Lying down I was sure it would be the last time. My pain was excruciating and I continually cried out. No one could hear me in this abandoned forest where not an animal roamed. I wailed in a feeble attempt to express such pain. I had a long, bleeding, burning, horrible cut from my shoulder to my heal and two parallel on either side of it. They were leaking my life's blood onto the forest floor at an amazing pace. The red soaked the leafy ground and reddened the brown floor. My voice cries out in one last attempt to express the horror I feel, but then all is black.
"I think we should have let her be" a male's voice said. The voice was not to high and not to low and had a feel to it as though it would get annoying.
"No! Then she would have died!" a female voice said. I immediately hated this voice. It hurt my sensitive half-demon ears and it was immediately annoying.
"Yea, Inuyasha. Leaving her would be mean!" a young male voice said. I like this one it sounded friendly and it seemed to hide a great amount of hurt within.
"I must agree with Shippo. Leaving her could have proved a great sin." a smooth male voice said. I did not know if I liked this one. It sounded good enough and was soothing to my ears to hear, but it seemed to hide a disturbing quality. Like it belonged to someone who would be a cheater.
"Well, She should have fought off whatever nearly killed her!" The first voice remarked. Instead of it being annoying I rather began to like it. It was unique and interesting to listen to. About the subject they were talking about, well, it must be me. I would have thought that if they came across an almost dead brunette haired, cat-like girl, they would have let her be to die. Apparently they had helped me and were now talking about weather they should have or not. And, it angered me that the first one thinks I should have fought that thing off. I could not handle a 20 foot tall, black wolf with red eyes and fire breath that conveniently knew how to use an array of weapons that I didn't even know a wolf could use! Usually they don't even wield swords but a sword and throwing stars and a huge pointed metal disks and kamas and knives and daggers were just strange. Some of these weapons I didn't even recognize. Well, time to announce my presence.
"Stop fucking talking about me. If you wanted to leave me you should have. Don't go back on your decision now." I said, opening my emerald green eyes and sitting up. I realized I was on a small blanket stretched over rocky land. There were bandages down my side and my head was wrapped. I must have hit it.
"Fine, lets go!" The first one said. He said it loudly and my ears hurt. I grabbed my head and gasped.
"Oh my gosh! What's wrong!?" The girl said, which made them hurt more.
"Stop fucking talking!" I spat at her and bared my teeth. They were pure white, long and pointed. Just like a cat's teeth. I was half cat. I had the ears and teeth of a cat, also a tail and claws.
"My, my, testy, isn't she?" The smooth one said. I whipped around fast and slashed his cheek with my claws. He recoiled and lifted his hand to his face in shock.
"Okay, just tell me what's wrong and I will fix it then you can leave if you wish." The girl said. I glared at her.
"Just. Shut. Up." I said slowly, to make sure her small brain could understand me. I closed my eyes and thought of what had to be done. I had to determine where I was then head back to the wolf's cave to get my brother. The wolf had taken him and wanted me in exchange so I had to kill the wolf and get my brother. I leapt up into a tree to better taste the air. Once high in the branches, I opened my mouth and took a deep breath. I instantly coughed and almost choked on a vile smell coming from below me.
" Oh my god! What smells so bad!?" I yelled down. Then I saw the girl spraying her hair with some sort of clear spray. I growled and leapt back down next to her. I was at least a head taller.
"If you don't stop fucking around, I will kill you." I said to her in all honesty. She was shocked but put the things away. I went back to the top of the tree and tasted the air. I had to head north.
"Goodbye, idiots." I called down and started to leap from tree top to tree top to get to my location. They followed. The first one called to me.
"Hey, we are going in the same direction so stay out of out way!" I got pissed.
"Shut the hell up mongrel mutt!" I yelled at him. I had noticed that he was half dog demon. He was obviously angered so I laughed (more like cackled) and continued to leap from tree to tree. After a while it became to dark to go on so I settled in a tree about 300 meters from the rest of the group. I though a lot of my brother and what he was going through. He was going to be tortured then killed. I think it might hurt him more if he saw me killed though. We have always been very very close. I began to sing (which I did very often) about what I though he would be feeling.
Will you think that your all alone,
When no ones there to hold your hand?
When everything slips away,
like a wave washing away the sand.
I hope to be there
to be your rock, the one that steadies you.
After that it dissolved into humming at which point I eventually fell asleep. I dreamed of my brother that night. He was being tortured and I was watching, not able to do anything. I woke up in a cold sweat and found tears running down my face.
"Please, please brother, be okay for me." I whispered to the wind. Then I began to run along the path to the cave. It was still about 20 miles away but I could reach it in about 3 days. I had to be a little slower than usual because of my injuries. Actually, after about 2 miles they started to hurt, then burn. My step faltered but I had to press on. Not to far in front of me I saw the group. I hissed and ran past them. They all stepped out of my way as I stormed past but the half-demon followed me.
"Hey, I smell blood." he said to me. I looked down my side and indeed I was bleeding pretty badly.
"Goddammit." I mumbled to myself. I ran up a tree and sat in the branches to assess what was wrong. Once again the half-demon followed me.
"What do you want?" I asked him, not being to mean just wondering why he would help me.
"We need you. You are a strong fighter and we need to fight more monsters than we can handle alone." He replied, his voice becoming softer.
"The next one to fight is a black wolf who I heard is very strong." he continued. I looked at him in shock. They needed...me? They actually wanted to stay with me? Then I thought of what he had just said.
"A-a wolf?" I questioned. He nodded and stared at my hands, which had stopped unwrapping the bandages on my side. This wolf must be the same wolf that has my brother, I though to myself. I continued to undo the bandages until a long, red, and bleeding line was visible. It hurt, bad.
"Want me to ask Kagome for any medicine?" The half-demon said, referring to the girl. I shuddered and strictly said no.
"her voice hurts." I complained, like a child. He laughed. Actually laughed.
"I have been the only one that thinks so for a while. Its good to be able to talk to another half-demon every once in a while." he said, " Oh, and my name is Inuyasha, what's yours?" I wondered briefly why he was suddenly so interested.
"Nekokira." I replied. He nodded and jumped off the tree because it had gotten late already and we needed rest. I stared up at the moon in heartache.
"We are coming, bro. We're coming." I whispered to the moon, hoping that my brother was still alive. Our days continued like this for a while. We would go a small ways then rest them go little farther. It was hard with my sores but we still made progress, just slowly. Inuyasha and I became closer, until we would have normal conversations. I actually started to really like him, because I had never had a friend before that understood. None of the people I had ever come in contact with had understood my pain, but he did and that meant the world to me. Then we finally caught up with the wolf. It was large and black with red eyes and was sitting inside a cave, waiting for us.
"Ah, you again. Come to fetch your brother I presume?" The dreaded wolf said to me.
"Damn right! Give him to me and then we fight!" I yelled at him. Inuyasha and the others were confused. They had just though that they would fight and leave, but this was personal.
"So sorry to inform you, but your brother is long dead." I stopped and could hear my heart in my ears. That can't be true. My heart sped as I tried to keep up my tough impression.
"No way! I won't believe you! Show me!" I yelled at him, but my voice was breaking.
"Very well. One moment please." The wolf said as it retreated into it's cave.
"Hey what the hell, Nekokira? You know this guy?" Inuyasha asked me.
"He gave me those cuts and he has my bro. I will kill him." I replied with determination.
"Behold, my lovely prize for you." The wolf came back and was carrying a limp corpse. He dropped it at my feet and it was him. My brother. My blood went cold and I lost all sense of surrounding. I fell onto my knees and looked at his dark, messy hair. His beautifully shaped lips and perfect nose. And his eyes, although closed, that I knew where the same emerald green as mine. Then I saw a drop off water on his face. I looked up to see that I was not raining, then lifted a hand to my face. I was crying. I replaced the sadness with anger. I hated this damned wolf. I lifted my eyes to stare into his. As the group saw me crying they were all stunned into silence.
"I. am. Going. To. Fucking. Kill. You." I said slowly and clearly to the wolf then I felt my body change. I had the sensation of elongating and growing thicker. Then a thing shot out of my spine like a continuation to it. After I felt this all stop I looked to Inuyasha and his eyes were wide in surprise. I was a giant snow leopard. And I wanted to kill the wolf. I wanted to kill that was all that went through my mind. I don't even remember what I did I just know that once I began to remember again I was standing triumphantly over his dead corpse. Then I collapsed and changed back. I was breathing hard and labored. I felt as though my body was going to fall apart.
"Hey, lets get her out of here!"Inuyasha yelled to the group and then he lifted me up and started to run.
"It's gonna be okay. I know how you feel, I lost one dear to me too. I can help you with this." he said, then I fainted.
The next few weeks I traveled with the group. I was dull and didn't have anything left in me. I didn't smile but I didn't cry. I became less aware of my surroundings and got hurt a lot. At night I would look up at the sky, not able to sleep. When I would attempt to sleep the image of my brother, dead, came before my eyes and I had to open them. I didn't even think for myself. Someone would tell me to follow them and I would. If they told me to kill myself I probably would. I just had no life left in me at all. Nothing was worth living for anymore. I had lost the one most dear to me, the only one dear to me. What could be worse?
"Hey, we are going, come on." Inuyasha called up to me. I nodded and jumped down from the tree to follow him.
"I need to talk to you tonight" He hissed into my ear. Once again I nodded. The day was full of heat and pain from the long, steady walk but I didn't care. Nothing mattered anymore. By the time the sun went down we had covered a large number of miles. I leapt into a tree and Inuyasha followed me. Once we were high up and no one could hear or see us he began to talk to me.
"What's wrong with you? You used to be more alive" he said to me, looking into my dull eyes.
"Well, I don't know" I replied, shrugging as though it wasn't important.
"Can you even feel anything?" he asked me, worried.
"Not so far" I replied, in a monotone. His face got a look of determination and revise.
"what do you fell when I do this" he said and he hugged me close to him. My stomach felt weird and there was a sharp piercing feel in my chest.
"I-i don't know, it's weird... But I like it" I told him, looking down in embarrassment.
"How about this" he asked. Then he pulled my head up from my chin so I was looking at him and placed his lips on mine. He kissed me gently and lightly at first then pulled away to see my reaction. I was blushing like mad and I had a new feeling in my heart. Was it... love?
"D-do you love me?" I asked him, slowly and hesitantly. He looked into my eyes, kissed me once more and said, "Yes". I wasn't sure if I loved him.
"I think I love you." I looked into his eyes.
"I'll make you sure by the end of tonight" he said, a sly smile spreading across his lips.