Affliction
By Miss Kagura
Chapter Three – Needles


The next morning came and the Higurashi house came to life, a strange panic taking over as Souta tried to finish a project, Inuyasha came to voice his dissent, and Kagome tried to get everyone ready for the trip to the 'doctor.'

"Kagome, what the hell were you thinking bringing him here?" Inuyasha yelled at the bathroom door.

"Enough!" Kagome hissed through toothpaste dripping out of her mouth. "You need to calm down, Inuyasha." She said, spitting into the sink and rinsing her mouth out.

When the door opened, Inuyasha found himself face-to-face with Kagome, who was wearing different clothing than he was used to. Bare feet in sandals gave him a full view of her legs as they emerged from her blue skirt. For a split second, he found himself breathless. Of course, when he finally did breath again, he did so only to make an ass of himself. "Who are you trying to impress?"

Kagome sighed and wished his strange acknowledgement of her body had come in the form of a compliment. 'You. I am trying to impress you.' Her eyes said to him, although she knew he wasn't always skilled at reading her emotions. So, because Inuyasha was unable to admit how beautiful he thought she looked, and she was unable to admit she wanted him to notice, they resumed their normal routine. He insulted Kagome, and she punished him for it. "Sit."

Down the hall, in the bathroom attached to Mrs. Higurashi's room, a naked Sesshoumaru eyed a pile of clothes curiously. The shoes presented the biggest problem, really, he decided, staring down at long, clawed toes. His boots were made out of youkai flesh, and were naturally resilient to being shredded, but regular leather was no match for claws that could slice through iron.

Bathing in the modern era was a great improvement over taking a dip in some lake in Feudal Japan. The hair conditioner had his hair feeling as soft as a newborn pup's, there were no youkai in the water, no little fish tried to nip at his skin, and he smelled like something called 'vanilla,' which was an exotically pleasant scent.

Sesshoumaru ignored the problem of his feet for the time being and picked up the boxers with a deep frown. Why did Keiko Higurashi have men's clothing lying around? Maybe she was more than a typical housewife? He stepped into the boxers and pulled them up. They were considerably more pleasant than a fundoshi, and about a thousand times easier to put on and remove.

The rest of his clothing, a pair of pants, an undershirt, and a button-down shirt, went on without incident. The buttons proved slightly annoying with only one arm, but Sesshoumaru managed easily enough. He cut the claws on his hands and feet with Tokijin and slipped the leather shoes on. Finally, he looked in the mirror and concentrated for a moment, altering his youkai's humanoid form. His ears rounded on the tips and he twitched them. "Disgusting." He said to himself as he left the bathroom.

There he was, Sesshoumaru, Lord of the West, disguising himself to better blend in with humans to take advantage of their medicine. He pulled at his necklace and growled in frustration, but felt his anger slip away when he saw Rin. Just looking at her was enough to remind him of why such things were necessary.

Sesshoumaru passed his brother, who was on the floor cursing under his breath at Kagome. He had no desire whatsoever to become involved in whatever problems Inuyasha was having with his bitch, but found her ability to subjugate the hanyou extremely amusing.

"Inuyasha." Sesshoumaru said, putting his foot down on Inuyasha's head. He took a letter out of his pocket and placed it in Inuyasha's hand. "Give that to Jaken."

"Like hell I will!" Inuyasha yelled into the carpet.

He ignored his brother's complaints. "After he receives this, Jaken will bring you something that you are to bring to me as a means of compensating the Higurashi family."

Inuyasha clenched his hand around the note and stuffed it into his haori as he stood up. If it was for Kagome's family, he'd be answering to Kagome if it didn't get delivered, and he knew her wrath could be far scarier than Sesshoumaru's. "Keh, you look like shit in those clothes."

Sesshoumaru grunted. "You have cat ears, Half-Breed."

Kagome left her room with Rin riding on her back the same way she rode on Inuyasha's. Rin seemed to be quite a lot better after the rice and a good night's sleep in a bed, something she hadn't had in years. She hated being sick, but it was nice to have someone really take care of her.

Rin wasn't really sure what was going on, but from what Kagome explained, she wasn't really allowed to talk about a lot of what she did with Sesshoumaru. She noticed his clothes and smiled. "You look dashing, my Lord!"

Sesshoumaru felt the miniscule amount of color in his face drain. Having her compliment him was something he was used to, but having her do so about his appearance in front of other people was slightly embarrassing. Kagome's lips pursed together, and she shot Inuyasha the 'I'll sit you if you laugh' look.

"That's enough, Rin." Sesshoumaru said, following Kagome all the way to the bus stop, where he was faced with the greatest horror of the Modern Era. In his mind, he could only describe the bus as a carriage of human filth, where he, Sesshoumaru, was expected to stand quietly among a dozen humans, all who were within mere meters of him. It was repulsive, he hated it, and the fifteen minute trip seemed to take hours to him.

Soon, Sesshoumaru found himself standing at the entrance to the Tokyo Children's Health Center, the mecca of healing and the source of hope for the continuous flow of people that exited and entered the building. The building smelled of illness, death, broken dreams, and disappointment all mixed in with an odd, sterile scent he couldn't quite place.

He stood and watched the people that came and went, noticing how utterly depressed most of them were. When he caught up to Kagome, she was already sitting in the lobby of the Emergency Room, filling out a bunch of papers. "Hey, what's your last name?"

"Last name?" Sesshoumaru curiously asked.

"Don't you have a family name?" Kagome asked. "You have to, right? How else would people know which family you belong to?"

The slightest amount of amusement danced in his eyes. "Prowess. Strength. Steel. They define my family more than a name ever could."

Kagome rolled her eyes. "Sesshoumaru Inutaisho it is then. And this is Rin Inutaisho, your adopted daughter."

"Daughter?" Sesshoumaru inquired. "Is that necessary?"

"Yes, it is. If you're not her legal guardian, Child Services will come and put her in another home." Kagome explained. "This isn't like your time. Humans really look out for children now." Her eyes glanced down to the next section. "Do you know anything about Rin's medical history? Does anything run in her family?"

"Being murdered." Sesshoumaru replied.

Kagome sighed. "Is she allergic to anything?"

As the questions went on, it became apparent that despite his efforts to save her life, Sesshoumaru knew next to nothing about Rin, despite the fact that he had literally heard her chatter on and on for hours at a time.

Kagome finished filling out the forms and took them to the counter, then returned to her seat to wait. When she turned and saw Rin asleep in the chair next to her, Kagome rubbed her forehead. "I really don't get you. You hate humans, want to kill your brother, and then suddenly, there's this little girl following you. Not only that, you'll do anything for her, except…" She tried to say 'care about her,' but Sesshoumaru obviously cared about her, or he wouldn't have gone so far to help her.

"Except what?" Sesshoumaru asked, pushing her farther into a conversational corner.

She crossed her arms and leaned back in the chair, considering Sesshoumaru's actions. His pride meant everything to him, and yet he was willing to let a human 'bitch' put Beads of Subjugation on him, drag him to another era, and tell him what to do. However, he was still being a stubborn jerk, incapable of admitting he cared about Rin.

Inuyasha acted like that. Did that mean he loved her? Or was he just a jerk?

"Nothing." Kagome said.

A few minutes later, a male nurse entered the room and called for them. "Inutaisho? Rin Inutaisho?"

The nametag on his scrubs said 'Hiro Takahashi,' and he lead them down a long hallway and into a small room with an examination table. "All right, we're going to need to get her measurements." He said, writing down her weight. "You're doing great. Could I get you to stand next to this wall?"

Hiro scribbled something down on his clipboard and went to a cabinet where he took out a small plastic cup. Kagome felt her heart start to thump. She hadn't thought about what would happen at this point, but it was probably going to be bad.

He knelt in front of Rin and showed her the cup, pointing to the tiny restroom connected to their exam room. "I need to a urine sample from you. So what I need you to do is—" The glare Hiro was getting stopped him mid-sentence.

Sesshoumaru had murder in his eyes. "And just what sick, perverted need do you have for that?"

Kagome stepped on his foot. "Sesshoumaru…Heel."

Wham!

Kagome took the cup and gave it to Rin. "Pee in this, okay?"

Rin nodded and went into the little bathroom, and Kagome used the chance to try and clean up the mess Sesshoumaru almost made of the nurse's insides. "About Sesshoumaru…"

Hiro shrugged. "This is the last fucking time I'm doing three shifts in a row." He said, sliding Rin's chart into a compartment on the door as he left.

"Heel! Heel! Heel!" Kagome turned to the irate taiyoukai, who was making the floor vibrate with his angry growl. "This is a hospital. They're going to need to do and take things from Rin and you can't kill them for it!"

Sesshoumaru stared daggers into her as he stood. "Explain to this Sesshoumaru what her urine has to do with her illness."

"Who cares? Why are you making such a big deal about this? It's just pee." Kagome replied.

Rin emerged from the bathroom with a full cup, which she put on the counter just as the door opened again and the doctor entered. "Hello, my name is Dr. Okawa." The doctor was a middle-aged man wearing a white coat and glasses. Dr. Okawa took the clipboard and grunted as he read it. "112 centimeters…looks like Rin is a little short for her age in addition to being considerably underweight."

Dr. Okawa had Rin lie flat on the table and he listened to her heart, her lungs, and then palpated her abdomen, back, and sides. "Do you hear something?" He asked.

Kagome glared at Sesshoumaru, who was emitting a steady, threatening growl as he watched the human man touching and pressing Rin's body in ways that made him feel extremely angry. "Nope." Kagome said with a smile. "I don't hear anything."

Okawa shrugged. After a series of questions, his beeper went off, indicating he was needed elsewhere. "I can't really say for sure what is causing Rin's illness, so I'm ordering diagnostic tests and recommending she be admitted for treatment for this anemia. Depending on the outcome of the tests, you'll be referred to a new doctor."

As Dr. Okawa rushed down the hall to help his next patient, he wondered if it would ever become easier to have his job. He saw the telltale bloody gums and bruises of leukemia. Whether or not she lived or died, she had a long, hard fight ahead of her.

Another nurse came in and led them to a room with a cold metal table in the middle. This nurse, a warmer-seeming female, put Rin on the edge of the table. "Hey there, Cutie." She took Rin's arm and used a swab to clean the inside of her elbow, filling the room with the foreign scent of alcohol. "I'm going to need to take some of your blood so we can find out why you're sick, okay?"

Rin laid eyes on the needle and her eyes widened in panic. She looked up at Sesshoumaru, begging him to save her from the threat that lay on the nurse's metal tray, and Sesshoumaru looked at Kagome, who shook her head. When Sesshoumaru did nothing, Rin turned her pleading eyes to the nurse. Why would someone who seemed so nice want to do something so terrible to her?

Kagome held her free hand. "It's all right. It doesn't hurt that bad. I actually just had to have my blood taken a few weeks ago. It'll only hurt for a second."

Sesshoumaru watched Kagome's gesture intently, noticing how Rin visibly relaxed when Kagome held her tiny hand. Under a mask of apathy, Sesshoumaru committed the act to his memory. It was odd to see such weak creatures pushing one another to have courage when they were so fragile.

The needle in the nurse's hand could hurt, it could kill, and Rin closed her eyes as the very tip penetrated her arm. She felt a tiny sting, and then exhaled. "That's it?" She asked curiously, watching as the vial filled with blood.

"Yes, now this isn't so bad, is it?" The nurse asked Rin, who shook her head.

Rin shook her head, suddenly feeling a little lightheaded. She could see Sesshoumaru observing with an odd expression on his face. The smell of the sickness on her blood filled the room, overwhelmingly strong to his taiyoukai nose. It seemed to wrong to him that the very blood that sustained her life would try to kill her.

Just as the nurse finished, a man with a mask and scrubs entered. "Is this the patient needing lumbar puncture?"

The nurse nodded. "Lumbar puncture and marrow biopsy." She took Rin by the hand and went behind a folding screen in the corner of the room.

When Sesshoumaru saw Rin's clothes fall to the floor, he was prepared to spring into action. Kagome's glare stopped him, and Rin soon came back into view, in what he thought to be a modest gown. Of course, when he saw it was backless and her bare bottom was completely exposed, the room started to rumble again until Kagome stepped on his foot.

Sesshoumaru was frustrating Kagome to no end; everything made him angry. He wanted to kill the nurse that tried to explain urine samples, the doctor that felt her chest and listened to her heart, the nurse that took her blood, and now, this grown male who could quite obviously see her behind.

However, to Sesshoumaru, all this made humans seem like they had gone completely mad. In exchange for slightly longer lives, they were willing to compromise their dignity, exposing their bodies and fluids to strange people and the odd gadgets they used. Was this part of the cost of beating some of the diseases thought to be fatal in his era?

The man said nothing, but the nurse put Rin back on the table. "All right, now we need to do a lumbar puncture. That means we have to take a sample of the liquid that runs down your spine and into your brain. You'll need to lie down on your side and curl up for this, and it's very, very important that you don't move until the procedure is over. Okay?"

Once again, Rin looked to Sesshoumaru to save her, and he just looked away. She gave up, and lay down on the cold metal table, curling into a fetal position. The man seemed like a monster to her. The mask that was supposed to prevent infection covered his humanity, and his blue eyes seemed so cold to her. The doctor put on a pair of gloves and cleaned her back with alcohol. "You may feel a little pinch." The doctor said, piercing her back with the first of two needles. "This will numb the area."

Sesshoumaru watched Rin's face contort in agony as the painkiller spread through her lower back. She squeezed Kagome's hand, trying her hardest not to run away or break down. For a few minutes, the room was dead silent as the doctor waited for the Lidocaine to numb her back. "Be very still." The doctor said as Rin felt a needle forced into her spine.

"That's not numb!" Rin screamed, trying to jerk away. Pain shot from her lower back, all the way up her body and into her head, which was pounding as spinal fluid drained from her. Her body was held firm by familiar long fingers, and when she looked up, Sesshoumaru was holding her down, trying to keep her from moving while the needle was lodged in her spine. "How could you do this to Rin?!" She felt betrayed, being tortured with such pain while Sesshoumaru kept her still, making her endure having her body violated with the sharp needles.

The doctor withdrew the needle and frowned at the vial of bloody fluid. "Take her for an MRI immediately." He said to the nurse, who nodded and pushed an exhausted, upset Rin down the hall in a wheelchair. He pulled the mask down and scribbled on Rin's medical papers. "Her spinal fluid is bloody, which means she has bleeding in her spine or brain. After Rin has the MRI, we'll finish with the marrow biopsy. I've seen enough at this point to refer you to a hematological oncologist, unless you already know someone."

"No." Kagome said, shaking her head.

Over the next three hours, during which Rin got an MRI, x-rays, and a CAT scan, she refused to so much as look at Sesshoumaru or Kagome. She was too tired to care or think about anything; all she wanted to do was rest. The doctor returned for the final test, the bone marrow biopsy.

"You're almost done, Rin." Kagome said, offering Rin her hand, which Rin refused to even acknowledge.

Rin just lay on her side on the cold table. She was far beyond caring that a grown man could see her butt. The doctor was a monster, worse than any youkai or bandit she had met. He stabbed her with things and hurt her, and Sesshoumaru, her protector, did nothing.

The doctor cleaned her right hipbone with alcohol and Rin could only imagine what horrors were to follow. She looked behind her and saw a huge needle in his hand, a needle intended to go into her very bones. Something cool and smooth was smoothed over her skin, which suddenly felt numb.

The needle went in painlessly, and just when Rin thought it wasn't going to hurt her at all, a sharp, intense pain shot through her side and down her leg. She screamed and clenched her hand around the edge of the table, refusing to cry or call out for Sesshoumaru to save her. I won't cry. I won't cry. I won't cry… Rin chanted in her head, her eyes tightly closed.

When Rin's hand had been pried off the table, she desperately reached out for it again, only to find warm, soft flesh.

Sesshoumaru felt the child squeezing his hand with far more force than he believed she had and could have sworn he felt her pain for a brief moment. As much as Kagome's comfort helped Rin, his seemed to be exponentially more beneficial. "Rin, you're all right."

His sharp senses picked up the sound of her teardrops hitting the metal table as the doctor withdrew the needle and bandaged the wound. "No…Rin hurts. Rin is tired."

"You were really brave today, Rin." Kagome said. Rin still rejected her; she could forgive her Lord Sesshoumaru. She didn't know Kagome well, and all Kagome seemed to do was bring her pain after earning her trust with things like bubble baths.

The doctor checked Rin in to stay at the hospital, and yet another needle invaded Rin's body as they put an IV in her hand to treat the anemia that made her so weak. When she succumbed to her exhaustion, she was frightened and hurting inside and out.


The Next Morning

Sesshoumaru awoke to the sound of Kagome returning after a night at her home. The noise awoke Rin, who sat up and stretched. Much to Sesshoumaru's shock, she smelled quite a lot less ill, the black circles under her eyes had disappeared, and some of her color had returned. This was no doubt due to the liquid entering her through the IV needle.

Kagome had, in her hands, a strange box wrapped in colorful paper. "Good morning Rin! You're looking much better today." Rin's dubious eyes watched Kagome as she came toward her with the box. "I brought you a few things today. Some bubble bath, some clothes, crayons, coloring books, and this." She said, holding the box out to Rin.

Rin didn't know about what 'crayons' or 'coloring books' were, but they didn't sound painful. She carefully tore the paper off the box and screamed in utter delight when she pulled the baby doll out. "Sesshoumaru-sama! Look! Isn't she beautiful?!" Rin said, showing her new toy off.

"Hn." Sesshoumaru grunted in reply, watching an altogether strange phenomenon unfold in front of his eyes. Rin cradled the doll, as if comforting the strange object. She treated the baby as if she were its mother, despite the fact that she could barely remember her own mother and was never around babies. The gestures and behavior that Sesshoumaru had a difficult time forcing out of himself Rin gave to the doll as if they were instinct.

"So, what are you going to name her?" Kagome asked.

Rin held the baby close. "Sesshoumaru!"

"Rin, you will not name your fake girl-child after this Sesshoumaru." He said, insult evident in his voice.

Rin frowned. "Why not?"

Kagome was clearly giving her best efforts not to giggle, but eventually, she broke down and laughed at Sesshoumaru, who did little more than glare and her and look away.

On the floor above them, a doctor was standing in a room, staring at the x-rays pinned to a light panel on the wall. "What the hell?" He said, as he compared them to the other imagery taken of Rin's spine.

A nurse entered and gasped as she saw the pictures of the tumor that was growing on Rin's back. "That is the Inutaisho girl's tumor? It looks like…"

The doctor finished her sentence. "A spider."


Please Review!

Author's Note: There will be pairings later on, but it's not really the purpose of the story. The theme of this story isn't love as much as it is the preciousness of life, something I think everyone has to assess when dealing with a disease like this.

Next Chapter: Spider
The doctor gives Rin's diagnosis, and casually mentions the tumor on her back happens to be shaped like a spider. Kagome returns to the Feudal Era, leaving Sesshoumaru to behave himself…which he fails in doing. Sesshoumaru visits Toys 'R Us and decides humans have gone mad.

Special thank to my reviewers: Ru-Doragon, Shiori The Lady Kazekage, ArizonaBay, Silver Moon Vampire, Asumi Kiribashi, fluffyinu94, xxxchocoholic, crazyhorsegirl3, Kagome Lady of Darkness, shikonprincess15, mangadreams, WhiteWolfChickie, TheRYU, DK, Solaira, InuJoey, lindajrjt, DarkAngel512, supersillee06, llebreknit, and Elvin BlueEyes!

I wasn't planning on writing so often on this story, but the reviews are really encouraging. Thank you!