YuYu Hakusho Manga - 006 The Lonely Journey

Call me crazy, but that sounds kind of... nice to me right now? These days, I'm spending a LOT of time at home, and when I go out, I'm enmeshed in social encounters that I just don't have the skill to maintain for more than a few minutes anymore. I'm out of practice being around others, but I'm so sick of hanging out in my house a majority of the time, so the idea of a long trip all by myself is strangely appealing. There's a BIG national park near me, and I keep thinking about how relaxing it would be to just disappear inside it for a few days. Or weeks.

At least your antics kept them on their toes, Yusuke. 

Botan picks out who she's looking for below, a bent old man with stark cheekbones, great heavy eyebrows, and a sour expression. He's standing by a fence, at which he meets a neighbor, a woman holding a large pot and wearing a huge smile, asking him if he likes stew - she says she made a lot and thought she would share. The old man appears to stick a finger in the pot to take a taste from it, smacking his lips thoughtfully for a moment, as the neighbor woman asks him if he thinks it's good. He responds with a gag and turns around, muttering that he'd rather eat dog food. Well fuck you too, buddy!

The neighbor stands sweadropping in shock for a moment, spluttering about the dog food comment the old guy made, then she starts flailing, incensed that he would insult her best dish like that when all she wanted was to do him a little favor, since he lives alone and all. Another two neighbor women approach the first, asking if she's okay. She whines that she's DYING of mortification from that old grouch's horrible comment. One of them seems to immediately reflect the irritation of the first, supposing that she tried to be nice to the old guy. The other advises her not to bother, as he's so sour on everything. She explains that he lost his family in an accident six months ago.

SIX MONTHS AGO??? Uh, yeah, never mind, I kind of get the attitude now...

Anyway, apparently the neighborhood tried to help out the guy since they felt so bad for his loss, but he's not accepting any spontaneous kindness.

Yeah, REALLY understanding the attitude now. 

One of the other women says that she still goes over to check on him every once in a while, but he treats her like a burglar when she does. Suddenly, a cup hits her on the back of the head, and all three of them are forced to flee when the old man starts throwing all kinds of household items at them, yelling at them to take their yammering elsewhere. He scoffs in frustration at them while they shout back at him that they're GOING already, telling them to STAY gone, because he can take care of himself. 

Yusuke wonders at this energetic response to neighborly concern, and asks Botan if she's SURE that the old dude is just days from death. Botan admits that she is kind of wondering herself at this point. Then she draws Yusuke's attention to the local wildlife, which you don't often see in cities anymore; a fat tanuki is creeping around the corner of the fence. Yusuke asks what it's doing here, so Botan suggests they inquire. 

She descends to its level and, startling it a little, asks it what's up. Rather than running off, the tanuki stares at them, which leads Yusuke to question if it can see them. Botan says that animals have a very keen sixth sense.

Uhhhh, sure. I'll take your word for it, Botan.

The tanuki pulls a photo from... somewhere, and Yusuke observes that it's of the old man while Botan makes a noise indicating her recognition as well. It's clear this creature can't talk, but it does seem to transfer its memory of the old man telepathically to Botan and Yusuke. At an unspecified point in the past, the old man and a small boy named Shinji are walking in the woods, the latter pointing out something in front of him and the former asking Shinji what's up. It's the tanuki, a bit smaller than before, with it's leg caught in a miniature bear trap. I say miniature, because if it had been regular-sized, the poor thing's leg would surely have been snapped right off. 

The old man identifies the baby tanuki, and kneels in front of it with the intention to free it, while he rambles about how people who set these traps ought to be lynched. A little extreme, but an understandable sentiment. At the very least, these people might benefit from being scared shitless by Yusuke. Apparently, a bit of branch stopped the trap from closing all the way, and that's probably what saved the little tanuki's leg. Once the creature is freed, and the old man has bandaged its leg up all nice, the tanuki limps off, looking around at the Shinji kid advising it to watch out for traps before it disappears entirely. 

Back in the present, the tanuki is sniffling with a happy tear in its eye, Botan declaring that the old man saved its life while Yusuke expresses some surprise that an old crotchety jerk like that did something nice. 

This little thing is so goofy-looking. 

Yusuke scratches his cheek in thought, saying that there's only a few days left to go now, and he can't imagine what the tanuki can do other than cook the old guy his last meal. Donning a mischievous kitty face, Yusuke suggests a nice tanuki stew, and Botan punches the back of his head, telling him that's not even a REMOTELY funny joke. Yusuke retorts that he's not trying to be funny so much as impress upon the creature that it's pointless. Over a peek inside the house below, where the old man is eating a spare dinner and coughing a little, Yusuke says he won't let anyone do anything for him, and the tanuki may as well bang its head against a brick wall, because it'll have just as much chance breaking through the old man's obstinacy. 

At first, the tanuki stares in contemplation of this idea, then the Shinji kid appears in its speech bubble and it points at it. Botan asks if it's asking what happened to the boy, and sadly explains that he and his parents went out for a drive and there was an accident, which left the old man bitter. The old man is sitting in front of a memorial shrine as she says this, with a picture of Shinji and his parents on it. Botan suggests that things might have been different if his grandson had survived the accident. 

Both Botan and Yusuke look at the tanuki in confusion as it takes out a little leaf, draws the kid's face on it, somehow, smacks the leaf on its forehead with the picture showing, then does a little flip.

Oh that's REALLY creepy. I kind of hate it, not gonna lie.

Botan is enthused, though, and exclaims that it's cute. We are just going to have to disagree. She says it's the first time she's seen a transformation. Yusuke is less impressed, pointing out to the newbie that its tail is showing, but Botan assures him that normal folks shouldn't be able to see it. Besides, if they do, they can just write it off as a little weirdo cosplayer. That's usually the assumption when this stuff happens in these kinds of comics, anyway. 

Yusuke kneels in front of the tanuki-boy and asks for confirmation that its plan is to impersonate the old man's dead grandson to get on his good side, to which the answer is a nod. This seems like a VERY BAD PLAN to me, but for other reasons than Yusuke gives, which is essentially that the old fucker is too far gone, got no good side left, and will shove the little troublemaker in a stewpot if he finds out what it really is. Yusuke, if ANYONE is going to be making the argument that somebody is too bad-to-the-bone based on a narrow observation of their somewhat shitty behavior, you should be the very LAST ONE. 

Anyway, the tanuki just stares silently, and eventually Yusuke comes to the conclusion that none of that matters to the creature, who nods again in affirmation. While Botan warns the newbie to remember that its assumed form will only last during the nighttime, while the moon's power is the strongest, Yusuke wonders aloud why the creature is wearing a blush on its illusory cheeks. Artist error, perhaps?

Anyway, as the night wears on, and the old man lies in his house coughing up a storm, he complains silently that his coughing and wheezing is worse at night, and that he can't sleep, but his strength is fading. He sits up at another violent coughing fit.

I would shit my soul. But, once again, I seem to be the only one creeped out the smiling illusory face of the dead grandson. The old man is crying tears of relief and joy at seeing it again, sobbing that it's really his precious boy. He hugs the illusion, and cries that it has no idea how lonely he's been, and just as Botan said, he fails to notice the tanuki tail poking out the back of the kid's trousers. Eventually the creature is patting the old man's back to ease the coughing and hacking, but while he expresses his gratitude and how good the action feels, the old man is still weeping.

Botan and Yusuke hang out above the house, just silently watching the place. Once dawn breaks, the old man blinks his eyes open and sits up, finding himself alone. He calls out for Shinji, who does not answer, so he starts to wonder if the whole thing was just a wishful dream. But then, he catches sight of a tray with a nice breakfast prepared on it, and he grins happily at the confirmation that it WASN'T just his imagination. 

I mean, I'm mystified too, but probably for different reasons. 

Botan says on this fifth night that she's thinking that this is it - the old guy's last night alive. Yusuke admits that he's still not certain about all this, even though it's been working out for the last few nights. Sweatdropping a bit, he asks Botan if there's not some risk of the the tanuki having given the old man some attachment to this world, thereby making it extra difficult for him to die and rest in peace as he should. Botan laughs that he's actually THOUGHT about those things, and Yusuke responds indignantly that he hasn't been half-dead this whole time for nothing. I guess he's not as stupid as even the afterworld presumed he was at the beginning of the story, huh?

But Botan assures him that he doesn't have to worry about all that "attachment to life" business, because the old man is way ahead of him on that matter. I mean, the guy HAS to realize that this isn't really his dead grandson, right? 

On this particular night, the old man calls to "Shinji" while he lies under a blanket on his futon. The illusory grandson is already sitting next to him dutifully, ready to wait on him and fulfill his every want. The old man only has one last request though, since it's late, and it's almost his time: he wants "Shinji" to remain with him through the night and into the morning this time. The tanuki remembers Botan's warning that it can only maintain its illusory form during the night, but the old man says he really doesn't want to be left alone in his last hours. 

Well, the carriage is going to turn back into a pumpkin regardless, so why not go all in?

As they lay side by side during the night, the old man says that this kind of reminds him of when they went to camp in the mountains. He reminds "Shinji" of the tanuki he found in the trap up there, and how they freed it. "Shinji" sweatdrops a bit as the old man admits he often wondered what happened to the little creature after that. Obviously, the speechless tanuki cannot answer, and just gapes in response. 

Birds start chirping outside, and furry little ears pop up on the tanuki's illusory head, causing it to let out a squeak of distress. In a panic, it throws back the blanket to flee, the dismayed old man asking what it's doing, and reminding it that it promised him to stay, ending with another plea to remain. It struggles to maintain its form with the coming sun, panting, but a gleam surrounds it.

The transformation back was so strained that it took off half its foot!

The Tanuki's little heart hammers and it has its arms thrown over its head as it anticipates the old man's explosion of anger at it pretending to be his grandson and trying to deceive him, imagining the old guy calling it a monster. Meanwhile, the old man stares in silence for a moment at the tanuki's back as it sidles along the wall toward the door in shame. Eventually, he tells the tanuki not to try and sneak away, and to come back over to him. When it turns back around, the old man is smiling. He chuckles and confesses that he already knows - apparently tanuki transformations are a lot harder to hide from people who are as close to death as he is, and a couple of days ago he spotted something that gave it away. He doesn't say what, but he says he's a stubborn old man and he didn't want to say anything.

The crying tanuki nods while the old man observes that it's full grown now, asking if its leg is alright now, and if it came to help him as a form of thanks. Still smiling, the old guy states that he's on his way to seeing Shinji for real now, because his tanuki friend freed his soul from the bitterness that trapped it before. He reaches out, asking to hold the little creature just a little while longer. It returns to the old man's side under the covers and they hug, the old guy muttering that it's so warm, soft, and sweet, the tanuki silently crying through it all. At last, the old man's soul rises up out of his body, offering a final farewell and thanks to the creature that made his last days so much better.

Later, I'm guessing after Botan carted the old guy off to the afterlife as her job dictates, she and Yusuke hover over the house and she expresses some pity for the poor Tanuki and its tough ordeal for a little buddy just starting out. She says she hopes that it'll be okay, but Yusuke asserts after a small pause that it'll be fine. 

To be fair, Yusuke, that's a pretty low bar to clear. 

So, what did I think of this chapter overall? This one made me sightly uncomfortable at first, because I couldn't help thinking if I were confronted with the image of a dead relative like this, I personally would be very upset, not to mention terrified. It wouldn't feel any better for me learning that this was a supernatural force imitating this relative, and I can't be certain that it would make much of a difference knowing that this force was thanking me for a kindness I had done it in the past. It seemed to me multiple levels of mind-fuckery that I was not vibing with. 

But, I didn't spend a lifetime in Japan with undertones of Shintoism present throughout my existence. My culture's undertones are distinctly Christian, even though I don't subscribe to that particular belief system, and as such, I have a cultural predisposition to knee-jerk interpret an event such as this in an almost sinister, demonic way. Since this is the context in which I live and have grown up, it's not always easy to spot, so it didn't occur to me at first that the old man would appreciate this creature's care for him in the form of his beloved grandson for an embarrassing amount of time. 

By the last few pages, however, I had gained a little insight not just into the characters of the old man and the tanuki, but also the cultural context that surrounds an event such as this, how it can be soothing and even a relief especially in a man's final days. No one wants to die alone, and since the people the old man loved most were all gone ahead of him, it was a scary time for him to have to come to terms with his mortality by himself. That new perspective allowed me to see how the tanuki coming to take care of him out of pure love and respect would soothe an old man's soul that had been so jaded at the actions of his fellow humans. 

And yeah, I cried a little at the end there, what of it? XD

However, it continues to be a source of endless frustration for me that these characters just aren't given names. On the one hand, I think it's really cool and masterful how YT creates these deeply emotional narratives for characters that don't even have a name for a majority or whole of the story. On the other hand, the epithets I have to come up to give a little variety with in these recaps are killing me!