"...The Hachibi's name?" Bee frowned.
After hearing Suguru's question, Bee couldn't help but take a glance behind. Looming there, Gyuuki remained uncharacteristically silent, seemingly conflicted by the child's teasing.
After a moment of contemplation, the Hachibi spoke.
"Yes, Bee... The human is referring to my name."
There was tension binding every syllable that Gyuuki uttered.
Then, there was silence.
—An unsettling silence of dreadful expectation where both Bee and Gyuuki held their breaths. Suguru's lips had been glued shut, seemingly realizing the sudden situation.
In a way, it was comical.
However, it had a few interesting implications, at least in Suguru's eyes. The half-second silence felt way longer than it should've.
"...Gyuuki,"
Bee mumbled the Hachibi's name, wondering how it rolled off the tongue, testing the rhyme, and seeing where it went.
"Hm," Bee took out his notebook, dipped the tip of his pen in ink, and began to write.
—Scribble... Scribble... Scribble.
For a moment, that was all that echoed out in the darkness.
The sound of rough ink against paper.
Gyuuki met Suguru's gaze, and upon seeing the innocent shine in the latter's eyes, he felt his nonexistent brow twitch.
"Oi," Gyuuki called out like a growl. "I'll ask again. Who the hell are you?"
Hearing the question, Suguru tilted his head. Cascading silver hair fell from his shoulders, glistening despite the darkness.
"Why must you be so insistent on who I am? Perhaps what matters more is who you are, Gyuuki-sama." Suguru's figure shimmered, moving as if he was but a mirage in this world of subconsciousness.
Doing so, he continued to speak.
"Uncle Bee knows you as the Eight-Tails. The world outside views you as a monster. The shinobi villages use you as a weapon."
—Step.
The footsteps of a child so small were unnervingly loud against the scribbling background.
"So, let me reflect that question back at you, Gyuuki-sama. Who are you?"
Suguru smiled. Suddenly, the eerie pressure he exuded vanished. Although the ominous gleam of his Sharingan was still present, his consequent shrug was filled with nonchalance.
"That's what I'm so eager to learn about. It's why I had interviewed your siblings, and now you. There's no need to learn about me, the interviewer. I'm here for a simplistic reason, after all."
A chuckle left Suguru's lips.
"It's all about satiating my hunger for knowledge."
"..."
With those words, Bee's scribbling was once again all that could be heard. Gyuuki fell silent, contemplating Suguru's words. Just like his siblings, Suguru's demeanor was an anomaly. For once, they had encountered a human who did not view them as objects and weapons.
Instead, they each bore an identity in the boy's eyes.
Somehow, it was refreshing. It gave Gyuuki some inch of hope for the future.
However, another part of himself told him to tread carefully.
'...How unsettling,' Gyuuki thought.
And that was when the scribbling stopped.
"Yo, Gyuuki my guy. All these years fightin' and yet I've never heard ya name? What a shame. It feels like everythin' was a lie, yo."
Bee continued.
"But I know it ain't no lie. I should'a asked, yeah? That's my bad, bro. I'm a damn fool, yo."
Leaping up, Bee situated himself upon Gyuuki's muzzle as he had often done. Sitting down, he crossed his arms and nodded to himself.
It was clear that Bee had made a decision.
"From now on, we will be Killer Bee and Gyuuki. Address us with 'Lord' wherever you go, yo!"
—Rrrrrrip!
Tearing out a page from his Rhyme Book, Bee handed Gyuuki the latest rap he had written. Verses charged with inexplicable emotions, and the revelation brought by a single name.
"This is for ya, ya damn fool," said Bee.
Meanwhile, Suguru watched the duo's exchange with a flicker in his gaze. Suguru watched as Gyuuki accepted Bee's gift. Watching as the Hachibi's gaze drifted past line after line.
Judging from Gyuuki's slightly opened mouth, there was most likely a pinch of incredulity seeping into his mind. Suguru could see that Gyuuki did not know how to react.
After all...
'Killer Bee isn't known for having good raps...' Suguru chuckled inwardly.
"..."
Another silence befell them, differing once more in the nature of its quietness. No longer was it some eerie tension or dreadful expectation.
"..."
"..."
"So,"
After a few seconds of such, Gyuuki was the first to break the silence. He looked at Suguru, with a tone of relinquishment. There was no need for the jinchuriki-bijuu pair to exchange any words.
Gyuuki's demeanor had changed and so had Bee's. They were now a little more welcoming of Suguru's presence.
Thus, Gyuuki nodded in Suguru's direction.
"...Let's hear what else you have to say."
Suguru beamed.
"Wonderful! Let's get started right away. First, I want to ask Bee about chakra."
Looking at Killer Bee, Suguru then went on to make a vague gesture.
"Can you give me a rough idea of how different your own chakra is from Gyuuki's? Furthermore, can you tell me more about your Kenjutsu techniques? Is it somehow related to Gyuuki being the Eight-Tails or..."
Just like with Shukaku and Matatabi, Suguru went through his list of questions.
At first, both Gyuuki and Bee were rather hesitant to answer a lot of things — their natural instincts seemed to abhor the spread of their own personal information. There was even a small moment where Gyuuki discretely disrupted Bee's chakra.
Gyuuki had, at some point, suspected Suguru's use of Genjutsu.
However...
Feeling Gyuuki's chakra, Bee could only shake his head. There was nothing to break. Suguru's questions and subsequent assumptions were difficult.
Not that they were hard to answer, but because answering one seemed to give a lot of hints to other topics — of which Suguru would tackle like a chain reaction.
It felt like Suguru was reading a book on their lives.
The only difference was that Suguru read only the first sentence of every paragraph — deducing the rest.
It was odd in the sense that they were being so clearly dissected in terms of knowledge.
"I've tasted seafood, yes." Gyuuki nodded at one of Suguru's latest questions. "However, judging from what Bee told me, I don't have what humans use to taste food."
"So you can't really give me an answer since we have no middle ground..." Suguru mumbled, falling into momentary thought. "How intriguing. Shukaku and Matatabi had never tried eating things..."
Suguru tapped the side of his head.
"I have a theory that it has to do with their general physique — sand and fire aren't exactly organic in the sense that normal animals aren't made of sand and seals. Furthermore, an animal with fire as its body is even more unlikely."
Glancing at Bee for a moment before looking Gyuuki straight in the eyes, Suguru continued.
"I also think that, if they did eat, they wouldn't be eating things that humans could call food. On the other hand, you, the Eight-Tails, have what I can actually call a living physique."
Similar to Son Goku, who seemed to have a functioning system of internal organs, which Suguru had seen in the original.
"What do you think, Gyuuki-sama?"
Suguru's look of curiosity also got Gyuuki recalling the seemingly distant past.
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Hi! I am back~
But not with daily uploads. I'm halfway through my thesis proposal and I'm no longer as burnt out. I'll be pacing myself with around 2-3 days per chapter.
Still, have five chapters today as an apology for being gone for a while!
Chapter 2/5.
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