Mad World
Kagome sat in her bedroom, staring blankly from the window as she rewrapped her arm wound. She was still trying to get her head around everything that had transpired that day, in both the past and the future. It had been an eventful one in both times, the two periods overlapping in a way that had never occurred before. She was trying not to think too hard about everything she had done in the past and how it had effected her time. She tried not to wonder why nothing had changed until this trip, her final trip through the well and back to the time period she belonged in. She tried not to think of how to find her demon friends, or the descendants of her human friends.
She stood in a huff, wincing as her torn up leg protested the sudden movement. It was no use; she was racking her brain for an explanation. She thought of Kaede, and wanted to jump back through the well to talk to her, but she had been warned against that. Besides, she was injured enough; a fall like the one from the well might just kill her. She tried to remember the phrase he had used…
Your presence in that world did this to the world you know. You presence in that world is over, unless you want to change even more? A familiar voice replayed in her head from that afternoon. She sighed and fell back into her chair. She tried not to think of what she had changed. She hadn't meant to…she just wanted to fix what she had broken, not break more. She almost cried into her hands at the thoughts of how nothing ever worked out in her favor in the end, and how she wished she had never fallen into the damn well in the first place. She stopped herself; to regret doing something was pointless, especially if you did the best you could in your situation, and had the best times of your life doing it.
She turned and looked out the window and at the world her two year long romp in the past had created and steeled her nerves. This was what she had done. These are the consequences of her actions, and adults faced the consequences of their actions.
**Flashback**
"Inuyasha!" Came Kagome's frantic cry as he got much too close to Naraku and the massive swirling vortex of attacks heading right for him. She needn't worry, however, the additional swing of the Tetsusaiga he'd made as he charged was the key proponent in the defeat of the wicked hanyou. The blast as all the attacks connected with him was enough to throw everyone to the ground. Luckily, Kirara's bulk standing protectively over them saved them from the worst of the rock and tree shrapnel rocketing in their direction. It took what seemed an eternity for the world to fall silent after the explosion as everyone's ears kept ringing long after it was all over. Slowly, everyone got to their feet, looking around and coming to the realization that it was really all over. Naraku was dead at last, and once they found his shards, the jewel would be complete. Miroku, Sango and Shippo slowly began to laugh, and within moments, it had evolved into uproarious cheers and joyous laughter as they danced and sang of their final victory. Kagome was pleased to be sure, but she couldn't see Inuyasha anywhere. After a moment of searching, she found him facedown in the torn earth near the crater that used to be Naraku. She raced to him at once as best as she could on her seriously wounded leg, calling out his name, but there was no answer.
She fell to her knees, careless of her injuries, at his side. She rolled him to his back and saw his face filthy with mud and blood and his sword abandoned nearby. She stroked his face, her heart breaking as she knew he must be dead, but as she touched him, his eyebrows furrowed and he stirred. Her heart raced; he was alive! He opened his bleary golden eyes, and took her in, a weak smile gracing his lips.
"I smell your blood, wench…what did I say about getting hurt?" He asked. Kagome made a sound somewhere between sobs and laughter and pushed the hair from his forehead.
"I told you not to get hurt either." She said grinning down at him.
Inuyasha slowly got to his feet with Kagome's help, and they looked around at the others, everyone who had had a hand in taking down the filthy black hearted hanyou. Sesshoumaru was farthest away, and once he saw Inuyasha on his feet, he swept away in his usual uncaring manner. Koga, Ginta and Hakkaku were likewise on the sidelines; they'd done what they could before the slew of magical attacks from the miko and demons in the area had cast. Miroku and Sango were locked in a passionate kiss, tears trailing from both their eyes. Miroku's wind tunnel was gone, and the two had plans to marry at last. Shippo was running towards Inuyasha and Kagome, his infectious joy spanning the whole clearing, save the last member left. Kikyo had shot a few helpful arrows, and was now watching the joy around her with an odd look of all her mixing emotions.
"Guess we'd better find his jewel shards, huh?" Inuyasha said to Kagome as he leaned on her. He was more wounded than them all, but he had been this seemingly done in before. Everyone was confident that he would make it through his newest set of gouges and broken bones. Kagome nodded, and she spotted them in the center of the crater. She retrieved them, and holding hers in the palm of one hand and the new portion of the jewel in the other, she purified it and it solidified into a nearly complete sphere. There were a mere two slivers left in the jewel, and she knew where those were. She turned to their bearer and smiled at him. Koga grinned sheepishly back and approached her grinning, ignorant of Inuyasha's soft growl. Kagome rolled her eyes.
It was only a few weeks ago when Inuyasha, struck with a moment of maturity and clarity, asked to speak to Kagome in private. He told her that he loved her as a friend, his true friend, his best friend. But that was how he loved her. He knew he loved Kikyo with a different sort of love, the love Kagome wanted and deserved from him. It had devastated her, but she had admired his honesty, and he was not trying to hurt her when he told her. In fact, he was about as torn up about it as she was. He thought for a long time that Kagome could take Kikyo's place in his heart, and wanted her to. It was all to no avail. He would always be bound to Kikyo, always love her, always need her. He told Kagome that he wanted nothing to change between them, and that once the jewel was formed, he would remain a hanyou for her, even if Kikyo wanted him human. If she couldn't have his heart, she could have his word that he would love himself as he was, not for what he, or Kikyo, or anyone else wanted him to be. She had accepted this offer, and tried to make things continue as normally as possible. She fought for weeks to forget her love, and she knew it was slowly working, but her heart still painfully clung to him and what they could have been.
She was surprised at how respectful about the situation Inuyasha had been. Clearly, something had happened between him and Kikyo to cause him this revelation, and no one was stupid enough to think otherwise. Inuyasha, however, didn't drag Kikyo along in their pack, nor did he even speak of her much, as he knew Kagome was still healing her broken heart over him. It made getting over him both harder and easier at the same time. Koga had only recently found out about this event, and had redoubled his efforts to make Kagome his, careless of Inuyasha's still very powerful protective instinct he held for her. In truth, he was jealous of the wolf, but he had made his choice, and it wasn't Kagome. He wasn't allowed to be jealous…in public, anyway.
Koga made his way to Kagome, and without hesitation, pulled the shards from his legs and placed them in her waiting hands. He held her hands in his a bit too long, but Kagome found she didn't much mind. She was a free woman, after all, what was wrong with looking? She giggled a bit and pulled away from him, solidifying the jewel at last. Everyone gathered around at once, the jewel bathing them all in a shining pink light.
"What are you gonna wish for, Kagome?" Shippo breathed.
Kagome smiled and clasped the jewel in her hands, and spoke the wish, the most selfless one she could possibly make.
"I wish for Kikyo to be resurrected in flesh and bone, complete with her soul and for all my friends and family to live long lives of joy and prosperity." She said.
A separate pink glow surrounded Kikyo, pulsing outwards like a heartbeat, a symbol of her true life returning. After a shining moment, she passed out, and Inuyasha dropped to her side at once, cradling her against his chest and calling her name.
"No need to fret, old friend. She must end this half life to begin a full one." Miroku said wisely. Inuyasha nodded and picked her up from the ground. Kagome felt the jewel fade from sight between her hands and felt the most peculiar sensation she had ever felt. It was the strongest desire she had ever felt ion her life, and her body moved to obey it without thought. It was almost like being possessed, but not fighting the control at all, as it was something you wanted to do in the first place. Kagome was walking through the trees, away from them all, as she was a few miles away her destination. The others called after her, but when she ignored them, they followed, concerned for her.
The group of two miko, two humans, a hanyou, a fox kit, a fire neko and three wolf demons made their way through Inuyasha's Forest to the Bone Eater's Well all in near complete silence. Occasionally, someone would try to get Kagome to stop or speak, but she moved tirelessly, were wounds dripping blood, but she seemed unfazed. It was a few hours before they made it, and the sun was still high in the sky, but falling, making it mid afternoon. She climbed the hill, everyone but the wolves suddenly knowing what she was doing. Kagome stepped up onto the edge of the well and turned to face the others. Words she didn't know tumbled from her lips. And she had no idea where they could have possibly come from.
"I hold Kikyo's soul in this time, so for me to be here any longer is to leave her dead. I love you all and wish you a very fond farewell. Make my wish come true, you guys." She said, the words bringing tears to almost every set of eyes before her. Koga was confused, but there was one thing that didn't escape him; she didn't plan on seeing any one of them ever again!
"Wait, Kagome, don't go!" He cried, running for her, his demon speed even without his shards prevailing and grasping her wrist as she took a step back and felt the magic swallow her up for the last time. Kagome felt the magic climb up her arm and reach around Koga's tight grasp on her wrist. She knew the well was going to take him with her, and it was too late to stop it. Koga felt his fur stand on end as the rush of ancient power crawled over him, the blow glow surrounding him as he floated weightlessly in the well. He had no idea what was going on, but knew Kagome must have the answer as she looked so at home in the hold of this power.
Kagome and Koga landed in the well and she felt the feeling of desire leave her. She gasped in pain; for the last few hours, she had been using her legs painlessly, and now the agony of her wounds had returned to her.
"Kagome…what the hell just happened?" Koga asked in a hushed voice. "I can't see the sky, and I smell…strange things...where are we?"
Kagome sighed. Koga had never known about the well or where she was actually from. She didn't really want to explain it, but of course now that he had experienced it first hand, she had to.
"Koga, I never told you this, but I'm actually from the future. This well is the gateway between your world and mine. Mine is five hundred years after yours." She explained, sitting in the dirt bottom of the well to rest. Koga looked dumbfounded as he tried to make sense of this new information.
"How were you able to jump through time?" He asked softly. "Is it because you're a miko?" Kagome shook her head.
"I don't have any solid answers…but I think it was the jewel, and the fact that I was Kikyo's reincarnation, so my soul technically already existed there, but she was dead when I came, so I was "allowed"." She explained. Koga's brow furrowed in thought.
"So, when you just wished her back to life, you had to come back to your time, or else she'd stay dead?" He asked. She nodded. "Plus since she's human, and it's actually been five hundred years, she's dead and her soul has been reincarnated into you?" Koga asked, rubbing his head.
"That's right…I think. So I don't know if I can ever go back." Kagome said, equally confused.
"What about me? How did I pass through with you? How can I get back?" He asked, the volume of his voice rising.
"I don't know, Koga, I don't have all the answers, it hurts my head to think about it all…plus I've lost a lot of blood." She said, and leaned against the well wall. Koga didn't know what to do to help her as he doubted very much that she'd allow him to heal her wounds his way, and he had no materials to bind it. He bit his lower lip, fretting about her and everything she'd told him.
"I can help heal your wounds, Kagome, but it would require…" Koga started, and tapered off nervously. She looked up at him.
"What?" She asked carefully. Koga scuffed his feet in the dirt.
"I'd have to…lick the wounds clean. My saliva would-"
"That's ok," Kagome cut him off with a chuckle. "I'll be fine once we can get out of the well…just let me rest a moment?" She asked. Koga nodded and sat at her side, not touching her, but close enough to offer comfort should she show signs of needing it.
She looked up at the roof of the well house, resting and reliving the last of her time in the past. What a present, to defeat Naraku on her seventeenth birthday! But she was suffering for it, she knew as she bled into the dirt bottom of the well. Maybe she should let Koga help…she smirked a bit and changed her mind. She'd be fine. Kikyo had been restored to her true life, Miroku had the promise of his returned to him, Inuyasha had a future mate to look forward to, Shippo had all the family he would ever need even without her…but now she had dragged Koga out of his world and into hers. She had no idea how he would react to the future…what if he could never get back? She sighed unhappily, and decided that she should probably get out of the well if she wanted to be healed. She looked for the rope ladder her Gramps usually left for her, but she knew she'd never be able to climb it with her leg in the condition it was in.
As she sat trying to figure out how to get out, the door to the well house opened, throwing some light over the edge of the well. Kagome grunted in pain as she stood, Koga gasping her arms as she flinched.
"Mom? Gramps? Souta?" She called up the well.
"Who?" Koga asked. Kagome shushed him.
"Not exactly, wench." Came an all-too-familiar voice, and a man dropped into the well, landing beside her and Koga. Before she could move to face him or even speak, he wrapped his arms around her waist, told Koga to remain where he was and jumped, taking them both out of the well with ease. He set her down carefully with her injuries and leaned against the side of the well. Kagome turned around and gasped at what she saw.
"Inuyasha?" She cried too loudly.
"What the hell? Mutt-face!" Koga cried out with Kagome.
Inuyasha placed a finger to his lips as he clapped a hand over her mouth. Inuyasha looked as though he'd aged only a few years in the 500 it had been. He wore black slacks and a white wife beater, showing off his toned form and rippling muscles. His hair was a sheet of black, his ears small and human, his eyes a deep brown, fangs and claws all missing. He stood rather close to her and lowered his lips to her ear, clueless as to how it effected her heart.
"Kagome, the future you remember isn't the future outside this well house. I can't explain right now, but you'll have to play along with me for the time being. It's very important that you follow my lead, do you understand?" He said, his tone soft but deathly serious. Kagome nodded, and he drew her arm across his shoulders.
"Act unconscious for a few minutes, I'll try to squeeze in what I can. Koga, I know you can hear me and I know you don't like me, but if you have a brain in your head, you'll stay in this well until I come back to tell you the coast is clear. Your life depends on it." He muttered, and heaved her hurriedly out of the well house, yelling out that he had found her.
Kagome leaned against him, slack in his hold, and snuck glances through slightly parted eyelids. Her mother, brother and grandfather all rushed over to Inuyasha, crying out her name, looking much the same as ever. She was so confused, but listened intently to the words being passed around her.
"Oh, thank you so much for your help, Yoshi! Where did you find her?" Her mother said. Yoshi? Who was that?
"At the bottom of the well…she must have fallen in searching for the cat or something, poor girl." Inuyasha answered with much faked concern. Kagome almost furrowed her eyes. Her mother knew Inuyasha, why was she calling him Yoshi? What was going on?
"Oh my poor baby, she's soaked in blood! How long do you think she's been down there?" Kagome felt the breath leave her; didn't her mother remember Inuyasha, or that she traveled to the past?
"What a terrible thing to happen on her birthday." Inuyasha, a.k.a. Yoshi reiterated. They also thought she had fallen into the well looking for the cat…it was almost as if she had never traveled to the past at all. Inuyasha seemed to sense this, and worded carefully his next comment, made in a light joking tone at her mother.
"It's a good thing it didn't transport her to the past of anything, than we'd have never found her!" He said with a laugh. Kagome strained to hear her mother's answer.
"What an odd thing to say, Yoshi…well, those demons about can do some strange things, I suppose." Her mother said. Kagome had had enough. She stirred and pretended to be waking from unconsciousness.
"Mom?" She asked. Everyone cried out in relief, and hauled her inside to clean her wounds and bandage her before she could get a word in.
As they bandaged her wounds, Kagome learned "Yoshi" was a family friend for life after he had saved Souta from being hit with a car a few years ago. She also learned that her family thought this family friend was a human being, and Kagome sighed a bit…perhaps her family wasn't speaking of her ability to travel through the well because they didn't know her already knew. They must have truly thought Inuyasha was this human Yoshi as he had claimed. It occurred to her that her family had never seen Inuyasha as a human, so that made sense that they wouldn't recognize him. Once she was cleaned and wrapped up, Yoshi convinced them all to let him take Kagome up to her room for a much needed rest. They made it there in silence, and Inuyasha locked the door at once before her sat next to her on her bed.
"Inuyasha, what is going on? Why do they think you're a human named Yoshi? Why did she mention demons like she did, but deny that I can travel to the past?" She launched into her questions, but Inuyasha shushed her quickly.
"Kagome, please slow down. I don't have a lot of answers, but I have a few. Let me just start with what Myoga told me years ago before he died.
"Your presence in that world did this to the world you know. You presence in that world is over, so don't think about going back and trying to fix it. With Kikyo's soul there and alive again, you can't come back like you used to, so you and Koga are stuck here, think about it."
"I'd rather not." Kagome moaned, clutching her head. Inuyasha smirked; she reminded him of himself when he had first tried to understand it all.
"Listen Kagome, I'm not sure where to start, but I'm gonna try. The future, well, the present actually, began to change the second you fell into the well two years ago. Thanks to the jewel's power, all the demonic energy you kept bringing back here, the fact that you jumped through time in the first place, and finally you bringing Koga back with you have all resulted in this new future." Inuyasha tried to explain. Kagome gasped as she remembered about Koga being here in her time.
"Speaking of Koga, he's still in the well!" Kagome said, now ashamed that she'd forgotten him there. Inuyasha nodded.
"Yeah, I almost forgot…I guess I'd better go get him, wait here."
With that, Inuyasha slipped down the stair with lies of checking if the well had been damaged or not, and ducked swiftly into the well house to the sounds of irritated growls and snarls of the wolf demon still at the bottom of the well.
"You know, I told you to stay there so you wouldn't be found…making all that noise might defeat the purpose." Inuyasha said down to him. Koga was perched on the well's edge in a flash, glaring into Inuyasha's human eyes.
"You'd better tell me what's going on, Mutt-face…" Koga snarled, unwilling to admit to the extent of his confusion. Inuyasha chuckled a bit at the "nickname" he hadn't heard in five hundred years from the wolf, and for good reason. He, like Kagome, had just skipped the last five centuries.
"Koga, as of right now, no one can see you but Kagome and I…anyone else will kill you on sight because you're a demon, and trust me, their methods have gotten better lately." Inuyasha explained, then told him of the window that lead to Kagome's room, directing him to jump through it for the answers he and Kagome both wanted. Inuyasha poked his head from the well house, gave Koga the go-ahead, and watched in apprehension as the wolf bolted across the grounds and into Kagome's open bedroom window. She gasped and jumped at his sudden entrance.
"Koga!" She called out. Koga shushed her.
"Mutt-face said no one can know I'm here, or they'll kill me!" Koga hissed, looking around the room for a quick hiding place as he heard footsteps on the stairs.
"Why-" Kagome started, but Koga wormed his way under the bed as her mother opened the door, looking at her daughter with concern.
"Kagome? Are you alright?" She asked. Kagome waved a hand and chuckled lightly.
"Yeah, Mom, I just dozed off and had a bad dream." She said. Her mother raised an eyebrow at her.
"In a chair?" She asked. Kagome nodded.
"I'm really tired…say, Mom…you do know where I was earlier, right?" Kagome asked carefully, testing the waters.
"Yes, sweetie, you were in the past, but Yoshi doesn't know that, no matter how close to the family he is." Her mother explained, and without thinking that Inuyasha might have a reason for hiding his identity, Kagome spoke.
"But he does, Mom…that Yoshi guy is actually Inuyasha in his human form…except it's not the new moon, so I have no idea why he'd be human right now…" Kagome thought, racking her brain. Her mother considered her words a moment, and laughed lightly.
"I thought he looked familiar, and I can understand why he'd make everyone think he's human. If word got out he was a hanyou, he'd be killed." Her mother explained in a shockingly calm tone.
"But Mom, no one would believe it if anyone called him a hanyou, would they?" Kagome asked.
"Oh, but they would wench." Inuyasha said from the doorway. Kagome's mother beamed at him.
"I'm glad to know who you really are at last…why didn't you tell us? You should have known we'd remember and keep your secret." She said. Inuyasha sighed and sat on the edge of Kagome's bed, unaware of Koga beneath it.
"I'm sorry, I was just so used to calling myself Yoshi and introducing myself as human. Besides, I knew this day would come. Can Kagome and I have some time alone? I have to tell her what's new in this world." Inuyasha said in a dark tone.
She left, and once the door shut, Kagome motioned Inuyasha to stand. He looked at her, confused, then heard the growling under the bed. He jumped up with a stifled laugh and chocked an apology as Koga crawled from under the bed and moved to sit on top of it instead. Koga shot him a nasty glare.
"Get on with it then." He snapped, crossing his fur covered arms. Inuyasha sat in a second chair next to Kagome, and launched into his explanation.
"Kagome's presence in the past, with many other factors, have changed her present, this world. It started two years ago today when she fell into the well in the first place. Every major event seemed to happen when Kagome was in the past, which is why she doesn't remember any of this happening. Two years ago, a demon came forward and publicly announced the existence of demons, claiming that the world was going to change and the era of humans ruling was coming to a close.
"Since then, every time Kagome had come to the future, and some demonic attack has happened, it has only helped to give proof to the fact that demons really did exist. It grew from there, more and more coming into the open and claiming to be demons, and causing havoc. The humans responded by making weapons and laws against demons. If anyone has been proven to have demon blood in their veins, they are to be executed on sight."
Kagome's hands were clasped to her mouth all through Inuyasha's grisly explanation. She had ruined her own time!
"I have to fix this!" She cried. Inuyasha shook his head.
"You'll only change more, Kagome. Kikyo's technically alive in the past now, thanks to you. If you went back, you'd have no soul. You're stuck here." Inuyasha replied. Kagome's eyes narrowed in thought.
"I have my own soul."
"The reincarnated soul of Kikyo. In the past, it's her soul, here it's yours."
"But you just said she's technically alive in the past now, and yet here I am, alive and whole too. How can she be alive and dead at the same time?" Kagome said. Koga, Kagome and Inuyasha rubbed their heads as they tried to work it all out.
"Time is a strange phenomenon, Kagome, just go with it." Inuyasha said heavily. He had no real answers, either.
"No, I have to understand so I can fix it, or at the very least send Koga back to his own time." Kagome wailed. Inuyasha rubbed his ears painfully.
"I'm sorry, Kagome, and to you too, Koga…you're both stuck here. I'll see about getting Koga a concealment charm, but in the meantime, he has to lay low or he'll be killed." Inuyasha said again.
**End Flashback**
Kagome looked over at Koga, who had stayed sitting near the head of her bed as he had been since he'd been told he was stuck in this strange land forever. Kagome felt her heart go out to him; his home was gone now, though it was possible his friends were still alive. Inuyasha had left shortly after their talk, promising to come back with a charm that would make Koga look like a human. They then just had to figure out how to integrate him into society. Kagome was certain that if she explained it to her family, they'd go along with whatever they decided to do. After all, her family was more tolerant than the rest of the world, right?
She had told Koga that it was possible for him to find his friends, and they were most likely alive. He didn't look convinced; he doubted very much that anyone from his pack had survived more than a week without his leadership. Kagome had never seen Koga this upset, and longed to ease his pain…but had no idea how.