THE CHALLENGE: Write me a nice story about the original Inuyasha, the bad-
tempered 16th-century teenaged half-daemon, suddenly waking up and finding
himself in the body of his reincarnated adult self—a twenty-something
archeology professor married to Kagome and living in 21st century Tokyo.
Humor, drama, angst, adventure, lemon, one-shot, novel, whatever you want.
Author's note: So of COURSE, Mido-chan had to butt in and write a one shot, which I finished in four hours flat when I've been struggling with my last one in tab order since November. Life's weird.
Oky guys, for those of you who had no Idea what Hero in the 21st Century is . . SHAME!! No no, I'm just kidding. It's an online Inuyasha Doujinshi that is, in my detail freak opinion, very very good. If you haven't read, some of the scenes will confuse, as there are direct references to the Doujinshi in very much all the short. But don't despair! I've pasted the short notes on the series the author herself has up on the site after the one shot (Scroll down and read it now, they're indispensable) and I've also pasted a link to the Doujinshi page, as always in ff.net format- meaning with lines between. If you want further information you can go there!
This fic does have some sexual reference in it, but not anything more than there usually are in my fics. The section labeled 'Part 1' is all Miss K. Batey's, common to all answering the fic, except the lines after " 'Ka- Kagome?' ", which are mine and added for the fic's need.
Enjoy!
-----
Prelude:
She watched him sleep beside her, trying to fight the content fatigue of their love making in order to watch him for a few seconds more. She passed her fingers through his hair, caressed his face, raced along the lines of his ears, traced his lips. Then she let her fingers graze the stick that was on his cheek, a reminder of his brother's claws that afternoon, and that had been marks on his other cheek, so long ago, and also a reminder of what he used to be and who he really was.
As her past had never left her memory and would never, as her past had haunted her for a year before it had finally found her again, having red hair instead of black or white, his past was haunting and hunting them now.
Toukijin. How were they going to fight Toukijin now? How could they- she, a woman with a child inside her and never trained now neglected latent miko powers, and he- the man she loved and who caused her a dull ache of pain to be apart from even during the short hours of the day they were apart for work? How could they, both humans, both vulnerable, both having their name and address on the telephone registry, ever hope to win or evade a sward that was thousands of years old and that had sought his blood since the day of forging?
She pulled her hands away from her face and around his chest in a ferocious action, as ferocious as the hug she was giving him. His words came back to her "Have someone else prepare me for my burial this time . . .". No, that was something that wasn't going to happen. She was going to be the mean, evil one this time around, she was going to die first, and he was going to have to wash her old ugly withered body with tears and bury her.
She let her arms relax from the desperate vice that her hug had been and he sighed in contentment. Having felt she had needed the reassurance of the strong contact he hadn't even groaned. Even asleep, he put her before himself.
Them, she reminded herself. Them before himself. She let one of her hands move between them to rest on her slightly engorged abodomen, rounded just enough to make her seem to have a full bladder, but nothing more. The little Koinu . . .
Their little one would have a normal life. Their little would know all about Inuyasha the great hanyou and the great Archeology and Anthropology Professor, their little would know all about the Lady Kagome, shikon-no- miko, and about the Lady Kagome the history and literature teacher. Their little one would know Inuyasha and Kagome, mummy and daddy, and they would both be there to see the little Koinu grow, become a big boy or girl, face his or her dragon, and then take a little koinu partner of his or her own and make new little puppies.
"You'll see how much we love you" she said into the room "You'll see, we'll always be there for you, I promise. We'll pull through everything- starting from this"
Her very own personal dog-boy shifted under her, gave a sniff and then groggily put an arm around her while he slept, smelling her distress.
"You're right, I'll go to sleep now" she said against his chest. He didn't answer- he never said anything unless it was a nightmare- and she just let his heartbeat re-assure her.
They were Inuyasha and Kagome. If they had lived through Naraku, they could live through this.
-----
Part 1:
Inuyasha opened his eyes slowly. Where the fuck was he? How the fuck had he fallen asleep?
He stared. He was indoors, looking at a smooth, whitewashed ceiling. If he didn't know better, he'd swear he was in Kagome's realm. What the fuck.... He closed his eyes again, trying to figure out where he'd been when he fell asleep.
Something was wrong with his sense of smell. Was he human? What time of the month was it? He considered. Dulled though it was, the scent was definitely that of Kagome's house, overlaid with the scent of Kagome herself. And-- another scent, not his own but somewhat similar to his own, the sort of scent he picked up on nights when he or Miroku had—um—dreamed. He opened his eyes again and sat up. He was in a room very definitely of Kagome's realm, but not Kagome's room, although her scent was everywhere. He was lying in a strange bed of the sort Kagome used, but wider. He frowned at his own hand. No claws. Definitely human. But the fingernails were unbelievably white, as though he'd held them underwater for a long time. The way Kagome liked her fingernails to look.
Shit. He was naked.
Shit. He was naked!
How the fuck had that happened? What the fuck was going on?
This bed, like Kagome's, was covered, not by kimono, but by several wide layers of fabric in pale colors. Inuyasha pulled one of the covers forward to hide his nakedness, and then stopped to stare down at himself. His...hair...was a strange color. Not the usual silver, not the black of his human form. A reddish-brown...
What the fuck was going on???
He realized now that the long hair hanging down around his shoulders was also reddish brown.
Was this a dream? What was this place? Where were the others? Kagome's scent was there, but not that of the other companions. Kagome herself was not to be seen. He looked around, wary.
The room was a soft, blurry haze.
His pulse quickened. He was human, deprived of most of his sense of smell, and on top of it, his eyes didn't work right.
Inuyasha took a deep breath, then slid one leg out from under the coverings. The reassuring feel of tatami met his foot. He brought his other leg out and stood upright, rubbing his eyes. It did no good; the room remained in a fog. There was a piece of cloth under his foot. He bent carefully and picked it up. He recognized it as a loincloth, similar to ones Kagome's little brother wore, but the green color of the midday sky. Fascinated, Inuyasha lifted the little piece of fabric close to his eyes. It was odd, stretchy, in the manner of some of Kagome's kimono, although he would never admit to having examined her clothing as closely as he perhaps might have done.
The scent on the loincloth was same as the male scent he had already noticed, and, he suddenly realized, one he had smelled before.
There was a man, Inuyasha knew, who gave Kagome gifts of charms, potions, and shoes. The scent on those gifts was the scent that was in his nose now. Kagome had never said the man's name—never even said the giver was a man, although Inuyasha's nose knew—but spoke of him quite casually as a schoolmate, one of the many people studying magic in Kagome's training school. Inuyasha had mixed feelings about these gifts. Although he didn't much like the idea of a man giving anything to Kagome, her demeanor led him to believe the friendship was innocent. And he heartily approved of the gifts themselves, which were of a protective nature and entirely suitable for a woman in Kagome's position and with Kagome's responsibilities. In fact, precisely the sort of gifts he might have chosen for her himself, had he the means and the opportunity.
Now the terrible thought occurred to him that he had been a fool. Really, Kagome spoke very little of her life on this side. And of course she owed Inuyasha nothing, nothing at all. Could she truly have given her heart—and her body—to this "schoolmate," and never said a word to Inuyasha?
And yet, he had never caught the scent of another man on Kagome, not even when he had surprised her in her own realm.
Despair and confusion washed over Inuyasha, and he closed his eyes. None of this made sense: not the scent, not his own strange transformation, not this strange place...
Wrapped up in his own thoughts, he had barely caught Kagome's scent when a warm arm snaked around his neck and a familiar voice said, "If you were about to put those on, don't bother." Panicking, he jumped back, away from the arm, covering his nakedness with his right hand, the stranger's loincloth dangling limply in the other.
Kagome was dressed in a strange kimono. This was not a great surprise—Inuyasha knew that when she was at home she rarely wore her battle gear. Like much of her clothing, the garment was all of a piece, rather than folded over in the manner of what he thought of as proper kimono, and very short—very, very short, showing virtually all of her long legs. He pulled his eyes upward and opened his hand a bit wider. Under the circumstances, he did not want to contemplate Kagome's legs. He forced himself to look at the center of the kimono, which was decorated with a stylized painting of two youkai lords: a tall deer youkai with proud antlers, and another very small animal unknown to him, with large teeth and a long tail, wearing a cap of unfamiliar style.
Kagome said, "Iis aruweiso Muusu ando Sukuweru."
While he was trying to figure out what the fuck that meant, she grabbed the hair at the nape of his neck and pulled his face down to hers.
"Guess what?" she said. "Grandpa and the girls have a wedding. Mama is going to see her sister. Souta won't show up for a good three hours yet. The place is ours. I think this is our chance, Dog-Boy."
Inuyasha gaped at the face that was now only inches from his own.
This isn't Kagome, he thought.
And then:
Is this Kagome?
It looked like Kagome, but...older. Yes, of course, Kikyou looked like an older version of Kagome, but this woman was older than Kikyou. But not old, just—older. And beautiful. But—so much like Kagome, that laughing expression that was Kagome. Maybe—almost—evil? That smile, almost evil...wicked.
There were times—well, pretty much any time he could think of, actually—that Inuyasha would have given his right arm to have a woman smile at him like that.
Right now, of course, his right arm was the only thing between him and complete mortification.
Who the hell was this woman? Why the hell did she look and smell so much like Kagome? What the hell did she want from him? What the hell was he going to do? What the hell was she going to do?
As it turned out, the first thing she was going to do was plant a solid kiss on his open mouth. He managed not to bite both their tongues in shock.
The second thing she was going to do was pull the kimono over her head and throw it over her shoulder. Now she was dressed just like him. "Bai bai, muusu ando sukuweru," she said.
She smiled that smile again and did the third thing she was going to do:
She slipped her right hand underneath his.
Inuyasha said, "Ka-Kagome?"
All his world jolted with the sensation of her hand wrapping around him. Literally jolted
His blood gave a leap of the sort he hadn't experienced even when he had been bathing and thinking about her. But the sudden jerk of feeling didn't only bring pleasure with it.
His body spasmed, his nose seemed to clear and his eye sight slapped him with the sharp angles of the room.
Before he could even think of calling her name- whether it was for help, for mercy or as a battle cry he didn't know, as he just couldn't decide who this woman fondling him tenderly was, the Great Inuyasha let his world go blank.
------
Part 2:
Slowly the foggy world came to, and he blinked his eyes once, twice, three times; the fog gradually receded to the corners of his vision. When he groaned and rubbed his eyes, the fog was gone for good.
He stopped moving as he took the room in, and his previous experiences assailed him. The room was the same one he had woken up before, the smell was identical, the light almost the same.
What was different now was that his nose wasn't having problems, that his eyes seemed to have cured themselves and that the woman who had been looking at him like a succuba Kagome out of his wettest dreams had gone.
A quick inspection- or rather a tug at the material on the raised futon he was on- told him that he was still naked, and that he was STILL wearing the odd colour of fur he had woken up in, and, worst of all, that he was still in the body of a human that apparently had courted and won over him in Kagome's affections.
At least he thought that was Kagome. He was fairly sure of it, especially now that his nose seemed to have recovered completely from that strange malfunction. The smell of her sleep, of her distress, of her happiness, of her . . . excitement, it was everywhere in the room, and all over his own body. With the sheets still raised in his hand, the smells of the bed were clear, and other scents were clear also as they came from specific parts of his own anatomy.
And yet her smell spoke of something else. Her smell spoke to him- as had always done and always would do- of her age, of her well being, her state of mind. And what his nose told him Kagome was at the moment made no sense.
He growled at his own ineptness and confusion, only to feel more inept as he nearly chocked on his attempted growl. He savagely took his anger out on the bedding, shoving the material off him roughly, and sliding off the raised futon. Kagome had once told him a name for it, but he couldn't . . . quiet . . . remember . . .
His musings ground to a halt as he turned around, absently and nervously inspecting the foreign yet familiar room, and found himself facing . . . HIM. That one standing before him in the mirror, with red hair that was as long as his used to be, with a body very similar to the human one he used to have save for the . . . 'hair', was the one who had taken Kagome, who had excited her the night before and several nights before. Who had taken out of her a reaction and touch just now that he had always wanted from her and never had.
Why was he here, in this body that wasn't his, with a woman that was supposed to be his and that had apparently had chosen not to be- why had she? He couldn't remember for the life of him. All he knew was that he was Inuyasha and she was Kagome, and that they travelled with Miroku and Sango, and had just defeated his brother and Toukijin on his human night. What had happened? Why this body? Why this man? What had he done to make Kagome chose him?
Was this the future? Or perhaps a warning, that if he didn't claim her now, as soon as he woke from this dream, this man would take Kagome and she would . . . she would child for him?
And more importantly, why the fuck could he smell his brother's blood in the room??
"Inuyasha!"
He turned around, startled, and immediately fell into stance. But it was Kagome, holding what seemed to be a clay basin containing steaming hot water and a cloth hanging out one side.
Wait a minute, had she called him-
"Inuyasha! Oh Kami Inuyasha, don't you ever scare me like that again!" she exclaimed as she put the basin down on a table by the raised futon- he swore he had known the word for it upon waking, but now there was no recalling it- and ran to his side. Her arms were familiarly around him, just as before, as though she did this every day of her life.
But- she did. She had apparently wedded this human, was carrying his child, if his nose wasn't lying to him as well, and had shared . . . what she had been trying to start earlier. But if this human was that boy from her realm, then how had she called him-
"Inuyasha?"
He looked at her, more and more startled as his nakedness didn't seem to effect her minimally now, and she put a hand on his forehead
"I never remember you fainting, even when you had a handful of poison claws popping right out of your back. Say, it's not that the nurse at the pregnancy course talking about fainting spells influenced you ne? because I should tell you that I'M the one who's supposed to have them, not you" she joked, passing her fingers hastily and knowingly on all the points healers used to check health, much as she used to do when he had been injured
"I fainted?" he barked "Look Wench, I'd never do that". As his confusion peaked so did his irritability. And maybe if he mistreated her as this human, she would return to him. Maybe this was the reason he was here? But she still called him-
"Inuyasha, what on earth . . . why are you angry? I know you are- don't deny it, your eyes are amber, and they only are when you're pissed. And you only call me wench in bed usually . . . say what's up?"
"Bitch!" she blinked and stepped slightly back, and although her features were older, settled into a definite frame, the hurt was the same "Why should I deny that I'm pissed? Hell I am! Tell me what's going on or sure as hell I'll . . ."
He'd what? She called him Inuyasha but he looked like the boy- man- from her time. He smelt like a human but felt like a hanyou. He didn't know where the fuck he was, he was still naked and there was still the scent of his brother in the room. What was he going to do? Apart from blowing the whole place and maybe then missing the whole reason why he was there?
"Koinu, what's up?" she asked, this time sounding like the times she had just seen him with Kikyou.
iPuppy? What the fuck . . .?/i
"Look Wench, I have no idea what the fuck you're talking about, I just want to know why you're fucking this . . . this . . . human!"
When he indicated himself, he accidentally damaged the body he was in with his claws. Kagome's eyes widened as she looked at the blood oozing very slowly out of the grazed skin, then at the claws on his fingers, then when she looked back up at his face, her mouth fell open.
"Oh kami Inuyasha" she whispered. Cautiously she reached up and placed one palm on his chest, smearing the blood slightly, and the other over his head. A split second later he felt the familiar comfort of her fingers on his ears.
He closed his eyes, but opened them again when he felt her hand begin to tremble and move away. And then all of her began to tremble as he watched her, and she looked at him with total terror in her eyes.
He looked in the mirror. He still had the ridiculous hair, but now he could see that his eyes were normal, and that his ears were once again where they had always been, save one night a month. And now that all the other features were there, he began to see that even the shape of his face and eyes were nearly identical- save for the freckle that sat on his cheeks here and there.
He was just . . . a hanyou, as he had always been. Why was she so terrified of him so suddenly?
"Guess the human's better than this thing ha?" he asked her reflection. Her head spun around to look at him "Why are you with this human? What did I do, I don't remember. Why did you leave?"
"You don't remember" she repeated, and then her expression cleared and settled into a steady worry "Well, then, just. . . just let me take care of you ok? I promise I'll tell you everything Inuyasha, but now please, can you just trust me and . . . let's sit ok?"
-----
She helped him into his shirt and into his trousers. Although he seemed more inclined to jump out the window than allow her to dress him at first, but when she had explained that they were married he seemed to placate- and in fact he seemed to have fallen into one of those badly concealed sad moods of sulkiness she hadn't seen for . . . a dozen years.
The confusion of the moment had slowly made way to the rather unsettling realisation that Inuyasha . . . had possessed Inuyasha. Her Koinu was no where inside those eyes any longer, and she found herself looking at the forehead of the man she had buried. Forehead, because he was still looking at anything but her even now that she had clothed him. He shifted uncomfortably in the tight jeans and shirt, clothes his body wore every day. Especially the shirt with the stupid stuff written all over it. But his mind seemed to take him back to the time when he had worn his red outfit. That red outfit.
She didn't know what she was going to do to solve the problem, but she had an inkling of what she might do to find what had caused it. She reached out to him and he flinched. After all the years together, a reaction like that from him hurt. He said he remembered nothing. He must have forgotten dying, and telling her. And he most definitely had forgotten last night. Hell hadn't he flinched last night.
"Inuyasha" she chastened slowly "I've helped you dress, I explained to you that we're married. You don't have to be . . . uncomfortable at me touching, ok?". He kept looking down and he shrugged.
She tried reaching out to his face again, and this time, to his credit, he didn't move away, but he stiffened so much she could have ironed his shirt right there on his back. She sighed tiredly and started peeling off the stick.
"Aw, hey, hey, what in the hells are you DOING?!" he said, batting her hand away and covering his cheek- stick half hanging- with his palm. Hadn't she seen what was underneath she would probably have burst out laughing. Not even when they had first met and he was 16 was Koinu ever so childish. She had to admit she missed this part of him- when it wasn't in a situation like this.
"Sesshoumaru, you bastard, I should have known" she spat, clenching her fists. She stood up, picking at her fingers furiously with her nails as she walked around the bed towards the door. Oooooooh that bastard was going to get a purified arrow up his ass . . .
"What's with my shit head brother now? Are you consorting with him too now?" blurted out Inuyasha, reacting- as he always did- when he was confused and lost- violently in self protection.
However that reaction- as it always did- didn't seem to have any self protection elements in it when it was thrown at Kagome. Even though the usual flames that went alight around her were missing, her eyes quietly seethed.
"You know Inuyasha, for the first time in 11 years, I wish I had put a rosary on Koinu too" she said acidly, leaving him on the bed, feeling terribly like he'd just seen death in the face- and it had smiled at him. Apparently, with age, Kagome got only scarier.
-----
Part 3:
He cautiously descended the stairs. After having left the unfamiliar room, he had been relieved to see that at least the landing had remained the same. He could spy the room that had been Kagome's opposite, and the Twerp's just between. There was another room that, he remembered, had been unused, but that now had the ofukuru's scent. As he went down the stairs, he was also relieved to find that another thing had remained the same. Grandpa Grumpy still was unable to climb the stairs, so he slept on the ground floor.
Ground floor? Where on earth had he learned that?
Shaking his head uselessly, he went into the kitchen. Kagome was there, dressed, he now noticed, in the tight- tight- dress she had flung off herself before she . . . never mind. She was sitting at the table, with a cup of the stuff she called- what did she call it? He was sure he had known it once- and there was a cup of steaming ramen on the table in front of the seat beside her.
Well, at least he still remembered what that was called.
He silently took the offered seat, and reached for the ramen, half expecting her to snatch it away from him. She had never done it, but she just might turn into one of those village boys, who knew.
"Inuyasha, you said you don't remember?"
It sounded more of a hopeful statement that asked for it to be waved off as a joke. Tough luck
"Yeah" he said. This was Kagome- his Kagome, showing off her legs to another man, and carrying the child of another man, that she still called Inuyasha. He wasn't understanding a shit.
"What do you remember? I mean, what's the last thing that you remember before waking up"
"You putting your hands where you shouldn't" he replied. He saw her changing colours
"I wasn't talking about waking up now" she said sternly "I was talking about waking up before. And there's no reason why I SHOULDN'T. Please, this is serious"
"Yeah, lets get the filthy hanyou out of the human's head, so you can get him back" he replied spitefully. He stuffed his mouth with ramen before he told her just what he thought of her at that moment.
"Of course Inuyasha. I would just marry the first man that passed by me on the road" she answered sourly. Looking at the bowl of ramen, it suddenly reminded him of another container of instant- that stank. And then he looked up at her, she was wearing clothes like she used to, but these were blue, and she looked as though she were a walking skeleton. He blinked, and she was there wearing her tight short dress, hands pressed against her mug. Wait- mug?
Grunting, he put a hand to his temple and shook his head.
"Koinu, are you alright?"
Puppy? WHAT the fuck!!
i"Don't be crazy puppy-chan! You just can't be crazy!" /i
He shook his head as he remembered a stout man- no, it was a woman. But the scent said it was a man. And he was being hugged, and he was . . . small, a kid. Kid? Oh kami what the fuck was happening . . .
"Inuyasha, koishii, answer me, onagai?"
i"Koishii!! It's true! It's true! There's going to be a little Inuyasha running around the house in nine months' time!"
She hugged him
"Or a little Kagome. Let's just hope that it won't be a little Sesshoumaru ne?"
"Hell no"/i
He grunted again, and let her arms hold him from behind- and that thank kami brought a memory he could relate with, although the thought of himself as a youkai was frightening when she was close.
"Inuyasha? Why don't you just tell me what you remember ne?"
"Being human, and Toukijin finding us. And then the battle, and Seshoumaru, and then waking up- in your arms."
"It's strange that you remember Toukijin" she said, smirking sourly.
"Why did you mention Seshoumaru? Now shit aside, Kagome, what did he do to me? Did he put me in the body of – your lover?". Saying that had been like swallowing Miroku's cooking.
"No, he didn't do that. The kami did that when you were re-incarnated"
"Re - so I died?"
"Yes you- did."
"Against Toukijin? Against that bastard Seshoumaru?"
"No"
"And you? You re-incarned too? You smell the same and look the same Kagome."
"No, I just, grew a little" she smiled at him at that "You know how my time is the future of yours, ne? Me and Souta explained that once, remember that?"
i"So you mean that if I live 500 years, the place where I live will become this one?"
"Hai, inu-no-niichan!"
"See Inuyasha, I told you it wasn't that hard a concept to grasp"
"What are you implying bitch, that I'm as dumb as you?"
"Inuyasha, osu-/i
"Yeah" he replied, cutting his thoughts "yeah I remember that"
"Well I came through the well after you died. And the 'you' in this time had been trying to get my attention and tell me you were back for years before I realised. Remember Houjo, the boy who used to give me gifts you liked?" she prodded gently
"Yes, I remember. So you married him, ha?"
"No. Yes. Depends on what you mean"
"What do I mean? that you took him as your man and that you bedded him"
"Well than yes, I did. And I also married you too" she answered primly, still holding him from behind
"What the fuck does that mean? You waited for him to fuck you and give you a child before you stuck my head into his useless body and had me stick with it?"
"No Inuyasha! Haven't you been listening! And now your body isn't useless- at least not in the manner you mean- and that's a problem to me"
He withdrew and she quickly went on
"Well not a problem to me, it doesn't matter to me which body you're in. That's the whole point, don't you understand?" She rested her head against his shoulder, her cheek against his neck "You got re-incarnated, but not like me. You kept all the memories of the life you had before. The first thing you told me when we met again was about your mother, and Seshoumaru, and that village boy you attacked for food"
"I told you . . . that" he said. She nodded against him
"Inuyasha, I love you, you know I do, and you know I can't love anyone else. I'm in love with your soul Inuyasha, not with what's holding it. If you'd been born a woman I'd have become a lesbian"
"Like my Aunts" he stated. Aunts?
"You remember?" she asked hopefully
"Not . . . a lot. Just a thing here and there" he said
i"And then I said to him, a woman has a _right_ to have an orgasm!!"/i
His face caught fire.
"What's wrong?"
"I just remembered the first time my mother met you"
"Oh! I remember her little orgasm speech quiet clearly!"
i"Oh! Inuyasha! I love you! OH!"/i
He went even redder
"And now you remembered, what?"
"Junior-year choir" he coughed. She turned around and sat in his lap, making him squirm while she smiled pleasantly.
"That was our first time" she said quietly
"I know . . . now" he said, looking away. This was all too new. And old. Oh- just fucking shit. Literally.
"And last night? You remember last night? And last Wednesday? You made me miss a day of lectures because you were one horny dog" she kissed his nose.
"No" he said tightly.
"But you'll remember you'll see, you're remembering already. It will only take some time" she said reassuringly, resting her head on his chest and patting the other side of it.
"You sure seem eager to- . . ."
"Don't start that again Inuyasha" she growled- really growled.
"Yeah well, if I stay like this what will you do ne?" he asked, still not hugging her as she sat in his lap, too uncomfortable with the whole new world.
"I'd try to help you adapt again. But then you'd have a problem giving your classes"
i"Ok guys, you see that bone-pile there? What do you get out of it?"
"That some predator used to nest in this area, evidently, Professor"
"Or else that people were having a picnic here. Look at them again Suki, they're chicken bones"/i
"Ack" he pressed his hands to his forehead again "If I get this sort of thing every time I remember something from your human's life, than I don't want any of his shit"
"Inuyasha, he's you. HE had your memories and didn't complain!"
"Well, so he was all perfect wasn't he?"
"IS perfect- and no he's not, he's a bloody mess like you- because he is you, and I have to pick up stuff after him constantly!"
i"Why the hell do I put up with you!"
"I dunno, because you're pregnant?"
"I haven't been pregnant that long!"
"Maybe . . . because I'm better than nothing?"
" . . ."
"I'm not sure that isn't right"
'I am all that is left of Lord Inuyasha, seeker of the Shikon no Tama. The only thing I have sought in this life time is the love of Lady Kagome. . . . all in all, I think I've been a bit of a disappointment' /i
He didn't put his hand to his head this time as the images assailed him. Kagome however realised he had stiffened and took her head off his chest to look up at him. The scent of worry that was all over her increased again.
"What did you remember?"
"He . . . I really hoped you'd say no that day you know" he began in a guttural voice.
"Nani?"
"I don't know what the fuck is going on, but I know what he . . . I . . . I know that's, . . . this is me"
"What did you remember? When you waited for me under the tree? The note?"
Slap Reaching a conclusion in the food place Slap Rushing off to the shrine Slap Writing the note on the railings of the long stairs up Slap Seeing her again, note in hand, looking at him with eyes that were haunted and face that was . . . hollow.
"Ung" he said, squeazing his eyes at the painful assault of memories "Woman, if you don't shut up you'll be giving me a blow job before you know it"
SLAP Just how good Kagome was at that particular activity.
He saw Kagome smile rather . . .what had he called it before? Ah yeah, wickedly, at both his grunts, one of head pain and one of anything but pain- which she felt clearly as she was seated on him.
"What exactly did you remember, dog-boy? Just how good you are in that room you woke up in?"
"No, don't change subject" he scowled. Kagome arched an eyebrow and was silent "I was talking about . . . remember when we had that discussion, about me leaving stuff around the house?" her face turned sad and she nodded "I . . . know it was me because I know the feeling I had then"
"You mean when I said . . ." she started quietly
"All that year, I never came anywhere next to you because of what I was and now . . . back then I only wanted to be that again for you. You like my hanyou form better?" he asked, not really knowing which answer he wanted to get.
"You just don't seem to understand" she sighed "If nothing else, THAT would convince me that you're surely Inuyasha. Koinu" she hugged him "I love you- your soul, I already told you. If your soul were to take over Jaken's body and be stuck in it for eternity, then I'd be for eternity Jaken's wife"
He shivered
"Kagome, don't DO that, don't even think something like that!"
Jaken . . . . he shivered again.
"Ok" he sighed and put his chin on her head. "But why did you leave? I don't remember what I did to piss you off enough . . .
"You didn't do anything . . . well you did but I told you . . . you died Inuyasha"
"Di . . . oh yeah. Before I killed Naraku?"
"No, Naraku was killed but . . . you used the Shikon to give your human life to Kikyou. You died in my arms . . . and then you had only your Youkai self left. I had to . . ."
He tried to say something but couldn't. So instead he finally hugged her.
iI couldn't hug her . . .as I couldn't say her name . . . .
Slap /i 'ok, I'm gonna say it, I'm gonna say . . .' "Higurashi?" 'shit'
This time, he only hugged her tighter and fought the pain with her scent. She raised a hand without raising her head and started tenderly tracing her fingers along his perfectly healed cheek.
-----
Part 4:
When Souta had realised he had forgotten his extra note book to write the new DreamWeaver program he had in mind, he had had all the honest intentions of sneaking in through the kitchen door, grabbing it and leaving strait back to the museum, especially since he knew exactly what the weddies liked to do when the house was empty.
But the Kami hadn't liked his time table, and decided to be just as snotty as a university department and change just one lecture to ruin a whole week.
He had even intended sticking to plan A when he found them hugging in the kitchen (Kami he would never eat on that table anymore now). But plan A didn't fly out the window, it rocketed out the window aboard a hard disk eraser virus sent by the Microsoft inc when he saw just what was on his brother-in-law's head.
"Fuck" was the only thing he could say
Both of them looked up at him, one looking dazed, the other with an annoyed expression he hadn't seen in years.
"Hey twerp"
He gaped for a few seconds, attempted to form a coherent sentence and then reverted back to the thing he knew he could say
"FUCK"
"My thoughts exactly" said Kagome "but we had an inconvenient to it this morning"
"Nee-chan, no shit, what the hell is going on"
"He's taken up my in influence- but I never had those colours in my hair-" he stopped and frowned at a lock of red "Let's not talk about the hair"
"I like it that way" said Kagome, moving off his lap as if nothing had happened. Souta was going to have a seizure until he realised something
"Hey Nii-chan, so now you can smell as well as you used to?"
"And some"
"So if I tell you . . ."
Slap "Hey Nii-chan, you think you can find-" "Sorry Souta, I haven't got that good a nose anymore"
Inuyasha grinned. Souta stared at his fangs for a few seconds until the neo- hanyou spoke in a rather sly voice that was totally Koinu's
"So . . . who she and why do you want to find her house?"
"Fuck!"
"Can do"
Souta banged his head on the closest wall available.
-----
"So what do you think happened?" Souta asked as they all had a cup of instant tea in front of them. At odd moments Inuyasha would swear and hold his head, and then swear some more and drink some tea.
"I have my little theory, which is why I'm going to carve the family jewels off a member of the Dog Demon family" she said hotly
"Hey, you need those too" protested the red-head next to her. Both of them looked at him as if he'd turned into Jaken. Ack- I have to stop thinking like that
"I wasn't talking about your attributes Koinu" said Kagome
"Koinu dammi! Get back HERE!"
"Babra! Don't swear in front of the little one!"
"Sorry Terra" /i
"Aaah, Barbra and Terra, ok" he said to himself out loud, finally remembering his nannies' names.
Again, Souta and Kagome seemed to have seen Jaken in his place . . .
I"But lately Jaken's been wearing his 'nice human' disguise"/i
"Jaken's still alive!" he suddenly exclaimed
"Oh look, he's gonna get there on his own. Koinu's coming back it seems"
'Wait a minute, if Jaken's still around it means that-'
"Seshoumaru's still alive!" he exclaimed again
"Well done, you deserve a cookie" said Kagome "And now you remember that we met him just yesterday?"
i"Kagome! You're with child aren't you!"/i
"Yeah" he growled
"And the scratch on your cheek?" she pressed on
"Yeah"
"And the antidote?"
i"He throws like a girl"/i
"erm . . . Yeah"
"I'm seeing where this is going" said Souta finally.
"Well I was stupid and panicked and you were out cold. That wasn't an antidote. I have the inkling Mr Casino gave me his blood to use as antidote and, hey presto! Turned you into a hanyou again."
"Man that guy's a . . ."
"Bastardly son of a bitch pulled out the wrong way with a superiority complex from hell"
Again, he found himself resembling Jaken
"This is so weird" said Souta at last, sipping his tea "Nii-chan with an Inuyasha attitude and Koinu's vocab. You know, you had promised yourself never to swear like that anymore"
"Well yeah, as soon as I'll remember that promise I'll keep to it, but for now, I'll just 'be myself'"
"I was afraid you were going to say that" replied Kagome, but this time, she was smiling. And then suddenly she was haggard and bone thin again as he remembered himself speaking
i"I can't go back to being what I used to be- that angry, jealous bully who used to swear at you! I hate that person! /i
He shifted uncomfortably as he remembered telling her just who he had become for her, just who he had tried to be in order to accomplish his mission of gaining her. Just what he'd learned, who he'd met, he remembered round about all his life in one big SLAP
He tumbled to the floor in a dead faint.
"I hope this doesn't become a habit" sighed Kagome "Come on Souta, move your lazy ass"
"I'm coming, I'm coming"
-----
Kagome watched him wake up, slowly, groggily blinking his eyes and then screwing his features at the light of the lampshade. His auburn ears flickered around. His nose sniffed once. He got her scent. Twice, he got his own and Souta's. Three times. Here comes the Tsunami.
"Seshoumaru! You bastard!"
She sighed. There was still no knowing if it was Koinu. Seshoumaru always got the same reaction out of both his past and present self.
"Is that the way to talk to your brother?" replied the other. Kagome hadn't been happy to let the demon into her house, and even less so into her bed room, especially when he started going on about the variety of scents in there, but there had been no helping it when Inuyasha hadn't revived on time.
"What did you do? Why are you here at all?" he seethed, getting his anger in check, his ears going back and forth. Kagome would have jumped on him and hugged him hadn't Mr Diva been there. Temper control was never a virtue the past Inuyasha had had.
"Tsk, still talking disrespectfully to your brother" replied the other "I have only given you a tiny help, since I was slightly obliged to, as the sward stolen is mine, and this is how you repay my generosity?"
"Help!! GENEROSITY!" he took a couple of deep breaths "Seshoumaru, I have ears on top of my head"
"You've had them for a life time, you'll get used to it again"
"How the hell am I ever leaving the house again! I'm a university professor! What am I going to tell my students, that I got exposed to gamma rays!"
"Too much science fiction exposure brother. But I guess that could be a possibility if-"
"Seshoumaru! For Kami's sake, be serious!"
The elder youkai pinched his nose bridge as though he were dealing with a child. Kagome nudged him with her dart pistol and let some miko power seep through for good measures.
"And I see the bad manners rubbed onto your wife as well" Kagome saw Inuyasha look at her as though he's been startled and then smile slightly "Mrs Inuyasha, poking your brother in law is not of good greeting"
"Turning your brother into a hanyou in 2009 and then leaving without an explanation is most uncivil, brother-in-law, you must consent" she replied "And my name is Kagome Inuyasha Houjo"
"And mine's Souta Higurashi bla bla" said her brother. She had to remember to buy him some new hair dye. Without his help . . . Seshoumaru could have been the fastest thing on earth, but he couldn't beat both their spiritual powers together "You made the problem, now solve it, Moon-face"
Kagome and Inuyasha looked at her brother.
"Why didn't I every think of that one?!" snickered the neo-hanyou.
"Fine fine, you are a family of uncivilised people" huffed the youkai. He put his claws in his pockets, at which both siblings jumped to his neck "Do I look like I need a gun?"
"Never trust a youkai" said Inuyasha. They gave him all an odd look and he rolled his eyes.
"Well here. Not that you deserve it, but you are my brother . . . and I would hate to have to contribute more than a trust fund to the obnoxious whelp you no doubt produced"
He took his hand out of his inner suit pocket and in it had a . . . leaf. Or at least it looked like it. On second glance it turned to actually be a charm of some sort, and both Kagome and Souta could see that it had very powerful youki in it
"This should last you about a month" he said, putting it down on the bed "I always keep one with me just in case. I'll have a box of them sent to you"
When Inuyasha just looked at it, Souta picked it up, keeping Seshoumaru in good range of his air gun ('no shit around this guy') and put it on Inuyasha's head. Instantly, his ears were back on each side of his face and his irises went round again. The colour remained amber.
"It's a kitsune charm?" asked the human hanyou, looking at his normal nails. When he touched them, however, he could still feel the claws "And you use them too?"
"Where did you think my tail went, on a walk?" replied the older youkai
"I don't know, maybe you cut it off yourself" sniggered the other one "You were always into pain, coming to fight me every time knowing you were going to lose"
"I'm beginning to regret this" said Seshoumaru. "Now please, can somebody bring the Tetsusaiga here?"
"Na qa, no can do" said Souta "I'm not leaving psychopath zebra with my sister and brother on his own". Inuyasha was at an inch from explosion
"I see the hero complex rubbed off. That and a taste for weird hair"
"Look who's talking, fucking jii-jii"
"Souta, it's ok, I had it here all along" they all looked at Kagome in astonishment "What? I am a miko you know? Concealing youki isn't so complicated"
"Never mind" said Seshoumaru "Now will you hand that to your . . . husband?". Kagome growled at him in a manner that made him raise an eyebrow, and shoved the sword at her husband. "Very well brother, now point it that way" he pointed towards Souta "and pull it out thinking of your . . . wife"
Inuyasha growled much like his wife and extracted the sward.
And nearly fell off the bed with the unexpected weight.
When he looked at it, he almost fainted for the third time in the same day in two lifetimes. There, at the end of his arm, was a transformed fang lighting the room better than a halogen.
"There, my work is done" said the youkai, standing up, and startling the two siblings out of their stupor. Inuyasha was too engrossed in seeing Tetsusaiga like that again to care "Now you're on equal footing with that sward. It's all in your hands now brother, I want the sward back if you make it through with your skin"
Souta gave him a "Yeah, yeah" and escorted him to the door and down the stairs with Kagome. She then went back up to the bedroom.
Inuyasha was there, resting his back against the book shelf at the head of their bed, looking thoughtfully at the pulsing sward in his hand. As he held it upright, it almost touched the ceiling. She slid on the bed beside him.
"I thought those days were over" he said quietly
"I don't think they ever will be. Even in our next lives, we'll probably have to wage war against something or someone to live"
"Must be in our Karma" he said "I never wanted to fight and kill again"
"You won't have to kill. You'll just have to defend yourself and be careful, and knock Toukijin out of whoever's hands."
"Hmm" he replied unhappily. She snuggled against him "I'm a hanyou again"
"So I heard. And I'm carrying your first child. All in all, I think Seshoumaru did do the right thing"
"Hmm"
Feeling him sigh sadly and remembering what he had said about the memory of their conversations, Kagome hugged him hard
"What I said then still holds Inuyasha. I love your soul, not the body it's in. Who you are, not what you are, remember? You're Inuyasha Houjo, the boy who used to give me gifts at school and the boy who I used to sit" they both chuckled "My husband and a daddy"
"Well, at least I got your ears back"
"Yep, can't say I didn't miss those". They both chuckled again and settled into a confortable silence, still in the glow and protection of Tetsusaiga.
"Hey" he said suddenly, startling a wife who had nearly dosed off "Did Seshoumaru talk about a trust fund???!!!"
End
Ok Guys, this is the premise of events this fix is built on, sprung out of the ingenious mind of Miss K. Batey.
Basic premises in The Hero:
1.Inuyasha died in Kagome's arms at the end of the quest (on Kagome's 16th birthday), following the killing of Naraku and the destruction of the Shikon no Tama, which was vaporized in Inuyasha's hands. As he was dying, he declared his love for Kagome and, not realizing he was mortally wounded, promised to come find her in her realm. After preparing his body for burial and witnessing his cremation, Kagome returned home to grieve. (Note: so far in The Hero we've heard four or five different versions of Inuyasha's death, but this much can be stated as true.)
2.Houjou-kun is Inuyasha's reincarnation. Physically he is a different person (he and Inuyasha are distant relatives, and there is some resemblance, but not much). Spiritually and mentally they are the same person, but at different points in life. He has remembered his previous life since an accident on his fourth birthday. During the timeline of the original Inuyasha story he remembered Kagome and the quest, but thought he might have imagined it all. He nevertheless dedicated his life to finding Kagome, and to changing all the things she didn't like about him, and eventually to protecting her.
3.Like his original self, Houjou-kun always loved Kagome's name and loved speaking the word—but not to her. Some compulsion prevented him from calling her by her name, or from telling her his own. Almost a year after Kagome's return through the well, he spoke her name, and was afterward able to reveal himself to her. Eventually she got used to it.
4.Houjou-kun's given name is Inuyasha, which is his mother's family name. (No, that's not usual in Japan. A fortune teller said they should name him Inuyasha, using the kanji familiar to us.) During his teenaged years, nobody calls him Inuyasha. His family nickname is Koinu, which means "puppy." As a teenager he is very embarrassed by his nickname. (As an adult he takes it in stride.)
5.All his life, Houjou has had recurring nightmares about being shot by Kikyou and pinned to the tree.
6.Houjou-kun is cute and clueless and weird, but he's not boring. He's quite strong for a human, a power hitter (right fielder) on the baseball team. He's still never met a tree he can't climb. He has an extraordinary sense of smell—sufficient to identify a person by scent alone, even at some distance. He's also highly intelligent, and determined to be a good student because he thinks that's what Kagome would like. He is immensely knowledgeable about fairy tales and legends, particularly ones involving magic swords. He has lived in several countries and speaks several languages, including excellent English. He still sits and broods, either on the roof of his house or in trees.
7.A few months before Kagome was first pulled down the well, Houjou-kun bought Tessaiga in one of those antique shops where you buy magic things and that you can never find again after you've bought something. He still has the sword as an adult.
8.The Hero takes place more than 10 years after Kagome's return home after the end of the quest. Houjou and Kagome are married and now live in the shrine house with her mother and grandfather. Souta, who is a grad student in science and a computer geek, shares an apartment with friends. Houjou, who owns an old Toyota Hilux pickup truck, is an archeological anthropologist on the faculty of the prestigious Edo University—specializing, of course, in Feudal Japan.
9.All along, Inuyasha was the guardian spirit of the Higurashi shrine.
10.Mama and Grandpa always knew Inuyasha would die, and always knew the location of Inuyasha's grave. Kagome would have known, too, if she'd ever read any of the stuff in the shrine office and on the little plaques. At the time Kagome turns 15, Houjou-kun knows about Miroku's grave, but not about Inuyasha's. Kagome finds his grave after her return from the quest. The adult Houjou and Kagome both know about Inuyasha's grave. Anyone who can sense the Shikon can see it in Inuyasha's grave, permeating his remains. Kagome reports that they are inert—morally neutral, and presumably drained of power.
11.Inuyasha died because he used the SNT to give the remainder of his human life to Kikyou. Therefore, Kikyou was alive and human at the end of the quest. All of the other companions survived, as did Sesshoumaru and his party, including Kohaku, who Sesshoumaru Tenseiga'd at Rin's request. (AN: I particularly liked Miss Batey's shift into a verb here :P)
12.Miroku and Sango conceived a son while "comforting" each other the night of Inuyasha's death; they then married and had many sons. Miroku lived to be 100 years old. He was a famous historian, and also wrote down the Inuyasha stories. Late in his life he founded a monastery, and both he and Inuyasha are buried on its grounds.
13.Both Myouga and Sesshoumaru are still alive in modern times. So, apparently, is Rin. We know nothing about what happened to Shippou, (Mido- chan note: Although I gave a fair hint of just exactly WHERE Shippo is working in this short, ne ;P) Kirara, Kouga, Kanna, or Kagura. (The Hero storyline branches off from the original immediately before the monkey god story, so Hakudoushi is not an issue.)
14.Nothing has ever been said about the status of the well after Inuyasha's death. Kagome made it home through the well and has never mentioned visiting the surviving companions. Both Kagome and Houjou visit Miroku's grave when they want to talk to him.
15.Even as an adult, Kagome is still saddened by the thought of Inuyasha's death, although she and Houjou are loving and affectionate.
16.Houjou wears a string of prayer beads as a sign of reverence for his mother's family's guardian spirit. We can guess on the basis of hints and comments here and there that this spirit is the great dog daemon (the original Inuyasha's father) and that his mother's family descended from the inhabitants of the dog daemon's territory.
17.As in the original story, Houjou is the direct descendent of the family ruling Musashi domain, where Kaede lived. In The Hero, the original Inuyasha was also a member of that family (Houjou's ancestor was Inuyasha's uncle, so Inuyasha's grandfather is their first common direct ancestor.) Houjou's ancestor, the uncle, tried to have Inuyasha killed after his mother's death. (The would-be "hit man" was in fact an ancestor of Kagome, but nobody in the story has any way of knowing that.) Inuyasha pronounced a curse on the Houjou family, promising to destroy them to the last man.
I hope you did go through these, and that they interested you enough to go take a look here at http :// www. hibernatingbats. com /
The drawing style has nothing to do with Takahashi's hand, but it is in itself a style of its own, and very uniform and beautiful. Certain details, especially the hands, remind me strongly of the great Quentin Blake, who has accompanied my up my childhood with Roald Dahl.
I hope you follow my advice and you follow that link!
Midoriko-sama
Author's note: So of COURSE, Mido-chan had to butt in and write a one shot, which I finished in four hours flat when I've been struggling with my last one in tab order since November. Life's weird.
Oky guys, for those of you who had no Idea what Hero in the 21st Century is . . SHAME!! No no, I'm just kidding. It's an online Inuyasha Doujinshi that is, in my detail freak opinion, very very good. If you haven't read, some of the scenes will confuse, as there are direct references to the Doujinshi in very much all the short. But don't despair! I've pasted the short notes on the series the author herself has up on the site after the one shot (Scroll down and read it now, they're indispensable) and I've also pasted a link to the Doujinshi page, as always in ff.net format- meaning with lines between. If you want further information you can go there!
This fic does have some sexual reference in it, but not anything more than there usually are in my fics. The section labeled 'Part 1' is all Miss K. Batey's, common to all answering the fic, except the lines after " 'Ka- Kagome?' ", which are mine and added for the fic's need.
Enjoy!
-----
Prelude:
She watched him sleep beside her, trying to fight the content fatigue of their love making in order to watch him for a few seconds more. She passed her fingers through his hair, caressed his face, raced along the lines of his ears, traced his lips. Then she let her fingers graze the stick that was on his cheek, a reminder of his brother's claws that afternoon, and that had been marks on his other cheek, so long ago, and also a reminder of what he used to be and who he really was.
As her past had never left her memory and would never, as her past had haunted her for a year before it had finally found her again, having red hair instead of black or white, his past was haunting and hunting them now.
Toukijin. How were they going to fight Toukijin now? How could they- she, a woman with a child inside her and never trained now neglected latent miko powers, and he- the man she loved and who caused her a dull ache of pain to be apart from even during the short hours of the day they were apart for work? How could they, both humans, both vulnerable, both having their name and address on the telephone registry, ever hope to win or evade a sward that was thousands of years old and that had sought his blood since the day of forging?
She pulled her hands away from her face and around his chest in a ferocious action, as ferocious as the hug she was giving him. His words came back to her "Have someone else prepare me for my burial this time . . .". No, that was something that wasn't going to happen. She was going to be the mean, evil one this time around, she was going to die first, and he was going to have to wash her old ugly withered body with tears and bury her.
She let her arms relax from the desperate vice that her hug had been and he sighed in contentment. Having felt she had needed the reassurance of the strong contact he hadn't even groaned. Even asleep, he put her before himself.
Them, she reminded herself. Them before himself. She let one of her hands move between them to rest on her slightly engorged abodomen, rounded just enough to make her seem to have a full bladder, but nothing more. The little Koinu . . .
Their little one would have a normal life. Their little would know all about Inuyasha the great hanyou and the great Archeology and Anthropology Professor, their little would know all about the Lady Kagome, shikon-no- miko, and about the Lady Kagome the history and literature teacher. Their little one would know Inuyasha and Kagome, mummy and daddy, and they would both be there to see the little Koinu grow, become a big boy or girl, face his or her dragon, and then take a little koinu partner of his or her own and make new little puppies.
"You'll see how much we love you" she said into the room "You'll see, we'll always be there for you, I promise. We'll pull through everything- starting from this"
Her very own personal dog-boy shifted under her, gave a sniff and then groggily put an arm around her while he slept, smelling her distress.
"You're right, I'll go to sleep now" she said against his chest. He didn't answer- he never said anything unless it was a nightmare- and she just let his heartbeat re-assure her.
They were Inuyasha and Kagome. If they had lived through Naraku, they could live through this.
-----
Part 1:
Inuyasha opened his eyes slowly. Where the fuck was he? How the fuck had he fallen asleep?
He stared. He was indoors, looking at a smooth, whitewashed ceiling. If he didn't know better, he'd swear he was in Kagome's realm. What the fuck.... He closed his eyes again, trying to figure out where he'd been when he fell asleep.
Something was wrong with his sense of smell. Was he human? What time of the month was it? He considered. Dulled though it was, the scent was definitely that of Kagome's house, overlaid with the scent of Kagome herself. And-- another scent, not his own but somewhat similar to his own, the sort of scent he picked up on nights when he or Miroku had—um—dreamed. He opened his eyes again and sat up. He was in a room very definitely of Kagome's realm, but not Kagome's room, although her scent was everywhere. He was lying in a strange bed of the sort Kagome used, but wider. He frowned at his own hand. No claws. Definitely human. But the fingernails were unbelievably white, as though he'd held them underwater for a long time. The way Kagome liked her fingernails to look.
Shit. He was naked.
Shit. He was naked!
How the fuck had that happened? What the fuck was going on?
This bed, like Kagome's, was covered, not by kimono, but by several wide layers of fabric in pale colors. Inuyasha pulled one of the covers forward to hide his nakedness, and then stopped to stare down at himself. His...hair...was a strange color. Not the usual silver, not the black of his human form. A reddish-brown...
What the fuck was going on???
He realized now that the long hair hanging down around his shoulders was also reddish brown.
Was this a dream? What was this place? Where were the others? Kagome's scent was there, but not that of the other companions. Kagome herself was not to be seen. He looked around, wary.
The room was a soft, blurry haze.
His pulse quickened. He was human, deprived of most of his sense of smell, and on top of it, his eyes didn't work right.
Inuyasha took a deep breath, then slid one leg out from under the coverings. The reassuring feel of tatami met his foot. He brought his other leg out and stood upright, rubbing his eyes. It did no good; the room remained in a fog. There was a piece of cloth under his foot. He bent carefully and picked it up. He recognized it as a loincloth, similar to ones Kagome's little brother wore, but the green color of the midday sky. Fascinated, Inuyasha lifted the little piece of fabric close to his eyes. It was odd, stretchy, in the manner of some of Kagome's kimono, although he would never admit to having examined her clothing as closely as he perhaps might have done.
The scent on the loincloth was same as the male scent he had already noticed, and, he suddenly realized, one he had smelled before.
There was a man, Inuyasha knew, who gave Kagome gifts of charms, potions, and shoes. The scent on those gifts was the scent that was in his nose now. Kagome had never said the man's name—never even said the giver was a man, although Inuyasha's nose knew—but spoke of him quite casually as a schoolmate, one of the many people studying magic in Kagome's training school. Inuyasha had mixed feelings about these gifts. Although he didn't much like the idea of a man giving anything to Kagome, her demeanor led him to believe the friendship was innocent. And he heartily approved of the gifts themselves, which were of a protective nature and entirely suitable for a woman in Kagome's position and with Kagome's responsibilities. In fact, precisely the sort of gifts he might have chosen for her himself, had he the means and the opportunity.
Now the terrible thought occurred to him that he had been a fool. Really, Kagome spoke very little of her life on this side. And of course she owed Inuyasha nothing, nothing at all. Could she truly have given her heart—and her body—to this "schoolmate," and never said a word to Inuyasha?
And yet, he had never caught the scent of another man on Kagome, not even when he had surprised her in her own realm.
Despair and confusion washed over Inuyasha, and he closed his eyes. None of this made sense: not the scent, not his own strange transformation, not this strange place...
Wrapped up in his own thoughts, he had barely caught Kagome's scent when a warm arm snaked around his neck and a familiar voice said, "If you were about to put those on, don't bother." Panicking, he jumped back, away from the arm, covering his nakedness with his right hand, the stranger's loincloth dangling limply in the other.
Kagome was dressed in a strange kimono. This was not a great surprise—Inuyasha knew that when she was at home she rarely wore her battle gear. Like much of her clothing, the garment was all of a piece, rather than folded over in the manner of what he thought of as proper kimono, and very short—very, very short, showing virtually all of her long legs. He pulled his eyes upward and opened his hand a bit wider. Under the circumstances, he did not want to contemplate Kagome's legs. He forced himself to look at the center of the kimono, which was decorated with a stylized painting of two youkai lords: a tall deer youkai with proud antlers, and another very small animal unknown to him, with large teeth and a long tail, wearing a cap of unfamiliar style.
Kagome said, "Iis aruweiso Muusu ando Sukuweru."
While he was trying to figure out what the fuck that meant, she grabbed the hair at the nape of his neck and pulled his face down to hers.
"Guess what?" she said. "Grandpa and the girls have a wedding. Mama is going to see her sister. Souta won't show up for a good three hours yet. The place is ours. I think this is our chance, Dog-Boy."
Inuyasha gaped at the face that was now only inches from his own.
This isn't Kagome, he thought.
And then:
Is this Kagome?
It looked like Kagome, but...older. Yes, of course, Kikyou looked like an older version of Kagome, but this woman was older than Kikyou. But not old, just—older. And beautiful. But—so much like Kagome, that laughing expression that was Kagome. Maybe—almost—evil? That smile, almost evil...wicked.
There were times—well, pretty much any time he could think of, actually—that Inuyasha would have given his right arm to have a woman smile at him like that.
Right now, of course, his right arm was the only thing between him and complete mortification.
Who the hell was this woman? Why the hell did she look and smell so much like Kagome? What the hell did she want from him? What the hell was he going to do? What the hell was she going to do?
As it turned out, the first thing she was going to do was plant a solid kiss on his open mouth. He managed not to bite both their tongues in shock.
The second thing she was going to do was pull the kimono over her head and throw it over her shoulder. Now she was dressed just like him. "Bai bai, muusu ando sukuweru," she said.
She smiled that smile again and did the third thing she was going to do:
She slipped her right hand underneath his.
Inuyasha said, "Ka-Kagome?"
All his world jolted with the sensation of her hand wrapping around him. Literally jolted
His blood gave a leap of the sort he hadn't experienced even when he had been bathing and thinking about her. But the sudden jerk of feeling didn't only bring pleasure with it.
His body spasmed, his nose seemed to clear and his eye sight slapped him with the sharp angles of the room.
Before he could even think of calling her name- whether it was for help, for mercy or as a battle cry he didn't know, as he just couldn't decide who this woman fondling him tenderly was, the Great Inuyasha let his world go blank.
------
Part 2:
Slowly the foggy world came to, and he blinked his eyes once, twice, three times; the fog gradually receded to the corners of his vision. When he groaned and rubbed his eyes, the fog was gone for good.
He stopped moving as he took the room in, and his previous experiences assailed him. The room was the same one he had woken up before, the smell was identical, the light almost the same.
What was different now was that his nose wasn't having problems, that his eyes seemed to have cured themselves and that the woman who had been looking at him like a succuba Kagome out of his wettest dreams had gone.
A quick inspection- or rather a tug at the material on the raised futon he was on- told him that he was still naked, and that he was STILL wearing the odd colour of fur he had woken up in, and, worst of all, that he was still in the body of a human that apparently had courted and won over him in Kagome's affections.
At least he thought that was Kagome. He was fairly sure of it, especially now that his nose seemed to have recovered completely from that strange malfunction. The smell of her sleep, of her distress, of her happiness, of her . . . excitement, it was everywhere in the room, and all over his own body. With the sheets still raised in his hand, the smells of the bed were clear, and other scents were clear also as they came from specific parts of his own anatomy.
And yet her smell spoke of something else. Her smell spoke to him- as had always done and always would do- of her age, of her well being, her state of mind. And what his nose told him Kagome was at the moment made no sense.
He growled at his own ineptness and confusion, only to feel more inept as he nearly chocked on his attempted growl. He savagely took his anger out on the bedding, shoving the material off him roughly, and sliding off the raised futon. Kagome had once told him a name for it, but he couldn't . . . quiet . . . remember . . .
His musings ground to a halt as he turned around, absently and nervously inspecting the foreign yet familiar room, and found himself facing . . . HIM. That one standing before him in the mirror, with red hair that was as long as his used to be, with a body very similar to the human one he used to have save for the . . . 'hair', was the one who had taken Kagome, who had excited her the night before and several nights before. Who had taken out of her a reaction and touch just now that he had always wanted from her and never had.
Why was he here, in this body that wasn't his, with a woman that was supposed to be his and that had apparently had chosen not to be- why had she? He couldn't remember for the life of him. All he knew was that he was Inuyasha and she was Kagome, and that they travelled with Miroku and Sango, and had just defeated his brother and Toukijin on his human night. What had happened? Why this body? Why this man? What had he done to make Kagome chose him?
Was this the future? Or perhaps a warning, that if he didn't claim her now, as soon as he woke from this dream, this man would take Kagome and she would . . . she would child for him?
And more importantly, why the fuck could he smell his brother's blood in the room??
"Inuyasha!"
He turned around, startled, and immediately fell into stance. But it was Kagome, holding what seemed to be a clay basin containing steaming hot water and a cloth hanging out one side.
Wait a minute, had she called him-
"Inuyasha! Oh Kami Inuyasha, don't you ever scare me like that again!" she exclaimed as she put the basin down on a table by the raised futon- he swore he had known the word for it upon waking, but now there was no recalling it- and ran to his side. Her arms were familiarly around him, just as before, as though she did this every day of her life.
But- she did. She had apparently wedded this human, was carrying his child, if his nose wasn't lying to him as well, and had shared . . . what she had been trying to start earlier. But if this human was that boy from her realm, then how had she called him-
"Inuyasha?"
He looked at her, more and more startled as his nakedness didn't seem to effect her minimally now, and she put a hand on his forehead
"I never remember you fainting, even when you had a handful of poison claws popping right out of your back. Say, it's not that the nurse at the pregnancy course talking about fainting spells influenced you ne? because I should tell you that I'M the one who's supposed to have them, not you" she joked, passing her fingers hastily and knowingly on all the points healers used to check health, much as she used to do when he had been injured
"I fainted?" he barked "Look Wench, I'd never do that". As his confusion peaked so did his irritability. And maybe if he mistreated her as this human, she would return to him. Maybe this was the reason he was here? But she still called him-
"Inuyasha, what on earth . . . why are you angry? I know you are- don't deny it, your eyes are amber, and they only are when you're pissed. And you only call me wench in bed usually . . . say what's up?"
"Bitch!" she blinked and stepped slightly back, and although her features were older, settled into a definite frame, the hurt was the same "Why should I deny that I'm pissed? Hell I am! Tell me what's going on or sure as hell I'll . . ."
He'd what? She called him Inuyasha but he looked like the boy- man- from her time. He smelt like a human but felt like a hanyou. He didn't know where the fuck he was, he was still naked and there was still the scent of his brother in the room. What was he going to do? Apart from blowing the whole place and maybe then missing the whole reason why he was there?
"Koinu, what's up?" she asked, this time sounding like the times she had just seen him with Kikyou.
iPuppy? What the fuck . . .?/i
"Look Wench, I have no idea what the fuck you're talking about, I just want to know why you're fucking this . . . this . . . human!"
When he indicated himself, he accidentally damaged the body he was in with his claws. Kagome's eyes widened as she looked at the blood oozing very slowly out of the grazed skin, then at the claws on his fingers, then when she looked back up at his face, her mouth fell open.
"Oh kami Inuyasha" she whispered. Cautiously she reached up and placed one palm on his chest, smearing the blood slightly, and the other over his head. A split second later he felt the familiar comfort of her fingers on his ears.
He closed his eyes, but opened them again when he felt her hand begin to tremble and move away. And then all of her began to tremble as he watched her, and she looked at him with total terror in her eyes.
He looked in the mirror. He still had the ridiculous hair, but now he could see that his eyes were normal, and that his ears were once again where they had always been, save one night a month. And now that all the other features were there, he began to see that even the shape of his face and eyes were nearly identical- save for the freckle that sat on his cheeks here and there.
He was just . . . a hanyou, as he had always been. Why was she so terrified of him so suddenly?
"Guess the human's better than this thing ha?" he asked her reflection. Her head spun around to look at him "Why are you with this human? What did I do, I don't remember. Why did you leave?"
"You don't remember" she repeated, and then her expression cleared and settled into a steady worry "Well, then, just. . . just let me take care of you ok? I promise I'll tell you everything Inuyasha, but now please, can you just trust me and . . . let's sit ok?"
-----
She helped him into his shirt and into his trousers. Although he seemed more inclined to jump out the window than allow her to dress him at first, but when she had explained that they were married he seemed to placate- and in fact he seemed to have fallen into one of those badly concealed sad moods of sulkiness she hadn't seen for . . . a dozen years.
The confusion of the moment had slowly made way to the rather unsettling realisation that Inuyasha . . . had possessed Inuyasha. Her Koinu was no where inside those eyes any longer, and she found herself looking at the forehead of the man she had buried. Forehead, because he was still looking at anything but her even now that she had clothed him. He shifted uncomfortably in the tight jeans and shirt, clothes his body wore every day. Especially the shirt with the stupid stuff written all over it. But his mind seemed to take him back to the time when he had worn his red outfit. That red outfit.
She didn't know what she was going to do to solve the problem, but she had an inkling of what she might do to find what had caused it. She reached out to him and he flinched. After all the years together, a reaction like that from him hurt. He said he remembered nothing. He must have forgotten dying, and telling her. And he most definitely had forgotten last night. Hell hadn't he flinched last night.
"Inuyasha" she chastened slowly "I've helped you dress, I explained to you that we're married. You don't have to be . . . uncomfortable at me touching, ok?". He kept looking down and he shrugged.
She tried reaching out to his face again, and this time, to his credit, he didn't move away, but he stiffened so much she could have ironed his shirt right there on his back. She sighed tiredly and started peeling off the stick.
"Aw, hey, hey, what in the hells are you DOING?!" he said, batting her hand away and covering his cheek- stick half hanging- with his palm. Hadn't she seen what was underneath she would probably have burst out laughing. Not even when they had first met and he was 16 was Koinu ever so childish. She had to admit she missed this part of him- when it wasn't in a situation like this.
"Sesshoumaru, you bastard, I should have known" she spat, clenching her fists. She stood up, picking at her fingers furiously with her nails as she walked around the bed towards the door. Oooooooh that bastard was going to get a purified arrow up his ass . . .
"What's with my shit head brother now? Are you consorting with him too now?" blurted out Inuyasha, reacting- as he always did- when he was confused and lost- violently in self protection.
However that reaction- as it always did- didn't seem to have any self protection elements in it when it was thrown at Kagome. Even though the usual flames that went alight around her were missing, her eyes quietly seethed.
"You know Inuyasha, for the first time in 11 years, I wish I had put a rosary on Koinu too" she said acidly, leaving him on the bed, feeling terribly like he'd just seen death in the face- and it had smiled at him. Apparently, with age, Kagome got only scarier.
-----
Part 3:
He cautiously descended the stairs. After having left the unfamiliar room, he had been relieved to see that at least the landing had remained the same. He could spy the room that had been Kagome's opposite, and the Twerp's just between. There was another room that, he remembered, had been unused, but that now had the ofukuru's scent. As he went down the stairs, he was also relieved to find that another thing had remained the same. Grandpa Grumpy still was unable to climb the stairs, so he slept on the ground floor.
Ground floor? Where on earth had he learned that?
Shaking his head uselessly, he went into the kitchen. Kagome was there, dressed, he now noticed, in the tight- tight- dress she had flung off herself before she . . . never mind. She was sitting at the table, with a cup of the stuff she called- what did she call it? He was sure he had known it once- and there was a cup of steaming ramen on the table in front of the seat beside her.
Well, at least he still remembered what that was called.
He silently took the offered seat, and reached for the ramen, half expecting her to snatch it away from him. She had never done it, but she just might turn into one of those village boys, who knew.
"Inuyasha, you said you don't remember?"
It sounded more of a hopeful statement that asked for it to be waved off as a joke. Tough luck
"Yeah" he said. This was Kagome- his Kagome, showing off her legs to another man, and carrying the child of another man, that she still called Inuyasha. He wasn't understanding a shit.
"What do you remember? I mean, what's the last thing that you remember before waking up"
"You putting your hands where you shouldn't" he replied. He saw her changing colours
"I wasn't talking about waking up now" she said sternly "I was talking about waking up before. And there's no reason why I SHOULDN'T. Please, this is serious"
"Yeah, lets get the filthy hanyou out of the human's head, so you can get him back" he replied spitefully. He stuffed his mouth with ramen before he told her just what he thought of her at that moment.
"Of course Inuyasha. I would just marry the first man that passed by me on the road" she answered sourly. Looking at the bowl of ramen, it suddenly reminded him of another container of instant- that stank. And then he looked up at her, she was wearing clothes like she used to, but these were blue, and she looked as though she were a walking skeleton. He blinked, and she was there wearing her tight short dress, hands pressed against her mug. Wait- mug?
Grunting, he put a hand to his temple and shook his head.
"Koinu, are you alright?"
Puppy? WHAT the fuck!!
i"Don't be crazy puppy-chan! You just can't be crazy!" /i
He shook his head as he remembered a stout man- no, it was a woman. But the scent said it was a man. And he was being hugged, and he was . . . small, a kid. Kid? Oh kami what the fuck was happening . . .
"Inuyasha, koishii, answer me, onagai?"
i"Koishii!! It's true! It's true! There's going to be a little Inuyasha running around the house in nine months' time!"
She hugged him
"Or a little Kagome. Let's just hope that it won't be a little Sesshoumaru ne?"
"Hell no"/i
He grunted again, and let her arms hold him from behind- and that thank kami brought a memory he could relate with, although the thought of himself as a youkai was frightening when she was close.
"Inuyasha? Why don't you just tell me what you remember ne?"
"Being human, and Toukijin finding us. And then the battle, and Seshoumaru, and then waking up- in your arms."
"It's strange that you remember Toukijin" she said, smirking sourly.
"Why did you mention Seshoumaru? Now shit aside, Kagome, what did he do to me? Did he put me in the body of – your lover?". Saying that had been like swallowing Miroku's cooking.
"No, he didn't do that. The kami did that when you were re-incarnated"
"Re - so I died?"
"Yes you- did."
"Against Toukijin? Against that bastard Seshoumaru?"
"No"
"And you? You re-incarned too? You smell the same and look the same Kagome."
"No, I just, grew a little" she smiled at him at that "You know how my time is the future of yours, ne? Me and Souta explained that once, remember that?"
i"So you mean that if I live 500 years, the place where I live will become this one?"
"Hai, inu-no-niichan!"
"See Inuyasha, I told you it wasn't that hard a concept to grasp"
"What are you implying bitch, that I'm as dumb as you?"
"Inuyasha, osu-/i
"Yeah" he replied, cutting his thoughts "yeah I remember that"
"Well I came through the well after you died. And the 'you' in this time had been trying to get my attention and tell me you were back for years before I realised. Remember Houjo, the boy who used to give me gifts you liked?" she prodded gently
"Yes, I remember. So you married him, ha?"
"No. Yes. Depends on what you mean"
"What do I mean? that you took him as your man and that you bedded him"
"Well than yes, I did. And I also married you too" she answered primly, still holding him from behind
"What the fuck does that mean? You waited for him to fuck you and give you a child before you stuck my head into his useless body and had me stick with it?"
"No Inuyasha! Haven't you been listening! And now your body isn't useless- at least not in the manner you mean- and that's a problem to me"
He withdrew and she quickly went on
"Well not a problem to me, it doesn't matter to me which body you're in. That's the whole point, don't you understand?" She rested her head against his shoulder, her cheek against his neck "You got re-incarnated, but not like me. You kept all the memories of the life you had before. The first thing you told me when we met again was about your mother, and Seshoumaru, and that village boy you attacked for food"
"I told you . . . that" he said. She nodded against him
"Inuyasha, I love you, you know I do, and you know I can't love anyone else. I'm in love with your soul Inuyasha, not with what's holding it. If you'd been born a woman I'd have become a lesbian"
"Like my Aunts" he stated. Aunts?
"You remember?" she asked hopefully
"Not . . . a lot. Just a thing here and there" he said
i"And then I said to him, a woman has a _right_ to have an orgasm!!"/i
His face caught fire.
"What's wrong?"
"I just remembered the first time my mother met you"
"Oh! I remember her little orgasm speech quiet clearly!"
i"Oh! Inuyasha! I love you! OH!"/i
He went even redder
"And now you remembered, what?"
"Junior-year choir" he coughed. She turned around and sat in his lap, making him squirm while she smiled pleasantly.
"That was our first time" she said quietly
"I know . . . now" he said, looking away. This was all too new. And old. Oh- just fucking shit. Literally.
"And last night? You remember last night? And last Wednesday? You made me miss a day of lectures because you were one horny dog" she kissed his nose.
"No" he said tightly.
"But you'll remember you'll see, you're remembering already. It will only take some time" she said reassuringly, resting her head on his chest and patting the other side of it.
"You sure seem eager to- . . ."
"Don't start that again Inuyasha" she growled- really growled.
"Yeah well, if I stay like this what will you do ne?" he asked, still not hugging her as she sat in his lap, too uncomfortable with the whole new world.
"I'd try to help you adapt again. But then you'd have a problem giving your classes"
i"Ok guys, you see that bone-pile there? What do you get out of it?"
"That some predator used to nest in this area, evidently, Professor"
"Or else that people were having a picnic here. Look at them again Suki, they're chicken bones"/i
"Ack" he pressed his hands to his forehead again "If I get this sort of thing every time I remember something from your human's life, than I don't want any of his shit"
"Inuyasha, he's you. HE had your memories and didn't complain!"
"Well, so he was all perfect wasn't he?"
"IS perfect- and no he's not, he's a bloody mess like you- because he is you, and I have to pick up stuff after him constantly!"
i"Why the hell do I put up with you!"
"I dunno, because you're pregnant?"
"I haven't been pregnant that long!"
"Maybe . . . because I'm better than nothing?"
" . . ."
"I'm not sure that isn't right"
'I am all that is left of Lord Inuyasha, seeker of the Shikon no Tama. The only thing I have sought in this life time is the love of Lady Kagome. . . . all in all, I think I've been a bit of a disappointment' /i
He didn't put his hand to his head this time as the images assailed him. Kagome however realised he had stiffened and took her head off his chest to look up at him. The scent of worry that was all over her increased again.
"What did you remember?"
"He . . . I really hoped you'd say no that day you know" he began in a guttural voice.
"Nani?"
"I don't know what the fuck is going on, but I know what he . . . I . . . I know that's, . . . this is me"
"What did you remember? When you waited for me under the tree? The note?"
Slap Reaching a conclusion in the food place Slap Rushing off to the shrine Slap Writing the note on the railings of the long stairs up Slap Seeing her again, note in hand, looking at him with eyes that were haunted and face that was . . . hollow.
"Ung" he said, squeazing his eyes at the painful assault of memories "Woman, if you don't shut up you'll be giving me a blow job before you know it"
SLAP Just how good Kagome was at that particular activity.
He saw Kagome smile rather . . .what had he called it before? Ah yeah, wickedly, at both his grunts, one of head pain and one of anything but pain- which she felt clearly as she was seated on him.
"What exactly did you remember, dog-boy? Just how good you are in that room you woke up in?"
"No, don't change subject" he scowled. Kagome arched an eyebrow and was silent "I was talking about . . . remember when we had that discussion, about me leaving stuff around the house?" her face turned sad and she nodded "I . . . know it was me because I know the feeling I had then"
"You mean when I said . . ." she started quietly
"All that year, I never came anywhere next to you because of what I was and now . . . back then I only wanted to be that again for you. You like my hanyou form better?" he asked, not really knowing which answer he wanted to get.
"You just don't seem to understand" she sighed "If nothing else, THAT would convince me that you're surely Inuyasha. Koinu" she hugged him "I love you- your soul, I already told you. If your soul were to take over Jaken's body and be stuck in it for eternity, then I'd be for eternity Jaken's wife"
He shivered
"Kagome, don't DO that, don't even think something like that!"
Jaken . . . . he shivered again.
"Ok" he sighed and put his chin on her head. "But why did you leave? I don't remember what I did to piss you off enough . . .
"You didn't do anything . . . well you did but I told you . . . you died Inuyasha"
"Di . . . oh yeah. Before I killed Naraku?"
"No, Naraku was killed but . . . you used the Shikon to give your human life to Kikyou. You died in my arms . . . and then you had only your Youkai self left. I had to . . ."
He tried to say something but couldn't. So instead he finally hugged her.
iI couldn't hug her . . .as I couldn't say her name . . . .
Slap /i 'ok, I'm gonna say it, I'm gonna say . . .' "Higurashi?" 'shit'
This time, he only hugged her tighter and fought the pain with her scent. She raised a hand without raising her head and started tenderly tracing her fingers along his perfectly healed cheek.
-----
Part 4:
When Souta had realised he had forgotten his extra note book to write the new DreamWeaver program he had in mind, he had had all the honest intentions of sneaking in through the kitchen door, grabbing it and leaving strait back to the museum, especially since he knew exactly what the weddies liked to do when the house was empty.
But the Kami hadn't liked his time table, and decided to be just as snotty as a university department and change just one lecture to ruin a whole week.
He had even intended sticking to plan A when he found them hugging in the kitchen (Kami he would never eat on that table anymore now). But plan A didn't fly out the window, it rocketed out the window aboard a hard disk eraser virus sent by the Microsoft inc when he saw just what was on his brother-in-law's head.
"Fuck" was the only thing he could say
Both of them looked up at him, one looking dazed, the other with an annoyed expression he hadn't seen in years.
"Hey twerp"
He gaped for a few seconds, attempted to form a coherent sentence and then reverted back to the thing he knew he could say
"FUCK"
"My thoughts exactly" said Kagome "but we had an inconvenient to it this morning"
"Nee-chan, no shit, what the hell is going on"
"He's taken up my in influence- but I never had those colours in my hair-" he stopped and frowned at a lock of red "Let's not talk about the hair"
"I like it that way" said Kagome, moving off his lap as if nothing had happened. Souta was going to have a seizure until he realised something
"Hey Nii-chan, so now you can smell as well as you used to?"
"And some"
"So if I tell you . . ."
Slap "Hey Nii-chan, you think you can find-" "Sorry Souta, I haven't got that good a nose anymore"
Inuyasha grinned. Souta stared at his fangs for a few seconds until the neo- hanyou spoke in a rather sly voice that was totally Koinu's
"So . . . who she and why do you want to find her house?"
"Fuck!"
"Can do"
Souta banged his head on the closest wall available.
-----
"So what do you think happened?" Souta asked as they all had a cup of instant tea in front of them. At odd moments Inuyasha would swear and hold his head, and then swear some more and drink some tea.
"I have my little theory, which is why I'm going to carve the family jewels off a member of the Dog Demon family" she said hotly
"Hey, you need those too" protested the red-head next to her. Both of them looked at him as if he'd turned into Jaken. Ack- I have to stop thinking like that
"I wasn't talking about your attributes Koinu" said Kagome
"Koinu dammi! Get back HERE!"
"Babra! Don't swear in front of the little one!"
"Sorry Terra" /i
"Aaah, Barbra and Terra, ok" he said to himself out loud, finally remembering his nannies' names.
Again, Souta and Kagome seemed to have seen Jaken in his place . . .
I"But lately Jaken's been wearing his 'nice human' disguise"/i
"Jaken's still alive!" he suddenly exclaimed
"Oh look, he's gonna get there on his own. Koinu's coming back it seems"
'Wait a minute, if Jaken's still around it means that-'
"Seshoumaru's still alive!" he exclaimed again
"Well done, you deserve a cookie" said Kagome "And now you remember that we met him just yesterday?"
i"Kagome! You're with child aren't you!"/i
"Yeah" he growled
"And the scratch on your cheek?" she pressed on
"Yeah"
"And the antidote?"
i"He throws like a girl"/i
"erm . . . Yeah"
"I'm seeing where this is going" said Souta finally.
"Well I was stupid and panicked and you were out cold. That wasn't an antidote. I have the inkling Mr Casino gave me his blood to use as antidote and, hey presto! Turned you into a hanyou again."
"Man that guy's a . . ."
"Bastardly son of a bitch pulled out the wrong way with a superiority complex from hell"
Again, he found himself resembling Jaken
"This is so weird" said Souta at last, sipping his tea "Nii-chan with an Inuyasha attitude and Koinu's vocab. You know, you had promised yourself never to swear like that anymore"
"Well yeah, as soon as I'll remember that promise I'll keep to it, but for now, I'll just 'be myself'"
"I was afraid you were going to say that" replied Kagome, but this time, she was smiling. And then suddenly she was haggard and bone thin again as he remembered himself speaking
i"I can't go back to being what I used to be- that angry, jealous bully who used to swear at you! I hate that person! /i
He shifted uncomfortably as he remembered telling her just who he had become for her, just who he had tried to be in order to accomplish his mission of gaining her. Just what he'd learned, who he'd met, he remembered round about all his life in one big SLAP
He tumbled to the floor in a dead faint.
"I hope this doesn't become a habit" sighed Kagome "Come on Souta, move your lazy ass"
"I'm coming, I'm coming"
-----
Kagome watched him wake up, slowly, groggily blinking his eyes and then screwing his features at the light of the lampshade. His auburn ears flickered around. His nose sniffed once. He got her scent. Twice, he got his own and Souta's. Three times. Here comes the Tsunami.
"Seshoumaru! You bastard!"
She sighed. There was still no knowing if it was Koinu. Seshoumaru always got the same reaction out of both his past and present self.
"Is that the way to talk to your brother?" replied the other. Kagome hadn't been happy to let the demon into her house, and even less so into her bed room, especially when he started going on about the variety of scents in there, but there had been no helping it when Inuyasha hadn't revived on time.
"What did you do? Why are you here at all?" he seethed, getting his anger in check, his ears going back and forth. Kagome would have jumped on him and hugged him hadn't Mr Diva been there. Temper control was never a virtue the past Inuyasha had had.
"Tsk, still talking disrespectfully to your brother" replied the other "I have only given you a tiny help, since I was slightly obliged to, as the sward stolen is mine, and this is how you repay my generosity?"
"Help!! GENEROSITY!" he took a couple of deep breaths "Seshoumaru, I have ears on top of my head"
"You've had them for a life time, you'll get used to it again"
"How the hell am I ever leaving the house again! I'm a university professor! What am I going to tell my students, that I got exposed to gamma rays!"
"Too much science fiction exposure brother. But I guess that could be a possibility if-"
"Seshoumaru! For Kami's sake, be serious!"
The elder youkai pinched his nose bridge as though he were dealing with a child. Kagome nudged him with her dart pistol and let some miko power seep through for good measures.
"And I see the bad manners rubbed onto your wife as well" Kagome saw Inuyasha look at her as though he's been startled and then smile slightly "Mrs Inuyasha, poking your brother in law is not of good greeting"
"Turning your brother into a hanyou in 2009 and then leaving without an explanation is most uncivil, brother-in-law, you must consent" she replied "And my name is Kagome Inuyasha Houjo"
"And mine's Souta Higurashi bla bla" said her brother. She had to remember to buy him some new hair dye. Without his help . . . Seshoumaru could have been the fastest thing on earth, but he couldn't beat both their spiritual powers together "You made the problem, now solve it, Moon-face"
Kagome and Inuyasha looked at her brother.
"Why didn't I every think of that one?!" snickered the neo-hanyou.
"Fine fine, you are a family of uncivilised people" huffed the youkai. He put his claws in his pockets, at which both siblings jumped to his neck "Do I look like I need a gun?"
"Never trust a youkai" said Inuyasha. They gave him all an odd look and he rolled his eyes.
"Well here. Not that you deserve it, but you are my brother . . . and I would hate to have to contribute more than a trust fund to the obnoxious whelp you no doubt produced"
He took his hand out of his inner suit pocket and in it had a . . . leaf. Or at least it looked like it. On second glance it turned to actually be a charm of some sort, and both Kagome and Souta could see that it had very powerful youki in it
"This should last you about a month" he said, putting it down on the bed "I always keep one with me just in case. I'll have a box of them sent to you"
When Inuyasha just looked at it, Souta picked it up, keeping Seshoumaru in good range of his air gun ('no shit around this guy') and put it on Inuyasha's head. Instantly, his ears were back on each side of his face and his irises went round again. The colour remained amber.
"It's a kitsune charm?" asked the human hanyou, looking at his normal nails. When he touched them, however, he could still feel the claws "And you use them too?"
"Where did you think my tail went, on a walk?" replied the older youkai
"I don't know, maybe you cut it off yourself" sniggered the other one "You were always into pain, coming to fight me every time knowing you were going to lose"
"I'm beginning to regret this" said Seshoumaru. "Now please, can somebody bring the Tetsusaiga here?"
"Na qa, no can do" said Souta "I'm not leaving psychopath zebra with my sister and brother on his own". Inuyasha was at an inch from explosion
"I see the hero complex rubbed off. That and a taste for weird hair"
"Look who's talking, fucking jii-jii"
"Souta, it's ok, I had it here all along" they all looked at Kagome in astonishment "What? I am a miko you know? Concealing youki isn't so complicated"
"Never mind" said Seshoumaru "Now will you hand that to your . . . husband?". Kagome growled at him in a manner that made him raise an eyebrow, and shoved the sword at her husband. "Very well brother, now point it that way" he pointed towards Souta "and pull it out thinking of your . . . wife"
Inuyasha growled much like his wife and extracted the sward.
And nearly fell off the bed with the unexpected weight.
When he looked at it, he almost fainted for the third time in the same day in two lifetimes. There, at the end of his arm, was a transformed fang lighting the room better than a halogen.
"There, my work is done" said the youkai, standing up, and startling the two siblings out of their stupor. Inuyasha was too engrossed in seeing Tetsusaiga like that again to care "Now you're on equal footing with that sward. It's all in your hands now brother, I want the sward back if you make it through with your skin"
Souta gave him a "Yeah, yeah" and escorted him to the door and down the stairs with Kagome. She then went back up to the bedroom.
Inuyasha was there, resting his back against the book shelf at the head of their bed, looking thoughtfully at the pulsing sward in his hand. As he held it upright, it almost touched the ceiling. She slid on the bed beside him.
"I thought those days were over" he said quietly
"I don't think they ever will be. Even in our next lives, we'll probably have to wage war against something or someone to live"
"Must be in our Karma" he said "I never wanted to fight and kill again"
"You won't have to kill. You'll just have to defend yourself and be careful, and knock Toukijin out of whoever's hands."
"Hmm" he replied unhappily. She snuggled against him "I'm a hanyou again"
"So I heard. And I'm carrying your first child. All in all, I think Seshoumaru did do the right thing"
"Hmm"
Feeling him sigh sadly and remembering what he had said about the memory of their conversations, Kagome hugged him hard
"What I said then still holds Inuyasha. I love your soul, not the body it's in. Who you are, not what you are, remember? You're Inuyasha Houjo, the boy who used to give me gifts at school and the boy who I used to sit" they both chuckled "My husband and a daddy"
"Well, at least I got your ears back"
"Yep, can't say I didn't miss those". They both chuckled again and settled into a confortable silence, still in the glow and protection of Tetsusaiga.
"Hey" he said suddenly, startling a wife who had nearly dosed off "Did Seshoumaru talk about a trust fund???!!!"
End
Ok Guys, this is the premise of events this fix is built on, sprung out of the ingenious mind of Miss K. Batey.
Basic premises in The Hero:
1.Inuyasha died in Kagome's arms at the end of the quest (on Kagome's 16th birthday), following the killing of Naraku and the destruction of the Shikon no Tama, which was vaporized in Inuyasha's hands. As he was dying, he declared his love for Kagome and, not realizing he was mortally wounded, promised to come find her in her realm. After preparing his body for burial and witnessing his cremation, Kagome returned home to grieve. (Note: so far in The Hero we've heard four or five different versions of Inuyasha's death, but this much can be stated as true.)
2.Houjou-kun is Inuyasha's reincarnation. Physically he is a different person (he and Inuyasha are distant relatives, and there is some resemblance, but not much). Spiritually and mentally they are the same person, but at different points in life. He has remembered his previous life since an accident on his fourth birthday. During the timeline of the original Inuyasha story he remembered Kagome and the quest, but thought he might have imagined it all. He nevertheless dedicated his life to finding Kagome, and to changing all the things she didn't like about him, and eventually to protecting her.
3.Like his original self, Houjou-kun always loved Kagome's name and loved speaking the word—but not to her. Some compulsion prevented him from calling her by her name, or from telling her his own. Almost a year after Kagome's return through the well, he spoke her name, and was afterward able to reveal himself to her. Eventually she got used to it.
4.Houjou-kun's given name is Inuyasha, which is his mother's family name. (No, that's not usual in Japan. A fortune teller said they should name him Inuyasha, using the kanji familiar to us.) During his teenaged years, nobody calls him Inuyasha. His family nickname is Koinu, which means "puppy." As a teenager he is very embarrassed by his nickname. (As an adult he takes it in stride.)
5.All his life, Houjou has had recurring nightmares about being shot by Kikyou and pinned to the tree.
6.Houjou-kun is cute and clueless and weird, but he's not boring. He's quite strong for a human, a power hitter (right fielder) on the baseball team. He's still never met a tree he can't climb. He has an extraordinary sense of smell—sufficient to identify a person by scent alone, even at some distance. He's also highly intelligent, and determined to be a good student because he thinks that's what Kagome would like. He is immensely knowledgeable about fairy tales and legends, particularly ones involving magic swords. He has lived in several countries and speaks several languages, including excellent English. He still sits and broods, either on the roof of his house or in trees.
7.A few months before Kagome was first pulled down the well, Houjou-kun bought Tessaiga in one of those antique shops where you buy magic things and that you can never find again after you've bought something. He still has the sword as an adult.
8.The Hero takes place more than 10 years after Kagome's return home after the end of the quest. Houjou and Kagome are married and now live in the shrine house with her mother and grandfather. Souta, who is a grad student in science and a computer geek, shares an apartment with friends. Houjou, who owns an old Toyota Hilux pickup truck, is an archeological anthropologist on the faculty of the prestigious Edo University—specializing, of course, in Feudal Japan.
9.All along, Inuyasha was the guardian spirit of the Higurashi shrine.
10.Mama and Grandpa always knew Inuyasha would die, and always knew the location of Inuyasha's grave. Kagome would have known, too, if she'd ever read any of the stuff in the shrine office and on the little plaques. At the time Kagome turns 15, Houjou-kun knows about Miroku's grave, but not about Inuyasha's. Kagome finds his grave after her return from the quest. The adult Houjou and Kagome both know about Inuyasha's grave. Anyone who can sense the Shikon can see it in Inuyasha's grave, permeating his remains. Kagome reports that they are inert—morally neutral, and presumably drained of power.
11.Inuyasha died because he used the SNT to give the remainder of his human life to Kikyou. Therefore, Kikyou was alive and human at the end of the quest. All of the other companions survived, as did Sesshoumaru and his party, including Kohaku, who Sesshoumaru Tenseiga'd at Rin's request. (AN: I particularly liked Miss Batey's shift into a verb here :P)
12.Miroku and Sango conceived a son while "comforting" each other the night of Inuyasha's death; they then married and had many sons. Miroku lived to be 100 years old. He was a famous historian, and also wrote down the Inuyasha stories. Late in his life he founded a monastery, and both he and Inuyasha are buried on its grounds.
13.Both Myouga and Sesshoumaru are still alive in modern times. So, apparently, is Rin. We know nothing about what happened to Shippou, (Mido- chan note: Although I gave a fair hint of just exactly WHERE Shippo is working in this short, ne ;P) Kirara, Kouga, Kanna, or Kagura. (The Hero storyline branches off from the original immediately before the monkey god story, so Hakudoushi is not an issue.)
14.Nothing has ever been said about the status of the well after Inuyasha's death. Kagome made it home through the well and has never mentioned visiting the surviving companions. Both Kagome and Houjou visit Miroku's grave when they want to talk to him.
15.Even as an adult, Kagome is still saddened by the thought of Inuyasha's death, although she and Houjou are loving and affectionate.
16.Houjou wears a string of prayer beads as a sign of reverence for his mother's family's guardian spirit. We can guess on the basis of hints and comments here and there that this spirit is the great dog daemon (the original Inuyasha's father) and that his mother's family descended from the inhabitants of the dog daemon's territory.
17.As in the original story, Houjou is the direct descendent of the family ruling Musashi domain, where Kaede lived. In The Hero, the original Inuyasha was also a member of that family (Houjou's ancestor was Inuyasha's uncle, so Inuyasha's grandfather is their first common direct ancestor.) Houjou's ancestor, the uncle, tried to have Inuyasha killed after his mother's death. (The would-be "hit man" was in fact an ancestor of Kagome, but nobody in the story has any way of knowing that.) Inuyasha pronounced a curse on the Houjou family, promising to destroy them to the last man.
I hope you did go through these, and that they interested you enough to go take a look here at http :// www. hibernatingbats. com /
The drawing style has nothing to do with Takahashi's hand, but it is in itself a style of its own, and very uniform and beautiful. Certain details, especially the hands, remind me strongly of the great Quentin Blake, who has accompanied my up my childhood with Roald Dahl.
I hope you follow my advice and you follow that link!
Midoriko-sama