What in all the hells is taking Kagome so long?!" Inuyasha muttered to himself. He leaned against the well, legs crossed and arms angrily locked over his chest. All she said she had to do was one test. One measly little test, and she'd been gone for almost 2 days now. What? Had the wench fallen down a hole? Stubbed her toe on a chair? Got caught in a door?

"Whoa, that's a bad path to be going down." Inuyasha sighed, banishing thoughts of a maimed, hurt, or near-death Kagome as well as he could. She was fine. She was back in her time. There were no demons there at all. She was fine. He didn't care at all. She was just a human wench! She didn't matter this much to make him feel this way. And plus, She was abso-fucking-lutely fine!

But by the gods, what if she wasn't?!

Inuyasha groaned aloud, back tight and his muscles sore from being constantly tense and on edge for the past day. He stretched backwards, trying to relieve his back at least; sure he couldn't take this much longer. He was going to run back in after her or go mad and crippled trying not to. And really, which was worse? His rampant and gory imagination, or a couple hundred sits in a row?

All Inuyasha needed was a brief mental flash of Kagome, bloody and beaten into an early grave, to send him jumping to his feet and darting into the well.

Besides, he thought to himself, as long as he stayed at her house, maybe let her mom baby him a bit, Kagome couldn't get mad at him. And even if she did, a couple sits might work out this knot at the base of his spine.

Inuyasha trudged up the stairs instead of jumping; still attempting to tell himself all was fine with Kagome. He shoved open the door to the well shrine; swearing some day he was going to tear the damn thing out if it didn't start opening faster. Yeah, he was failing the whole "being calm" deal. He couldn't help it. Something wasn't right. Something was not right at all and it was leaving a bad taste in his mouth.

He quickly darted for the house, unable to contain himself anymore. He jumped up to the second level, immediately ripping up Kagome's window and tearing inside. It was too quiet... as clichéd and horrible as that sounded, it was too fucking quiet. Her family was in here. He could smell them. He could hear their little human hearts beating. And he'd just torn into their house with as much crash and bang as a cannon. If Kagome was here, she'd have sat him through the damned floor.

He so didn't have fucking time for this! Something was wrong and he was getting a sinking feeling it was Kagome. Seriously, who else could it be? Who else in this damned family attracted danger like a corpse attracts flies? Oh dammit! Bad analogy!

He threw open her door, about to storm down there and ask just where the hell his stupid wench had gone, when he was hit with the upsetting smell of tears.

What in all the hells was going on?

His feet didn't touch a single step as he leapt down the stairway, a horrible knot of nausea sinking into his stomach. Something had gone wrong. What had gone wrong? What the hell was wrong?!

Mrs. Higurashi saw him first. He was hit immediately with the knowledge she was the one with tears down her cheeks, the happy light that was always in her eyes seemed permanently dead. "Oh, Inuya-"

"Where is Kagome?!" He blurted out so fast he wasn't sure she'd understood him. Hell, he hadn't understood himself! But... oh holy hell, where the hell was Kagome? Something was fucked up big time and where the hell was his Kagome?!

Mrs. Higurashi's eyes died further, if it was even possible. Inuyasha felt his body break out in a cold sweat. It was about Kagome. Kagome was the reason Mrs. Higurashi was crying, was dying inside. He felt his heart suddenly beat wildly, sure that even Kagome's human mother hear it. Fuck, he felt like the entire room was pulsing with it. Hell, he could feel himself pulsing, throbbing, swaying from the force of it.

And then Mrs. Higurashi's mouth opened so slowly. It was agonizing. He couldn't hear her; the gush of blood and panic was too loud. But at the same time he knew was she was saying. Her words were coming out too slow for him to understand it seemed, but words were coming out.

Kagome... and an accident? Yeah. That was just like her. She'd gone and done something, but what in the hells had happened!

Something about a car... Inuyasha hated those things! They were to loud, to fast, and reeked to high heaven. But what in the hell did a car and Kagome and an accident have to do with-

…a morgue? That was where they took dead-!

No.

No No No!

Kagome was not dead.

She was NOT fucking dead!

His heart was pounding in his ears, drowning out every sound and thought other than that he had to find Kagome. He had to get to Kagome and show her mother that she was not dead. The annoying wench could never die! She was too enraging and stupid and stubborn and whole and kind and pure and light... She was not fucking dead! He wouldn't let her die!

Morgue? Mrs. Higurashi thought Kagome was in a morgue? Well, unlucky for that belief, he fucking knew what a morgue was. And he knew where one was too! He hadn't spent two plus years suffering Kagome's blathering banter and learned nothing.

He was vaguely aware of his surroundings rapidly changing from the inside of Kagome's home, to concrete streets and rooftops. The memory of when they'd strolled, hand in hand, through Kagome's city engulfed him. It had been a moonless night, and Kagome had suggested that they go to her time and "live it up." She had spouted off all these things they could do, and in the end they'd just ended up walking and talking. Or more like her babbling and him trying to keep up with the conversation.

Some how they'd gone from talking of Kagome's annoying school, and her friends, to their friends, and how many people had died... He remembered how completely angry it had made him to think that all it took to bring up thoughts of death was to think of him and the rest of the group. She'd sensed it somehow and told him that people in her time die too, that more people died in her time than in his every single day.

He'd scoffed, thinking she was just spouting lies, but then she told him of the hospitals and how even though they had more powerful medicine than she did, people still died. She had told him of this place called a morgue, and then a funeral home, and then of course he knew what a cemetery was. The whole conversation had turned horribly morbid and they'd given up on walking through the town and gone straight back to Kagome's home.

But... they hadn't gotten back before Kagome stopped him in front of the door and kissed him square on the cheek.

The thought made his chest ache horribly and his heart raged even more heavily in his ears. He just had to get to Kagome. He was not going to let those soft lips and soft voice be cold and silent in death. She was not dead! She just couldn't be!

He got to the place that he knew was called "A Hospital" and he ran straight in, barely avoiding all the damned people clogging the narrow halls. Didn't they know to get out of a his way?! Dammit! Tables on wheels, people on tables, People dressed in cloth like paper, and all horrid people pushing the tables, leading the ones clothed in thin smocks. Wherever he went he was chased by metal whirring, wheezing, hacking, and the stench of chemicals people in this time used to clean. And of course the uproar that a red and white blur brings when it dashes through a crowd.

It felt like forever, but eventually instinct drove him down into the hospital's basement, following the smell of death, and through a heavy metal door into a cold room. Great! A Dead end, and the only person here was a shaking pathetic human in white, just like so many other's in this reeking shit hole of a place!

"Where is Kagome?!" Inuyasha shouted at this human who reeked of scents he could not name. But mostly he reeked of death, like this room, which only frightened and angered him more.

"Wh-who?"

Inuyasha had the human's throat in his hands before the man yelped or he himself realized he was going to strangle the human for not producing his Kagome immediately. "Kagome! Kagome Higurashi! Where the fuck is Kagome Higurashi!" He screamed at this old, flabby human, stinking of death and unnamed putrid reek, and started shaking him back and forth. He was going to throttle this damned human if he didn't start spilling answers! He was going to give this wretch a real reason to smell like death!

The human choked and gagged, pointing frantically to a metal wall to the side. Inuyasha dropped him to the ground to turn and regard it, pointedly ignoring the sucking gasp of air at his feet. When he leapt towards it, it seemed more like the wall of metal and tiny little doors had been the one to rush at him instead of him to it.

But… was Kagome in here?

Inuyasha ripped the first door in front of him right off its hinges, throwing it behind him. It was a tiny little space. A tiny little hole in the wall with a cold metal table inside, long and thin. They shoved Kagome in one of these? They dared to put his Kagome in a dark, cold, little hole like this?!

In seconds he was destroying that wall. Metal shrapnel flew behind him. Dead humans on trays were yanked out to their farthest position and the trays they laid on canted drunkenly downward, or to the side. The human he'd throttled had fled the room, and somewhere someone was yelling loud enough to be echoing in every room of the building. But Inuyasha didn't care anymore.

He'd found Kagome now.

His heart had surely stopped and leapt upwards into his throat. Kagome was so pale... He brushed a lock of her hair out of her face. It stuck, matted and stiff in her blood. Her skin was so pale... and so cold. She was only covered in a thin sheet. She had to be freezing.

It felt like the world was in slow motion as he took off his haori and draped it over Kagome's chest. In the same movement, he gently got his hand behind Kagome's shoulders to lift her up. She was so stiff with cold Inuyasha had trouble getting her to lay in his arms right. It was cold, right? She was stiff with cold. If he didn't warm her up, she was sure to freeze to death.

The lump in his throat where his dying heart had lodged grew bigger. His stomach suddenly heaved, but he didn't throw up. He heard someone utter a strangled moan. He didn't care anymore.

Because Kagome really was dead.

He didn't know what he was doing, or where he was going to, but now he was running up and out of that horrible place of death. To hell with the monstrous humans who were trying to stop him. How could they expect him to leave her there, in that dark, cold hole in the wall? With that filthy old human in white that reeked of chemicals and death?

But what could he do? Where could he go? Where could he take Kagome where all this horror could be taken back, and she could be alive again? How could he take this back and make it all right again?

Sesshomaru.

Sesshomaru had Tenseiga. He'd brought that little human girl back to life. Inuyasha could use Tenseiga to bring Kagome back to life, just like that little girl.

The well. Now.

Inuyasha mentally commanded himself to move faster, everything moving past him in a blur. By the time he was back at Kagome's home, he was moving to fast to stop. Turns out he really did keep his promise to those doors. He just barely managed to turn to the side, hitting them with his body and not Kagome's as they crashed through, demolishing the shrine doors and a portion of the wall as well. They rolled down the steps to the recessed flooring, Inuyasha curling up around Kagome to protect her from their fall. With a final groan of splintering wood, his back broke the side of the well and they toppled in, Inuyasha falling headfirst and still attempting to protect Kagome's body from the fall.

Landing had been beyond painful, and yet, Inuyasha didn't feel the pain. His legs felt weak, but they didn't fail him. His throat was raw from trying to breathe past the lump in it, but he continued panting and gasping for air.

He shifted Kagome's stiff body in his arms, trying to make sure that the thin sheet and his own haori fully hid and protected her body. How dare he be weak, feel sore or pant for air? How dare he get to have those privileges when Kagome could not? How dare he even be able to stand and jump and run?

It didn't matter. Sesshomaru. That was next. He'd gotten to the well. Now to get to his brother.

Inuyasha started running before he'd even known where to start. Somehow, he'd known the right direction. Sesshomaru's scent hit him eventually, and it was straight in front of him. His feet were beginning to ache with running so hard and so fast. Each gasp for air literally burned. But all he could think of was how dare he feel when Kagome could not? How dare he feel anything ever again if he couldn't save her now?

.

.

.

Sesshomaru scowled to himself. The scent of that filthy half-breed was rapidly moving towards him. It was mildly surprising just how fast the whelp was coming, but only for a brief moment. The only thing that was truly surprising about his half-brother was how he was still alive and disgracing everything around him with his foul blood, foul actions, and foul mouth.

So the brat was coming for him? Let him. Sesshomaru would merely end the half-breed's existence and spare the world his tainting presence.

But what in the world was that fetid reek Inuyasha was dragging with him?

Sesshomaru ceased his travels. Rin and Jaken and his castle could wait. He was actually mildly curious to see just what his brother wanted. Of course, the vast majority of him was angered that the brat thought himself important enough to come after a demon lord. Time to get this over with and done. He had much higher matters to deal with.

He turned around, and decided he wouldn't wait for Inuyasha's movements, while faster than normal, still would take him forever and a day to reach him. It took no more than a quarter of an hour to reach his half-brother.

At the look of wide-eyed horror on the whelp's face, he wanted to laugh. Yes, Half-breed. This is the true meaning of spee-

Oh holy hell, what sort of battered, bloody, and broken mess was his brother holding?

"Save her!"

Her? Oh! So the poor puppy's bitch had been killed? Violently, from the looks of things. Sorry, half-breed. This Sesshomaru will not fix your mistake.

"No." Sesshomaru replied simply and turned to walk away.

"Tetsaiga for your Tenseiga!" Sesshomaru didn't turn around. Why dignify such vile bargaining with a response.

"I'll give you my life for her's, You Son of a Bitch!" Sesshomaru heard his brother's voice crack. Pathetic. Really, truly pathetic. One, she was a bitch of a human. Two, there were hundreds more where she came from, if not thousands. Three, it wasn't as if her life would have been long anyway. And four, if Inuyasha hadn't been able to protect her, then really, did she deserve to live for being so stupidly connected with such a weak half-breed? While Sesshomaru thought this was a new low, even for his filthy abomination of a sibling, feeling Tenseiga suddenly rip free of his body changed his opinion, and changed it with fury.

He whipped around, intent on having the puppy's intestines to litter the ground with, and paused. Whatever fate caused him to do so would be the next to die, but first he wanted to see, just could the half-breed do it? Was Inuyasha so blessed that he could wield Tetsaiga AND Tenseiga?

Sesshomaru smirked, watching Inuyasha whip the blade around frantically. It seemed not.

He took Inuyasha's hand in his own on a wild backswing, and pried his blade from the brat's hands. Just what possessed him to then waste concentration on the dead miko and destroy the creatures around her dead body was a complete mystery to him. But watching his brother instantly fall to his knees and cradle the woman's body in his arms, he knew he wasn't quite done with this. Inuyasha would not be allowed to get away scot-free for pestering him, being weak, and actually thieving his sword.

The human woman groaned, her brow furrowing as her bone's reformed and the lacerations in her skin, and most likely in her internal organs as well, knit together and disappeared. "Inuyasha?"

His brother made some hideous choking sound and held her tighter, obviously completely forgetting about Sesshomaru. Well, that was enough of that.

He snapped his hand forward through his brother's tangled matt of hair and gripped his fingers around the puppy's throat to send him hurling away from his precious human. Inuyasha rolled head over heels before managing to find purchase in the ground and scraped through the dirt to a stop.

"I believe you said, 'My life for hers,' did you not?"

The human wench made some sort of gasp of disbelief, and then amazingly, since she had been dead minutes before, she started yelling at the both of them. A truly contemptible wench.

No matter. A deal was a deal. He got to take Inuyasha out of this world in return for bringing that damned human back. Granted he truly did not have the time or the energy to waste on this, so with a quick movement he grasped his brother by the throat again, this time holding him from the front to choke any and all verbal filth out of the half-breed, and started moving back towards his castle.

The first thing he did once he had returned was to hurl his brother's unconscious form into an underground room, pleased as he watched the limp body hit every step on the way down. It was infuriating the wretch passed out from a few moments of constricted airways. If the brat was going to fall unconscious, then he deserved every bruise and contusion he got.

He, however, gracefully went down them, kicking his brother's prone body away from the bottom step so he could lean down and take Tetsaiga from his brother's possession. There. Now the room would be sure to hold the wretch as long as Sesshomaru was forced to keep the whelp alive. He turned and went out of the dank, dark chamber; vaguely remembering this had been a torture chamber under a past lord. Well this Sesshomaru had no need of such rooms...

Except for keeping doomed bastards prisoner until he'd dealt with and been welcomed by Rin. He had barely returned to ground level when the painful clattering of the little human girl's wooden shoes grated against his already angered nerves.

"Lord Sesshomaru! You have returned!" She beamed up at him, though his expression was never more than indifferent. He nodded in return. The little girl quivered with excitement. It never ceased to amaze him how full of life such a frail creature was, and how far removed from the horrors of the world. With this little child before him, one could scarcely believe that such an abomination lay at the bottom of a stairway somewhere beneath their feet.

"And will you be staying?" The child inquired.

Sesshomaru nodded, fighting against a wince as Rin squealed. "With Rin?!"

He nodded again. She squealed again, high-pitched and laughing.

"You will cease at once." Sesshomaru commanded, and the little girl stopped.

"Yes, my lord." She smiled.

Oh, if only his ingrate of a sibling could have a shred of this child's manners. Nevertheless, it didn't matter now. Maybe it was the fact he always felt more merciful around the child, but Sesshomaru realized that as long as Inuyasha remained sealed away in that room, the world would no longer see the stain on his family tree. Eventually the world would forget. Eventually he could forget. It was the same sort of peace he'd felt when the half-breed had gotten himself sealed by the first miko bitch.

Yes. He would hide the wretch away until the world forgot, he forgot, and even the blasted whelp forgot. Surely the brat would cease to be belligerent, irreverent, and vile after a few decades locked away in a hole.

And, if not, Sesshomaru could always keep him there. Out of sight, out of mind. There, in that one-time dungeon, Inuyasha was unable to be obscene to him, anyone else, or to the traditions of the world. He was not a blot on the earth's history, or his own page of history, as long as he stayed down there.

And if the consequences were not as wonderful as they seemed at this moment in time, Sesshomaru could always kill him.