Disclaimer: Would you look at that... I'm still to broke to buy a tee-shirt for either of these fandoms. So, no, in case you were wondering, I don't have quite enough dough to buy both of these stories.

Kagome kept running until the afternoon sky had dimmed into a deep scarlet that she was too upset to see. She slowed down, her feet suddenly cold. She looked down, stifling her tears, to see she was in a meadow and nearing a wooded area. Lush green blades poked out from between her toes, which were pink with cold. She stumbled to the rough brown trees, and upon arriving at the base of one, curled up into a little ball. The numbness that had been broken hours before had quickly returned. Only now, trembling with lack of warmth, did it recede. In her short, baby blue hospital gown, she shivered. The soles of her feet were bleeding. Hot tears fell down her face, and the momentary heat she felt made the responding chill so much worse. She pulled her legs closer to herself, pulling her arms into her dress.

She had to get back home... Back to InuYasha...

"Hello there," said a masculine voice behind her. She tensed, her neck jerking to look at him, but the rest of her to stiff to respond properly. He was too high up to make out his face. "You've caused quite the stir, you know. Everyone's looking for you."

"Leave me alone," she mumbled. She needed space. She needed to think.

"Sorry, no can do. I've been told to find you." He chuckled quietly at his rhyme.

"I'm not going." She said, stubbornly. She heard him crouch down beside her, and she turned to look at him. She blinked in surprise at the sight of him. There was something... familiar. The shape of his nose and eyes, his face, the way he crouched. The way that even when he looked friendly he had the hardened expression of someone who had suffered. And his shiny silver hair...

But this was not the man she had deemed her soul-mate. This man was another, different. Before she could ask his name, he flung his arms around her.

"Keiko! It's you. They told me your name, but I never thought that it was YOU who went missing from the hospital! How did you survive? Why did no one tell me you were alright?"

Kagome was momentarily lost in how nice it felt to be in this stranger's warm arms, held close to his beating heart. She was lost in the feel of his chest through his vest, in the sudden familiarity.

Then his words caught up with her brain, and she jerked away from him.

"My name is Kagome. Ka-go-me. Not Keiko." His eyes went blank and sad.

"They were right..." so the hospital personal still thought she was delusional, and were spreading the word around. "You really don't remember me? At all?"

"No. You look a little like... someone I know... but you aren't him."

"You couldn't be remembering your old buddy Kakashi, could you? That is me, I've just grown up."

"Sorry, no." She looked at him as she said it, with serious, ice-blue eyes. He looked away. "We need to get you to the Hokage. Come on."

"No. I don't trust you," she lied. The fact was, she did trust him. She couldn't help it. Not when he looked like... well, he looked a lot like InuYasha. But she shouldn't trust him. He was one of the people who thought she was Keiko. Who knew what they would do to her because they thought that.

She saw a momentary flash of pain in his eyes, then they were filled with warmth.

"Hey," he said kindly, "it'll be fine. At the very least, it's warm in her office."

He had her at "warm," dispite her reservations.

"Who's office?"

"The Hokage's," he was suprized at her lack of knowledge.

"Ho-ka-ge," she pronounced, commiting it to memory. "Hokage." The word felt strange on her lips, for though her mind had never before known the word, and didn't recognize it even slightly, her lips formed the word as though she had spoken it all her life. She liked how that felt, and thusly repeated, "Hokage. Hokage. Ho-ka-ge."

She giggled.

Kakashi stared. Then, he picked her up and, without a word, transported both of them to the Hokage's office.

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Sorry for the lack of update for so long. Hopefully i'll have more free time soon, but I'll none-the-less insure you don't have to wait this long again.

Please read my other story too! Even if you don't like Sakura, I think you could enjoy it.