Summer Survival

"And so, they all trudged back to their bunks and tried to sleep."

How They Didn't End Up Sleeping After All

They didn't end up sleeping after all.

"Pssst," Hakudoshi whispered.

"What?!" Koga growled; he had almost fallen asleep, too!

"Have you ever wondered about where we're headed?" Hakudoshi asked.

"Oh yeah, huh," Inu-Yasha said. "They didn't say anything about that. I thought we were just going to sail around the ocean for a month and turn back. Why?"

"I don't know," Hakudoshi said innocently. "It's just that it doesn't seem like the captain has been steering the ship ever since we set off, does it? I wonder what that means…"

This caught their attention, including Sesshomaru, who had been ignoring their whispering up until now.

"They probably have a GPS system…" Inu-Yasha said, though he wasn't as sure as he sounded.

"Shall we go spy on them?" Hakudoshi suggested slyly.

"I don't see why not, now that you've made it impossible to sleep," Koga grumbled, but he, too, was curious as to what the whole deal was about.

Slowly, carefully, quietly, they crept out of their bunks and tiptoed to the door, where they opened it just a fraction—

Creeeeeaaak.

At first, they panicked and thought Naraku might hear the noise, but when Sesshomaru glanced around, he saw that the girls' door was open as well and realized it must have been their door that made the creak. His suspicions were confirmed when Kagura began reprimanding Rin in a hushed voice when she noticed the boys.

"Couldn't sleep?" she asked wryly.

They stopped short of the kitchen, where the captain and Naraku were still in. They seemed to be absorbed in a discussion.

Not steering after all? Hakudoshi thought smugly.

"Are you sure this will work?" Naraku asked skeptically.

"Of course," the captain replied, which nearly caused the lot of them to collapse on each other in shock. The captain was speaking…normally?! What could this mean?!

Naraku heaved a sigh. "But we could drift for days, weeks, maybe months and not find one. And we don't have months."

"Well, we have to find one that hasn't been found yet if we're to be rid of it for good."

Kagura felt it coming, but couldn't stop it. She sneezed.

And, unfortunately, this time, Naraku heard her.

Without saying a word, he stormed over to where they hid. Koga tried to run for it, but Naraku grabbed his ponytail before he could get away. Nonetheless, this allowed Sesshomaru and Hakudoshi to get away, though the captain had Inu-Yasha and Kagura in his grasp. Naraku had an iron grip on Rin's wrist, and it began to sink in what the scene looked like. It was just like in the books she read; there were six kids who eavesdropped on two villains plotting…something villainous but one of them made a noise and four were caught and two escaped, hopefully to get help and rescue the other four…she then realized that was impossible as they were in the middle of the ocean and cut off from the rest of civilization, and it didn't seem like Hakudoshi or Sesshomaru would try to rescue them anyhow.

"What's this, Captain?" Inu-Yasha growled, struggling (in vain) in the captain's grip. "What are you trying to get rid of?"

"Like, I have no idea what you're talking about, Uncle," Kagura said hysterically. "So can you please, like, let me go?"

"What are you trying to find?" Rin demanded, putting up a brave front to make up for Kagura's cowardice.

"You won't get away with this, you hear?" Koga yelled aggressively, trying to kick Naraku, though it was somewhat difficult being held by your ponytail a good foot off the ground and three feet away from your target.

"What shall we do with them, sir?" Naraku asked, raising an eyebrow.

"LET'S PRETEND NONE OF THIS HAPPENED AND GET ON WITH OUR DAILY LIVES!!" the captain replied, and the two of them dropped the four onto the floor in a heap. "NOW, WHY DON'T RIN AND NARAKU GO PREPARE DINNER AND THE REST OF US ACTUALLY FINISH SWABBING THE DECKS!! KOG, YOU'RE PRETTY FAST! GO GET SESHMARU AND HAKUDOSH! KAG, INU-YASHA, LET'S GET STARTED FIRST!!" He then stormed above deck towing Inu-Yasha in his wake. Naraku sighed and tried to ignore Rin's questioning expression as he thought about what to make for dinner that night. Koga was already gone to fetch Sesshomaru and Hakudoshi.

However, when he went to the boys' quarters, he saw that they were not in their bunks. He checked the bathroom. Not there. He scratched his head. Where could they have gone?

Koga went above deck to tell the captain he couldn't find them when he heard Inu-Yasha and Kagura exclaiming, "What are you DOING?!" and the captain yelling, "DON'T WORRY, I'LL SAVE YOU!!"

He ran over to where they were (which is at the edge of the ship) and saw that Hakudoshi and Sesshomaru were seated in a small rowboat suspended at the side of the ship. They had somehow cut the rope and the only thing keeping them attached to the ship was the captain. His first thought was Wow, the captain's reaaaally strong and then What are they doing? and then Oh yeah, they still think the captain's a bad guy and finally Wait, isn't he? Before he could hurt his head too much thinking about it, the captain interrupted his thoughts with a loud thump! as he hauled the whole boat aboard.

"DON'T DO ANYTHING SO DANGEROUS AGAIN!!" the captain scolded deafeningly. "I DON'T KNOW WHAT GOT INTO YOUR HEADS, BUT YOU COULD'VE BEEN LOST AT SEA WITHOUT FOOD OR WATER FOR DAYS AND…AND…" All of a sudden, he burst into tears and bear- hugged Hakudoshi and Sesshomaru. Inu-Yasha, Kagura, and Koga's minds went blank from the shock of it. It was silent save the captain's occasional sniffing and sobbing. Finally, after approximately five minutes, Sesshomaru was the first to absorb what just happened and said coldly, "Your charade doesn't fool me."

Hakudoshi was the second to gather his wits. "Let go of us if you don't have a death wish." He held a gleaming, sharp knife at the captain's throat.

Inu-Yasha gasped, Kagura screamed and closed her eyes and covered her ears, and Koga made up his mind and exclaimed, "Now that's going too far—"

"I DON'T KNOW WHAT YOU'RE THINKING, BUT I CAN'T TELL YOU THE TRUTH; IT'S NOT WORTH KNOWING!!" the captain bawled, plucking the knife out of Hakudoshi's hand as easily as if it were blunt. "SEE HERE—" sniff—"YOU PROBABLY HEARD ALL THE WRONG STUFF AND ARE ASSUMING THINGS I CAN'T IMAGINE, BUT—" sniff—"ME AND NARAKU, WE'RE NOT DOING ANYTHING WRONG AND WE AREN'T GOING TO DO ANYTHING TO YOU SO DON'T ACT SO FOOLHARDY AND GET YOURSELVES KILLED!!" He said some other things like "Foolish kids" and "They oughtn't know these kinds of things" and "They got it hard already" before he began to calm down and continued, though his voice was still haggard. "I promise you, you'll all get to go home safely at the end of this trip. NOW LET'S JUST FORGET WHAT JUST HAPPENED AND GET ON MOPPING!!"

Everyone was battered and bruised from the unexpectedness of it all, and struggled to mop as their thoughts kept jumping all over. They were so baffled that they forgot, once again, there was no water. The captain realized they were in no condition to mop and decided to give up the task. "ALRIGHTY!! SEEING AS HOW IT'S GETTING DARK ANYWAYS, LET'S ALL WATCH HOW TO SURVIVE AT SEA(that's the name of the movie they watched earlier)ONCE MORE TO REFRESH OUR MEMORIES!!"

Even if they could refuse, they were in no state to as they captain dragged them all off to his quarters.

Rin was too scared to ask what the whole deal was about and followed all of Naraku's orders without hesitation. She washed the dishes in the same fashion she had during lunch; no one complained about them then, so she supposed it should be okay. After she finished and set the table, Naraku told her which ingredients to fetch, and she realized he was making soup again. Fish soup. Rin would have laughed if she wasn't so frightened. It was worse when they had to wait for the soup to boil. There was nothing to occupy her or Naraku then. In the awkward silence, Rin's imagination went wild. Could they be looking for…treasure? A rare species maybe—mermaids? She almost laughed out loud but one look at Naraku's grim face made her grin fade. Poor mermaids, she thought, to be stuck with him. Poor me. Her thoughts were interrupted when the captain thundered past the kitchen with the five unwilling passengers trailing behind him. This all happened in a flash. Then the fire began hissing, and the pot cover looked ready to fly off.

Once the soup was done, Naraku sent her to fetch the others. Rin was still afraid to question him and so went towards the others' relative direction and hoped she might run into them. She did, but now she wished she hadn't. Much to her horror, the song from the end of the dreaded movie floated out from the captain's door and she had the sudden urge to run away. Luckily for her, she didn't have to go inside after all as the movie ended and they all came out themselves, looking stricken and disgusted. Inu-Yasha looked the worst, as he was the only one of the five who actually had to watch it twice.

"Dinner…?" Rin offered tentatively, but they all appeared not to have heard her and strode past without recognition. Only the captain was cheerfully acknowledging her with a "THANK YOU!! NOW LET'S ALL GO ENJOY OUR WONDERFUL DINNER!!"

Dinner was blessedly uneventful as each person was left to their own thoughts.

No one said anything when they went to bed, with the exception of the captain, who ordered, "OFF TO BED, THE LOT O' YOU!"

However, once in bed, they did not immediately fall asleep. There was simply too much that went on that day to sleep so easily.

After moments of silence, Inu-Yasha asked, "So, what do you think they're up to?"

"Please, why bring this up when it should hardly concern us and we need our sleep?" Sesshomaru said in a sarcastic tone.

Inu-Yasha would've glared at his brother if he could only see him, "Fine. You don't care. But whatever it is they're planning, I'm not just going to sit back and look in the other direction for their convenience."

"Me neither," Koga agreed. "I'm still confused as to whether the captain's the good guy or the bad guy."

"Maybe it's for your own convenience that you look in the opposite direction," Sesshomaru answered in a bored voice. "Because if you knew, they would have to kill you." He almost hoped they would; then he wouldn't have to do it himself.

"So why didn't they earlier?" Inu-Yasha countered.

"Because we had no idea what it is they're planning to do so there was no point in doing so," Sesshomaru pointed out, rolling his eyes.

"Even so, I'm still curious as to what they're not telling us," Hakudoshi said mischievously.

"Suit yourselves," Sesshomaru replied diffidently. "But I would prefer that we sleep before the captain begins snoring—"

SNOOOOOOORE.

And so, only Naraku and the captain had a wink of sleep that night, again.

Author's Note: Sorry it took a while to update; I'm still busy. Don't you like how the title refers to both the beginning and the end of this chapter? It might not seem like it, but I was tempted to jump right into the main plot in the middle of this chapter, but I thought that they should spend a little more time on the ship. I'll try to keep it going, but I would love some ideas, please! Special chapter next week!—I hope.