A Meeting of Beasts...
A forest, a stocky man, and a silent observer.
The man had come there to get away from the rest of the world, something he always found to be easier in the eastern lands than where he had more or less settled for the last couple of years. The observer had come there to pass the time while a friend of his went through the motions of living a modern life for a day or two.
Annoyed at the presence of the stranger he could sense all too well, Logan snarled; "Get down from there and face me! You come to fight, let's fight. If you've come to talk, let's fight instead. But quit that pitiful attempt at hiding from me." A beat, where nothing happened, -apparently the Other had not even shifted at being thusly challenged- then he snapped; "Get down here, I say, or I'm coming up after you!"
Finally, a reaction. A flash of red, the sparkle of metal, and Logan sprang his claws in defence. The stranger chose to leap over, rather than at him, and whirling about to keep the danger ahead of him, Logan felt the sting of unearthly energy prickle along the flesh on his side and back.
Seeing the other clearly for the first time, his eyes landed quite naturally on the blade extended between them. To call it big would be an insult to the human concept of size. A smirk; "Compensating, are we?"
A shift of the other's shoulders, a pale eccho wavering in the air about the blade; a sign of surprise?
Looking at the intruder's face, Logan knew it to be true; it held the expression of one wondering whether he'd just been insulted.
In an oddly aged variation of the local language, the question came; "What?"
Logan, widening his smirk into a not entirely unsympathetic grin, nodded at the wide length of metal hovering equidistant between them, anchored in the other's strangely pale hands; "folks who walk around with exaggerated stuff like that, tends to do so because they're lacking in...other departments."
A pause, as the other studied the blade as if for the first time...then, impossibly, swept it down into a sheath that could not have been much thicker than a stick of bamboo, snapping back; "Care to try me without it, to test your lackwitted notion?"
"Don't mind if I do. Though I'd rather thought to avoid pointless bloodletting for today."
Taking the other in properly, Logan momentarily blanched; taken as a whole, the figure before him were among the more noteworthy he'd recently seen; a blood-red cloak, white shirt and the red resumed on his legwear. Hair white as snow flowing down deceptively thin shoulders(he had wielded the exaggerated blade easily enough)...and atop it all two furry, pointed...dog ears??
As the stranger snarled, no doubt aware of where Logan's study had halted and why, evidence was supplied that a set of fangs were present as well, if only slightly larger than those found in every human jaw he could care to check.
"Touch them, and die."
The X-Man blinked, puzzled at why he should be expected to want to touch them. Then a light went off, and he grinned; "I'm not the touching type, fella. Have no fear."
As the other seemed to relax(his hand dropped from the hilt of his sword once more), he added; "Name's Logan. You?"
"My...name is Inu-Yasha."
"Huh. Fits." Logan observed, glancing back at the ears, adding a disarming smile as the other's eyes flared.
"A demon, then, are you? Out to kidnap an infant or three?"
"What'd I want with a bunch of mewling little humans? I'm hauling enough babies around as it is!"
"Are you, now...anyone I'd know?"
"As I doubt you're likely to have been living here for any length of time, no. Most of them...can't get here, anyway."
"Why's that?"
"None of your damned business!"
"To be sure, pal, to be sure. No need to go all defensive on me. 'Less you want to try -me- that is?"
A curious look to his eyes, the 'demon' shook his head; "Nah. You don't seem to bleed easy. Don't want to draw attention in this...place."
"That I don't." Logan smirked shifting slightly to confirm to himself that whatever had happened to his side and back was not still affecting him.
"Fancy meatcleaver you got there. How you manage to enlarge it like that?"
"Care to tell me how you spring blades from your arms?"
Looking momentarily to one of his hands, twisting it to study the back of it, Logan shrugged; "Can't say I do. Don't really understand it myself, really."
"No need to understand your prime weapon?" Inu-Yasha queried, his voice odd. drawing his own length of metal in idle fashion, he appeared to study it as he murmured; "How lucky you are."
"Lucky and lucky, now..." the canadian cautioned, shoulders shifting in momentary unease at the memories.
"There are times I'd like just as well to be rid of them. Don't suppose you've ever wished to be rid of that thing, eh?"
"No...Never. My father gave it to me. Entrusted it to my care, at any rate. Never bothered teaching me how to use it, though. Don't doubt there's still many more options to discover about how to..." a sudden blink, and IY's gaze flashed up to focus on Logan, brow dark; "Why am I telling you this, anyway? What am I at all -talking- to you for!?!"
"Was kinda wonderin' that, myself. P'rhaps you knew me to be like you. As I know you to be like me. A younger me, but a me, nonetheless."
"What's -that- supposed to mean?!?"
"Precisely that." Logan smiled, his point made.
Looking the canadian up and down for a moment, the dogeared demon sneered humorously; "So you're a later me? Perhaps I ought to just go leap of a cliff and end it now."
"Now now, don't do that. The waters're polluted enough as is." Logan countered with a shrug and a smile.
A surprised blink, then a suspicious frown, before both engaged in a brief chuckle.
"Heh, good one. Shame, though. About the waters, I mean."
"Sure is at that. Little to be done about it now, though...and it ain't so bad here as some places." Logan commented, lying smoothly to see if there would be a reaction.
There was; Straightening and setting his feet as if personally responsible for keeping the local waters cleaner than elsewhere, the demon nodded once, decisively; "I'd expect nothing less."
"Thought you didn't care for humans. Ain't seen too many of your sort about, though, so it must be them you trust so much in."
His proud pose faltering, Inu-Yasha blinked in surprise yet again, then struggled to take himself in, correct his mistake; "Yes, well...there are some of the humans in this area I have...had a hand in forming, so..."
"Is there, now. Care to introduce me?"
"...No."
A shrug; "Shame. Bet they're real nice people."
"They are."
A pause, then, somewhat defensively; "They got a cat, too."
"Can't go over too well? DOG-demon and all?"
A faint snarl, then; "I can't be bothered to care about every lousy little kitten who can't figure to leave me alone."
"Oh, there's more than one?"
"Sure." a beat, then a snort of amusement; "At times, the two don't quite see eye to eye, though." a moment of apparent thought, and a mild frown at himself; "Never have, really. Not likely to be going to, neither."
"That 'cant get here'-thing again?"
A quick nod.
"It's passport out of order?"
Yet again, that surprised flicker of eyelids; "what?"
"Passport. so that it can travel between countries. Or doesn't it have one?" an easy smile, that widened as Inu-Yasha apparently relaxed, having thought it something the other cat could use.
"It doesn't have one." came the reply, along with an oddly grateful look; seemingly Logan had supplied the demon with a perfect excuse.
"And the others? Ain't got it, can't afford it?"
"Precisely." Inu-Yasha practically sighed with relief.
Deciding not to tell the demon of the myriad other ways people could cross borders, Logan looked about idly; "Your friend...the one who -can- get here...around nearby?"
"No. She won't see us talking, if that's what you're afraid of."
"Not at all. Just figured on checking to see just how alike we are."
"Easy. Not at all." the other snapped, the turning down of further discussion along that road apparently grounded in a train of thought as unpleasant as some of Logan's own.
"If you say so." he countered, not interested in exchanging blows with what seemed to be a rather decent, if hotheaded, guy.
"I do." the demon nodded brisk confirmation.
"You can land, boss. Ain't no danger here." the canadian offered a moment later, causing the demon's eyes to fly skyward and immediately lock on the figure hovering just a few spearlenghts above them.
Recognizing it's gender through several means he trusted wholeheartedly, his eyes flashed back down to earth as if in an attempt to break his own neck, face burning crimson.
"I wouldn't worry, lad. Don't figure she'd be the sort to fly around these parts in anythin' that could be considered indecent." Logan commented humorously, throwing a long, studying look up himself before shaking his head, feigning disappointment; "Nah. nothin' to see there."
A quick grin, and a voice pitched to low for anyone but the demon to hear; "Not that she's the type to overly mind if there were."
A puzzled look from the other, before he looked skyward once more, cautiously, the color of his cheeks only slowly fading...then rising again as the woman landed, letting her clothes resettle from their aerial jaunt. While the result were no more indecent than her decent had been, the overall impression was that of a lady whose form he was unfit to see.
His knees buckled and he fell, landing on all fours, and still had to forcefully break his gaze away, focusing it on his own hands, momentarily unable to get up.
"Seems you got another one, boss-lady."
"So it does." was the somewhat tired response, before she added; "What curious ears..."
Immediately following the remark, a breeze tickled the protrusions playfully for a moment, and his face reddened until he thought he'd faint...though he was unsure if it was from shame or anger. mistress of the winds, was she? Kagura's descendant? Kagura -reborn-?"
Lifting his head cautiously, his eyes climbed from feet to legs, some rough patches making him swallow before reaching her face, and he tested her scent. No trace of malice, only an undercurrent of caution beneath the wealth of...benevolence she exuded. And brown as the earth he had had numerous chances to examine in detail('SIT, boy' rang faintly in his mind, and he only barely kept himself from reacting as his necklace always made him)...that, for him, clinched it; she was no mere lady of the winds, this one. Where she walked, all life took note. Her love was life itself, and her anger the darkness of earthwrenching storms. He only briefly allowed himself to meet her eyes before looking away again, in lieu of getting laboriously to his feet. As he got up, he was careful to only look at Logan...until her command craved otherwise; "Please, look at me."
He would have sworn his neck and head had frozen in place, but for the fact he -did- manage to wrench his head around to do look at her, his eyes wide and uncertain.
"Look at me." she said again, spreading her arms slightly to supply unhindered study. "Am I a face in the sky? am I clad in clouds? Do I strike you to earth with lightning for being in my presence? No. So why do you expect me to? Look."
Lifting a bare arm free from her robes, she placed the nail on the revealed skin, and with a sudden tang of sharp chill, cut herself.
Wrought between his impulse to stop her, and his inability to at all approach her, he watched as she withdrew her ice-sharpened nail to reveal two tiny trails of blood trickling from the miniscule wound.
It being no larger than to be easily ignored, she lowered the arm and smiled; "You see, I am every bit as normal as you." a glance at his ears, and she murmured, despite herself; "Maybe even moreso."
For a fraction of a second, a ghost-image of another woman, dressed in white and red and wielding a bow shimmered beside the windwalker, and Inu Yasha choked; that would appear to be a good comparison indeed. Only where Kikyo dedicated her life to her faith...and later, to the defense of the Jewel...it seemed this quite literally 'unearthly' woman had devoted herself to something far more vibrant and real.
"Life." he breathed, helpless to stop himself. "You...you value life."
"Above all else." was the unhestitating response, as clear and unmistakable as any declaration his dead-and-revived love had ever given.
"If...if only she had been allowed to do so as well..." he murmured, making the other two raise questioning eyebrows at each other.
He sighed, faintly smiling despite himself; "But then I might never have known her."
"Love lost?" Logan asked, with the sympathetic tone of one who'd gone through it himself.
"You...could say that." Inu-Yasha allowed, still looking at the woman. Steeling himself for a moment, he gave a question in return; "Do you have a name, high lady?"
"My name is Ororo Munroe. But most call me Storm."
"Storm..." as he repeated the common name for the woman, his inner eye observed the havoc such a thing conld wreak. Looking again upon the real world, and the woman herself, he knew beyond doubt he did not want her to demonstrate why they called her that; considering the perfect tranquility with which she observed him, her fury would be fearful indeed if some poor fool ever managed to awaken it.
"Would I be right in thinkin' you'd rather be sparrin' with me than her, given the choice?" Logan quipped humorously, chuckling at the gulp and nod with which the other replied. "Can't fault you there, son. Sure, she cuts as easy as any lady I've ever known...but you gotta get close to do so. Trust me; she wants you at a distance, you remain at that distance. No two ways about it."
"You make me sound undefeatable, old friend." Storm chided amusedly, before returning her attention to Inu-Yasha; "Trust me, I have been brought low often enough to know I am anything but that."
Aware of what some people were capable off, her choice of words nevertheless brought for mental imagery that baffled and shocked him. It was with little surprise he found that his wish to hunt and kill those responsible were only a little weaker than had it been Kikyo that had been treated so. He -was- surprised, however, to find that he held a deathgrip on the hilt of his sword...and that neither Logan nor Storm seemed to be concerned about it.
At his puzzled expression, easily enough to understand, they both smiled, and Storm explained; "As 'untouchable' as I am, I fear that I have to trust the senses of my friend here rather than my, where danger is concerned. In return, they are every bit as infallible as the man himself."
"Moreso, I'd say...but that'd be braggin'. Never held with that stuff..." a grin; "...beyond what's expected, naturally."
"Naturally." Storm agreed, her smile as genuine, if more restrained than her companion's.
After a moment of enjoined amusement, Logan shrugged for no apparent reason, turning his grin on the demon for real; "I've shown you mine, now you show me yours."
This time, the surprise plainly knocked Inu-Yasha over. He tumbled to the ground, rear end first. There he sat, open-mouthed, staring at the other man as he struggled to figure out what had just happened.
As realization struck, he frowned darkly, both for being played such a trick, and for using such language in the presence of what fell little short of a godess.
With a chuckle, Logan nodded; "apologies all around...and an extra one for milady." he bowed at them both with an ease and familiarity with the motion that smacked new surprise on the demon's features.
"I think you are more of a mainstay here than I am." he offered, smiling slightly before adding a grin; "If in a different timeslot."
He held back a gloating guffaw as he saw them blanch as he knew himself to have done so often in their company.
"Time-displaced? And from the past, this time?" Storm wondered, studying the strange figure before her as if for the first time.
"Name's Inu-Yasha. Approximately 'Dog-demon' in plain english." Logan supplied helpfully, smiling as Storm chided in kind; "I'm nearly as familiar with the language as you are, my friend. Certainly enough to recognice something like that."
"Apologies, then, high lady." he grinned in return, and she shook her head in feigned exasperation, smiling all the while.
"So the barrier your other friends can't cross is the one we all fight against with every breath we take. how bout that. SO what's you and your friend on this side's secret?"
"I wouldn't bother. Don't appear like anyone else can get through."
"Bummer that. Would've liked to know this place back when."
"No you wouldn't."
"Now now, boy. I'm as fighting fit as ever. I may be an older you, but I ain't no befuddled you just yet." a beat, then the canadian grinned as if fit to burst; "Say, why don't you show your stick to the lady here. you know, like you did for me?"
Surprisingly, the demons face remained clear and untainted. If anything, it grew paler.
"I don't know how you did it to him," Storm commented, more to derail any thought of violence than anything, "but I would be interested in seeing what sort of weapon such as you would carry. I have a few avenues of collecting apart information myself, and they tell me you are capable of far more damage on your own than either of us...well, compared to what damage we would be prepared to deal, at least." she amended, eyes lowered with a faint blush, as if ashamed at herself. Or more likely, at the fact that she had to downplay her potential for destruction at all.
About to deny her statement, Inu-Yasha held his silence at her amendment, then nodded, satisfied.
With a brief deathglare on Logan, he drew his blade once more, careful not to position it...indecently.
"Huh. thought it was bigger'n that...?" Logan muttered, peering curiously at the seemingly rusted length of old metal.
"It is."
In a flash, the blade thickened, grew, and seemed to extend beyond itself as well.
"My father's fang." Inu-Yasha offered, not sure what to do with it now that it was out and ready.
Storm only realized she'd approached when she saw the demon withdraw, maintaining the distance between them.
With a calming smile she advanced again, reaching out her hand to prove once and for all that she was not 'untouchable' in any sense of the word.
By the time her fingers brushed his shoulder, she half expected him to topple anew, he was so white, the blade shivering in his hand where it had insinuated itself between them...crosswise, mark.
As she did no more, he took a sudden step back, as if to break any hold she might have. Pretending not to notice, she lowered her arm and turned instead to a study of the blade itself. Glancing once up at the demon, she queried 'May I?' and gently lowered a hand toward the topside flat. Long before fingers touched bone, the energies surrounding it had her withdrawing with a gasp of suppressed air. At once, the blade was gone, and the demons hands were on her, supporting in case she'd fall.
"You move quite fast..." She remarked, her humor faint and kind as if to not scare him away; "I doubt very much that a battle between you and Logan would be easy to follow."
Eyes momentarily shifting to the other man, Inu-Yasha returned his gaze to that of Storm, now suddenly more afraid of having to stop and let go than stand there, meeting those eyes. What he read there told him she'd be unlikely to reach Kaede's age...but that she would be all the better for the world while she was around.
What she read in his, he did not want to know. The soft smile of understanding that formed on her lips disturbed him enough. Ensuring she could indeed still stand on her own, he disengaged from her personal space as violently as he could without causing her discomfort...of any kind.
Relieved to find her walking...nay, -floating- back toward her friend, he felt about ready to fall back on his ass again. Giving himself a few good smacks about the mental ears and a round of talking to that put Kagome's best to shame, he remained on his feet, trying to ignore the sensation still tingling in his fingertips.
The next moment he was glad of it, as it gave him something else to think about; "What did you feel? of my sword, I mean."
It was a supreme effort of will not to try and make his inquiry more innocent; he knew his reference to a weapon was as good as it got.
"It is made both to kill and to defend. To destroy, and to protect. It is a most potent weapon, with layer within layer...some of which has not yet been fully awakened. That is what I felt in your blade. That...and that it was made and given in love."
"How bout the wielder?" Logan commented humorously. "How's it feel about him?"
"I doubt very much anyone else would've gotten half as much out of it as the one with which it currently resides." the windrider replied easily, her smile at the demon making him wish Kikyo had been half as open about her feelings.
"You ain't answered me." Logan commented, giving Inu-Yasha an expectant look.
"What?"
"You've seen my friend. Let's see yours." a humorous smirk; "Or are you perhaps ashamed of us?"
A long look at the windrider had the demon shake his head in two violent twists. "Never. I just...don't think...She might not be home from school, yet."
"If you tell us which one she goes to, we can meet her coming out. I'm pretty sure most of the schools 'round here let go their prisoners any time now.
Inuyasha named it, as best he could recall, and was unsurprised to find the lot of them rise into the air a moment later...
"So which is it?" Logan wanted to know, observing the flood of young men and women that flowed through the outer gates of the school.
Already having picked her out, as he could had there been a thousand like her there, Inu-Yasha nevertheless hesitated before pointing; "It's her. But wait. we don't want her friends to know that she's different."
"Well aware of that, bub. We ain't gonna foul up her life if she haven't done so on her own."
Following Kagome with his eyes, the others going her way mereley disturbances to his sight, the demon followed along the rooftops, leaping and climbing along a well-familiar route. He did not care to know how the others followed, and would not have been surprised to know Logan did as he, Storm keeping sentinel from above.
Not far from her family's shrine, he swung down to walk nearly beside her, as if merely happening to be in the neighborhood.
Aside from a cautious glance sideways at him, she said nothing, trusting him to know when it was safe to be near her and not.
"No Hojo today, then?" she queried a moment later, not looking at him, but secure he'd know her smile was for him.
"Nah. Can't smell 'im, at any rate. Guy like that as like to be a ghost as anything."
"He is not. He's sweet." the girl countered defensively, then sighed; "Just a little slow to catch on, at times..."
"For which you and your precios 'normal life' should be glad."
Giving him a dirty look, she nevertheless nodded as they turned up the stairs to the shrine.
"Kagome, I got someone who'd like to meet you."
"Huh? Here? In my era?"
"Why else would I mention it here, in your era?!"
"I don't know, geeze. Calm down, I was just asking."
"Wait. let them come so we won't have to deal with your family messing things up."
"That special, are they?"
"...Not sure what you mean by that, but yeah, they're special. Every bit as special as me and you."
"I'm not special! I'm just a schoolgirl failing her exams with aggravating regularity because you haul me off to the feudal era every time I get some time to study!"
"Fired a bow, recently?" Inuyasha countered, fighting to restrain his temper. He did NOT want the windrider to watch them squabble like little whelps over a bone.
Simmering, Kagome accepted defeat. No doubt more because she was tired and IY's refusal to continue the debate rather than any belief she had been wrong.
"Kagome Higurashi?"
"Yes, who's...asking...?"
Having turned around at the question, she was dumbstruck at what she saw; a sidewhiskered, stocky little man in jeans and a shirt walking alongside a darkskinned woman who's robes and bearing both spoke of benevolent royalty. That they were walking down a street ordinarily occupied by sailor-suited girls and impeccably dressed boys didn't help the image any.
"Wh...Who...??"
"My name is Ororo Munroe, and this is Logan." The woman replied with a disarmind smile that the girl could not help but return.
"Howdy." the man offered cheerfully, and she nodded her acknowledgement, still looking at the woman. While her perceptions were quite the bit more modern(jaded) than the halfdemons', she nevertheless fought the urge to look away, run and hide, and cry bitter tears that she'd never be able to acchieve half the impact the woman did with her bare presence. She too, was thusly reminded of Kikyo. As the demon, she knew instinctively that this woman were so much more than a shrinemaiden, whatever be the scope of her power.
"Do not seek to raise me above yourself, little one. In your own way I am sure you are my better...quite aside from what secrets you might share with your friend, there." a pregnant pause, then, quietly; "For one, you still have your family."
This took both timetravellers by surprise, as they both knew she was referring to the time she herself were their age.
"I...I'm sorry." Kagome offered, pitifully aware how insufficent it might have been, even then.
"It is history. Painful history, but still history. I do not let it worry me. If I did, America would be a wasteland."
"Your grief is nature's grief. The rain are your tears, the storm your rage that nothing can be done."
Three sets of eyes blinked at the demon, who frowned back at them with a defensive snap; "What of it? It's true, is it not?"
"It is...though I doubt the world would agree with the poetic lilt you lend your facts." the windrider smiled, and gestured for them all to continue up the stairs; "I trust we will talk freer once we are quite at ease and have some privacy."
"Agreed." Logan nodded, then looked to Kagome; "Unless you think your family'll take exception?"
"Oh, no. not at all. My mother is just great about the whole timetravel-thing, and granpa..." an faintly exasperated smile; "well, nobody need worry about him, he's just there to invent crazy diseases to explain my absence from school. And Souta...that's my little brother...hehe, he'd just love you two."
"We'll take your word for it." Logan acknowledged with a chuckle, and they proceeded up to the shrine proper.
Grandpa Higurashi made a bit of a fuss, thinking the two newcomers had come through the well, too, then demanded to know where they -did- come from; they certainly could not belong in any world -he- knew.
Mrs. Higurashi met the two newcomers with the same ease she had greeted the dogdemon, all those months ago. To look at her, she was greeting two valued friends of the family. Her and Storm got along as though the Kagome's mother were the windriders older sister.
As for Souta, he caught on to the similarity between the two men the moment he saw Logan walk in beside th demon. And his reaction to Storm was such that Inuyasha had to stop him from fleeing the room.
"How's that for a turntable?" Logan chuckled humorously as Storm accepted a seat and with natureborn ease got the child to settle beside her.
"Laughs at the beast, and runs from the beauty."
"I trust he has already learned that evil often wears the finest mask." the windrider considered, to which Souta shook his head...only to nod vigourously the next instant; "No...I mean yes, I know that can be so, but I just thought...I wanted to... I didn't..."
"You didn't feel worthy to be in the same room with her." InuYasha offered with a carelessness that nevertheless had the ring of confidence.
Souta, looking up at the windrider, swallowed without appearing to know why, and nodded; "That...would be about it, I guess."
"Ain't no trick or nothin'. she'd be able to tear this place apart without moving from that seat." Logan commented offhandedly. "And besides, plenty folks worship her in the 'less educated' corners of the world already. won't hurt with one or two 'intellectuals' added to the mix."
The revelation of what the other woman could do, had Mrs. Higurashi pause momentarily in pouring the tea, but Grandpa and Souta gave no reaction. Grandpa because he had no faith in the two foreigners being able to do squat to their historical shrine, and Souta part becasue he figured she'd've done so already if she intended to, and part because he saw Buyo crawl up to curl in the strange lady's lap as if he belonged there; If the lazy cat dared trust her, he could hardly do any less.
"Just don't threaten anybody's life, and you won't have nothing to fear." Inuyasha contributed, and Kagome nodded despite herself. She idly played with the notion of which(of Storm and Kikyo) where the staunchest defender of their faith, but came to the conclusion that neither would be likely to yield short of surrendering their life to their respective causes.
"And this is where we 'change tracks', so to speak." Kagome offered, leaning on the edge of the infamous well, idly considering her multifaceted emotions about what it represented as their two new friends came up to peer into the darkness below.
"Take a looksee and see if you find another world down there, will ya?" Logan asked of his 'boss-lady', who smoothly rose into the air and positioned herself above the yawning 'gateway' between the eras. A confirming look exchanged with Kagome, this being her family's well, and the windrider dropped from sight.
The trio leaning over the edge to look after her, waited, two of them more than reasonably sure nothing would happen, but nevertheless holding their breath in expectation.
A few moments later Storm resurfaced, an odd look on her face.
"There was some strange energies down there, to be sure...though they did not appear very friendly."
Kagome, remembering 'mistress centipede', shuddered despite herself. Surely -that- spirit had long gone. And surely the townsfolk had ceased throwing demonbones down it...right?
"Might it be that it didn't recognize you as one of the 'initiated'?" Logan theorized, and Storm, after a moment of thought, nodded; "That might very well be it. I sensed no outright hostility, no malevolence. Only...a barrier."
"Maybe there be a key or somesuch?" Logan suggested, and again his companion nodded; "Not unlikely. I should like to make an attempt with whatever you use to cross over." she told Kagome, who seemed momentarily uncertain before reaching into the neck of her sweater to fish out the bottle. With a little yelp, she was airborne, and descended together with the windrider; "This will work as well, will it not?"
"Y..yeah, sure."
As they reached the intended bottom, a veritable lightshow of frantic energies fizzled all about them, and Kagome sensed Storm remaining behind at a certain point, herself dropping all the way to emerge on 'the other side', as it were. Going through the motions of returning home, she found Storm hovering at sufficient height not to interfere with her return. The implication that something might go wrong had the other woman remained at the bottom made the girl's blood run cold. She had read and seen enough to know what terrifying results complications in the less down-to-earth sciences could cause.
"Disappointing." was all the windrider said as she 'picked up' Kagome and carried them both out of the well.
"Dead end." she told the others as they landed, and Inuyasha gave a relieved sigh even as Logan shrugged; it would've been an exiting opportunity but no big loss if it weren't possible.
...And here my inspiration fails me.
Suggestions accepted.
My thanks for your attention.