Yusuke smiled and left him alone.
Yusuke and Kuwabara were the only ones who spent the day awake, mostly
playing cards or staring off into space and dreaming. At one point, Yusuke
snapped out of his trance with a start as the setting sun suddenly flashed in
his eyes when before he'd been shaded by the eaves of the house. He blinked to
clear his vision and looked out over the grass. Kurama suddenly appeared in his
range of vision, sitting up in the grass and stretching. He looked at Yusuke,
and Yusuke grinned. "You've got grass in your hair," he called.
Kurama brushed his fingers through his hair, trying to dislodge the
grass stems, as he got up and walked toward Yusuke. He sat down and glanced
around. "Where are Kuwabara and Hiei?"
"Last I saw, Kuwabara was playing Solitaire and Hiei was on the roof
sleeping off the effects of the Ensatsu Kokuryuha." Yusuke lay back in the
grass, looking up at the sky, which was starting to shade into familiar
red-orange to the west.
"Is it just me or do all the sunsets here look the same?" Kurama asked.
"It's not just you," Yusuke said. "I'd swear we were watching a movie
of a sunset replayed every night."
"It must take a lot of power and time to create a coherent world, even
only a piece of one like this," Kurama said. "I wonder why he bothered."
"What do you mean?" Yusuke asked.
"Think about it," Kurama said. "Why bring us here? It couldn't have
been an accident, or other people would have stumbled in here by now. This trap
had to have been set for us. Someone's trying to kill us, but they're going
about it in a very strange way."
"Yeah, I see what you mean," Yusuke said. "Whoever it is, they're
going to an awful lot of trouble. And it isn't even working." He shrugged. "I
mean, there's got to be quicker ways to kill us, not to mention ones that have
a better chance of actually succeeding."
Kurama looked at him, smiling. "Maybe - but you have to admit, we're
difficult to kill. Permanently, anyway."
Yusuke gave him a look, and Kurama's smile widened. Yusuke sighed and
didn't respond to the comment. "So why an imaginary world?"
Kurama shrugged. "We must be in one of the other planes, separated
from the Ningenkai. I'm just not sure where. Some of the planes are made
largely of unformed energy, kind of like the nebulas where stars are created.
We could be in a pocket of order in one of those planes of chaos."
Yusuke looked at him in surprise. "You get all of that stuff about
alternate planes? When Koenma tried to explain it, it didn't make a whole lot
of sense."
Kurama shrugged. "I came from the Makai, remember? When you've
transferred between planes yourself, it's easier to see what's going on." He
continued with his explanation. "If this place is sealed off from the other
planes, that means that even Koenma can't reach us here, or even find out where
we are. It also means that if we die here, our spirits won't be able to
transfer to the Reikai."
"Shit!" Yusuke sat bolt upright. "You mean we'll be stuck here forever?"
"Maybe," Kurama said. "I don't know how long spirits can stay attached
to a place like this. We might dissolve into the rest of the chaos of this
plane. Actually, we probably would sooner or later anyway - this place must
take a lot of energy to keep it running. Eventually, it'll collapse back into
chaos, and we'd go with it."
"Damn," Yusuke muttered. "If our spirits can't get to the Reikai,
Koenma wouldn't have a chance of bringing any of us back to life."
"Not to mention the fact that none of us would ever get to our proper
destinations in the Spirit World," Kurama said. "We'd probably just cease being
altogether." He put his chin on his folded arms, his knees pulled up to his
chest. The breeze ruffled his hair as he stared at the sunset.
"Maybe this place is a better trap than I thought," Yusuke sighed.
Kurama only nodded.
"Is Hiei still asleep?" Yusuke asked, putting down the king of spades.
"I don't know, I haven't checked," Kurama replied, looking at his hand.
Hiei appeared next to them. "I see you two have decided to allow
Kuwabara to poison us again."
Yusuke looked at the kitchen, from which cooking noises drifted into
the room. They were sitting in the still-charred and open room, largely because
the hole in the wall at least allowed some circulation of air. While the heat
of the day was fading, the house was still stuffy.
"Kuwabara's cooking hasn't killed us yet," Kurama replied.
"I don't trust that to last."
"I cook all the time!" Yusuke complained. "Let him take his turn for
once. And if you think you can do any better, the kitchen's right over there..."
Hiei ignored him and changed the subject, looking out at the night. "Do
you think the shadows are all dead?"
"I don't know," Yusuke replied, sobering. "I think I got all the
ones that came after you last night, but I don't know if there's any more. We
haven't seen any signs of it..."
"But we've been staying close to the house all day," Kurama
said. He put down the ace of hearts and looked innocent when Yusuke grumbled about
Kurama's luck with card games.
"Hmph." Yusuke put down the cards and looked back at Hiei, but he had
disappeared again. "I wish he'd stop doing that!" he complained.
"You might as well wish for the sun to stop shining," Kurama told him
with a smile. Yusuke rolled his eyes.
* * *
Kuwabara moaned and turned over in his sleep. Elsewhere, his mind was
wandering, and dreaming. He began to glow with a golden light.
Hiei lay stretched out on the roof, with only his cloak between him
and the hard tiles that covered the upper surface of the house. Suddenly he
twitched sharply, waking himself up. He sat up on the roof and looked around,
wondering what had disturbed him. But when he saw nothing, he shrugged and lay
back down, closing his eyes. Soon, he was lost in his dreams again.
Yusuke breathed smoothly in and out under Kurama's gaze. He mumbled
something under his breath and sighed. Kurama wondered what he was dreaming,
and smiled, closing his own eyes for a second. He stretched, and opened his
eyes again.
Or at least he thought he did. <What the--?!>
He was back in the city. In Tokyo. He knew that immediately, from all
the familiar sights around him. "Kurama!" he heard someone call. He turned
around, and saw Yusuke behind him.
"Yusuke?" he asked, surprised. "What's going on?"
"What do you mean, 'what's going on'?" Yusuke asked him.
"This," Kurama said, indicating everything around them. "How did we
get back to Tokyo?"
Yusuke paused for a second, thinking. "You're right," he said. "We're
still back in that weird place. So how are we here?"
"Kuwabara's dreaming, and he's gotten us caught up in it," Hiei
replied, landing next to him. "We have to find him, and get him to wake up."
"How can you tell?" Yusuke asked.
"Because this certainly isn't _my_ dream, and I trust the two of you
to have better judgment in your colors than that," Hiei said, indicating a
garishly colored display.
"You're right," Yusuke said, looking at it. "That's Kuwabara all over."
"So where would he be?" Kurama asked. "You know him the best of all of
us, Yusuke."
"Hmm..." Yusuke said, thinking. "He wouldn't be at school. I don't
think he'd be at the movies. Unless this is a _really_ weird dream, I doubt
he'd be at the pachinko parlor. His house, maybe?"
"Why don't we split up, and meet at your school in an hour?" Kurama
suggested. "That way, we can cover more ground."
"Sounds good to me," Yusuke replied. He turned to say something to
Hiei, but Hiei had already disappeared. "Well, later!" he told Kurama, walking
off.
"Later!" Kurama said as he turned away. He glanced at the crowded
streets, wondering which way to go first. With a shrug, he walked toward the
park.
Hiei didn't know why, but he had a nagging suspicion that Kuwabara
wasn't in the city at all. He decided to act on the suspicion, nebulous though
it was, and simply went in the direction that seemed best. After all, this was
a dream; normal rules of logic wouldn't apply here.
He traveled easily along the roofs of the buildings, flickering past
so quickly that he appeared to be nothing more than the passing shadow of a
bird. He quickly reached the outskirts of the city and halted for a moment in a
grove of trees, trying to orient himself. He spent a lot of time, more than he
would admit to, exploring the Tokyo area while the others occupied themselves
with ridiculous human-world things like school, but he hadn't made it out here
yet. He wasn't sure where to go.
Then he caught a glimpse of a red roof through the top branches of the
trees. Quickly he went toward it, hiding among the branches as he neared. As he
suddenly came to the edge of the trees and gained a clear view into a large
open space, he lost his balance and almost fell out of the tree, barely
managing to catch himself in time.
The clear area was what looked like the courtyard of a temple, but
there was only one wall. It had a Chinese-style gate colored bright red with
accents of green. In front of the wall was a low table with a bouquet of
flowers sitting on it.
<I don't believe it...>
Kuwabara sat on one side of the table, Yukina the other. Yukina was
wearing her favorite light blue kimono, red ribbons in her hair. Kuwabara was
in a T-shirt and jeans, which figured. Kuwabara was holding her hand and saying
something passionate which Hiei couldn't hear.
<Damn him.>
Yukina blushed and giggled. Hiei scowled. Kuwabara had never been told
that Yukina was his sister, because the idiot would let it slip in some
conversation with her. And she wasn't supposed to know. And that meant that
Hiei couldn't logically object to any relationship between them, no matter how
much he disliked Kuwabara.
But as Kuwabara leaned over the table to kiss Yukina, Hiei decided
that things had gone far enough. He appeared right behind Kuwabara and tapped
him on the shoulder. Kuwabara yelped in surprise and jumped a foot, turning to
scowl at Hiei. "What do you want?"
"I have to tell you something important," Hiei said. "Now."
"Well, what is it?" Kuwabara asked, still holding Yukina's hand.
Hiei glared at him. "Not in front of Yukina."
Kuwabara grumbled, then reluctantly agreed, letting go of Yukina's
hand. "I'll be right back, Yukina-san," he told her, and she nodded
uncertainly, watching Hiei with her huge brown eyes. Hiei knew he made her
nervous. When he'd first met her again after the years he'd spent searching for
her, she'd reacted by mentioning that he looked familiar, but she couldn't
quite place who he was. Hiei had no intention of ever telling her that he was
her brother, so he insisted that she didn't know him. He didn't think she quite
believed it, though.
He pulled Kuwabara away until they were out of earshot and hidden
behind a screen of trees. "You're dreaming, idiot," Hiei told him. "You've got
to wake up."
"Why?" Kuwabara asked. "If I'm dreaming about Yukina, that's none of
your business!"
Hiei mentally tried counting to ten, a trick he'd heard worked for
humans. It didn't work too well for him. "You pulled all the rest of us in your
dream," he told Kuwabara. "I don't want to stay in your head for the rest of
the night. So wake up."
Kuwabara sighed and looked back toward Yukina. "Can't I dream for just
a little while longer?"
Hiei glared at him.
"Okay, okay. How do I wake up?"
"You expect me to know?" Hiei demanded. "This is your dream!" He
paused. "You could always try to slap yourself awake," he suggested.
"Can't I just kiss Yukina first?" Kuwabara asked plaintively.
"_No_!" Hiei said flatly.
Kuwabara frowned, then whirled as he heard Yukina scream.
"_Yukina-san_!" he yelled, charging through the trees. Hiei got to the
clearing first.
The clearing was full of shadows. They slithered over each other and
joined like pools of black mercury, circling around Yukina where she stood in
the center of the clearing. "Kazuma-san!" she cried desperately. "Help me!"
"Yukina-san!" Kuwabara ran past the last of the trees, his Rei sword
out. Without hesitation he flung himself at the barrier of shadows. "Get away
from her!"
The shadows twisted and pulled away from the sword, shifting and
pulling together into one mass. The mass of shadows started to assume a human
shape as Kuwabara ran at them, sword upraised. Then he skidded to a halt as the
darkness brightened into color, forming into Kurama's shape. He knew it wasn't
really Kurama, but he still couldn't strike.
The shadow Kurama smiled at him, and the trees went crazy. Their
branches clawed at Hiei and Kuwabara, trying to slice them to pieces. Their
roots trembled as they started to tear themselves loose from the ground. They
bent and twisted as if caught in a hurricane wind. The shadow Kurama simply
stood at the center of the chaos and laughed.
Then suddenly its laugh turned into a choked-off grunt of pain. It
looked down stupidly, and saw a tree branch three inches wide protruding from
its chest. It looked back.
Kurama - the real Kurama - stood next to a tree, touching it to exert
his own control over it. He looked impassively at his duplicate. "That's an old
trick," he told it. "Can't you think of anyone else to copy?"
The false Kurama trembled and then suddenly fell apart into liquid
shadows again, sliding free of the branch. The trees shuddered back to their
normal stillness. The shadows swirled up into another human-sized column, but
this time Hiei sliced through the column and the shadows fell back into a pool
again, unable to support themselves. Red lightning started to crackle around
them. "I think we made them mad..." Kuwabara said.
The shadows moved like lightning and swallowed Yukina.
"No!" Kuwabara shouted, even as Hiei moved. He plunged straight into
the mass of shadows after her, groping for her hand. He couldn't see a thing -
He ripped the headband from his forehead and used his Jagan. Yukina
appeared to his second sight, a glow of blue almost smothered in black. He
grabbed her hand and pulled her close to him, then concentrated and surrounded
both of them with flame without touching Yukina. The shadows pulled away, and
Hiei pushed through the outer skin, pulling Yukina with him. They both gasped
for breath as the hole started to close. "Kuwabara!" Hiei yelled. "Get over
here!"
Kuwabara grabbed Yukina's wrists and hauled her free of the shadows.
They closed over Hiei's head again, and he held his breath and struggled as
they tried to suck him further in. Then someone grabbed his hand and pulled,
hard.
A flare of yellow light cut into the shadows next to him. The
shadows
ripped apart and Hiei fell out, landing on top of Kurama, who had been yanking
on his arm. Hiei got up and looked back, and saw Kuwabara slicing repeatedly at
the shadows with his Rei sword. But all that he was managing to do was cut them
apart, just like Hiei's sword. Hiei turned to look at Kurama. "Where's Yusuke
when we need him?"
Kurama shrugged helplessly. "He's probably all the way across town."
"Damn."
The ground rippled beneath their feet, throwing them off-balance. The
packed earth softened, liquefied, and they all started to sink into the melting
earth. The skin of the ground cracked, revealing liquid darkness underneath.
Hiei tried to leap clear, but the shadows sucked at his feet and
wouldn't let him go. Kuwabara sliced at the shadows frantically with his Rei
sword, only managing to keep himself from sinking past his knees. Yukina gave a
high, thin shriek as the shadows pulled her shoulders underneath the surface.
Kurama thrashed wildly, trying to pull himself free of the clinging, slimy
darkness. Hiei sank to his waist, one arm already trapped by the
shadows.
Yukina screamed again, trying frantically to keep her head above the
surface. The shadows clung to her hair. Kurama sank farther, almost to his
neck. Hiei almost slid under completely.
Suddenly Kurama's eyes blazed with green light. He tore an arm free of
the shadows and pointed at a tree. Vines writhed around his arm and arced
toward the tree, winding themselves around the trunk. Kurama yanked his other
arm free of the shadows and reached out to Hiei, more vines wrapping around his
arm and extending toward Hiei. Hiei managed to free a hand and grabbed on to
them, pulling himself toward Kurama. The vines wound around themselves and
arched toward Yukina and Kuwabara, making a solid frame for them to hang on to.
Kurama pulled himself toward the tree, just as it began to sink too.
"Dammit, Yusuke!" Kuwabara hollered. "Where the hell are you?!"
"Wake yourself up, you idiot!" Hiei yelled. "It's the only way out of
this!" The shadows sucked him under the surface, and he burst back up into air
again with a hard kick.
"I don't know how!" Kuwabara yelled back.
"Try something!" Kurama cried, barely keeping above the surface. Black
ooze stuck to his hair. "_Anything_!"
"Okay - I'll try--"
Kuwabara looked up at the clouded sky. A ray of sunlight speared
through the clouds and hit him in the head as Kurama, Hiei, and Yukina sank
beneath the surface.
Kurama sat up abruptly, gasping for breath. He looked around, and saw
Yusuke still asleep next to him. The moonlight had traveled all the way across
the floor and was vanishing from the room, one last sliver clinging to the
window sill. The night was half over.
Yusuke stirred and stretched, yawning. "Oh, hi," he said sleepily to
Kurama. "You found Kuwabara?"
"Yeah," Kurama said. "We found him." He shook his head and smiled as
Yusuke turned over and went back to sleep. <Blissful ignorance.>
Hiei fell off the roof.
He twisted like a cat in midair, landing on his feet in the grass. But
he'd still fallen off the roof. He looked around suspiciously, but didn't see
any way that anyone could have seen him. <Good.>
Quickly he leaped back up to the roof, wrapping himself up in his
cloak again before going back to sleep on the tiles. For some reason the night
seemed colder than it had before.
Kuwabara sighed, still wishing he'd had a chance to kiss Yukina before
Hiei had butted in. Then he turned over and went back to sleep, hoping for
another dream - a better one this time.