Yu Yu Hakusho Fan Fiction ❯ Flames ❯ Of Loyalty ( Chapter 3 )

[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]

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"Not, two days ago I was having a look in a book
And I saw a picture of a guy fried up above his knees
I said I can relate
Cause lately I've been thinking of combustication as a welcomed vacation from.
The burdens of the planet earth, like gravity, hypocrisy, and the perils of being in 3 - D...
And thinking so much differently."
~*~*~

It had been a week since he'd last seen Hiei and already his world seemed to be in shambles. It shouldn't have been as hard as it was to hold back the sadness. He was use to such things, he'd held it back so many times before. He'd lost many partners in his line of work so why was this one so hard?

A few days early he'd sworn he's seen the demon and perhaps that was the problem. It wasn't the last time he had either. It seemed his Hiryuu was showing up in the shadows all over the city and it was beginning to take it's toll on him. It was getting harder and harder hold back his sorrow and loneliness.

<Let me out, Shuichi, I can fix it all.> Yoko spoke within his mind.

"I can't do that, you know I have to keep a low profile." He spoke to himself.

<Then let us compromise, we'll meet half way. Let me help you.> He could almost see the kitsune grin.

"Half way? We're already torn between the two identities." The red head spoke with a laugh. "What would it be like? If I give you to much more freedom I'm going to end up with your ears and tail."

There was a laugh at his concerns <Your right, but we're cunning, we'll find a way to hide them. Your going to lose that red hair your so proud of too.>

"That's to obvious, everyone's going to notice that." Shuichi replied seriously. "We'd have to do it slowly, let the color fade away."

<Well of course, if we went to quick you'd get lost. We can't have that, we're trying to live out her lifetime here.> Again, he could feel the Yoko grin. <You height will keep as well as your green eyes, but the rest will resemble me more then you. We're going to end up stuck if we stay half melded for to long though.>

"Good point. At half meld, can we still access your full power?" Now the concern was for the long term.

"Shuichi, dinner is in an hour! Start cleaning up." His step-father yelled up to him.

"Alright, thanks!" He yelled back.

<We'll going to end up loosing maybe and eighth of my power, nothing a little bit of training won't bring back though.> Yoko continued the conversation. <You'd eventually become the second personality once the meld was complete. Our voices will meld, it will be a bit deeper but it will be up to me to interact with your family, which means you'll need to tell me what to say.>

"We'll find a way to make it work. Let's start." He said softly.

The kitsune didn't reply instead he felt the power surge through him and he welcomed it happily. He was comforted by the rush of power. He let the power overtake him.

<Hey, calm down, if you don't fight it a little it's hard to keep it all filtered> The voice in his mind spoke.

He almost thought of ignoring it, he was tempted to just let it go. After a moment he fought back against the power trying to take over. He held onto his humanity while letting some of the demon's cool domineer slip through. He could feel the thoughts mingle and he could see what the kitsune's past thoughts.

<It's all true. That's how I think it could have gone. It would have been simpler then you made it to be. Sometimes you think to much.> Yoko said once the first power fed had finished.

"Your right, it could have been that simple. He probably would have waited..." Kurama mumbled.

The kitsune could tell that the red head wasn't going to do much so he used the link to take the body and moved them to the mirror. It was already visibly obvious the human was beginning to change.

<Shuichi, we have a problem. My silver hairs have slipped through, and it doesn't look like normal ageing.> The kitsune actually sounded slightly worried. <How are you going to explain this?>

"Perhaps thinking to much isn't as bad as you make it sound. You forget we have many plants we've used for camouflage." Kurama said with a smile.

He reached for a seed he kept in a small, dark box in his dresser drawer. Carefully he opened it just a crack, enough to get one seed out, then snapped it back shut.

The kitsune, as well as the human, began to feed power into the seed in order for it to create and sustain the right camouflage. However both knew once it was set the plant would continue to feed on their energy and it would only be a matter of time before it would suck them dry and leave them for dead.

<This really isn't one of your safest ideas. You know we have to throw this thing off on someone before it kills us. It won't take it more then 2 minutes for this thing to kill a human.>

"Again, you're thinking to small. We know where the portals to the demon world are, it's easy enough to throw it into there. The plant will sense all the demon energy on the other side. There will be no resistance." Kurama replied in a cool tone.

Yoko began to wonder if the meld was such a good idea. Sure it would offer him freedom but it seemed to be corrupting the human the other wished to keep.

Still, the two continued through the days, that turned into months, that slowly became a year. That's when the unthinkable happened. Shuichi's mother fell ill and it was cancer, it had been advancing undetected for quite some time. It was the time that the human had been dreading. That same human had begun to lock himself away inside the kitsune that was slowly melding with him. It was now up to the demon to play the role of the concerned human, something he was very unfamiliar with.

"Shuichi, we only have two seeds left, we either need to take a vacation of find a way to gather more." Yoko spoke using the body's voice.

<Whatever, just figure something out. She's going to die soon, right. Then we see how things are split and we give it all to them anyway. Then we leave for the Youkai and I'm expendable then. You'll forget all about me once we get there. Just like he did.>

"He said he would wait for you." Yoko said softly, "I'm sure he still is."

<No, he said he'd wait for you, Kitsune.> He replied bitterly.