Chapter Thirty-Six: Not Exactly Friends

Sesshoumaru was rudely awakened next morning by a fierce smack to the nose. Snapping his eyes opened Sesshoumaru looked around to find the culprit, already prepared to give the person the most scathing insults from his arsenal.

He blinked. There was no one there.

"Squeek."

Blinking, his eyes blearily traveled downward to find Kuufuku happily flouncing away, his long pink tail held high like some perverse triumphant flag.

"Oh for the love of-" Sesshoumaru fell backwards on to his bed with a groan.

His very lonely, very hard, and very pink bed.

Glancing out side, Sesshoumaru estimated that he probably got at most two hours worth of sleep the night before.

After Inuyasha had given him the sudden snow bath by pushing him into the snow pile, of which Sesshoumaru was very suspiciously thought had been built over an existing pile of rocks, he had returned to the cave to find Inuyasha already bundled up in his own bed. The hanyou was more than likely just pretending to be asleep but Sesshoumaru figured his best course of action was to leave the other boy alone.

Grudgingly, Sesshoumaru wandered over to the already laid out robe as wearily collapsed on the horrid surface.

The Taiyoukai had spent hours upon hours yelling at himself for losing such contol around Inuyasha. But then again, it seemed as if whenever he was around the sexy hanyou, his youki had decided to take the initiative and Sesshoumaru found that he would no longer find himself in control of his own body.

'Oh Kami,' he groaned as he dragged one of the pink sleeves over his head. 'I am so dead.'

He laid there for a few minutes simply enjoying the feeling of stillness before finally shoving the sleeve off his face.

'Hell, I'll have to face the boy sometime,' he told himself.

"Inuyasha-" he started as he sat up. However Sesshoumaru found himself only address the kitsune who was giving him a rather amused stare.

"Inuyasha isn't here."

"Thank you, for stating the obvious," Sesshoumaru scowled. "Now could you possibly tell me where our illustrious cave-mate went?"

"No idea."

'Must. Not. Strangle. Child!' Sesshoumaru pinched the bridge of his nose. "He didn't tell you where he was going?"

"He didn't say anything to me," Shippo explained with a sigh. "I woke up and he and Rin were already gone." The kit paused. "Kuufuku is still here though."

Sesshoumaru's eye twitched. "Great," he muttered. "Where the hell did he go?"

Where Inuyasha had gone, actually, was not very far into the woods at all. He was in a small geln some distance away picking berries furiously with Rin.

'I'll kill him,' Inuyasha thought. 'Bar that, I'm kicking his sorry ass out into the snow tonight.'

Another fist full of berries found their way into the basket at his side. 'Rin can stay, but the prick has got to go.'

He fiercely yanked at the small red globes of fruit, most of them squashed into juice, for a good while before he finally managed to slow himself down. "That bastard," he muttered, but was surprised that his voice did not hold as much malice as he had before.

It had been so aggravating the night before that Sesshoumaru had completely disregarded his warning of not allowing himself to be used as Sesshoumaru's personal play thing but Inuyasha had to admit that at the time, Sesshoumaru had looked just as surprised that it happened as he did.

A thought occurred to him that perhaps Sesshoumaru really didn't have any control over what he did. Hell, Myouga never really explained a Youkai's mating habits. Considering Inuyasha's age, the bug probably didn't think it was necessary yet.

'Oh hell, I can't kick him out if it's not his fault,' Inuyasha thought bitterly. 'I can beat him up, but I can't kick him out.'

"Inuyasha-sama!" Rin's cheery voice rang across the field. "Rin has found more berries!"

Unable to suppress a smile, Inuyasha wandered over to where the girl stood triumphantly next to a rather large bush. He stared down at the bush with a frown. "I'm sorry Rin, but we can't eat those. They're not meant to be eaten."

Rin's eyes got huge as she looked at the bush in dissaointment. "Why?"

"Because they'll make you sick," Inuyasha explained.

"Why would the make Rin sick?"

"Because they don't taste very good."

"But why don't they taste good?"

Inuyasha sweat dropped. "Er, I think I saw some over here that we could gather."

"YAY!" Rin cheered as she danced over towards the indicated bush, her own little basket swinging from her arm.

Inuyasha sighed in relief as he watched the girl move away, taking her circling questions with her. 'Who knew kids were so difficult?'

It was then that he heard it. A sudden gasp of indrawn breath behind him.

Inuyasha's temper flared at the thought that Sesshoumaru actually had the gall to follow him when he thought it was clear as day that he wanted to be away from the youkai.

Whirling around, Inuyasha nearly bit off his tongue when he saw that it was not his brother behind him but rather some one else he really did not expect to see for a long time.

It was Sango who stood behind him gapping in surprise, her giant boomerang hanging limp from her hand. The two stared at each other, nither one quite sure wat to say.

It was actually Kirara who broke the silence, for Inuyasha anyway. 'I'm sorry pup, I hadn't realized which direction we had been traveling.'

Inuyasha told her silently that it was not the small neko's fault while he nearly groaned aloud with dread.

For where ever there was one the others were sure to be…

"Inuyasha!" Miroku said amazed as he stepped into the clearing behind the Demon Slayer. "My god! You've been missing for months! Where have you been?"

Cue the perv.

Inuyasha gave a little nervous laugh as he raised a hand in greeting. However before he could say anything another voice stabbed into the silence.

"Inuyasha?" a high-pitched screech sounded from the background.

The hanyou tensed and automatically took a defensive step back.

Kagome, in all her futuristic glory stormed over to the small cluster of people a scowl that would put Sesshoumaru's to shame planted on her face.

"OSUWARI!" She screamed in furry!

Both Sango and Miroku filched in anticipation of the resounding bang of Inuyasha hitting the floor but the hanyou simply stood there smirking.

'Really,' he wondered. 'How was I ever afraid of her?' With a smirk of triumph, Inuyasha held out his arms and did a full one hundred and eighty degree turn. "Notice anything different?" he asked.

Kagome gapped as she stared at the empty neckline. "You!" she screeched "How dare you remove those? You have no authority to remove those! You-" her voice trailed off into an inhuman screech.

"Kagome, please. Calm down," Sango tried to place herself between the fuming girl and the now very worried hanyou while Miroku tried to place himself between the girls.

'She's worse that before,' Inuyasha realized as he stared at the girl in shock. 'I didn't even know that was possible.'

Suddenly Inuyasha felt pressure in his free hand and looked down to see Rin clining to his hand as she stared at the other tree humans apprehensively. "Inuyasha-sama?" she whispered.

Glancing at the other three he leaned down and whispered to Rin to go by the berry bush and to stay there, no matter what happened. He quickly asked Kirara if she would stay with the child and spotting the girl, the neko immediately agreed.

He looked back just in time to see Kagome throw off her two compamions and marched as quickly as she could through the ankle deep snow right at Inuyasha who was not an idiot and immediately moved away from the charging female.

"Just what did you think you were doing?" she hissed. "How dare you leave the village! You have an obligation to search for the Jewel shards! You can not slack off on your responsibilities!"

"Yeah right!" Inuyasha shouted back as he ducked behind Mirouku. "I ain't have to do shit!" Kagome gasped at the swear but Inuyasha stubbornly continued before she could even utter a word of protest. "Who was it again that broke the damn thing in the first place? It certainly wasn't me who shot that arrow."

Kagome made a frantic lunge at the youkai who quickly jumped out of the way, this time landing behind Sango who looked at him furiously for putting her quite literally in the middle.

"You were there! You made a vow that you would help me find the shards."

"I did no such thing!" Inuyasha gasped as he evaded another swipe of the girls fingernails. From the way Mirouku was wincing, Inuyasha knew that those things just had to hurt.

"Yes you did!" Kagome counted. "You said you were going to gather the shards!"

"For myself you whacked out psycho! I wanted the jewels for my own purpose. The fact that you tagged along didn't mean I was friggin' helpin' ya!"

Kagome gasped in anger and made another desperate lunge at the silver figure. "What of Naraku?" Kagome snapped. "You vowed to get revenge and stop him from obtaining the sacred Jewel."

"What the fuck dose that have to do with YOU?"

"Inuyasha!" A familiar voice rang into the glen as Shippo suddenly appeared and clambered up onto his shoulder. "Miroku! Sango! You're all here!"

Kagome stared at the small kitsune in shock. "Shippo!" she gapped. "YOU!" she whirled around to point an accusing finger at Inuyasha, "how dare you kidnap that poor child and force him to live in the woods!"

"What?" both youkai shouted in shock.

"Inuyasha, what is going on?" Shippo demanded as he stared at Kagome in shock as she still continued her shouting about Shippo still being only a child and other such nonsense.

"What are you doing here?" Inuyasha asked the kit.

"We got tired of waiting for you to come back and make breakfast so we decided to come and find you."

Inuyasha boggled. "'We'?"

Suddenly there was dead silence followed by a rather hallow thump.

Turning, Inuyasha stared at Kagome's slumped form laying flat on the snow covered ground, the other two beside her both in battle formation. Sango's boomeranged held at the ready while Mirouku already had his free hand grasping his beads.

Inuyasha stared at the slumped woman in complete shock before he slowly looked up past the unconscious figure to the silver figure that stood directly behind her.

There in a triumphant pose, stood Sesshoumaru- wearing a wicked grin on his face and a holding a gigantic rock in his hand.

~TBC~