Similar Fates

The woods were empty of the usual sounds of wildlife as Bankotsu lowered his partner Banryu to face the dead priestess Kikyo. "Well, aren't you going to shoot?"

Kikyo seemed to hesitate, though kept her bow drawn. "What do you intend to do in this world? Why do you continue to kill even after being resurrected? What reason do you have?"

(Ah, this old bit. A little different in the words from before due to my "status", but ultimately still the same.) Bankotsu decided to try and explain the obvious one more time. "Now that's a strange question. I don't need a reason to kill. I've always been this way. Before my death, and after I was resurrected."

Kikyo seemed to lower her guard a bit, though Bankotsu still felt like it would be risky to attack right at this moment. While Naraku hadn't ordered him to kill her, he had been warned of her power, and how an arrow from her filled with her light of purification might not need to strike him directly to still do the job. Of course in a way such a warning just made him want the fight even more. "In the world we live in, it's sometimes necessary to kill in order to survive." the priestess stated, "But you died once. So why not try to change the way you live?"

"Hah!" (Nobody ever listens.) "I'm a mercenary to the core. And I enjoy it." Bankotsu took a moment to raise his massive sword up and reflect on some of those past encounters. The many impotent curses people flung at him, the pleas to change for what they called "the better". "People talk about heaven and hell. But once you're dead, you're dead." (As you should well know.) Bankotsu pointed Banryu at Kikyo and spelled out the obvious for her. "I don't care about the other world. While I live, I'll do as I please."

Kikyo narrowed her eyes "You say that to convince yourself, don't you? You're trying to make excuses for what you're doing."

(Make excuses? Hah! I just told her. I don't need to excuse anything.) A funny thought struck him, and he shouldered his weapon. "Say Kikyo… dead people like us will probably share the same fate."

Eri bolted upright in her bed panting. She clutched and felt at her throat for Jewel Shards which were not there. She quickly turned to her nightstand and desperately grabbed the cell phone on it. A few button presses later and there was a ringing. A couple of moments later a sleepy voice answered "…Hello?"

"Yuka, I'm having the dreams again!"

"Oh for… it's not even 5 yet and it's Sunday morning." Yuka grumbled, "So which one was it, the one where you're a zombie mercenary and Kagome is a ghost doll, or the one where you're the snail princess of the dessert kingdom?"

"The mercenary one. It just all felt so real… so vivid… I…"

"That's what you said about the snail one!" Yuka screamed in tired frustration.

"But it was! I swear I could still taste the pudding when I woke up, and I was a bit slimy for some reason. What do you think is going on here Yuka?" Eri waited a few moments for a response. "Yuka?" A few more moments later and the sound of a tone came from the phone. Eri stared at the phone in hurt betrayal. "She hung up on me."

(Oh well, no sense in staying in bed. I doubt I'm going to be able to go back to sleep after that.) Eri swung her legs out of her bed and pondered for a second what she should do. (Maybe I'll just get an early start on my chores.) With a plan now in mind Eri got up and walked over to her closet. And removed from it the two meter long novelty feather duster she'd purchased last year. "Come on partner, we can't rest until we've slain 1000 dust bunnies!"