PREFACE
Book 3 of the Remnants of Another Life Series. Mated agents, Wraith (Kagome Higurashi) and Fang (Koga) have a new international threat on their hands. A mysterious group has been targeting the gifted. With the newfound absence of H.A.V.O.C, murders of these talented individuals have begun to happen on a large international scale. The only clue is a strange symbol that is left behind with the bodies. Can R.O.O.T's infamous Alpha Team figure out the mystery before it is too late, or will they become the group's new targets?
**You WILL need to read Books 1 & 2 prior to reading this story. Otherwise you will NOT be able to understand all of the background or the terminology!.**
Chapter 1
The young woman burst from her home and onto the darkened street. She pushed her legs with everything that she had in an attempt to get away.
Her very life depended on it.
Her heated barefoot trek took her down her street and to the main avenue. With every step, she prayed to a higher power for protection.
The weather, as if immediately responding to her fright, instantly became overcast. Numerous dark storm clouds gathered together in the sky. The low rumble of thunder echoed over her.
She needed to get to a public area. She needed help.
As she fled on the side of the road, she desperately hoped that someone might pass by and help her. She just needed one car… just one.
As if in answer to her silent prayer, a set of headlights appeared in the distance, making their way towards her.
Thank God! The woman thought to herself over the thumping sound of her frantic heartbeat. She braced herself as she pushed her body harder and faster to make her way to the car.
As the car approached she began screaming and flailing her arms, struggling to get its attention.
The heavens assisted her plight by providing her with a downpour of rain.
"Help! I need help! Someone is trying to kill me!" She shouted, hot tears now burning down her face.
The car immediately came to a stop.
"Thank you!" She shouted through harsh and ragged breaths. "Oh my God, thank you!" She continued, as she dove for the car door's handle to force her way inside.
The moment the door opened she bent down to shimmy inside. Her movements were so frantic and so desperate that she failed to notice the male passenger within.
The unexpected occupant's arm shot out, the tattoo of a cut circle stood out starkly on the pale skin of his hand. He immediately took a strong hold of her wrist and pulled her forcefully into the car.
Realization dawned on her too late.
"NOOOOOO!" She screamed. "DON'T DO THIS…!"
The rest of her frantic pleas were immediately cut off with the loud thud made by the closing of the door.
The car immediately sped up and took off into the night.
The bright florescent light streamed through the Intelligence department's main conference room. Many agents that were stationed at R.O.O.T's South Korean base affectionately referred to this particular room as the "War Room".
In this moment, General Sesshomaru decided that the affectionate term fit as he, the other department heads, and some of his other highest ranking agents, listened to Sage debrief them on a series of attacks that had been springing up in high frequency as of late.
Sage, the head of Intelligence, Gateway, the head of Technology, and Inquest, the head of Interrogation, attended the meeting through a secure video connection, as they were located on other bases.
A group that had yet to be named, seemed to be targeting, and diligently executing, gifted individuals. The group apparently had an international presence as the reports of the attacks spanned the globe.
"How can we be sure these acts are related?" Inspect questioned from her place at Sesshomaru's side. "This could be nothing more than sporadic hate crimes."
Sage sighed. "From what my agents have been able to gather, these people have been leaving a calling card behind." He advised, as he held up a small white card. There was a printed image of a circle with a horizontal line going through it on the card.
"That's informative." Inspect muttered sarcastically.
Kagome squinted her eyes from her place at the back of the room. For some reason, the symbol seemed very familiar to her and she struggled to place it.
"These have been left near the site of the bodies in every instance. The police agencies that have been handling these crimes have never been able to find any fingerprints on them or decipher what they mean. We haven't been able to place this symbol either."
"How are the victims executed?" Sesshomaru asked.
"According to all of the information that we pulled from the global police departments that are handling these cases; the method of execution is not known. What we do know is that the bodies are burned. Whether the victims are alive while it's happening, or if they are being killed first and then burned afterwards, it isn't something that they've been able to decipher."
"Why would someone want to kill the gifted?" Anatomy questioned.
"Because we're different." Inquest answered, quickly. "We pose a threat to those who are not."
"But we help the world." Anatomy retorted, feeling himself getting angry.
"Not all of us do." Gateway chided. "Many of the gifted choose to help the world with their gifts, while many others choose to go in the opposite direction. Just ask our old friends at H.A.V.O.C. They built their organization on the use of the gifted, just as R.O.O.T always has, although our objectives have always been in absolute opposition to one another."
"How long has this been going on?" Sesshomaru interrupted.
"It's been happening quite often over the past month." Sage replied. "Ever since we took out H.A.V.O.C, there's been an attack on the gifted at least three times a week."
"What's the connection?" Sesshomaru hissed, feeling his patience growing thin.
"We're trying to figure that part out." Sage replied. "We've been going through all of the data that we stole from H.A.V.O.C's database to see if it holds any clues, but so far, we've come up empty."
"Agents Wraith and Fang, what has your private investigation into H.A.V.O.C's data yielded?" Sesshomaru questioned, directing his attention to the two agents that lingered in the back of the room.
"We're still picking through it." Kagome admitted. "It's almost a century's worth of data and there's only two of us. We've been trying to look at what we can in between our other duties and the progress has been slow."
Sesshomaru narrowed his eyes and Kagome took the hint.
"So far there is a wealth of information on gifted individuals, both human and demon alike, that worked within their organization, along with details on their powers. There is also information regarding the people that would often employ their organization." She informed before taking a deep breath.
"Could it be possible that this group is trying to punish the gifted for the decimation of H.A.V.O.C?" Koga asked thoughtfully.
"In looking back to similar crimes, it appears that this has been going on for quite some time. I'm talking years here." Sage advised. "However, it hasn't been this frequent before, so we have always considered these types of attacks to be random hate crimes and never gave it much attention." Sage huffed. "So, I do not believe that this is some form of retribution due to the loss of H.A.V.O.C."
Why would the attacks increase once H.A.V.O.C was out of the picture? Kagome wondered.
"Maybe H.A.V.O.C was an enemy of theirs." Kagome advised. "H.A.V.O.C's presence could have been keeping the attacks at bay. Now that they're gone, there's no one to stop them."
The attendants of the meeting seemed to ponder this thoughtfully.
"Does H.A.V.O.C's data make any mention of their enemies?" Sesshomaru said suspiciously, as he ran his fingers through his long hair.
"It doesn't call out enemies specifically." Sage informed. "They have information on many different terrorist groups, mainly because they were their clients. They also have a ton of information on many other groups, including R.O.O.T and numerous others."
"Is there any mention of that symbol somewhere?" Kagome asked. "Or anything about burning bodies?"
"No."
Kagome huffed. "So what is the plan to prevent more of these attacks?"
"We could send agents out to shadow the gifted." Anatomy thought. "We are forever working to update our database with information on them as we find them, and our H.R. department works very hard to recruit all of the ones that we are able to identify."
"We don't have enough resources to place agents alongside all of the gifted that exist in this world." Sesshomaru said coldly.
"The biggest issue is that these people don't act like other terrorist groups do. They don't take responsibility for their crimes publicly, nor do they tout about their group's mission in any way. As a result, we have no idea who they are." Sage interrupted.
"I want our best tracking agents and psychics to visit the scenes of the most recent crimes." Sesshomaru ordered. "Have them report back their findings. Maybe they can find a lead." He said as he met and held Kagome's eyes.
"Understood." All of the department heads said in unison.
"I will share the recent locations with you now, Inspect." Sage advised as he began to type away at his laptop.
"Great. I'll take a look and assign some of my teams to go out in conjunction with yours." She said authoritatively.
"I will assign several assassins with superior tracking abilities as well." Sesshomaru said in a low voice as his eyes scanned the room. "We will reconvene after we are able to study their findings. Until that time, you are all dismissed."
As the large video screens faded to black and the agents present in the war room began to disperse, Koga took the opportunity to whisper in Kagome's ear.
"I have a feeling that Alpha will be assigned to this."
"Probably. You'd be able to pick up on the possible scents of the enemy so that we can track them down. We also have Mystic who might be able to sense something."
"We'll have you, too." Koga said proudly.
Kagome smiled. "I doubt I'd be much help. I can't track down anyone that I haven't come in contact with before." Kagome said dejectedly.
"You're amazing at figuring stuff out. You may be able to find a clue or something that doesn't require the use of any sensory abilities." He said thoughtfully as they began to exit the room, however their movements were interrupted by the low voice of their leader.
"Agents Wraith and Fang, I want you to refocus your efforts in analyzing the data. Instead of picking through everything and flagging the demonic information that you find, I want you to now assist Intelligence in deciphering the information in relation to this current problem." Sesshomaru commanded from his seat at the conference room table.
Koga rolled his eyes.
"Yes, sir." Kagome replied on their joint behalf before turning to make her way to the elevator bank.
"Who has time to go through all that shit?" Koga muttered under his breath.
Over the past month Koga's new responsibilities had been taking up all of his available time. If he wasn't reviewing his department's mission strategies, the top brass was pulling him into meetings for his strategic input. Although he loved the additional influence and the status that his new duties provided, he didn't have time to take on any more work. He had his hands full.
"I know."
"R.O.O.T employs plenty of demons, they're all considered "gifted" beings here. Why can't he have any of them look through the data and identify demonic shit?" Koga said angrily.
Kagome sighed. She often wondered this herself and came up with her own conclusion, however it wasn't one that she would ever readily voice.
H.A.V.O.C most likely had some type of information that could or would relate to Sesshomaru in some way. She could only assume that there was something that Sesshomaru was possibly hiding from his past, something that he was more comfortable with Kagome unearthing versus anyone else. Sesshomaru had requested that Koga help Kagome in his spare time. Either Sesshomaru knew full well that Koga would never make the time to review the data, or he actually trusted Koga as well, although he would never admit it.
"Don't worry about it. I'm sure he has his reasons. I'll make a point to take a look at what I can today." Kagome said as the elevator kicked into motion and began to take them to their floor.
"He relies too heavily on you." Koga whispered.
Here we go. Kagome thought, bracing herself for one of Koga's long lectures.
"If anything, this data thing is one giant excuse to have something to privately talk to you about over the next few years…" He started, happily getting into one of his favorite conspiracy theories regarding their leader.
Kagome instantly turned on Koga, grabbing his neck and pulling him down to her in a soft and interruptive kiss, effectively silencing him until the elevator's buzzer sounded signaling that they had arrived on their floor.
Upon hearing the sound, she released him and calmly exited the elevator, making her way to her office.
It only took a few moments before Koga caught up to her, falling in stride alongside her.
"Were you trying to shut me up?" He grumbled.
"I've heard that particular theory before." Kagome said offhandedly as she checked her watch, her engagement ring sparkling against the light as she did so. "I don't need to hear it again, babe. I barely get to see you anymore as it is, and when I do, I'd rather spend the time doing anything but talking about Sesshomaru." She admitted as she entered her office.
Koga sighed. "Sorry." He said, before the pinging sound of his phone diverted his attention.
"Damn it, another conference call." He grumbled, quickly giving Kagome a chaste kiss and walking away, most likely to his desk.
Kagome sadly watched him go before lowering into her seat and bringing up the data that was captured from H.A.V.O.C.
She missed him.
Over this past month it was as if she and Koga had switched places. In the past, he had an abundance of free time and would use it to seek her out. Most days, she would arrive home late and he would be waiting for her, a nice home cooked meal always waiting on the table. Now, he was usually pulled away during the day or extremely busy. When she did happen to get a free moment, she found herself looking to sneak some time in with him, not the other way around. When she got home late, he usually walked in the door even later. Koga was genuinely happy about his new role and higher stature within the organization and she was too. However, it was somewhat of an adjustment on her part.
The change gave her a renewed appreciation of him and all the things that he would do for her in the past, when he had the time. Without meaning to, she had taken all of his efforts for granted.
Maybe tonight I'll make something for him. She thought happily to herself before blanching.
The last time I tried to cook I almost burned down the kitchen. She remembered. Albeit that was years ago, but still.
She could take down enemies with her bare hands, purify demons and hold her own in the bedroom, however, the domestic "Holly Homemaker" crap was way above her head.
It wouldn't hurt to try. She thought, pushing herself out of her comfort zone. I'll just pull up a how to video from YouTube. She thought. It can't be that hard to put something together if I'm following directions.
With her evening plan in place, she finally settled herself and dove into the records that were pulled up on her computer screen. An hour passed of scanning through the data before Kagome decided to try a different tactic and search the information using keywords.
"Circle with line through it." She attempted.
Nothing came up.
"Burning."
A ton of records related to individuals with elemental fire powers came up.
Kagome sighed as a thought randomly came into her head.
"Tsuki Industries."
Information related to Sesshomaru's private companies came onto the screen. The majority of the information was regarding the circuit manufacturing plants.
Makes sense. Kagome thought, remembering H.A.V.O.C's development of the ultimate soldiers.
There was no information related to any of the people that were employed by Tsuki Industries nor was there any information regarding those who were invested in the company.
She tried another search term.
"Dog."
Nothing came up.
"Sesshomaru."
Nothing.
"Wolf."
Several files came onto the screen.
Get out! Kagome thought as she quickly went through the records and came to a hard stop at one name.
It read, "Yuna Suzuki / Deceased."
Ayame? Why the hell were you in their database? Kagome hissed as she hurried to read the information.
The file listed Ayame's history within the police force along with a history of purchases made for lab equipment and the rental of many of H.A.V.O.C's scientists. Several large transfers of money from overseas accounts were also included in her file.
So that's where she got the materials and the staff to help Enzyme with his secret research related to the anti-human virus that he was designing! Kagome thought triumphantly, remembering that unlike R.O.O.T, H.A.V.O.C's gifted personnel was out for hire.
Kagome became dejected to find that there wasn't any additional information. Under the section reserved for "means of death", there was nothing more than a strange symbol that looked like two arrows facing in opposite directions.
What the hell does that mean? She wondered as she quickly attempted to try and search it.
Hundreds of thousands of records came up.
As Kagome tried to scan a few of them, she noticed that the only thing they all had in common was that all of the files were of people whom were dead.
Maybe that's H.A.V.O.C's symbol for deceased? She thought as she exited the search and began to pull up some random records from the system of individuals that were also flagged as being dead.
She found that some people had different symbols listed in the "means of death section."
Alright, maybe these symbols somehow explain the way these people died? She guessed. How the hell would H.A.V.O.C even know how Ayame died? She wondered.
"Why are you doing this?" The young woman cried as a hood was pulled over her head and her hands were tied tightly behind her back. The car she was in was going so fast that the G-force had her tightly pressed backwards into her seat.
"You are unclean." The voice of the male passenger that had tied her quickly responded, his voice full of compassion.
"I don't understand." The woman sobbed between frantic breaths. "I haven't done anything to you."
"You will understand with time." The female driver's voice called over to her. "We are here to help you, Emi."
The hostage immediately stilled at the use of her name.
"We know all about you, Emi." The female continued. "You will transcend away from your physical corruption and into the purity of nirvana. Be thankful that we found you."
"Huh? What are you going to do with me? I have money if that's what you're after. I can find a way to give you whatever it is you want." Emi said frantically.
"Money, like all things physical, are meaningless to us." The man at her side chided. "The greatest reward is setting your soul free."
"You're going to kill me." Emi realized. The knowledge provided her with a burst of adrenaline and she immediately shifting her position in her seat and blindly tried to kick out the car's window in a desperate attempt to somehow flee.
Two strong hands immediately wrapped around her, interrupting her efforts and effectively restraining her.
The pouring rain that was flooding over their car immediately turned to hail. The hail was so large that it pelted the car and shattered the windshield.
"She's trying to stop us." The driver called out. "Knock her out!"
"I didn't want to have to hurt you." The male voice grumbled.
With these words, Emi felt a sharp pain against the side of her head and her world faded to black.
Before Kagome knew it, hours had passed and the sun had already gone down. She tiredly rubbed her eyes and prepared to go home.
As she left her office she made her way past Koga's desk, finding that he was not there.
His computer was still on and his things were littered about.
He most likely got pulled into something. She muttered as she checked her watch and set off to cook dinner.
As she left the building and crossed the grounds, she noticed that Sesshomaru was out for one of his walks.
"I found some stuff in the data." She said as she made her way over to him. "I don't think any of it relates to this morning's meeting, but it seems interesting."
Sesshomaru said nothing. Instead he began to walk alongside her as she walked over to her building.
"Do you think that there is something in all that data about you?" Kagome whispered.
Sesshomaru seemed to hesitate before answering.
"It is possible." He admitted. "I have also been combing the data personally, however, I have yet to find anything of substance. Most of their information seems to be written in some type of code, which make it most cumbersome to read."
"Oh." Kagome said, quickly becoming dejected that Sesshomaru already knew about the coding that was hidden within the records.
So much for my big finding.
"Is there anything that you're afraid they have on you?" She asked carefully.
Sesshomaru narrowed his eyes, yet did not speak.
"It helps to know what I'm looking for." She pushed, hoping to provide him with some incentive to share with her. "I hope that by now, you know that you can trust me."
As they approached the door to Kagome's lobby, she spoke again.
"Thanks for walking me. I'm off to attempt to cook dinner." She said chuckling. "Hopefully I don't burn the building down."
Sesshomaru studied her. "You are not able to prepare food?"
"I can make a bowl of cereal and I am very adept at calling in dinner from the base's kitchen." She said smiling.
Sesshomaru blinked several times before turning and walking away. "Best of luck to you agent Wraith and goodnight."
"Goodnight!" She called back as she hurried into her building's lobby, nearly crashing into Frisk as she ran blindly towards the elevators.
"Can you talk?" Frisk asked abruptly.
"Huh? How did you get in here?"
"Mystic let me in. I had been hanging out with her and Quake for a while, but they kicked me out." He huffed.
Kagome knew better than to take the bait and ask why.
"Is something wrong?" She said instead, as she got into the elevator with Frisk following right behind her.
"Inspect's being a complete bitch!" He grumbled as he followed her into her apartment.
"What happened?" Kagome asked as she took her shoes off and headed directly into her kitchen, getting straight to work.
"Rai, Inspect and I have been together for a while now. I get that she has a demanding job and I'm fine with that. But is it too much to ask to spend some time together once in a while? The only time I get to see her is early in the morning or late at night. We never get to do anything at all!" He roared.
Kagome paused. "I thought your relationship was a secret?"
"We've never announced it, but people have started to catch on. We don't deny it, but we don't put the information out there either." He answered, as he walked around the apartment, taking note of all the pictures that were littered throughout the home.
"Do you two try to plan days off or anything like that?" Kagome asked as she began to boil some water and add some oil to a pan in accordance to the notes that she was taking from a video she had playing in the background.
"No."
"Well you may want to start there."
Frisk sucked his teeth. "It's not the same."
"You have to start somewhere. If you really cared for her, you'd find a way to make it work. Planning things ahead of time would certainly help, don't ya think?" She muttered as she started mixing some ingredients together before whisking the yolks of several eggs.
"Why does all of this have to fall on me though? Why can't she try to plan some time with me?"
"Have you told her that?" Kagome asked as she poked at a few raw chicken breasts with a chopstick and gagged.
The sound grabbed Frisk's attention.
"What the fuck are you doing?" He asked curiously as he came up behind her to investigate.
"I'm trying to make dinner." She said as she dumped the dry ingredients into the whisked egg yolks.
"You don't cook. I seem to remember you trying to once and you almost destroyed your old apartment."
"That was years ago." Kagome muttered as she grabbed a chicken breast with a tong and flung it onto a wooden cutting board, blankly staring at it.
"You're going to have to touch that to cut it." Frisk said, wincing.
"It makes me gag. It's slimy." She said trying not to look at it.
Several moments passed with Frisk and Kagome staring at the chicken.
"Could you do it?" Kagome asked sweetly.
"Yuck. Hell no!"
Kagome huffed and placed her palm on the breast and immediately gagged.
The sound prompted Frisk to also gag.
"Why did you choose chicken if it freaks you out?" Frisk wondered.
"Because it's the easiest meat to work with." She replied.
"Chicken isn't meat, it's poultry."
"And poultry is bird meat." Kagome quipped.
Frisk scratched his head.
"Maybe if you put something between your hand and the chicken then you won't have to feel it." He said thoughtfully as he looked for something to anchor the chicken down with.
He felt like a true hero when he pulled the lid off of the giant pot of water that was on the stove and placed it on top of the breast.
"You're so smart!" Kagome exclaimed, beaming at him.
She immediately got to work slicing the breast in half before repeating the same process with several others. When she completed this task she checked her haphazard instructions before shrugging and dumping all of the cut chicken breasts into the bowl of mixed egg yolks.
"I don't think you're supposed to do that." Frisk said seriously. "Aren't you supposed to dip them one at a time and then roll them in the crumbs?"
"What difference does it make?"
"I'm not sure, but I've never seen anyone dump them in all at once."
"I'm sure it's fine." Kagome said offhandedly as she set off to gather her bowl of breadcrumbs.
Frisk watched as Kagome set up the bowl and attempted to suppress her gag reflex yet again when she fished the yolk covered breasts out of their current bowl and into the new breadcrumb bowl.
"Frisk do me a favor and turn on the fire for that pan of oil that's sitting on the stove." She requested before gagging loudly.
"Can you stop doing that? It makes me sick every time I hear it!" He grumbled as he turned on the burner's pilot, waiting for the oil to bubble.
"I can't help it!" She huffed, flustered, as she tried to work the chicken into the crumbs using nothing but tongs.
"Anyway, back to what you were saying. It shouldn't just be you doing all the work to try to see her. I'm assuming you told her that already?"
"No, I didn't. We got into a fight because I said we never do anything and that she doesn't make time for me. Then she said that I knew what I was getting into with her position and blah, blah blah…" He grumbled, trying to forget the heated argument.
"So maybe approach her and say, here's a potential solution that we both need to work at. Tell her that you care about her and you care about making it work." Kagome said honestly as she washed her hands and checked on her pot of water.
"This is taking too long to boil." She said angrily, immediately turning the fire up all the way.
"You have too much water in that giant pot, that's why." Frisk corrected.
"No, it's not. It's because you took the lid off so that I could use it to hold the chicken." She retorted.
"That wouldn't make a giant difference, Rai."
"Since when are you a fucking chef?" Kagome grumbled. "Mr. Know-it-all."
It was at this moment that Kagome's phone rang and she hurried to pick it up, noticing that Frisk had taken to poking at the breaded chicken with a chopstick while loudly gagging in the background.
"Agent Wraith speaking." Kagome said, walking off and failing to notice that the pot of water was now boiling and was threatening to spill over.
"Ha. Ha. Very funny, General. No, I haven't burned down the apartment yet, but thank you for checking on my wellbeing." She said sarcastically.
It was at this point that the pot boiled over, the water of which, fell into the pan of heated oil that was right next to it on the stove.
"Rai!" Frisk screamed in the background. "The pan is on fire!" He shouted at the top of his lungs.
"Holy shit!" Kagome yelled, immediately dropping her phone and running to get the fire extinguisher.
"How do you use this thing?!" She shouted as she struggled to read the instructions.
"You moron!" Frisk spat as he grabbed the fire extinguisher from her and attempted to do the same.
Kagome ran over to get a lid, hoping to stifle the flames that way. She silently thanked a higher power when she found the one she had used on the chicken. She quickly launched it, hoping it would land on top of the pan.
Luck was not on her side today.
The lid hit the top of the pan, causing some of the oil to spill out onto the stove, spreading the fire from the pan to the stove itself.
As the fire alarm began to go off, a huge bang resounded through the apartment. Sesshomaru made quick work of breaking past her front door and quickly ran into her kitchen, calmly observing the situation.
He quickly grabbed the fire extinguisher from Frisk, pulled out the pin and squeezed the handle, successfully putting out the fire in true heroic fashion.
Once the flames were extinguished he eyed both agents suspiciously.
The silence between all parties seemed to stretch out indefinitely before Kagome spoke.
"Do you know how to cook?" She asked brazenly. "I need to figure out a way to fix this before Fang gets home."
Sesshomaru shook his head in disbelief and immediately set off to open her apartment's many windows to air out the smoke.
He curiously took note of Kagome's apartment as he moved about, studying the décor and the home's many pictures. The large picture of Kagome and Koga that was placed on their living room wall caught his eye.
Kagome was wearing a champagne colored dress and was being held tightly by Koga, who was in a black suit. Her hand was clasped over his, making great show of her idiotic engagement ring. Both Kagome and Koga were staring lovingly into each other's eyes with candles and rose petals strewn about in the background.
Sesshomaru felt a tingle of warmth flood into his heart at her obvious happiness.
That must have been when he proposed to her. Sesshomaru thought to himself as he moved along.
As he made his way back to the kitchen, he noticed another picture in her hallway.
As he approached it, he immediately recognized Inuyasha. He and Kagome were apparently in a photo booth having an argument. It was obvious that Kagome had made him "sit" in the final photo of the series.
He grabbed the picture and brought it back with him to the kitchen to study it further. As he reentered the kitchen, he noticed that the mess had been cleaned up and Kagome was once again trying to cook whatever decrepit concoction she had come up with. This time, she had pushed the pot with the water onto the burner that was the furthest away from the pan with the oil. She had also placed a lid on top of the pot.
"You can't make an omelet without breaking a few eggs." She muttered idiotically.
Sesshomaru fought the urge to roll his eyes.
"Where was this taken?" He asked, pushing the photo of Inuyasha into her hands as he set off to find, and pour, himself a glass of wine. "You know you are not allowed to have any photos of the past."
"No one in that photo exists." Kagome answered quickly. "Therefore it is not against the rules." She corrected, as she passed the photo over to Frisk while she busied herself with frying the chicken cutlets.
Sesshomaru noticed that every time she picked the chicken up with the tongs, she appeared to stifle a gag.
"That was taken in Tokyo, by my old home." She called over to him. "It was one of the times that he came to visit me."
"This is the guy you named the dog after, right?" Frisk said curiously, remembering the hanyou from Koga's memories.
"Sure was." Kagome said softly as she removed the fried chicken from the pan and started on a new batch.
Frisk smiled and began to collect some of the dirty dishes that had accumulated and placed them into her dishwasher. He then set off to further explore her apartment. When he got to the bathroom he called out to her.
"You have the mother of all showers!" He yelled. "You have like ten sprays in here!" He said excitedly.
Kagome ignored him and instead added the pasta to the boiling water.
"It seems that you have everything under control now, Miss Wraith." Sesshomaru said lowly as he leaned against her counter, once again studying the picture of Inuyasha as he sipped his wine.
"You miss him, don't you?" She said softly as she watched him.
Sesshomaru scoffed. "Ridiculous."
"I miss him too." She said by means of response, as she finished off the chicken and began plating the food. When she was done, she passed a bowl of salad over to Sesshomaru.
"It's done, just toss it." She instructed, becoming elated when he actually did so.
Kagome set the strainer up in the sink and hauled the giant pot of pasta off the burner and hobbled over to it. She quickly found that she was unable to lift the large pot over the lip of the sink to pour it.
Sesshomaru immediately noticed and walked over to help her. He hovered over her from behind and took the handles from her hands, lifting the pot and dumping the contents into the strainer.