Disclaimer: I do not own the Inuyasha franchise.
Thank you to Rumiko Takahashi, who gifted us with such an amazing story, and to Sunrise studio, that made it into a great anime with breath catching soundtracks!
When You Are Gone
" We were made for each other
Out here forever
I know we were
Yeah, yeah
And all I ever wanted was for you to know
Everything I do, I give my heart and soul
I can hardly breathe; I need to feel you here with me"
When you are gone/ Avril Lavigne
"Ah, it seems it's going to rain tonight as well..." said an old woman while peeking out of her hut. Having looked around, and obviously, failed to locate the whereabouts of her who she was looking for, she let a tired sigh escape her.
"He's there again, isn't he?" She murmured, addressing nobody in particular.
Giving the gathering clouds another examining stare, she started walking towards the forest that grew at the east border of the village.
After what seemed to her tired limbs like an endless journey, she finally reached her destination - an old tree towering in
in the middle of a clearing. On top of one of the tree's impressive roots she spotted the one she was looking for.
"Inuyasha, you've been a frequent visitor to this place recently" She said while lowering herself on her usual spot - a rather thick root hovering not too high over the ground.
Waiting for the white haired boy, or should she say now, man, for she could never make her mind whether he had matured enough from his teenage appearance over the last 50 years to be called one, to reply she closed her eyes and inhaled the scent of the forest.
"Oy, Sango, don't tell me you've come here only to die with me watching!" Came the sudden, but not unexpected taunting remark.
Definitely, still a boy. Sango noted to herself and looked at him "You know, Inuyasha, given my old age, you could've been politer".
"Keh, you're the one who threatened to make me pluck weeds all day long if I ever called you "Sango-baba" again, so it doesn't seem to me that you're that old, just yet" He answered while jerking his head and awarding her with a displeased, yet amused grin.
She gave him a thoughtful "humm" and turned to look in front of her.
"Inuyasha, you really don't change, do you?"
He looked at her, slightly confused.
"Wha'dya mean?"
As she failed to suppress a laugh he turned away while murmuring an angry "Damn woman" under his breath.
They sat in silence for a few minutes, each keeping their thoughts to themselves.
"It was the same weather when she.." He broke the silence and paused as if searching for the right word ".. was gone.."
Though his face was calm, she knew just too well how much pained and grief his melancholicall expression was hiding. The two years that had passed since then, were not even the least successful in dulling his suffering.
"Inuyasha, you know Kagome-chan was happy with you. I'm more than certain that she never regretted leaving her world and spending the rest of her life her, with you". She said, feeling as if quoting herself for what seemed to be a hundredth time.
He was silent, so she continued.
"It's inevitable, we're humans, after all. She knew it just as well".
"But I could never give her the full life she could have had with a man in her world, or any other human man.."
Sango could hear the deepening pain at each uttered word. She knew all too well what he was referring to - the half demon and his human wife were not blessed with children.
Closing her eyes, she could hardly hold back tears as she recalled the look in her dear friend's eyes as she herself bore her fourth and fifth child, and when her eldest daughters bore their own children. It wasn't jealousy, no. It was pure sadness, so throbbing that she didn't dare to share, not with her friends, never with her husband.
She recalled the time when Miroku, rocking their youngest son to sleep speculated, that their half demon friend, could be compared to a mule. Purely for that matter alone, of course. Being a cross breed, he could not produce children of his own.
As horrible as it might be, at the back of her mind she understood that it was only reasonable, as nature was trying to repair the stirred balance his being was. She knew that it was only the smallest compensation fate himself claimed, for the miracle, as Kagome called it, in her coming to this world and meeting Inuyasha.
She did not notice that he was now eyeing her. A bitter smile appearing on his lips.
"You know, Sango, I sorta envy you… Even though that lecherous husband of yours died, you carry on like nothing happened..."
His words, yet again, reminded her of his never changing boyish thinking, and the ache in her back braced her desire to climb
up the roots and give him a good smack on his thick minded head.
"Inuyasha, I never thought you were that dense!" Taking a deep breath, she continued with a softer tone.
"We, as humans, know that our lives are limited to only a given period of time. As Houshi-sama once told me - it was perhaps
in our nature to let time soothe our grief and let our losses be replaced with memories of our loved ones who left us".
He avoided her look, perhaps, acknowledging her words.
"Besides, Houshi-sama passed away over thirty years ago. You could not expect one to grief for that long". She said while thinking to herself that neither she expected herself to outlive her husband by so many years.
"Keh, I suppose all the poison he absorbed into his body back then, didn't go unnoticed". Inuyasha commented, having a dark look in his eyes.
"You could be right." Sango dryly remarked and slowly straightened herself into a standing position, deciding not to remind the
tactless half demon, just how many times her husband's "poison absorbing" saved their lives.
"Come on, Inuyasha, it will be raining soon, let's go back". She called.
Remaining in his seated position he gave one last glace to the small polished stone at the base of the tree, and with one leap
placed himself next to his elder companion.
"Come, Sango, I'll carry you. If I let you walk, we'll be soaked by the time we get back". He snorted and crouched with his
strong back to her.
"Thank you". She replied.
Since Kagome's passing Inuyasha refrained from interacting with the villagers. He spent most of his days keeping Sango company
and complaining how she made him waste his time on troublesome work.
Shippou was also a frequent guest, becoming much more attached to Sango as his last living human comrade. He and Inuyasha never stopped bickering with one another, although Sango did notice that now, as the young demon was getting stronger by each visit, Inuyasha held more respect for him. Never admitting it, obviously.
"Inuyasha! Oy, Inuyasha!" Called Shippou. "Heh, I guess, you're getting old, Inuyasha, your hearing is becom…" He didn't get to finish his remark as a fist landed painfully on his head.
"Wha'dya say, punk!?"
Shippou rubbed the new formed bump on his head, while remarking that maybe next time he should dodge it, and not let Inuyasha have his way, for the sake of old time's memory. Maybe calling him "punk" didn't do him justice either, as his appearance now made him look only a few years younger than Inuyasha did, when they first met.
Deciding to talk about it to Sango some time later, he looked at his abuser.
"So, what have you been up to?" Keeping himself from adding "besides, plucking weeds, that is".
"Dunno, not much..." Inuyasha answered while looking at the direction where the sacred tree and the Bone Eating Well were located.
"Don't tell me you were busy sulking all by yourself again!" The young kitsune exclaimed and positioned himself so that he would be staring directly at Inuyasha's eyes.
"You're not the only one who's grieving you know! You think I didn't love Kagome, or Miroku?" He stated, perhaps louder than he meant to as he could feel tears making their way to betraying his resolve.
"You think it doesn't hurt me, when I think about them every day?" He said in a much quieter tone, almost a whimper.
"I wish... I wish we could all be together forever... But you know it can't be like that...".
Inuyasha remained silent, though never averting his gaze, he wasn't listening. It was obvious his mind was elsewhere.
He remembered how Kagome kept insisting that his brother, the one that never displayed even the smallest emotion, was probably broken by Rin's death. He recalled how she said that it must have been difficult enough for him to force her to stay in the village, rather than join him in his travels once more, only to lose her to death's grip at childbirth.
Even though he never understood why his emotionless brother kept the human by his side, as a child, in the first place, he could now relate to what Kagome thought he must have felt, it he was capable of emotions, that is.
Casting a look at Shippou, who by now had his back turned, and was pulling absentmindedly some weeds from the ground.
Not that Inuyasha allowed the thought that any of his remaining friends didn't care about Kagome's passing, it's just that for him she was so much more than he could express with words, so much more than they could understand. She left the comfort of her world, her family, her friends, a possibly much happier life, to be with him.
At first, he was so dazed, so enchanted by her presence beside him once again, that he completely dismissed the thought that their time together, as sweet as it was, was limited by her own life span.
When Miroku died he was grieving, as much as any other member of their group or the monk's family, but he just pushed the thought of inevitable separation away, as far as he possibly could.
When the aging of her body could no longer be overlooked, when her raven black hair turned gray, when her movements became restricted by aching limbs, he kept telling himself that he would cherish her, he would help her, he would preserve her precious life.
Only when she was laying in front of him, her lifeless hand falling from his cheek, the harsh truth crashed him.
She was no longer there to keep him company on the sleepless nights he turned human with her endless merry chirping-like chit-chat. She was no longer there to bicker with him things so small as never ceasing taunting of the small kitsune, only to let it all be forgotten, as night drew near and let herself fall asleep in his embracing arms.
She was gone, forever. Now, that the Shikun-No-Tama was gone from this world, no power could bring her back to him.
Seasons changed and Sango was soon gone as well, having lived a long and happy life, given everything, as she herself stated.
Shippou, having shown up the next day, didn't bother concealing his angst and tears, as he wept like his child self into Inuyasha's chest.
The half demon, in between the kitsune's sobs, nursed the thought that he was no longer bound to this village, he could get away, run from the pain, the sadness, the memories. Hopefully, time would be merciful, and would let him carry on, just like Sango told him it had let her.
However, even months later, try as he might, he could not tear himself more than a few days journey away from the Sacred tree, the palace where it all began.
Having spent the night between the branches of the Sacred tree, Inuyasha spotted Shippou in between a heap of nearby bushes.
"Inuyasha!" The young demon called and made his way towards his half blooded comrade.
With a displeased grunt, Inuyasha shifted and decided it would be best to pretend to be asleep, hoping the kitsune would get bored a leave him alone.
"Inuyasha! I know you're not sleeping! come on! You can't be planning on just doing nothing here all day!" Shippou kept repeating, while tugging and poking at Inuyasha's face.
As the dog demon's patience was about to burst, he felt something. Something he could not explain nor pinpoint as to what it was, something that made him shove the kid away, with such brute force that Shippou lost his balance and met the ground beneath the tree with a loud "thud".
Only Inuyasha was too far away to notice. He quickly made his way to the well, and without second thoughts jumped into it.
He landed on solid, dry ground, not that he expected anything else, he kept telling himself. However, the same urge that rushed him inside the well, made him kneel and bury his claws into the dusty earth.
"Please, damn it" He was begging, for the first time in his life "Please! Take me to her!" He could feel tears clouding his vision.
"There was no Shikun-No-Tama when she returned...Curse you! I know you brought her back because she wished for it just hard enough! Is my wish not strong enough? What do you want me to do, you bastard?!" Tears were now watering the ground in between his clawed hands, while he kept cursing, nobody in particular, but maybe God himself.
"Inuyasha!" He caught the distant echo of Shippou's voice. Wiping his tears with the sleeve of his fire robe, he stood up, readying himself to jump up.
As his bare feet were about to detach from the ground, he saw a familiar light breaking from under the dry earth. He felt himself being sucked in, like when he and Kagome arrived at her world after defeating Naraku.
He could still distinguish Shippou's voice, coming closer, however his mind was becoming blurry, his senses dimming, as if he was falling asleep.
The last thing he saw was the cloudless sky, hovering as if just above the well. As he closed his eyes, he let himself, finally, smile as her voice echoed in his mind.
Just before Shippou made his way close enough to the well, a peril of light emerged from it, before fading as abruptly as it appeared.
"Inuyasha?!" Called Shippou before looking into the well, only to find it empty.
Suddenly, he looked to his sides, brought his hand to his head and scratched it thoughtfully.
"Huh, what am I doing here?"
As he lowered himself into the soft grass with his back leaning against the well, he felt a single tear running down his cheek.
"What? Why am I... so sad..." He wondered while looking up to the clear blue sky
Far away, a few weeks journey away, perhaps, a small demon was leaning, breathless, on a wooden staff with a man's and a woman's faces engraved on top of it.
He stared at his master, who suddenly halted his rapid pace.
"Sessumaru-sama, what happened?"
The other demon did not answer, only let a single "huh" while looking up into the sky.
AN: This is it, for now.
For the first ever fanfic I got to write, I think it's ok.
Comments and reviews would be much appreciated, also, given that english is only a third language for me any grammar/style corrections
along with suggestions and critique would be warmly welcomed as well.
Thank you for taking your time and reading my story.
IndigoRed