By the time it finally occurred to her to worry about changing the future by meddling in the past, there was no point. She'd been back and forth a dozen times and everything was still the same. That must mean, Kagome reasoned, that whatever she was doing in the past was what was supposed to happen. (Or, at least that was the idea she got from a few of the time travel movies she'd seen. Kagome had never been a big fan of science fiction.) It was destiny. Her destiny. The thought comforted her and made her feel a little less guilty about breaking the Shikon jewel.
Once, feeling experimental, she had etched a character deep into the wooden flesh of the Sengoku Jidai-era Goshinboku. She'd traced over it with a finger as it bled thin sap, wondering what would happen, though she thought she had it figured out by now. The mark must always have been there, in the present, though she had somehow failed to notice it.
But when Kagome returned to her own time and examined the tree, no trace of her mark could be found. At first she had been puzzled. Then she simply shrugged.
Temporal mechanics were a headache, so it was easier just not to think about such things.
Until...
...until one day, when she hops into the well and, in that split-second of dim null-space between then and now, she floats past...herself.
ThatKagome's eyes fly open wide and she clutches through the air for thisKagome. Fingers lightly brush against a sock, but it is already too late. They are beyond each other's reach now and thatKagome's hand closes tight onto nothing at all...
Then Kagome blinked, the crunch of gritty soil beneath her shoe, a shaft of mid-morning sunlight hitting the well's interior just above her head. She waited until she had stopped trembling, and climbed out.
Of course she was shaken at first; who wouldn't be? She closed her eyes and replayed the scene in her mind. Had that Kagome, that other self, been different? Older? Younger? No. She'd seemed identical, right down to the overloaded yellow backpack slung across a shoulder. With a heart full of dread, Kagome left the well-house.
And, of course, everything was still the same. Why shouldn't it be?
Mama was still Mama. Souta and Grandpa and even Buyo: just the same as always. The shrine and the house and the city beyond it--it was all exactly how it was supposed to be. The only difference was the sense of disquiet in Kagome's heart.
She'd been sure things would be somehow changed now. Altered, because--let's face it--how could they not be, after she met herself in that dark space between times? And yet, the world went on as before, as if saying to her, you are less important than you think you are. no hard feelings.
She didn't tell anyone. There didn't seem to be a point.
And, after all, Kagome was nothing if not adaptable. This was just one more ordinary-extraordinary thing to process. She went on with her life, just as before, though now she felt a thrill of fear and anticipation every time she jumped into the well. Was it even possible to change the story?
What would happen, Kagome wondered, if she chanced to meet herself again?
What would happen if, this time, she was able to grab hold?