So this is 58 minutes late. Whoops.

Disclaimer: I do not own Inuyasha.

How to Kill Me

Chapter Fourteen: The End of a Rainbow

"I'm so high I can hear Heaven. I'm so high, I can hear Heaven. Oh but Heaven, no Heaven don't hear me. And they say that a hero can save us, I'm not going to stand here and wait."

-Hero, Nickelback

Two days later and we were driving into the city limits of Lowell, Massachusetts. The windows were down a bit to let the cool air waft in and the sun was just barely peeking through the clouds. Inuyasha was holding on to several papers, most of them printed from the internet regarding the most recent deaths that we were going to investigate.

So far there had only been two that we connected. The first death was of a middle-aged man whose family moved out of the city a while back. Their newest residence was on the way and while dressing up in our impressive fake uniforms, we managed to talk to the family briefly about what happened. Apparently, the man had been going crazy looking for treasure that was sure to be buried in his neighbours' backyards. While that was strange to the max, Inuyasha and I decided to go to Lowell where the events occurred.

It wasn't until we got set up in a motel just three blocks away from the second victim's house that we learned the funeral was today. Throwing Inuyasha a button up shirt and black slacks, we got ready in near silence before taking off and heading to the cemetery.

"Are you sure this is a good idea?' Inuyasha asked, leaning down to whisper in my ear as we walked through the iron gates of Lowell Cemetery.

I gave him a sharp look. "It's a fine idea. I do this all the time. Just don't say much and be vague as often as possible. A lot of these people are so distressed that they don't really care anyways, as long as you're there to pay respects."

Inuyasha mumbled something under his breath but followed me closely anyways. There was a fair-sized crowd gathering, people hugging and crying everywhere. As we came closer, I worked up tears to my face. When I cried, I looked horrible. Not only did my makeup run like a river (despite the waterproof guarantee) but my face was so red I tended to look like a cherry. My eyes went ridiculously puffy and my nose started to run... It was a terrible scene. It was safer to just try to make my face a bit red instead of the full works.

"I need your ears to be working overtime," I whispered. "Anything you hear, you remember. Got it?"

"Yes ma'am," Inuyasha replied, sarcasm dripping. "Anything else?"

"Nope, that'll be all sweetie," I murmured, casting my eyes down as we approached the thick of the crowd. We stood together, idly listening as I watched for Inuyasha's reactions. We softly made small talk about the weather, which neither of us cared about but didn't want anyone to get suspicious. I watched his face for any sort of hint that he heard anything.

Inuyasha's eyes locked on mine and I had about five seconds of warning before a soft hand was placed on my shoulder. I turned around, trying to school my features into an expression of sadness before facing a petite woman with short, dark hair. I didn't know her name but I tried to look as unsurprised as possible at how tenderly she looked at me.

"You must be Amy," the woman said, smiling gently with puffy eyes. "And Yuri, correct? You're earlier than I thought you would be. I can see the resemblance between you and…and…" Her voice trailed off as she looked at the casket, prepared above the hole that it would soon be lowered in once the service was over. "I just wish you got to meet him before he passed away," she whispered finally, squeezing my shoulder. "He would've loved to meet his only niece. He probably would've spoiled you rotten."

I gave a small smile in return, reaching out and patting her arm. "I know. I wished I could've known him better." Reaching behind me, I grabbed Inuyasha's hand and dragged him beside me. "Is there anything we can do for you?"

The woman shook her head, finally letting go of my shoulder. "There's nothing you can do. Please, feel free to talk to anyone. I told everyone to expect you."

I nodded, thanking her and dragging Inuyasha away. The moment we were out of earshot from the short-haired woman I raised my brows at him. "Have you gotten anything yet? We need to really book it now. If these other relatives come claiming to be Amy and Yuri, we're fucked."

Inuyasha shrugged and looked around, eyeing the crowd of grievers and sobbing individuals. "Not much though I think I learned something while you were talking to that woman." He fixed his eyes back towards me. "The victim was apparently looking for rainbows."

"Rainbows?" I asked, puzzled. "Why would he look for them?"

"You think I know what you stupid humans do for fun?" Inuyasha asked, smirking. "Right. Now do you want to go or not?"

"Let's haul ass," I replied, dropping his hand and walking back to the car. We gave small smiles to those we passed. A lot of them were probably relatives of the deceased and while no one called us out, I dreaded the idea that the real Amy and Yuri would be found and we'd be sticking out like sore thumbs. Finally passing through the gate, we walked down the block to my waiting Corvette. Jumping into the car, I started her up and sped off.

"We should get some food before searching again," I stated, trying to direct myself to where the heart of town would be. I've passed through Massachusetts multiple times in the three years I had been working as a demon slayer but I had never gone through Lowell before. It wasn't a small town like I would usually solve cases in, which disturbed me somewhat. Demons typically liked to wreck absolute havoc and while that could be easily done in cities, small towns were more likely to get caught up in the problems than a large city where death was a common occurrence.

"Are we going to hit up the police department today?" Inuyasha asked, leaning back in the leather seat and closing his eyes. "I wouldn't mind a nap actually."

"We're going to try to stay out of the police business for a while," I responded, turning down what looked like a promising street. "After what happened in Wadsworth – no matter how far away – I would rather let the suspicion die down before we set out on that ship again. No, we'll do this the sleuth way."

"And how do we do that?"

"You listen and smell and I put the human pieces together," I answered, smiling. "I'm almost happy that I got a dog."

"Fucking wench," Inuyasha muttered without heat, already feeling sleep pull him under.

"Don't fall asleep on me dog boy," I said, poking him in the chest while keeping the other hand on the wheel. "We're going to get some food in like five minutes. What do you feel like drive-thru or an actual place to sit and eat?"

"Can't you cook a meal yourself?" Inuyasha asked, opening one eye and peering at me. "You're a woman. Shouldn't you be able to cook?"

We almost drove off the road I was so intent on causing him pain. "Sexist pig," I muttered. "Just because I'm a woman doesn't mean I know how to cook."

"So you don't?"

"No, I can," I said, albeit grudgingly. "But it's too hard to go to the supermarket and get food. They're a lot more careful than diners typically are of scams and even if I got food, we'd need to eat it all before we left town anyways. The trunk is already exploding thanks to your crap."

"I was fine with one pair of jeans," Inuyasha snorted, turning around in the seat to look at me. "It's you that thought I needed four pairs."

"One pair is disgusting," I replied, wrinkling my nose. If I only had one outfit, I would have to do laundry at least once a day. It wouldn't be pretty.

We finally found some sort of diner and since Inuyasha hadn't responded to my question of his preferred choice, I picked for him. It was a popular diner – I had seen more than one in several different states. Dragging a grumpy Inuyasha behind me, we sat down and waited for our server to arrive.

"I hope it's another woman," Inuyasha said with a smirk, eyeing the few waitresses that were around. "I'd love to see your face when I get hit on again."

I rolled my eyes. "Yeah, because you're so hot. There isn't a bigger turn off out there than a guy who boasts about his attractiveness. It's boring, obvious and we hate you all the more for it."

Inuyasha relaxed into the booth and put his feet up just to the left of my body, resting on the seat I was on. "You're just jealous."

There was a witty comeback on the tip of my tongue but just before I was going to say it, a really good-looking male server came over to us and smiled. Now, that was more like it. "Good afternoon," the male said, giving us a big grin and tossing back his longish brown hair. "Welcome to Rosie's. Can I start the lovely couple off with some drinks?"

"Oh, we're not together," Inuyasha said quickly, looking quite peeved that his plan to woo over another woman failed epically. "Trust me on that one," he added, the sourness of his voice making him sound like a dick more than it made me look like a bitch.

Which was a good thing because the server frowned at me. "I'm sorry. I generally don't like to make assumptions," he said, looking worried.

"Oh, it doesn't matter," I replied quickly, giving him my sweetest smile and resting my head in my one hand. If Inuyasha got to flirt with the female servers then I sure as hell got to flirt with the male ones. "He's just a bit cranky from the long drive."

The server laughed lightly before smiling back at me. "So what would you like to drink then?"

"Water would be great," I replied, tilting my head just so and blinking up at him innocently.

Inuyasha clearly caught on to what I was doing and he growled. "Get me a coke or whatever," he snapped, glaring a hole in my head.

I looked at him pointedly. "Now don't be rude. You can sleep when we finish our food, okay?"

"I'll be right back with your drinks," the server said, barely glancing at Inuyasha before smiling at me again.

The moment he was gone, Inuyasha's feet were off of my bench seat and he was leaning across, growling. "What the hell was that?" he asked, amber eyes flashing. "You complain about me flirting and then you go and do it? Hypocritical much?"

I waved my hand at him, dismissing him easily. "It's just a bit of payback. It's not like he's going to tell me he's on break in a few minutes and wants to get to know me out back, you know?" Although at this level of desperation that I seemed to be reaching, I probably wouldn't mind if he did. "Just relax doggy boy." Inuyasha rolled his eyes at me so hard it had to have hurt. I gave him a glare of my own before tracing patterns into the wood table we sat at. "So what do you think about the treasure hunting bit?"

The half-demon before me shrugged and put his feet back up beside me. "It could be possession. We weren't near any of the bodies to smell sulphur. We connected the two men by how they died but we still need to figure out why the demon chose them. One was searching for treasure while the other was searching for rainbows."

I nodded absentmindedly, scratching at a particular rough spot in the wood. I opened my mouth to answer but the sudden clink of glasses on the table made me look up to see our attractive server.

"Have you figured out what you wanted?" he asked, smiling nicely at me before looking at Inuyasha. "I can come back if you still need time."

"Please don't," Inuyasha muttered under his breath and just barely hearing it, I nudged at his propped up leg. Shaking his head at me distastefully, he ordered his food with a plastered fake smile. "And what would you like babe?"

I almost gagged. "Don't ever," I quipped at Inuyasha before giving the hot server an apologetic look. "Ignore him, again. I'll have the feature salad with chicken please."

Looking at the two of us with slight confusion, he took the menus. "I'll plug that right in. If you need anything more, just let me know."

When he turned and left, I almost kicked him in the balls. "You would be the worst best friend if I was a guy," I said, irritated for reasons unknown. "If I was you would've seriously just cock-blocked me. You know, had genders been reversed and all that." Whatever. I couldn't even tell what I was trying to say anymore. I desperately needed to go to a club. Maybe after this case was over. "And back to what we were talking about... I get the rainbows."

Eyebrow raised perfectly, Inuyasha's golden eyes watched me. "What?"

"There's treasure at the end of a rainbow," I said simply. "This demon is convincing humans to search for treasure. I don't think it's possession though. The wife of the first victim said he was the same as always – just obsessive. She didn't notice red eyes or weird strength or anything."

"And what demon is that?" he asked, taking a sip from his drink. His foot suddenly nudged against my ass and I jumped, looking at the offending object and then back at his face. "What?" he asked, looking far too innocent.

I ignored that last part. "A powerful son of a bitch," I replied, tapping my nails against the wood. "Astaroth. He's one of the dukes of Hell."

"No," Inuyasha replied quickly. "It can't be him. He controls like forty legions and shit like that. Working magic on humans is below him."

"But it fits. He likes to provoke and lead men to hidden treasure, which both of our victims were trying to find. Maybe there's a reason that he's here that we don't know about yet," I said, shrugging. "If it is him, we need to find out where he is."

"And how do you suppose we do that?" Inuyasha asked, looking at me like I was growing another head. Yes. Probably one of the most used analogies out there but it did suit the situation perfectly.

Looking around the diner, I found our server and waved him over. Tilting my head and putting on an innocent expression, I tried to look thoughtful. "I'm really sorry to bother you but do you know of any abandoned places around here? Old building complexes or something like that?"

Biting his lower lip, the server thought about it for a moment, eyeing Inuyasha. "Um, there are several around here. It's not a small place to live. There are two I can think of close to here. The first one is on Jackson by Gorham and the other on Bowers and Salem." He studied me for a long moment, as if in consideration. "Are you tourists?"

"You could call us that," I replied cheekily, grinning. "I've been in Massachusetts before but never Lowell."

"Well welcome then." Turning around at his name being called – Jackson, Jeffrey? – he gave a wave before leaving.

"Well welcome then," Inuyasha mimicked in an unusually high-pitch. "He was undressing you with his eyes."

"Then that makes up for when you were eyeing the hooker's breasts, you perv," I shot back, shaking my head. "Are you so focused on making my life miserable that you're not even considering the case? This demon could be in one of the abandoned buildings. He's a duke of Hell. Trust me – he's going to be holing out somewhere."

"Are you still on the hooker thing?" Inuyasha growled, throwing his hands up into the air.

Way to prove my point.

"Yolcam lonshi pir, yolcam lonshi iaida: zacare ca od zamran, odo cicle qaa," I murmured, repeating the chant three times before dropping the silver rings into the metal bowl of herb-tainted water. I touched the bowl and slowly put pressure on the sides to make the water roll around, just barely splashing out the rim. "Hoath iadia," I said precisely as I dipped my hands into the water and pulled out the rings, splashing holy water across them.

Inuyasha was grumbling beside me in the motel room. "What the hell are you saying now wench?" my half-demon companion asked, sighing. "What are you even speaking?"

"Enochian," I said slowly, picking up the bowl of water after slipping the rings into my back pocket. "I needed to empower the rings. Hopefully one of them will fit on one of your fingers."

"Like angel babble?" Inuyasha spat out, groaning and pulling the pillow around his head. "Last time you did that, I got zapped by an angel."

"You're the one that wanted me to summon the angel in the first place," I reminded him, pouring out the contents into the sink. "Besides we're going to need the rings to survive. Astaroth apparently smells and wearing these rings will protect us from suffocating."

Inuyasha's laugh surprised me, hardly having heard it for weeks now. "He smells? Are you serious? He's a duke of Hell. I think we're going to need more than a ring."

Flipping him the bird, I jumped onto my own bed and relaxed into the brutally hard mattress. The motel room was the same as all the others I had been in – not nice but not disgusting. "Any clue what he's doing here?"

"You're dead set on the idea that this demon is Astaroth," the half-demon interjected, turning around so he was lying on his side to face me. I could see his golden eyes even in the dying light from the setting sun. "Why do you think it's him?"

I shrugged. "Instinct? I've been doing this a long time and when I feel like I've got the right demon, I generally stick to it. It just...makes sense. I mean I just summoned an angel and there is apparently some plan going on. Why wouldn't a duke of Hell go topside for a bit to wreck havoc? Isn't that in the job description of being a demon?"

"You make it sound like I would know," he said, frowning. "I'm only a half-demon you know. I don't have the drive like full demons do."

There was something in his voice that made me turn around to face him, watching the conflicting expressions on his face. His golden eyes held an intensity that would probably be forever unmatched by any other man. Never mind the colour, Inuyasha's eyes held emotion that was almost the definition of too much. "You sound like that's a bad thing," I replied, continuing to watch him. "You don't want to be a demon. I'd have to kill you."

A rough laugh later and Inuyasha was standing up, so close to my bed that I had to blink a couple times to make sure I hadn't been imagining it. When did he move so fucking fast? Why did he sound so...odd? He took a step closer until his knees were touching the edge of my mattress, long black hair flowing down his shoulders as he leaned over me. "You could probably kill me you know," he murmured, tilting his head.

I had to swallow around the lump that was in my throat. "Uh, duh? Of course I can. One way or another..." I nodded, pushing myself up off the mattress and sitting close to where he stood. "We should go now. It's finally dark."

For a while, Inuyasha didn't move from his spot by my bed. I went around to gather our belongings because after the Wadsworth Incident (as I am now going to call it), we decided that we should always pack up when we leave the motel, even if we plan on coming back. You see, this was never a problem for me before. Just another tick against Inuyasha for why I should kill him.

"Are you coming?" I asked, throwing him a look and nudging my way through the door. "Grab your duffel."

Shrugging to himself, for reasons that are completely unknown to me, Inuyasha finally turned and grabbed his bag. "Move it, wench," he muttered as he shoved past me out the door.

Wow. Moody much?

The problem with the abandoned building complexes was that both of the locations were in the middle of everything. There were storefronts all around, people walking to and fro laughing with ice cream or French vanilla lattes in their hands. This, of course, made things even harder for us. We were currently on Jackson Street since it was the closest location. We slid out of the Corvette after parking a block away in a more quiet part of the city. I got the various weapons that I wanted (a gun and knife, just in case) and then handed Inuyasha one of the rings.

"Have you even been here before?" I asked Inuyasha, smiling like we were having the best time – because nothing says a night out on the town like slaying a duke of Hell.

He frowned. "Uh no. I was mostly in Canada for the summer and when I wasn't there I was in the most southern part of the States. I don't like the cold. Why?"

"Because we need to blend in with our surroundings," I explained, gesturing around at the area and the people milling about. "If the police get into this, people can phone in and say they saw two strange unhappy looking people walking down Jackson Street from Gorham. Then the police will take it as a lead, check out security cameras and such. If we look like we're just hanging out as friends, no one will point us out."

"Two people not talking to each other and looking unhappy is suspicious behaviour to you humans?" Inuyasha asked, shaking his head. "What if we were just in a fight?"

"Doesn't matter," I replied. "It's the principle of the thing we need to focus on." Slapping his shoulder roughly and laughing, I pointed at what looked like really yummy donuts in the window. "Don't those look good?"

"You are so embarrassing," Inuyasha muttered, walking away towards the building.

Ugh.

Trying to look as inconspicuous as possible, Inuyasha and I hovered by the door to the building. I reached into my bag and pulled out a small satchel of lock-picking tools.

"Seriously?" Inuyasha asked, rolling his eyes and smacking my hand away. "Let me do this." With a small growl, my half-demon companion tapped at the door before punching it and letting it swing open like there was never a lock. "Much more effective," he announced, smirking at me.

Ugh. Again.

It turned out that the building was not the one being used for our demon so quickly making our way out, we ran towards the car and drove to Bowers and Salem. The abandoned building here was an actual apartment, where two-storey houses lined the streets with illuminated windows shining light on the street below. I parked the car a block away once more, making sure we weren't in a no-parking zone before racing back to our next location. The apartment building was actually really creepy. It had clearly been broken into before by drug dealers because pipes and papers littered the floor.

"Classy," I mumbled, shining my small pencil-flashlight and avoiding the shattered glass by my feet. I hesitated, waiting in the darkness.

"Kagome?" Inuyasha asked, stepping closer to me.

Beep... Beep...

"He's here," I whispered, looking around for some sort of stairway. "Upper floor though. I only have a weak reading."

"Oh, I forgot your demon radar," Inuyasha hissed back, grabbing my wrist and pointing the flashlight to a set of doors that led to the stairs. We silently made our way closer, looking up at the rounded flights of stairs in slight horror.

"I didn't realize there were so many storeys," I sighed. "I need you to listen carefully. Make sure the demon doesn't know we're on to him."

"Trust me," Inuyasha said, not as quietly as I would've preferred. "He already knows. But good effort." Grabbing my waist, I squeaked slightly as he picked me up and threw me over his shoulder. "Hold on."

"To what, your ass?" I snapped, wrapping my arms around his torso the best I could while hanging upside down.

I swear Inuyasha was laughing.

And then we were flying.

"Fucking Christ," I hissed, trying not to scream and whack him. "Are you trying to kill us?"

"I'm trying to get us up the stairs in less than thirty years," Inuyasha retorted, landing in a crouch and jumping up again.

I buried my face in his back. "This is not humanly possible," I murmured. "I can't believe this is happening."

"I'm a half-demon so of course it's not humanly possible wench."

Ugh. Times three.

Landing on what I assumed was the top floor Inuyasha flung me back over his shoulder so that I was standing upright. If I had to be honest though, I definitely had major head rush and that was not a good feeling when you were potentially getting into a fight with a duke of Hell. "Okay, on the count of three."

"This is stupid," Inuyasha told me, crossing his arms.

"One, two–"

"Kagome Higurashi," a deep voice drawled, a strange accent lilting the gravely sound. "How kind of you to finally join us."

Okay.

Did I miss something?

Gun in hand I swung at the demon with my foot. Moments later I was on the ground, face on the disgusting carpet floor. I could hear Inuyasha's growl on top of me and when I looked up I saw his body crashing into the wall beside me. This was not looking good. I flipped onto my back and aimed the gun at the demon, shooting off three bullets in the heart and one to the head.

Astaroth groaned in pain and staggered backwards. "Fucking bitch," he hissed.

I scrambled up, taking steps forward to purify him with my hand when all of a sudden I was flown back into the wall by an unseen force, gun flying down the stairs.

"Please bitch," the demon snarled, looking at me with piercing red eyes. "I just want to talk."

Yeah, last time I was told that, I gained a half-demon apprentice. Great. This should go well.

Let me know what you think :)