Disclaimer: I do not own Inuyasha & characters, Rumiko Takahashi does. I do own this idea dug up from the recesses of my imagination.
-Inuyasha will seem OOC for awhile
Summary: He was a talented painter, his trademark being the colour red. His childhood was filled with fear, uncertainty, confusion and quiet anger. That was when he heard them for the first time. They didn't stay long, before they too left just like everyone else. That is, until one came back, but it was a different one. It screamed danger and he knew his last living family member was now on Death's list. Now he'll do whatever it takes to save his sister, even if it meant he had to paint a sea of red to ensure her survival.
RED
Chapter 1
The hushed sounds of a wet brush sliding across the canvas were the only sounds heard in the empty, white room. Sunlight poured in from the glass windows, encasing the room in a bright light. Gold eyes gazed blankly at the distorted shapes, the red liquid the most prominent colour.
It all started after his father's and mother's abrupt deaths. Then his older half-brother was found dead in his office at work. From then on, his older half-sister took care of him, but that was when it started. That was the beginning. The beginning of his obsession.
"So beautiful…" the painter hissed, his eyes darting quickly to his jar of red paint. "So very, very beautiful, the colour red."
He was different. He knew that and it took him awhile for him to accept it. Not everybody was a talented painter as he, nor did anybody have the power to communicate with the dead. It was a curse, and oddly to him, as he aged, a gift. Not many liked to talk to him and he took comfort in the voices that he heard in his head as a child.
"You and your obsession with that colour," a voice drawled from the doorway. "Just a tad bit creepy. No wonder almost the whole town is wary of you, or fears you."
Fear. Just a simple, four letter word, but the meaning can be catastrophic, devastating even. He knows what fear was. He experienced it first hand when he found out all his family, but one, died mysteriously. He felt fear when they thought he, a small child, killed his own kin in cold blood. Yet, he did not feel fear when he heard the voices for the first time. Never that emotion he felt when it concerned those voices.
The young painter smiled as he dipped his brush back in the jar, allowing a small smile to grace his face. Ever since he could remember, he was always fascinated with the colour red.
"Inuyasha!" the owner of the voice screamed, her voice edged with mild annoyance.
Inuyasha craned his neck so he could see the slim form of his older half-sister standing in the doorway. Her black hair pulled tightly into a bun, her brown eyes were cold and calculating, as a disapproving frown marred her unblemished pale face. Her grey suit was clean and immaculate, no unwanted wrinkle seen anywhere.
"As I was saying, your painting is…scary. Use more colours than just reds, blacks and dark blues…"
Inuyasha kept his blank eyes on his sister, but his mind started to stray once more. He didn't love the colour red, more like obsessed over it. Love and obsessions are two different things. His obsession is what drove people away and is one of the reasons why people labeled him different. They called him a freak, the devil, outcast and other names he didn't quite remember. The older he got, the worse his obsession became and he started using blood as his medium to paint. Just a tiny prick of his finger and away he would go, painting with his finger, using blood as paint. He was seven years old.
There were no warnings to be given when the voices would start, telling him to paint certain things with his blood. His mind would block the present and instead, somehow, he occupied himself until his instincts told him he was done painting whatever his body automatically painted without his knowledge. he was usally greeted with grotesque and disturbing paintings of death. He always surprised himself at how detailed he can paint whtout even being aware.
Most of them were of people dying; more specifically, the people in the town. His paintings were a warning, but no one heeded them. Soon, young Inuyasha's paintings rang true and one by one, people were found in their own blood, the reason for their deaths were unknown. They blamed him, but there were no hard evidence except the paintings. He couldn't be labeled a suspect, for he was but a child. It was a coincidence they said, chance, but no one knew the truth.
The voices told him they didn't kill those people, they were here to deliver the messages of death and he was the one chosen to be the physical messenger of this world. The reason they died, the voices did not tell him. He went along with it, he was but a child meant to obey and listen. Yet, as he hit puberty, the voices left and his obsession over painting with blood was done with. The deaths continued though, as is natural for the cycle of life.
"Inuyasha stop!" the panicked voice of his older sister and the sharp pain in his right hand woke him from his reverie. He watched as his paintbrush flew in the air for a moment before gravity took its toll and it clattered to the ground, splattering red paint on the clean floor.
"Kikyou?" Inuyasha called out to his older sister, watching the many emotions flicker across her face.
"You did it again! Look at what you have done!" Kikyou snarled, pointing a perfectly manicured finger at the canvas. "It came back!"
Inuyasha turned back to his painting and his normally empty eyes shone with horror. On his canvas, what used to be shapes of nothing in particular was a familiar painted body, lying brokenly on something akin to a couch. Yet, that wasn't the reason for fear to grip his heart. Inuyasha was used to his mind shutting down as he painted and when his mind came back to the present, he wouldn't be surprised to find some horrid painting staring back at him.
Afterall, it is not a sign, since he has not heard the voices in years. No, this went farther than that and for the first time in his seventeen years of life, Inuyasha was scared of what he painted. On the canvas, besides the shapes and the broken body, was a name: KIKYOU TSUMAKI.
He thought too soon and a voice came back in full throttle and Inuyasha knew this voice was not part of the voices he heard as a child, the ones he oddly took comfort in. No, this one screamed danger and he wanted it out of his head.
Kikyo Tsumaki, Kikyo tsumaki, Kikyo Tsumaki! One, two three and four! Once the singing has been sung, once the light reaches the tallest of the tall, you will be granted the sleep you seek for, the embrace your heart so desires.
The windows shattered and a piercing scream followed soon after, as a spray of red splattered the once pristine, white walls.
Well it's been awhile since I wrote a story xD.
Please review & tell me what you guys think :}.