Armageddon: World's End
chapter 2
by Kristin Huntsman
Armageddon: Worlds' End part 2
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The day starts the way so many before it have: "Kuwabara, wake up!"
I snap awake instantly. Urameshi never uses that tone unless we're in serious trouble. "They've found us," I say, moving from the bed in an instant. My pack leans against the wall, ready for us to run at any second.
"Do we stand or do we run?"
"No more running, please," Kurama asks. "We've gotten a few days' rest. If we're strong enough, I'd really prefer to fight them."
Urameshi and Hiei look sharply at him, doubt clouding their eyes for the merest second. "We can take them," Hiei says, turning back to Urameshi and I. "They're in the valley below us. We have the advantage."
"How many?" I ask.
"Sixty," Kurama replies. "Armed and mounted."
I do some quick calculations. Sixty armed and mounted youkai means fifteen apiece. Assuming Kurama covers us from the roof with his bow-- "How many arrows do you have?" I ask.
"Twenty," Kurama replies. "I haven't had time to make more, and the right type of tree doesn't grow here...." I watch his eyes cloud as he remembers how he once would have been able to grow what he needs. He shakes it off, and finishes what he is saying. "I have no excuse. I'm sorry."
"Twenty arrows is better than nothing," Urameshi cheers him. "That leaves ten for each of us. Are we up to it?"
As an answer, Hiei touches his hand to his swordsheath and I clench my fists and nod. Silently, we move to our packs, collecting and preparing our weapons.
I am now as much of a swordsman as Hiei. He had given me one of his blades after we made our peace, and had instructed me constantly on its use.
One of the proudest days of my life had come the first time I bested him. He promptly whipped my ass the next time. But I _can_ do it. Which means that I'm more than good enough to take on most of the youkai who track us, hoping for the bounty on our heads, as well as the army that dogs our footsteps.
I glance over at Urameshi. Out of his pack he takes a beautifully made and kept bandolier of blades. Kurama had instructed him, as Hiei had instructed me, on the use of his chosen weapon. His accuracy with them is deadly, both in hand-to-hand combat and when they are thrown from a distance. Once he wouldn't have even considered using a weapon, but our defeat at Genkai's temple had taught him differently. Like me, he has become harder since then, both physically and mentally. Our friends - our teachers - have made survivors out of us both.
I look over at Kurama next. The loss of the Rose Whip, a weapon he had been using for hundreds of years, nearly killed him. At one point, shortly after his powers were torn from him in exchange for his family's safety, he had been so physically weak that I _had_ believed he would die. I had had to carry him as we ran, he couldn't walk. Leaving him behind, though, had never been an option. He also couldn't speak above a whisper, and he had constantly burned with fever, surely a strange experience for a youkai, someone who _couldn't_ be sick. He had asked me late one night, while Hiei and Urameshi slept, to promise him a burial in a place where green grass grew and flowers bloomed, when he died. I had made the promise, knowing how much it meant to him to have the plants he had always controlled near him in his death. But he hadn't died. He had refused to abandon us in favor of death, and recovered. Unable to summon his whip, Kurama had abandoned it entirely as a weapon. We had had enough sense not to offer him another. Instead, he trained with the bow and the staff. And became unrivalled in either.
I meet Hiei's steady glance as I look at him last. He silently slips his two blades into the double sheath on his back. I follow suit with my one, and we stand together. With a nod to Kurama, who is stringing his bow, and Urameshi, who stretches before the battle, we walk to the back door of the cabin and step out.
Dropping to the ground, we make our way to a look-out spot and view the troops of the Makai army, who slowly scale the steep ridge below us on their horses. he tells me silently.
He sounds strangely uneasy.
I look at him for a second longer, but figure that I'm not going to get anything from him and give it up. We make our way back to the cabin.
"How long?" Urameshi asks.
"Ten minutes," Hiei replies.
"Right. Kurama, you ready?" Urameshi calls softly to the roof.
"Yes. I'll start firing the minute they're in range."
The three of us make our way to defensive hiding spots. Hiei pauses a second before going to his, looking up at the roof where Kurama is hidden from view. I don't know how to describe the expression on his face. It's like loss and mourning and love and resignation and fierce pride all rolled in one.
Urameshi doesn't see it, but I do, and I suddenly know that Hiei knows something we don't. Something about this battle.
Someone is going to die. From Hiei's actions, I guess Kurama.
We wait a few minutes, then the whistling arrow flying above us announces the beginning of battle.
On the roof of the cabin, I know, Kurama stands fully exposed, sending arrow after arrow into the troops that scramble over the edge of the precipice. I hastily put up a kekkai before him, a barrier of energy that lets things go through one way only: out. He continues firing without cease, each arrow finding its target and dropping another enemy. Kurama never misses a shot. Then he pulls his sling out of his belt, and opens his pouch of smooth river stones and marbles. These are to distract, as he can't kill effectively with them. The youkai spot him on the roof behind my invisible kekkai, and run forward.
Falling perfectly into our trap.
We step out from our hiding places, and they're neatly trapped between us and the cabin. With cries of rage, we rush forward into battle.
Kekkai surround Urameshi, Hiei, and I. Unable to create his own, Kurama fights without one. However, I will not let him fall in this battle. As he drops from the roof, the kekkai of my making flares around him, then changes to be nearly skintight. He pulls a short metal rod out of his sleeve and it snaps out to become a long, thin staff. Grimly, he gets to work.
I catch sight of Hiei, burning with black fire, as I surround my sword with golden Rei energy. He slices an enemy through the abdomen, then flashes over to another. I turn to the youkai before me, and follow suit. Block, parry, block, slash, DUCK!, skewer! Damn, I missed him. Where is he? I have no time to look, for two more descend upon me.
I feel the current of energy flowing from my palms into the sword and alter it, speed it up, make it brighter. The sword in my hand suddenly flares, the energy surrounding it becoming solid, both harder and sharper than anything on Earth. The light distracts them a little, and I sieze the opportunity, swinging my sword in an arc. Two headless bodies fall to the ground, and I turn, looking for another opponent.
As I fight, I catch glimpses of my companions, and am reassured, for they hold their own. Hiei engages in a play of double swords with a youkai whose uniform is that of an officer. Kurama catches an enemy under the chin with his staff, the force of the blow snapping his opponent's neck. Urameshi fights with the captain, eighteen inch blades in their hands. Blades sharp enough to open cuts with just the passing of their breeze. I can see that Urameshi has taken several wounds, but the captain has far more. This battle we're gonna win.
Then an icy wind blows down my back, and I turn, as if in slow motion. I see Hiei's opponent reverse the direction of his upward slash, twisting his blade so that it enters Hiei's body through the chest. Youkai have their hearts on the right side. Kurama taught me this. The blade hits Hiei in the dead center of the heart.
"Hiei!"
Kurama's scream snaps me into real time, and I cover him as he rushes to Hiei, catching Hiei as he falls. He examines the wound in a microsecond, and catches hold of one of Hiei's swords. In a single smooth movement, he sweeps up from the ground and buries it in the youkai's heart. I finish off my opponent as Kurama falls back beside Hiei, and go over to them.
Urameshi is already there. I glance around and realize that we are surrounded by sixty corpses. Not a single youkai survived the attack.
Urameshi kneels with me beside Hiei, and gently examines the wound. I know what he's going to say before he even looks up.
"It's mortal."
"I know." Hiei sounds at peace with himself. "I've got a couple minutes, though."
"You're _dying_," Urameshi stresses, his voice tearful.
"We've all been dying for a long time," Hiei replies. "At least... I don't have to fight anymore...."
"Hiei...." I whisper miserably.
He looks at me. "You would have made Yukina a good husband," he says quietly. "She would have wanted you to have her necklace." Carefully, with his uninjured left arm, he pulls one of the two hiruseki pendants he always wears over his head and hands it to me. I accept it mutely, feeling tears beginning to prickle my eyes. Nothing is more precious to him than this memento of his sister, and rather than taking it to the grave, he gives it now to me. I never realized how much I really liked the little shrimp until now.
he tells me silently, so that Urameshi and Kurama can't hear.
I think back silently.
Hiei turns next to Urameshi and studies him, as if trying to figure out what to say to him. "You're a good leader, Yuusuke," he says finally. "Don't give up. You have to win."
"It's my fault you're dying," Urameshi says, kicking himself.
"Says who?" Hiei retorts. "I _chose_ this path. _I_ chose how I was going to die. Your job now is to take care of them."
Urameshi only nods, his eyes brimming with tears he refuses to let spill. Hiei looks at him for a second, then sighs, his eyes closing. He opens them again with a slight struggle and looks up into the face above him, as he rests on Kurama's lap.
"Kurama," Hiei says quietly, "you're not whole. I can fix that now. Dead men don't need youki."
"Hiei...." Kurama protests. Hiei catches his hand regardless and places their palms together. A flash of black and green is exchanged between the two hands, tendrils of energy wrapping about their wrists and joining them together for a second. Then the light fades, and I can see clearly that Hiei is almost gone.
"Kurama--" he whispers with the last of his strength, "--I always loved only you--"
"Hiei," Kurama says tearfully. I see a spark of response in Hiei's eyes, and then the light behind them goes out entirely. "Hiei! No! HIEI!!!" Kurama calls his name in sorrow. Then, as if he were the pilot on a cookstove, Kurama suddenly lights up, and is surrounded by a twisting torrent of black and green energy, reaching up into the sky.
"HIEI!!!!!" he screams into the uncaring world. Uncaring, except for us.
"Damn them," he sobs a few minutes later, still cradling Hiei's body.
"Damn them for killing you," he whispers harshly, and for the first time in nearly two years I hear an emotion in his voice.
A killing hatred for his own kind.
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Author's Message: Sturm und Drang part 2. It only gets worse. Is anyone crying after seeing Hiei killed? I was when I first wrote this, and for the first three edit runs. When I first got into YYH, I would never have believed Kurama and Hiei were involved with each other romantically, but things change. I got on the now-defunct YYH-Noise mailing list and met people who convinced me differently.... And if you like or hate what I write, or even just want to question or argue a point, please write to me at 71411.1046@compuserve.com. This is my boyfriend's e-mail address, so please do not send replies to here.