A lot of people have done a story on Miroku, Sango and everyone else being reincarnated into Kagome's time. Usually what happens is that Kagome finds out and decides to try and make them remember or befriends them or what not. I feel that this is sometimes an over used plot and wanted to try my hand at something a bit different.
Just for the record:
Yukimura Taji - Inuyasha
Yukimura Sumiko - Rin
Miyamoto Kaori - Sango
Kiyoraka Kazuo - Miroku
Kiyoraka Yasuo - Kohaku
Hey, I didn't say I was going with COMPLETELY new territory here. Some stereotypes and overly used conveniences are happening.
Inuyasha/Taji - 15
Sango/Kaori - 15
Miroku/Kazuo - 15
Rin/Sumiko - 8
Kohaku/Kazuo - 12
Disclaimer: Rumiko Takahashi owns the wonderful characters of Inuyasha.
The Path of Destiny
Chapter 1
Strange Dreams
Taji sat on his front porch and sighed. There was life and light outside, but it did not interest him. Children were playing down the street, and teenagers his age were riding bikes and talking about going to the movies. A strange man walked past the vacant home across the street and began jotting things down on a pad of paper. The setting sun caused all of the events to have an orange glow, making them seem even more peaceful, almost surreal.
Normally, he would have been at least semi-interested in the goings on, but not today. As a matter of fact, in the several weeks since he began having the strange dreams, he hadn't felt like doing much of anything.
Except finding her.
Taji grunted and stood up quickly. "Feh." He brushed his long, black hair from his face and shook his head. Kaori was right. Thinking about this shit was stupid.
His mother was concerned for him. He hardly slept anymore, and when he did he could only dream of battles and blood shed and...HER in the middle of it all. A shining beacon of hope through the rain of swords and terror. Taji didn't want to worry his mother, she had enough going on with the business his father had left them when he died a few years ago. He didn't want to add to her burden.
"Taji! Come inside, it's dinner time!" his mother yelled from the kitchen.
"Yeah, okay,!" Taji grunted. He quickly wiped his feet off, not daring to let his mom know that he had been outside barefooted again. Ever since he was young, he had hated shoes, and went without them as often as possible. As far as he was concerned, there were more important things to worry about than ancient scrolls and customs.
Like his dreams.
The light of the sunset reflected into his violet eyes and he covered them as he walked into the house. He took off his red coat and tried to put thoughts of her out of his mind. Whoever she was, she was just a dream anyway.
OoOoO
"Another one?" Kaori, his best friend, inquired in disbelief. "That's one every night this week, Taji!" Her dark brown eyes widened in shock at the news.
Taji nodded and shoveled more rice into his mouth, careful not to get his long hair caught in his chopsticks in the process. He quickly gulped it down with juice before speaking again. "Yeah, I know. They're coming all the time now. Same world, same people...all of them calling me some weird name."
"Ah..." she said softly, picking through her own lunch. "Have you figured out all the names yet?"
He ignored the question. "You gonna eat that?" he asked pointing to her lunch, his mouth full of rice and meat.
Kaori blanched and shoved her bento towards him. Being friends with Taji took dieting to a completely new level sometimes. "Do you know how to chew?"
"Feh! You've known me since we were in diapers and you're just now asking me that?" Taji shot back at her.
Kaori rolled her eyes skyward and flipped her hair over her shoulder. "It's no wonder you don't have a girlfriend."
Taji's violet eyes glared at her. For a moment, he was half-tempted to resort to their usual way of resolving fights; by throwing things at each other until someone eventually had some part of their body bleeding or bruised, when Kaori changed the subject.
"What do you think they mean?" she ventured again. She was almost afraid to ask, if for no other reason than Taji kept mentioning that he thought she was in the dreams almost every night, but she had a different name. Though her role, as far as she could tell, was that of a close friend and as something else...something strong.
Shrugging, Taji put his box back into his bag. He tipped his chair backwards and stared up at the ceiling, lost in his thought about his dream from the night before.
He had been somewhere different than most of the dreams. It looked like a modern day house as opposed to the ancient homes he was used to seeing. He could remember being angry, very angry with someone and because of this, he was going to make her...yeah, her, apologize to him. Sure, she had been in the right for whatever it was, but he didn't get an attitude and run off as she had.
He had climbed in through the girls' window (which was on the second story, he had noted) and watched her sleep for a moment before SOMETHING happened...a word in her sleep had caused him great pain and then her alarm clock had gone off. He awoke at that point; obviously he had been hearing his own alarm clock in the dream.
Well, except hers had sounded slightly different than his...
Suddenly, he lost his balance and fell backwards from the chair, hitting his head on the floor. "OW! What the he-Sensei?" he stopped suddenly when he realized who had tipped his chair back.
Takayama-sensei raised her eyebrows and pointed to the door. "Class started two minutes ago! Out!"
"But-"
"OUT!"
Taji glared at Kaori, who was immensely enjoying the display, before storming out of the room and slamming the door behind him. He'd been friends with the tomboy for years, but he was going to get her back for not waking him up.
OoOoO
"Taji! Oh! TAJI! Come on, I didn't do it on purpose, I didn't even see Sensei and-" Kaori stopped talking when she was subjected to another one of his glares. He kept walking and she sighed, slinging her bag over her shoulder. She shouldn't care, they were almost home anyway, but she had to get the last word in. "You've got a temper that suits a monster, Taji," she muttered darkly under her breath.
Taji whirled around and pointed at her. "Yeah, but now they'll probably call my mother! She ain't got enough to worry about, what with that bastard trying to take over the company! And my sister always getting sick! She just needs this compounded on it!" Kaori was closer to him and she just kept her mouth shut and listened as he ranted. When he was in one of these moods, it was impossible to shut him up. They seemed to occur more and more often as of late, she had noticed.
Finally, he took a breath and Kaori began her own tirade. "Well if you weren't so worried about some STUPID dreams more than your family and friends, you never would have gotten in trouble!"
"WHAT?!"
"Oh, you heard me, Yukimura Taji!" She blew her bangs out of her face and flipped her hair over her shoulder. "Sometimes you're so obsessed with this girl that I think you've forgotten everything that really exists."
She had pissed him off, and she was prepared for it. Her sleeves were rolled up, and her shirt wasn't tucked in, making it very clear to even a casual observer that she wasn't one to be trifled with. Unfortunately, Taji was the only person, male or female, who had ever taken her down in a fight.
The two had been friends and neighbors their whole lives. Like all friends they had their difficulties, which had only once resulted in a fistfight. Kaori had the edge during most of the fight, but Taji had still won in the end. They had made up, as always, and the punches that were thrown were never again mentioned.
Kaori had always had an affinity towards physical sports, mostly kendo and kenpo, making her an outcast from most other girls. Taji was much the same, but his crass nature and often crude language had kept most of the neighborhood away from him. An unlikely pair, but a pair nonetheless.
The sound of a car pulling up near them and several doors opening and closing was what brought them out of their contest. A family of four was climbing out of a white car and examining a nearby vacant home.
Taji and Kaori exchanged glances and continued to watch as the father began looking up and down the street. It was soon obvious what he was looking for when a large moving van pulled up beside the car.
"I didn't know that place had sold," Taji mumbled to Kaori, who nodded her agreement. The house had been on the market for almost a year with no buyers, the neighborhood normally was in an uproar when new neighbors were expected. It seemed to be a surprise to everyone.
Kaori sighed and shifted her bag. "Well, it's not like we're far from home." They lived just across the street. "We should introduce ourselves." Taji sent her a look and Kaori gave him one right back. "If they haven't seen us by now, they're pretty stupid, so let's go!" She grabbed a lock of his hair and tugged, hard.
His cry caught the attention of the two children in the family. Both boys, one perhaps the same age as Kaori and Taji and the other was probably twelve or so. By the time they had looked, Taji was grabbing her hair back and yelling at her to let go.
"Let that young lady go!" the older boy demanded, rushing forward with his younger brother on his heels.
The two stopped at the sound of his voice and quickly realized how their situation must look. Taji flushed and quickly let go of Kaori's hair, and she of his. He turned to the man. "Look, this ain't what it-"
The young man wasn't listening. As a matter of fact, he had completely bypassed Taji and headed to Kaori. He grabbed her hands, and looked deeply into her eyes. "Miss, are you all right?"
The younger boy had caught up to his brother and slapped his hand to his forehead at the sight. "Oh no, not again," he mumbled.
Taji took his astonished eyes off Kaori and looked at the boy, who seemed to be utterly mortified by the display. He and the older one looked almost exactly alike with matching black eyes, the same type of face, and even the small ponytail they each wore. The main differences were the freckles scattered across the young boy's face.
"The hell is he doing, kid?" Taji demanded. For a moment, he was worried for Kaori's safety but had to remember...Kaori could take care of herself.
"He's being a pervert. Onii-chan's gonna get his butt kicked one day," the kid replied softly.
"There's no way he's always like...like THIS?!" Taji gestured towards the two. Kaori was still looking flabbergasted by all the praise she was getting from this new arrival, highly unusual for her. Meanwhile, the boy was making a large show of checking to be sure that she was as 'fine' as she claimed.
"No this is uhhh...tame for him, actually. Most girls would have smacked him around this time, or filed a restraining order." They continued to watch for a few more moments, but when nothing interesting happened, the kid shrugged. "Oh well, less babysitting for me to do. I'm Kiyoraka Yasuo by the way."
Taji bowed his head and introduced himself. "Yukimura Taji. And the perv over there..."
Yasuo rolled his eyes and finally made a step towards his brother. "My brother, Kazuo. We're moving in today. ONII-CHAN! Leave her alone, geeze!"
Kazuo stopped talking and walked with Kaori to where Taji and Yasuo were. "You must
forgive my brother, Kaori-san," Kazuo said, trying to sound important, "for he does not understand the world such as I do."
"One way of putting it."
Introductions went around once more, as well as a quick (and detail-free) explanation to the scene they had witnessed. The new friends quickly began to talk about the schools that they would be going to, what there was to do in this section of Tokyo and other general topics.
"Yasuo!" Kiyoraka Daichi, their father, yelled. "Come get your cat!"
"Okay, Otou-san!" Yasuo yelled and took off.
After he had left, an uncomfortable silence fell upon the three teenagers. They each tried to start a conversation, but quickly lapsed back into silence and stared at what they could find in the sky and grass.
Taji couldn't let go of the nagging feeling inside of him as he looked around. Kaori was sitting on the grass with her dark blue fuku tucked under her legs. Taji was leaning against a near-by tree, his arms crossed while Kazuo stood between the two of them. Somewhere, somehow ...he'd done this before. With these same people, the same silence and the same-
"Don't you feel as though we've done this before?" Kazuo asked suddenly, his eyes clouded and voice puzzled.
Taji's head snapped up at the question, which was quickly followed by Kaori's own puzzled voice. "I was...just thinking the same thing. This air, this feeling...it's familiar."
They looked to Taji expectantly. He almost snapped that they were crazy, but thought better of it and said what he felt. "I feel...that we've met somewhere like this."
"Kaori!" Miyamoto Ami yelled from across the street. She was walking over towards Taji's house when she spotted the trio across the street. "Oh, there you are! Come inside, you've got a phone call from your grandmother!"
"I'm coming!" Kaori yelled back, glad to be away from the strange situation. "Well, it was a pleasure meeting you, Kazuo-kun." She smiled at him. "I hope we have class together!" With that, she turned around, but before she could walk away, she felt something brush against her butt and she froze.
On instinct, she whirled around and slapped Kazuo across the face. From the look on Taji's face, she had indeed, just been groped.
OoOoO
He turned around, desperate for something to help. He had to save them! He had to save her! "Kagome! Hand me the Shikon fragment!" he yelled.
"Inuyasha..." she whispered, shocked. "Inuyasha, you don't mean to use the Shikon fragment?"
Inuyasha nodded. "I'll use it! There's no other way!"
She shakily held out the jar containing their one Shikon shard and he grabbed it from her hand. "Inuyasha..."
'Please handle it, Shikon shard!' he thought as he broke the glass against his sword, embedding the shard into the metal. No sooner had he done so than he was blown back by the sudden tide of power that was being emitted. Power he couldn't control. He could hear the others behind him, but didn't care what they were saying. He was frightened now. 'Ugh! This is...Something is flowing from Tetsusaiga into me...'
He could feel the change in his body. His blood was on fire, screaming for release from his hanyou prison. He fought to keep control, because in the back of his mind he could still smell her. 'Sh-shit! My body doesn't obey me any more! My head is...'
He turned suddenly, keeping a firm grip on Tetsusaiga. He could tell by the way they looked at him that they were scared. Scared of him. 'Run away you lot!' he tried to yell.
She, the girl who was always there, always in his dreams, moved and threw off the red armor that was protecting her, and she cried out his name. "Inuyasha!" She wasn't paying any mind to the acid that was burning into her skin, or the voices of her friends. She ran for him and threw her arms around his stomach.
He could smell more acid, and growled, trying to force her away, but she held him fast. She was in pain, he could smell her flesh burning, but she dared not let him go. He already could feel it happening and his blood cooled as her power coursed through him, calming him.
'Kago...me...'
OoOoO
"KAGOME!" Taji yelled as he sat up in bed. He looked around, expecting to see her, expecting to see...He stopped and tried to still the beating of his heart. He didn't know who he was expecting to see anymore. Just as quickly as it had been there, it was gone. He took a few deep breaths and wiped the sweat from his brow.
It had been so vivid so...frightening. He could still smell the acid, taste the blood lust.
The door to his bedroom creaked, startling him. He nearly fell out of his bed, but could only sigh in relief when his little sister, Sumiko, poked her head into his room. "Onii-chan...are you okay?" she whispered while she closed the door to his room and leaned against it.
"Yeah." He ran a shaky hand through his hair and exhaled once again. "Why wouldn't I be?" His voice sounded normal to his ears, but Sumiko wasn't fooled.
She nodded slowly and shuffled her feet. "Then...why were you screaming?"
"I wasn't screaming!" he snapped.
Sumiko pouted and stamped her foot. "You were TOO!" she insisted. Taji shook his head, causing her to stamp her foot again. "Yes you were!" Since he wouldn't concede, she crossed her arms, mimicking his favorite position. "Fine. Then I'll just tell EVERYONE your girlfriend's name is KAGOME!"
With that said, the eight year old girl pivoted and threw the door open. The door closed with a soft clicking sound, and Taji just sat there, shocked. "Kagome?"
To be continued...
I hope you enjoyed the first chapter, there's more than a few to come. I've got quite a few of them written, even! I got the translation for the dream online from a scanlation. I would have probably used the official manga translation but volumes 36-39 of my manga vanished during my move. So of course that scene happened to be in volume 36. I might continue using the scanlations because sometimes I find the English translation to be poorly done.
For the most part I'll be following the manga, but there's some anime eps that I'll want to follow as well, plus I happen to want some anime only characters in the story, so I'll do my best to blend them without getting too convoluted. Though this is a rebirth story so it'll be convoluted without trying. So I beg you to hold on for the ride, I'll explain as much as possible.
Also a note about Taji/Inuyasha's hair. To the best of my understanding it is against the rules of most schools for boys to wear their hair as long as Inuyasha's is. It can signify you're in a gang, it looks sloppy, ect...ect...It's just not allowed. So I'm going to pretend that he's getting away with it without being punished.
Until next time!
Ginzuishou
