Accidents and Aftermath, Chapter 7: Love
Title: Accidents and Aftermath
Author: Dreaming of Everything dreams_of_all
Series: Yu Yu Hakusho
Characters/Pairings: Hiei/Botan
Rating/Warnings: T for over-all mood, nothing terribly bad in specifics.
Summary: When Hiei is poisoned, causing temporary insanity, he severely wounds Botan, who's now comatose, hovering on the brink of death. This fic is a series of onesided conversations between the two as Hiei deals with his emotions, and then the aftermath.
oOoOoOo
“Curiously, people resist the noble aspects of their shadows more strenuously than they hide their dark sides. It is more disrupting to find out that you have a profound nobility of character than to find out that you are a bum.”
--Robert A. Johnson
oOoOoOo
Hiei hadn’t been incredibly silent, but he had never been open and talkative, either. He had the feeling that this was the most he had spoken in… A long time. The silence seemed to draw the words out of him without even conscious thought, as if it was some magnetic force pulling at him and his voice.
He had certainly never spoken so deeply, so openly, so painfully. He was not sure he was enjoying the experience.
And he hated the circumstances that had caused it, maybe that most of all. The demons who had started it, and himself for finishing it, and Botan, in a heart-wrenching, painful, impersonal and guilty way, for being the one it had happened to, for affecting everyone it had.
Yukina, Yusuke, Kurama, Kuwabara, Genkai, even Koenma: they were his world, the only ones he interacted with. The sum and total of his family, friends, acquaintances and peers. Nobody has made him feel like Botan has, though, now that this has happened.
No one has caused that cocktail of mixed, conflicting, uncontrolled emotions the way she has managed by doing nothing. The guilt, envy, caring, worry, respect, hate, fear, understanding, need…Nobody has made him feel like Botan has. Maybe not feel as badly as Botan has, but it is calming to look into her face when he can push aside-though not forget-that she is dancing with her second death and it is his fault and he understands her better now, and what used to irk him about her doesn’t bother him as much anymore, now that that’s changing.
And now that there’s a chance that she will die, that she will be gone forever, he can’t imagine life without her. And it’s not just because of the impact it would have on the rest of his… friends, his co-workers, it would affect him as well, as much as he is reluctant to admit that.
It’s not even that he would feel guilt forced on him by the people who were mourning her. It wasn’t even that he would feel guilt for his own sake.
He would miss her. He wasn’t sure why, but he would miss her, and her irritating, unhelpful, over-all useless presence.
Somehow, though, it’s more than that.
It wasn’t that he would miss her-although he would-but that he couldn’t imagine life without her. It was like suddenly finding out that your world didn’t evolve around the sun you thought it did-that it was being pulled and directed and was centered around something else entirely.
Like Botan.
And he couldn’t hate her for that revelation. Couldn’t hate her for interrupting his not-really-peaceful world, couldn’t blame her for (being there) for what he had done. It is somehow frightening, to suddenly shoulder responsibility that way, not because he wants to or even because he has to but because there is no option but to.
The past few days, the past week and then some, he has told her more than he has ever told anyone else, including himself. He thinks that, if he could have listened to himself, he would have learned a lot. Kurama had once told him that nobody ever knows himself, and Hiei has only now begun to understand that.
I would miss her. I would… Regret not having her there.
“It’s…
“The guilt is only part of it. I’ve come to… Like having you around. Tolerate it. Or maybe more than that…
“It’s not that I can’t imagine you not being there, but that it makes me feel-lonely.
“I’m not sure I can imagine me without you. And I’ve always been alone before, completely independent.
“…But I’m not alone anymore. There’s Kurama, Yukina, even though she doesn’t know.” His voice was grudging. “Yusuke. Kuwabara.
“Botan…
“Or she was. She was there for me, maybe even considered me her friend, at least her coworker, even though I did my best to change that… And even though she won’t be, if she wakes up. If she ever wakes up…
“Even Botan has her limits. Sending her spiraling into a second death, to the point where it nearly cost her her life, would shatter even her limits.
“And that… Hurts. Though it shouldn’t. I did my best to accomplish that on my own, before.
“But before was a long time ago, wasn’t it? It seems like nothing is the same now. Not her, myself, anyone else. Even what’s important. No missions at all since this has happened-even Koenma’s rearranged his priorities.
“The world held its breath when you were hurt, and it hasn’t let it out yet.
“What happens when you die?
“I suppose we’ll have to move on. Yusuke has that weak human girl, Kuwabara his sister. Koenma will bury himself in work. Kurama-he’ll manage. He’s no doubt dealt with worse before, and he has his pathetic human ‘parent’ for comfort. Yukina has Genkai and the other spirit detectives looking out for her-and me, though… I can’t comfort her. I wouldn’t know how.
“And I-I’ll-just move on…”
But he couldn’t. And he knew that. Knew that he wouldn’t know what to do. Knew that he wouldn’t be able to face the rest of the Tantei, face himself, face the full force of the half-there guilt that was already stalking him, face the uncertainty. Face his humanity. (1)
Somehow, all of this and more had started hinging on Botan’s death. His life had centered around hers, impossibly and implacably. Was it because it was his fault? Because he had watched over her? Was it her expression-sudden, shocked, horrified, disbelieving, hurt-when his sword plunged into her? Was it just her, and her personality, and her belief, her trust?
He wasn’t sure. It had happened nonetheless.
He cared. He cared more than he knew, more than he could give voice to. About her and about what he had done to her, about how that damn night had changed the course of their lives.
And he hated that, somewhat. What it had done to him, to his independence, to the others, to her, to everyone. He hated not knowing. But the caring was stronger, and the guilt and the confusion-
For once, he was feeling something he couldn’t easily identify, or just as easily dismiss, explain away.
His thoughts quieted, and the silence grew thicker, heavy, accusing.
It’s frightening, suddenly not knowing. It had all the horror of being alone and unsure in the dark, with no one there-but that had never frightened him, not like this had. Hadn’t done this to him.
What feels like a painful eternity passes before the word he is looking for to describe the tangled bundle of emotions he is feeling finally occurs to him.
“Love,” he says quietly to the room, and his voice is tinged with wonder.
oOo
“If I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am become as a sounding brass or a clanging gong. And if I have the gift of prophecy and know all knowledge; and if I have all faith, so as to move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing.”
--1 Corinthians 13:1-2
oOoOoOo
(1) I have said it before and I’ll say it again-in some ways, the English language sucks. More specifically, there is no good synonym for ‘humanity’ that doesn’t have the emphasis on being human.
Author: Dreaming of Everything dreams_of_all
Series: Yu Yu Hakusho
Characters/Pairings: Hiei/Botan
Rating/Warnings: T for over-all mood, nothing terribly bad in specifics.
Summary: When Hiei is poisoned, causing temporary insanity, he severely wounds Botan, who's now comatose, hovering on the brink of death. This fic is a series of onesided conversations between the two as Hiei deals with his emotions, and then the aftermath.
oOoOoOo
“Curiously, people resist the noble aspects of their shadows more strenuously than they hide their dark sides. It is more disrupting to find out that you have a profound nobility of character than to find out that you are a bum.”
--Robert A. Johnson
oOoOoOo
Hiei hadn’t been incredibly silent, but he had never been open and talkative, either. He had the feeling that this was the most he had spoken in… A long time. The silence seemed to draw the words out of him without even conscious thought, as if it was some magnetic force pulling at him and his voice.
He had certainly never spoken so deeply, so openly, so painfully. He was not sure he was enjoying the experience.
And he hated the circumstances that had caused it, maybe that most of all. The demons who had started it, and himself for finishing it, and Botan, in a heart-wrenching, painful, impersonal and guilty way, for being the one it had happened to, for affecting everyone it had.
Yukina, Yusuke, Kurama, Kuwabara, Genkai, even Koenma: they were his world, the only ones he interacted with. The sum and total of his family, friends, acquaintances and peers. Nobody has made him feel like Botan has, though, now that this has happened.
No one has caused that cocktail of mixed, conflicting, uncontrolled emotions the way she has managed by doing nothing. The guilt, envy, caring, worry, respect, hate, fear, understanding, need…Nobody has made him feel like Botan has. Maybe not feel as badly as Botan has, but it is calming to look into her face when he can push aside-though not forget-that she is dancing with her second death and it is his fault and he understands her better now, and what used to irk him about her doesn’t bother him as much anymore, now that that’s changing.
And now that there’s a chance that she will die, that she will be gone forever, he can’t imagine life without her. And it’s not just because of the impact it would have on the rest of his… friends, his co-workers, it would affect him as well, as much as he is reluctant to admit that.
It’s not even that he would feel guilt forced on him by the people who were mourning her. It wasn’t even that he would feel guilt for his own sake.
He would miss her. He wasn’t sure why, but he would miss her, and her irritating, unhelpful, over-all useless presence.
Somehow, though, it’s more than that.
It wasn’t that he would miss her-although he would-but that he couldn’t imagine life without her. It was like suddenly finding out that your world didn’t evolve around the sun you thought it did-that it was being pulled and directed and was centered around something else entirely.
Like Botan.
And he couldn’t hate her for that revelation. Couldn’t hate her for interrupting his not-really-peaceful world, couldn’t blame her for (being there) for what he had done. It is somehow frightening, to suddenly shoulder responsibility that way, not because he wants to or even because he has to but because there is no option but to.
The past few days, the past week and then some, he has told her more than he has ever told anyone else, including himself. He thinks that, if he could have listened to himself, he would have learned a lot. Kurama had once told him that nobody ever knows himself, and Hiei has only now begun to understand that.
I would miss her. I would… Regret not having her there.
“It’s…
“The guilt is only part of it. I’ve come to… Like having you around. Tolerate it. Or maybe more than that…
“It’s not that I can’t imagine you not being there, but that it makes me feel-lonely.
“I’m not sure I can imagine me without you. And I’ve always been alone before, completely independent.
“…But I’m not alone anymore. There’s Kurama, Yukina, even though she doesn’t know.” His voice was grudging. “Yusuke. Kuwabara.
“Botan…
“Or she was. She was there for me, maybe even considered me her friend, at least her coworker, even though I did my best to change that… And even though she won’t be, if she wakes up. If she ever wakes up…
“Even Botan has her limits. Sending her spiraling into a second death, to the point where it nearly cost her her life, would shatter even her limits.
“And that… Hurts. Though it shouldn’t. I did my best to accomplish that on my own, before.
“But before was a long time ago, wasn’t it? It seems like nothing is the same now. Not her, myself, anyone else. Even what’s important. No missions at all since this has happened-even Koenma’s rearranged his priorities.
“The world held its breath when you were hurt, and it hasn’t let it out yet.
“What happens when you die?
“I suppose we’ll have to move on. Yusuke has that weak human girl, Kuwabara his sister. Koenma will bury himself in work. Kurama-he’ll manage. He’s no doubt dealt with worse before, and he has his pathetic human ‘parent’ for comfort. Yukina has Genkai and the other spirit detectives looking out for her-and me, though… I can’t comfort her. I wouldn’t know how.
“And I-I’ll-just move on…”
But he couldn’t. And he knew that. Knew that he wouldn’t know what to do. Knew that he wouldn’t be able to face the rest of the Tantei, face himself, face the full force of the half-there guilt that was already stalking him, face the uncertainty. Face his humanity. (1)
Somehow, all of this and more had started hinging on Botan’s death. His life had centered around hers, impossibly and implacably. Was it because it was his fault? Because he had watched over her? Was it her expression-sudden, shocked, horrified, disbelieving, hurt-when his sword plunged into her? Was it just her, and her personality, and her belief, her trust?
He wasn’t sure. It had happened nonetheless.
He cared. He cared more than he knew, more than he could give voice to. About her and about what he had done to her, about how that damn night had changed the course of their lives.
And he hated that, somewhat. What it had done to him, to his independence, to the others, to her, to everyone. He hated not knowing. But the caring was stronger, and the guilt and the confusion-
For once, he was feeling something he couldn’t easily identify, or just as easily dismiss, explain away.
His thoughts quieted, and the silence grew thicker, heavy, accusing.
It’s frightening, suddenly not knowing. It had all the horror of being alone and unsure in the dark, with no one there-but that had never frightened him, not like this had. Hadn’t done this to him.
What feels like a painful eternity passes before the word he is looking for to describe the tangled bundle of emotions he is feeling finally occurs to him.
“Love,” he says quietly to the room, and his voice is tinged with wonder.
oOo
“If I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am become as a sounding brass or a clanging gong. And if I have the gift of prophecy and know all knowledge; and if I have all faith, so as to move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing.”
--1 Corinthians 13:1-2
oOoOoOo
(1) I have said it before and I’ll say it again-in some ways, the English language sucks. More specifically, there is no good synonym for ‘humanity’ that doesn’t have the emphasis on being human.