Kurama's Spring Flower

Chapter Ten

In the hospital far from the action, Shiori Minamino enters the unconscious Urameshi's room and pauses to take in the sight of the girl that lays in the hospital bed whilst tears fall down her cheeks. She rushes over to the girl's side and places her unoccupied hand on the girl's still hand, and sighs in relief when feeling warmth in that hand. "Thank goodness you're a fighter Akina. I worry for what will happen when it's my turn to stay in this hospital, and how will Shuichi handle it." She then gently puts the flowers in the vase that was occupied with dying flowers, making her bin the dying flowers and change the water in the vase, before taking her seat beside Akina and tightly holds her hand as she speaks to the girl, "You are everything to Shuichi, Akina. He may not confess to it but he is showing me with how distressed he has been ever since the accident, and I hope you recover soon so that he can be his happy self, and maybe more happy than he has ever been." Shiori giggles before she then begins to sob, "I just wish that I wasn't ill, because I can't bare to let Shuichi know that he may lose us both, so please....please wake up! A-and please...lord...help my little boy cope with what's to come." There is then a knock, making Shiori turn to see a nurse come in and inform her that visiting hours is over, making the two unaware of what was going on between Akina's hand and Shiori's hand.

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Meanwhile, Shuichi has found Maya and is now walking through the forest with her on his back. "Huh?" Shuichi hears Maya say as she finally awakens but doesn't turn his head to face her, even as she continues, "Minamino? Why?" She then adjusts herself so that she can move her head more over his shoulder before she lets out a sigh, "Oh, I know. This is a dream, huh?" The blank face Shuichi had kept present on his face melts to a small look of relief as he calmly replies, "That's right, you're dreaming. And when you wake up, you'll forget it ever happened." He feels sadness as he knows how sad Akina would be if she were to ever find out that he broke a friendship she encouraged him to make. During his moment of thinking, Maya closes her eyes and snuggles into his neck as she smells him, making her breath out, "You smell nice." And at that moment, Shuichi speaks to her as she sleeps, unaware that what she was smelling wasn't his natural smell, but instead was a special pollen that will make her forget whatever he wants he to forget, "Forget everything...Including how you feel about me, and what you made happen to Akina."

"Mugen Flower pollen, right? Erasing her memories?" Hiei asks him as they continue their journey. To which Shuichi simply answers, "It's what's best for her." Instead of commenting on his reply, Hiei instead says, "I never got your name. I'll make a note of it." Shuichi smiles at him, knowing that he has just formed an alliance, before he looks ahead and answers, "It's Kurama." The two continue to walk as the sun slowly rises until they reach Maya's home, where the two then separate. 

When Kurama arrives to his home he changes his clothes, before he takes out the golden solution and stare at it with hope that this will wake Akina. Suddenly, there's a knock on his door for it to then open, revealing his mother, looking more healthy than any other day. "Good morning Shuichi. I'm just going out, do you need anything?" Kurama smiles at her and says, "No mother, but I will also be out today, visiting Akina." Shiori looks at him concerned and asks, "Do you want me to come with you?" Shuichi shakes his head, causing the woman to nod before speaking again, "When you come home, I do have something important to tell you dear, alright?" Shuichi nods before his mother then leaves, leaving him to then prepare for his journey to the hospital and before he leaves, something on the news catches his attention:

"In an old mannequin factory many missing victims had been discovered and sadly none of them could be identified, except for one of the bodies found chained to the fence had there ID card found and their name is Machi Joji, who was missing from a court case regarding a car accident that resulted in putting a teenage girl named Urameshi Akina in a coma. Police are trying to investigate who are the monsters that have kidnapped all these people to then brutally kill them-" Kurama turns off the news before standing in silence as he dives deep into his thoughts. 'Yatsude has already revealed that he was being controlled by a woman, and now the man that hit Akina was actually there in the factory under restrains? Was this woman the key source of his ability to easily get a hold of humans to eat, but if so why not have the others restrained also? Unless...unless this woman somehow knew Akina! But who?' He then breaks out of his thoughts when he takes note of the time and realises he could potentially miss the bus that goes to the hospital.

Whilst on the bus he thinks back to when he used the Mugen pollen and wondered if it would be best to use it on Akina after she recovers. But an internal battle had begun at the moment this thought is registered in his mind. On the one hand she would be safe from the conflicts that Demons and Spirits bring upon all three worlds, but he can't help but feel selfish in wanting to keep her and have her remember him so that she will definitely stay by his side. After all she did risk her life for him, and he would gladly do the same. There is also the matter of Akina already having Spiritual awareness and how long for. Kurama decides that it was best to ignore the idea of Mugen pollen and just continue to keep an eye on Akina, especially after hearing what that woman told him last night about her and making her sound like she wasn't a normal human.

The bus then stops round the corner of the hospital, making Kurama get off whilst thanking the driver, before he makes his way inside the building to then make his way to Akina's room. When he enters the room, he sees that the nurse assigned to Akina's intensive care was lightly brushing the unconscious girl's raven locks carefully, before noticing the visitor that clearly wanted to be alone with the girl. The nurse then gentle moves away from her patient and bows in greeting to the red head before speaking, "She still hasn't awoken I'm afraid, and the doctors are beginning to lose hope of her recovery as she is now showing symptoms of her health declining further. The Doctor is trying to contact her family to inform them that they should consider taking her off life support." Kurama froze at hearing this and started to look distressed, making the nurse gasp, realizing how blunt she's been on such bad news. She stammers out an apology before rushing out of the room.

Kurama slowly makes his way over to the girl and squeezes her hand before he whispers, "I can't let you go. I can't." He then let's go before he pulls out the golden substance and puts it in his mouth, but doesn't swallow it. He then puts his lips against Akina's and uses his tounge to force her lips open and make the substance go into Akina's, whilst mentally praying that some how she will swallow it and heal. He waits a moment before removing his lips from hers and watches her in desperation for her eyes to open, but after waiting a few minutes and she doesn't, he collapses into the chair behind him and buries his head onto her bed as he allows tears to escape his eyes, until he feels something weakly touching and playing with his hair and a weak voice speak, "Sh-shuichi...why are you c-crying?" He gasps and looks up, to see Akina awake and looking at him with concern, making him quickly and yet carefully pull her into a hug whilst whispering, "You're awake. You're back, Akina!"