AN: I loooove Christmas vacation. I didn't get as much done today as what I wanted to do, but it's only 3:30, so we will have to see what else I can do today…. And the important thing is: I finished a project and I updated! So I am happy!

Snow Queen: I am glad that you liked it. Myself, I thought it was weak… but I'm weird like that. I have very low opinions of my writing skills. Actually, I'd like to rephrase that: I have a very low opinion of the content. I… oh, screw it. I give up. ::smiles:: But I am glad you liked it.

Blood Red: ::whistles innocently::

Lily Thorne: this is going to sound terrible of me… but when I read your review, I think I nearly peed laughing. Killing Shippo… my god… what I great plot twist! But I love Shippo, so don't worry about him. No. All the angsty-stuff is just leading up to the mother of MS fluffy scenes I will have written… in this story, anyway. Trust me. At least, I like it, because it's not all clichéd with people shouting out 'I love you' at inopportune times, or… I'm shutting up in my ramble now.

Chadrific: I try to make thins bitter sweet or at least slightly amusing to lighten the sadness. Besides, things come in threes. ::grins:: But how do you know that their kid won't take after Sango? Maybe it'll be a male who is completely terrified of the opposite sex. I mean, perverts aren't born, they are made… and unmade in the same way.

Siren: My drugs aren't making me high. I'll admit it. I haven't been taking my medicine. I have a cold. Minus the occasional sneeze, I'm good. Maybe I'm allergic to school…

NefCanuck: I liked it. But now I really do want to write something about he trouble she got into when she was younger!

Lightsword: Working the story through flashbacks seemed like easiest way to cover years of MS.

Demon: ….Actually, I think Yugo turns out just fine. Truth be told… I rather like Yugo, as much as his character isn't developed and such. Everyone can fight over Miroku and I'll take wolf-boy while they are distracted.

Ninalee chan: Inuyasha's hairstyle was inspired by Mikaila-sama. ::drools over Mikaila's pretty pictures:: And I like the way they are turning out too. True, no doubt they have their fights, but I can't stand fighting like that, so I put one in, just because I can't make their marital relationship too perfect… but, well, what can I say? There was a lot of yelling when I was a kid and now I hate it. I have trouble raising my voice. That's why I love my roommate so much. She doesn't like yelling either.

Starzki: Heh. You should have seen the unedited version. ::grabs the soap to go and wash out her mind::

Iggy: Sorry I'm not online more. I get distracted easily, and need to concentrate on the fic if I was going to update today.

Enjoy!! ::grins and fixes her halo because her horns have upset it::

Chapter Seven:

Mood Swings

"Kari, watch out!"

We had been traveling for two weeks. We were one week away from the village that the wolves had taken over when we were attacked by a mantis demon. They always liked the intestines of youthful young males, and we had plenty of them. So, in the middle of rolling up our sleeping bags and making breakfast, a giant praying mantis demon attacked, aiming specifically for the males in our group.

Everyone reacted quickly. Miroku reached for his staff and ofuda, but was knocked into the chest by a razor sharp arm, sending him flying. I momentarily froze when I heard the sound of his body hitting the tree trunks around us. That moment of hesitation cost me dearly. I had reacted by immediately grabbing Shippo and Kirara, still asleep on our sleeping bags and directly in the path of the monster. That's when I froze, and because of such, I had to dive out of the way of the crushing feet of the monster.

And so it cam to stand on my weapon.

Yugo came up to me, glancing where Miroku had fallen and at the weapon under one of the demons armored feet. He gave me a questioning glance. "I can fight fine without it," I told him. I was pleased to see our students lining up, ready for instructions. Some of them were already fighting the demon, keeping it distracted. I gently woke Kirara. "Take Shippo and the males out of here."

The face of the boy beside me was crushed. "Sango-sama! That's not fair! I can stay and fight!"

We heard cries from the ranks. I had no time to argue with Yugo. Instead, I drew my sword. "Go! Yugo, this is my order: get your friends out of here. Only the women need to fight this battle! Now get out of here!"

His face scrunched, looking confused and withholding an impertinent answer, but he finally turned, barking out names and telling them to retreat. It made the girls confused. My stomach lurched as I ran to stand with the women who were shooting arrows or hooks at the mantis demon, keeping it at bay. I held it tightly, and ignored the pains in my abdomen to take control of the situation.

I looked around. Who was the fastest girl here? "Shana, when I give you the signal, I want you to run forward as fast as you can and take out that thing's foot. I don't care which one, just take out one of them, okay. All of you with arrows or any other long-range weapon, I want you to use it to focus on the eyes. Understand?" Heads nodded on either side of me. "Launch the first wave!"

Arrows, stars, and hooks reached up for the eyes of the demon. The demon shook his arms and its head rolled back. "Aim for the soft spot at the back of the chin! Shana, now! Aim for the joints!"

The lithe girl ran forward with her drawn sword. The demon had recovered, and I was busy yelling at people to move when I heard the demon scream. I turned back around and found that Shana had been successful. She was currently on all fours, retching into the grass at the gore that covered her body and at the stench of the blood. I was proud of her, but I wondered if there was anyway I could have prepared her for the outcome of her actions. Three legs leaking dark blood lay in the long grass.

"Everyone back up!"

I was surprised at the voice that yelled when the demon began teetering. It was Kari's. I was proud of all my students! We all backed up, and the praying mantis demon fell, landing ungracefully on its two large bladed arms. I hollered out the names of two more of my students. "Keep the arms busy! Anyone, the weak spot of a praying mantis demon?"

"Under the neck and between its eyes, but the first if hard to hit and the second is armor plated, so you need to be right up close to it." The voice was close to me. I turned to see Kari at my side, her cute face drawn into a tight line.

"That's correct." I marched right up to the demon and I slammed my sword into it with all my strength. Hot blood struck my face, but I didn't care. Mantis demons were one of the few that didn't have poisonous or toxic blood. They had other weapons at their disposal. I would never have been so bold if there weren't a crowd of able-bodied women behind me.

Turning, I began wiping the blood of my face. I knew I looked like a bitch, and sounded like one too, but I didn't care. I left my sword in the demon… for now. I had more important things to worry about. "Three of you, go and find the males. I sent them off, and I don't know where. Use chalk to mark your path so you don't get lost, and holler if you get into trouble. The rest of you, see to the injured."

One of the girls pointed at Shana, her voice wavering. "Sensei? Um… how do we fix something as bad as that?"

I laughed, despite myself. Shana laughed as well, pulling off pieces of skin and flinging it back at the dead demon. "Don't worry. It's not mine." Shana, it seemed, had made a full recovery.

Leaving the others to their devices, I marched to the trees where I had seen Miroku get thrown. I wanted to run to him. God, how I wanted to run to him. But I didn't want to let the students see how nervous I was. I didn't want them to get worried too. I was sure Miroku would be just fine.

His name was a whisper on my lips as I stepped into the long grass, trying to ignore the drops of blood on the tree that I knew were from him. His foot came into sight first, and when I saw that I lurched forward, not giving a damn anymore. The students were busy anyway! "Miroku?"

He lay curled up in a ball on the ground, a tiny pool of blood on the ground, the red liquid running between his fingertips. His face was tight with pain, and pale, but when he heard my voice, he looked up and looked a little better. "Is it dead?"

I nodded, and gently touched his shoulder, drawing him unto his back. I peeled his hands away from his chest. A gash started at his stomach, all the way up to his shoulder. I smiled down at him gently, stroking his hair. "You're going to be just fine, Miroku. It's long, but not deep. Can you move at all?"

"Not really. It's actually kind of comfortable here. I thought I'd just take a little nap and let everyone else have fun with a mantis demon. I've already have my fair share of fun with them." He held up his right hand, bloody though it was, and I remembered that a mantis demon had sliced his kazaana once. He closed his eyes, his head moving to rest on my legs. "I think… I think a kiss might make it better, though."

Grinning, I shifted slightly and leaned over him to kiss his mouth gently. Of course, once I kissed him, I couldn't stop kissing him, the nice little kisses that let our breaths mingle and letting us taste each other without arousing anything that would require us to "get a room" as Kagome had said before.

"Will Miroku-sama be okay?" Kari asked from the clearing. She peered into the grass and saw what we were doing and automatically turned red, though she smiled. That's when Miroku raised his hand and I felt it land on me, rubbing the curve of my ass gently, and I reacted as I always did, hitting hard enough so he saw stars.

"He'll make a full recovery."

-

We moved the camp site. The males returned, and as I was cleaning off my sword, I felt a small weight jump on my shoulders, and immediately recognized the feeling of the fuzzy hair and the tiny teeth that grazed my cheeks when the weight spoke. "Sango! Why did you send me away? I've helped you fight before! I could have helped this time!"

Gently, I pulled Shippo from my shoulder to hold him against my chest. I put the sword back in the sheath and I turned around to find all the males in our group staring at me. All of them wanted answers. I arched an eyebrow. "Didn't Miroku tell you?"

"Tell us what?" Yugo asked. I would have given him push ups for his tone of voice, but I let it pass this time. I deserved that kind of tone of voice.

"I already told the girls about this. It was one of the first things I taught them. There are some demons who only go after certain sexes or classes of people. For instance, I would never let a group of my girls fight a frog demon because they like to collect their bodies and keep them in stasis until he needs a soul to eat. And I don't like keeping a bunch of males around a mantis demon because if the demon succeeded in getting a body, the first thing she'd do is come after you boys. She would mate with you, and then she would eat your souls and organs after gratifying herself. That's why she went after Miroku, even though he didn't even have a weapon yet, and I had my sword. That's why she didn't put more force into the strike that took him down. She wants to mate with males before she kills them. You boys would only have been getting in the way. That's why I sent you off. It wasn't because you were incapable of fighting, it's because you would have been the targets, and we would have lost many of you to injuries. Praying mantasis don't know their own strength; that strike easily could have killed Miroku."

I kissed Shippo's forehead, and handed him off to one of the other girls in the groups, smiling at him. My stomach hurt again. "Now, if you boys all don't mind, I have one more lecture for you, all of you, and then I need to go and change Miroku's bandages."

I picked up the boomerang. "Does anybody know why this didn't break even though a demon stood on it? Does anybody know why my sword was able to go straight through that demon's scales?"

Everyone was quiet, and then Shippo took the initiative. He knew why. His fuzzy tail twitched. "I know why! It's because they're made from demon parts! That's why they're so strong and sharp and stuff!" He smiled proudly, and then he shrank in Kari's arms. "Um… it's okay that I answered that, right Sango?"

"Of course it is, Shippo, and you're right, of course. Demon slayers all use parts that come from demons. We use their scales for armor, their bones and teeth for weapons… So, this is what I want you to do. Soon, scavengers will come. We need to be gone before then. I'm not going to assign anybody posts. You have to do that yourselves. Should something happen to both Miroku and I, you need to be able to group yourselves together, fight on your own. So, what we need is somebody to start a fire and somebody to cut open the demon, to cut out strips of meat and smoke them. We'll take as much with us as we can, both to use in case we run out of animals to hunt, and for reserve food for the villagers when we free them. Next, we need to keep a few of the scales for reparations to armor. And finally, we need to collect the blades on the sides of the arms. Those of you who do this last job, you have to be careful. They're sharp. As for who ever cut out the strips of meat, use my sword to start."

I tossed the sword on the ground, and began to walk away, picking up Kirara and the medicine kit as I walked. "Everybody did good today, though."

When I had walked away from them, I cuddled Kirara close to my chest. "Thank you Kirara. Thank you so much for helping to take away my boys and Shippo." I felt my eyes begin to water as I wondered what I ever would have done without Kirara for all those years. She merely meowed and I let her down, and she headed back to watch the new generation of slayers work and I went to find Miroku.

He leaned up against a tree, his robes and armor beside him, a container of water at his side in case he got thirsty, and he lazily opened his eyes when he heard me approach. "Am I still the only one injured?" I nodded, and sat down next to him. "Good." His fingers curled against his wounds slightly when he struggled to sit up straight, allowing me to start undoing the bandages.

I leaned down my head, kissing his skin, and feeling surprise run through his body. My eyes sought out another white scar on his tanned skin, and I kissed that one as well. A third, and a fourth I kissed as well, before I felt his fingers in my hair, pulling me to a stop and drawing me around so that he could kiss me. Miroku always surprises me with his chaste kisses, leaving me wondering how someone who seemed as perverted as him on the outside could be so sweet and simple o the inside.

"What are you doing?"

I wrapped my arms around him carefully, leaning my cheek on his strong shoulder. "Just kissing you, wanting to make you feel better."

His laughter echoed into me. I always felt better when Miroku was laughing. "Oh. And here I was thinking you were trying to make me aroused because you wanted me right here and now. Which, of course, even in this state, I wouldn't have minded much. In fact, with our students not so far away, it actually would have been quite interesting. I mean, can you imagine what would happen if we were caught?"

My blush was so warm Miroku's shoulder could have burned off. "Actually, I try not to think about that. Sorry, but getting caught doesn't sound as intriguing to me as it does to you." I was quiet a moment, as Miroku's arm snuck around my waist. I brushed his fingertips with mine. "Miroku, my stomach's been hurting a bit this morning…."

His body tensed beside mine. Still, he tried to pretend that he didn't know what that could possibly mean. "So? It's been a stressful morning. And I hear that killing that demon was a bit bloody. Maybe you're just not used to the carnage. I mean, when's the last time you killed something other than dinner? I'm not saying that you're… you know, weak or anything, Sango, just that maybe you've forgotten how much blood and smell there is to killing. I know I have."

My fingers wound with his, and tensed. "I've also missed my period…"

Miroku cut me off, giving me a gentle kiss, keeping his voice steady and low, nice and soothing. "What do you want me to say, Sango? I'm not going to tell you that you're right and that just because you're missing your period once and you have an upset tummy that you really could possibly be miscarrying. Because I don't. I don't believe that at all, you've just gotten yourself thinking that way! So what do you want me to say, Sango?"

"Tell me it will be alright!" I cried, holding to him tightly, the sound of my sudden tears hiding the way he winced from me as I cried, clutching on to him. I was strong, I knew I was, but when it came to the subject of my body not doing what I wanted it to, it hurt. It was like that time I had been control of a succubus, but then… yelling, screaming at my body to move to the left, to miss, to soften my blows a bit, compared to telling my body to bear a child, the matter of the succubus had been easy! Miroku was my rock, because he believed in me more than I did myself, the same way I thought he held the whole world in his hands. "I know that it won't necessarily be okay, but tell me that it will be anyway!"

His voice was so low it was a whisper, and his hands were soft against my back. "It will be okay, Sango. It will all be okay."

-

We moved again, putting several kilometers between us and the corpse from, and sleep was uneventful. Miroku's few words had eased over my mind, and I slept like the dead. When I awoke, I was still wrapped up in Miroku's arms, a cat laying between our feet and a fox-spirit currently using her tails as pillows when an hour before, he had been curling up between Miroku and I. Miroku was still fast asleep.

I glanced at the sky, and calculated it as being only three in the morning. I wondered why I was up so early, and closed my eyes, ready to go back to sleep. I yawned, about to curl up again, and thinking about teasing Miroku into waking up with me so we could go and enjoy the hot springs by ourselves when I suddenly felt the urge to vomit.

Climbing out of bed, I'm afraid I was in such a haste that I woke up everyone in or on my sleeping pouch. They all raced after me as I ran into the bushes, and I wished that they wouldn't. I wished that they didn't need to see me fall to all fours and vomit.

I wished I hadn't need to have done that, period.

Miroku grimaced slightly, and knelt beside me, rubbing my back and pulling my hair from the sides of my face, putting it into a ponytail for me and holding it in place so that I didn't mess it up. He made soothing sounds, and was patient with me, not saying anything as my body shuddered, sending me into dry heaves, trying to vomit though I had nothing left.

Shippo, however, was far from quiet. "Wow, Sango! I've never seen anybody throw up so much!" One quick glare from me later, and he was quiet.

When I was finished, Miroku picked my up in his arms and carried me back to bed. He tucked me in, a very quiet Shippo sitting next to me with wide eyes, and Kirara resumed her place at the foot of the sleeping bag, her tails flipping from side to side and ears twitching as she stared at me, curious. Miroku fetched me a glass of water before he sat next to me. "Drink it slowly, Sango. You don't want to get dehydrated, but drinking it fast isn't a good idea either."

I drank it slowly, as he had ordered, and it was a long time before I spoke again. Miroku was sitting beside me, and I lowered my head into his lap, wrapping my arms around him, and he brushed my hair soothingly. "Go ahead and ask, Miroku. I know you want to."

"When you say that you missed a period… how many did you really mean?"

"Would you believe three? I just… didn't say anything earlier because I was afraid that if I made a big deal out of missing three month's worth's of periods that we'd start getting excited, and then if it didn't work out, then I wouldn't have gotten your hopes up." I felt my face soften, and then smile when Shippo's face popped up in front of mine, making a comical gesture or two with his eyes and tongue. I rubbed his head affectionately.

"When Kagome was pregnant, Inuyasha said that she got cravings for the weirdest things," Shippo said thoughtfully, tapping his lips with his finger. I was actually a little surprised that Inuyasha was having such nice conversations with Shippo. They were good for him. His large green eyes peered down at my face. "Do you have cravings for weird types of food?"

Reaching out, I grabbed his little fox leg and grinned. "Yes. I have a craving for fox." Shippo let out a little screech that turned into a giggle when instead of biting his leg like I was pretending, I planted a sloppy raspberry on his stomach. I giggled, feeling my husband look on approvingly. "Actually, though, I do kind of have a craving. I wanted some of the food Kagome has. You know, like the chocolate. And I want that watermelon fruit she brought us once. Better, I want watermelon and chocolate."

"Somehow, I think that finding you chocolate and watermelon is just a little out of our league." Miroku kissed my forehead, and his smile became lecherous. I could practically hear his body release hormones to make his blood start to boil. "Women become more amorous when they're pregnant. I don't suppose that you feel like having sex more often than you usually do, do you?"

My face began to blush; it was the deep color of red I blushed when Miroku first flirted with me or groped me, and he smiled to see it return. Because I had been getting more familiar with Miroku (and thus sex), the blush didn't appear as often as it used to, and I knew that he was missing it! "Actually, it's funny. I thought it was just me, but… Kagome once said that men could become aroused at the drop of a hat. Lately, I've been finding myself getting aroused by the oddest, simplest things; a pile of hay… socks."

"Socks?" Miroku looked about as perplexed as I felt when I first saw a sock and thought to myself: 'If Miroku were here, I'd have sex with him until we passed out from pleasure.' Miroku, however, eventually smiled deliriously. He picked up a leaf, and held it out to me with puppy-dog eyes. "Can you please pretend it's a sock?"

Rolling my eyes, I looked up at the two men in my life. "Look, don't say anything, okay? I don't want any of the students to know. Then they'd start treating me differently, and I don't want to be coddled. Besides, it… it… it could always be another false alarm, and I… don't want to go through that again, so no matter what signs I may be giving, I don't want anyone else to know about this. We're just going to keep on being regular me, until, if I am pregnant, a child is born. Understand?"

Both of them nodded. We all settled down to sleep again, as it was very early, and Shippo wandered back to his own futon. Personally, I think his nose was just a little sensitive for what my mind was going through. Now that the topic of sex had been brought up, I found that I wanted Miroku. Now. And covered in honey. Mm, honey!

As if picking up on my thoughts, I felt his hand stroke my stomach carefully, slipping between my legs. I rolled over slightly, allowing him more room, and he took the hint, though I was half-asleep. His hand slipped underneath my clothes, flush against my warm skin, and he shuddered.

His lips brushed my ears as he spoke, and I can't remember what he said, but whatever it was, it made me suddenly shut my legs and roll over, trapping his hand where it was and so tight that he couldn't move an inch. I think I was actually cutting off the circulation to his fingertips.

Shippo giggled from his sleeping bags. "She has mood swings too. Yup. Sango's pregnant."