FOX'S LAMENT
Fox's Lament a Yu Yu Hakusho fanfic by Yui Shinigami.
Author's Note: This began life as the first chapter of another, longer, fic. But the intent didn't quite make it to paper in a workable form, so I scrapped most of it and salvaged two chunks of the first chapter. Those two chunks were patched into what you see here. This takes place a few weeks after the Ankoku Bujutsukai; somewhere around there, the battle with Kuronue (second movie) also took place.
It's a funny thing how much one moment or one person, for that matter can affect you. Admittedly, I have considered the question before, but seldom has it held such importance for me. I suppose the most I'd thought about it in the past was after Kuronue's death; that experience probably changed me more than I'm willing to admit. One moment we were certain we'd gotten away with the theft scot-free; we were being pursued, but it was nothing to worry about. The next thing I knew, he was dead - well, close enough to it as to make no difference and I was barely able to escape with my own life. I'd never realized how close the two of us were, and until that day I'd always felt a sort of invulnerability. Nothing was good enough to challenge me, so nothing would ever go wrong. But when I heard that scream of pain, everything I'd believed for so long came crashing down around me. After that day, my actions were more cautious, both physically and emotionally. I didn't want to risk that kind of pain again. But soon I'd d opened myself up to it again, by allowing myself to love my mother, by allowing myself to become friends with Yuusuke and Kuwabara and Hiei, in short, by becoming human. I'd forgotten my original intention of ditching Kaasan when my powers returned and never coming close to anyone again; instead I acted as humans do - I made friends. Every time we're on a mission, every time one of them gets hurt, it reminds me of Kuronue, and it hurts. But I've come too far to turn back. I can't force myself not to care; to be perfectly honest, despite the risk and pain involved, I don't think I want to. One short moment can change everything, can have the most incredible effect on you, for better or for worse. I've had a few moments like that - Kuronue's death, the time Kaasan saved my life, and my battle with Karasu. Karasu. I can't think of any other name that makes me feel so disgusted. There was something about him, something just revolting, that makes me burn with the most intense hatred I have ever felt in my 1500 years. Part of that could be because I became human; they seem to have much stronger emotions than demons. But either way, Karasu had an aura of sadistic cynicism that still causes me to cringe, perhaps because it reminds me of my own past. I was an insufferable jerk when I was a youko, and I'm not too proud to admit it. I was cynical, cocky, vain, and - yes, I'll admit it - cruel. Since Kuronue and Kaasan, I've grown out of that, but when I transformed in the arena I could feel my old personality threatening to overtake me. When I revert to my youko body, I revert to my youko mind. It's an unsettling thing, to suddenly become everything you stand against. Karasu was representative of that - and suddenly I was no better than he. He's dead, but he lives on in my mind, taunting me in my nightmares, pointing out my flaws, tormenting me with evidence of my own hypocrisy. Your dark side loves to fight, he'd told me, and it's true. I took a perverse pleasure in watching those Mimosa plants devour him. I'm no better than he was, and it scares me. What if my other half turns on the people I care about? I've had nightmares of Karasu every night since I fought him. Every night, I wake up, fighting not to scream. I've gotten less sleep in the past three weeks than I normally get in two good nights. Sometimes I see Yuusuke looking as tired as I feel, and I wonder if he has the same problem I do. Every fight since I became a tantei has haunted me since then. Ghostslayer lives on in my nightmares; I can feel the cold steel sliding through my body, and hear Hiei's mocking voice taunting Yuusuke. Try as I might, I can't forget the battle with Genbu. Yeah, I won, but that wound was a lot worse than I let on, though I don't think they were buying my show of false bravado. When Yakumo's servant impersonated Kuronue, and I was forced to face one of my oldest friends in battle, I dreamt of it for weeks afterward. Even my experience with Utterdark returns in my dreams; I realize how reckless I was, how if Yuusuke had not saved my life, I would have only made things worse for Kaasan. But the nightmare of Karasu is more vivid and terrifying than anything else. Yuusuke must have to deal with it too. When Toguro killed Genkai-shihan, he took it harder than anyone. No surprise there; he was very close to her, and even though she's back now, the experience must have been hell for him. Yuusuke's been through a lot since becoming a tantei, and if my judgment of his character is even halfway correct it must have an impact on him. Maybe I should ask how he deals with it; it's getting worse and worse for me and I'm afraid of what might happen. I'm already standing perilously close to the brink of something, and if I'm given a push . . . It never does any good to dwell on emotions; one should always try to find the reasons behind them, if he hopes to overcome them. I know that. And I know why Karasu fills me with such revulsion and hatred, which in turn explains why my nightmares of him are ten times worse than any others I have experienced. What I can't figure out is what I'm going to do about it. Or about Kaasan. Every time I go on a mission for the reikai, the risk increases that she'll find out about my double life . . . or that I'll be killed before she finds out. I can't let that happen; if I do meet my death as a tantei, she deserves to know what happened. Nonetheless, I'm reluctant to tell her . . . I've lived for sixteen years now, hiding my past life from Kaasan, pretending that I was never Youko Kurama, that I've never been anyone except Minamino Shuuichi. I don't want Kaasan to know that I possessed Shuuichi's body before he was even born. She's happier not knowing, and while I love her and my human life, there's still a feeling of guilt there. Who would Shuuichi have been, what would he have turned out like, had I not invaded him? He could have been just like he - I - am now. Or he could have been totally different. Nobody will ever know. Perhaps it's that guilt that has shaped my personality as it exists now. For the first ten years of my/his life as a human, I just faked being human as best I could. I was rather sullen for those years, though, because I still thought like Youko Kurama and found human life to be all too boring. After Kaasan saved my life, I felt totally different. I realized that I loved her as my mother, and I realized just how guilty I felt about deceiving her. Since then, I tried to be the best son I could, in every way possible. I was faultlessly polite, I earned top marks in school, I finally let down my barriers and became close to her emotionally, within reason. I was still careful to project only the image of Minamino Shuuichi, not my inner self. But gradually, Minamino Shuuichi became my inner self. What he felt for his mother, I felt for her. What he thought about his friends, I thought about them. Youko Kurama began to feel more and more like a distant memory. But then Kuronue returned, if not physically - it was only an impostor, striking where he knew I would be most vulnerable - then he certainly returned emotionally, and my past life came back to me with a sudden and frightening vividness. I'm an impostor myself, caught somewhere between Minamino Shuuichi and Youko Kurama with nowhere to turn. I knew someday I would have to face this hurdle, and I would have to figure out who I really am. Shuuichi? Youko? Both? I will have to decide . . . and I will have to tell Kaasan the truth.