S3253
On that morning - well, not technically morning yet, since the sun had not risen above the crest of the wooded hill to the east of their camp, and was only making pinkish jabs at the blue-black sky, which was still half-filled with pale but valiant stars, making as lovely a scene as any mortal has ever had the fortune to view - as I say, on that morning, Kagome stalked angrily into the forest, ignoring Inuyasha, who was shouting rude things again. Her back was as straight as a poker; her fists were clenched; her arms held stiffly to her sides; her lips were pressed firmly together; her cheeks were pink with indignation; and her eyes were widened and lifted upwards to prevent the tears in them from falling. She would have made the perfect model for a picture entitled The Woman Scorned had not her widened eyes been glazed in a manner more often associated with a sleepwalker or a hypnotist's victim than an offended young woman. Other than that, however, only the blurry afterimage - well, part of an afterimage, anyway; at least an inch of one - trailing behind her marked that day as different from any other.
But it was different.
Observe, dear reader, the pretty scene we have playing out before us in the pink pre-dawn light. Kagome, still stiff and glassy-eyed, walks for ten minutes before she finds a clearing and can begin to relieve her feelings by screaming a number of unpleasant things about Inuyasha and hitting the tree in nearest proximation to her location. So engrossed is she in this pleasant pastime that she does not at first notice the tall, white-haired youkai who hears her voice as he passes through the forest on his way to some distant land and pauses to listen, with an amused smile and a glazed look identical to Kagome's, except that it is narrow instead of wide, as she heaps insult after insult upon the unknowing head of his hanyou half-brother.
Eventually, however, Kagome's invention begins to flag. She slows in her tirade ... stumbles over a word ... pauses ... and at last becomes aware enough of her surroundings to see Sesshoumaru. She stares, aghast.
It is he who begins the exchange which, having been begun, must needs continue to that end which all such fanfictional exchanges do. He says something - coolly, arrogantly - and Kagome takes umbrage. Her rage is not yet spent.
The war of words which follows is not pretty. Everything which can be brought up into the fray, is: Rin, Inuyasha and Sesshoumaru's father, Inuyasha's mother, the Sengoku Jidai, Jaken, Kagome's friends, the length of Kagome's skirt and the implications thereof, Sesshoumaru's battles with Inuyasha and the identical outcome of each, Inuyasha himself, Sesshoumaru himself, and (of course) Kikyou.
When Kikyou is brought up, Kagome's glazed eyes brim over with tears, and she begins to cry. "Leave me alone, why can't you?" she sobs.
Sesshoumaru seems to struggle inwardly. For a moment the glassy stare in his eyes vanishes, to be replaced with a look of disgust and horror, and he steps backwards ... but only for a moment. Then it returns, and he crosses the space between himself and Kagome, and lifts her chin gently so that she looks up at him. "Because," he says softly, "... I - "
It was at this point in the proceedings which I have faithfully described to you that a loud, undignified snort erupted from a convenient clump of bushes a few yards to the left of Sesshoumaru. He and Kagome both stiffened and looked vaguely alarmed, but the only movement either of them made was to look inquiringly in the direction from which the noise was coming.
The snort became a snigger; the snigger became a chuckle; the chuckle became a laugh; the laugh became a wordless howl of mirth puntuated with gasps. The bushes shook.
"This is not funny," observed a serious, childish voice, through the howl. "Their OOC percentages are unacceptable. Look."
The howling voice was understood to say (rather incoherently) that to look was impossible under the current conditions.
"Eighty-seven percent for her," said the childish voice, doggedly; "ninety-six percent for him. This is the worst I have seen."
There was another, louder gasp in the howl, and it stopped. "Oh, lawks!" said the howling voice, gleefully, and gulped down another laugh. "All right, fine. Though it's a pity I have to interrupt such a touchin' scene."
The bushes parted to let through a young woman whose clothing looked strangely disordered - dusty and wrinkled, with grass clinging to it, almost as if she had been rolling on the forest floor. She plucked dead leaves from her black hair, grinning impudently at Sesshoumaru and Kagome, who were still staring, vaguely puzzled.
"The good thing about dopplegangers," remarked the young woman conversationally in the direction of the bushes, "is that they slow down reaction time by about two hundred percent. If those two weren't hypnotised and possessed, I'm sure Sesshoumaru would have that acid whip out and ... blessed heaven!" She dived down and to the side as the aforementioned weapon sliced through a tree to her right, mere inches away from her head.
Sesshoumaru had moved from his position beside Kagome and his glassy eyes had narrowed to give him a dazedly icy glare. Things might have gone very badly for the young woman, unbalanced and faced with an irate youkai, had not her child-voiced companion come to her aid, stepping from the bushes with a thing like a handgun held in both small hands. By her face she should have been fifteen at least, but she was no bigger than a ten-year-old. However, even a ten-year-old can be dangerous with a weapon. The handgun made a high-pitched whining noise and a mild explosion: Sesshoumaru (and Kagome, who had been backing away) froze again. The breeze died, the wind-blown leaves paused mid-whirl and hung at extraordinary angles, and all sound ceased - except for that generated by the black-haired girl and her companion.
"Bejabers," said the black-haired young woman, faintly. "Thanks. Silly me, puttin' ideas into his head ..."
The small girl nodded acknowledgement. "Now what?"
"Well, now," said the young woman, jumping lightly to her feet, "now we extract the dopplegngers - quickly and painlessly - and those two go back to normal. We extract the dopplegangers - " (she was pulling on thick gloves) " - like so."
She put her left hand on Sesshoumaru's shoulder and shook him briskly and hard. As his body moved, the faint outline of a blurry afterimage became visible - and as soon as it did, the young woman hooked one gloved finger into it and pulled. The image stretched and distorted, but it began peeling away slowly from inside Sesshoumaru. When she had peeled away the head and shoulders of the inert youkai, the young woman twisted her fist in the stuff, put one booted foot against Sesshoumaru's back for leverage, and yanked with both hands. The afterimage made one last sticky resistance: then the girl was standing beside Sesshoumaru with her fist wrapped in what appeared to be another Sesshoumaru - a pale, nearly transparent Sesshoumaru with a faintly green complexion and blank black pits for eyes.
"Like so," repeated the young woman, releasing the doppleganger. It began to fade instantly and in a moment was nothing more than a vaguely body-shaped green mist that blew away on a wind that was not there. Sesshoumaru remained still, but the glassy look in his eyes had gone.
"Then," continued the young woman, moving to repeat the procedure on Kagome, "the blank 'verse the author is using to control this world will come unstuck - after I've finished with her - and none of the things they did under its influence will ever have happened."
The younger girl frowned. "The others do not have dopplegangers?" she asked.
The young woman was having trouble with Kagome's doppleganger, which was stuck at her waist. She spoke between yanks. "No, dopplegangers - are only used - to induce extremely - OOC behavior." The shade came unstuck and she toppled over backwards. "Oof! No, the influence of the blank 'verse was enough for the others. None of them were more than ten percent off."
"I see."
The young woman scrambled to her feet and pulled off her gloves, stuffing them in her pocket. "We're done here, then," she said cheerfully, digging in a different pocket and producing a metal device like a calculator. "I'll let you do one next time. Lovely feeling, that. Bit like pulling taffy." She tapped a few keys briskly, and the scenery in front of her tore in two noisily. Her companion walked primly around the still-inert characters and paused to hand the young woman the handgun before climbing through the rent. The black-haired young woman scrambled through backwards, aimed the handgun in Sesshoumaru's general direction, and pulled the trigger. It made a low sound like a great bell, and Kagome and Sesshoumaru stirred. The breeze picked up where it had left off.
While they were still blinking uneasily and frowning at the scenery with confused but clear eyes, the young woman pulled the two edges of the rip together with her hands. They mended with a zipping sound, and all evidence that she had ever been there was gone.
A few minutes later Kagome was back with her friends, most of whom were still asleep, though it was at least fifteen minutes after dawn, and one of whom was shouting at her in his usual affectionate manner.
"Where did you run off to?" demanded Inuyasha rudely. "There's youkai all over the place, woman, you know better than to wander off alone! You could have been killed, or got lost, with your lousy sense of direction, and I'd have had to waste time trying to find you. Where were you?"
"Er," said Kagome, uncertainly. She could not quite remember where she had been, but she was not about to admit it - even though Inuyasha's last sentence had sounded almost plaintive. There was a nagging feeling at the edge of her mind, as if something was not quite right ... and another, different nagging feeling that meant something else entirely.
"I'm sensing a shard of the Shikon no Tama," she told Inuyasha brightly. "It's to the west."
Instantly Inuyasha had applied himself to the task of waking the others with cordial blows and loving shouts. "Wake up, you lazy bums! Kagome feels a Shikon shard and we've got to get moving - it might be that dolt Kouga. Out of bed, runt!"
Kagome watched Inuyasha quizzically as he kicked Shippou out of his sleeping bag, and the nagging doubt left her completely. No, everything was exactly as usual. In which case...
"Inuyasha?"
"What?"
"Osuwari!"