Thank you to everyone who gave me feedback and true to my promise I'm not going to make you all wait so long for my future updates. Ashestoashes, THANK YOU for your comment that it would make a good sequel as that is exactly what I was striving for! It's awfully hard to take existing characters, make them older and wiser while still having them be the same characters, stick them in a new situation and have it still seem like it still belongs with the original story. So I am so happy!

I am taking a huge gamble in this chapter. I started this story to play with the idea of reincarnation, but it's about to be dealt with in a different way than the Kagome/Kikyo was in the original Inuyasha story. I'm hoping my readers will forgive me for not being true to the original concept of reincarnation in Inuyasha but...to me the point of fanfic is to introduce something new into the story that isn't in the original story. So I'm going to hope that my gamble pays off.

And to spare the shock of anyone who gets to the end of the chapter and wonders if I'm going to go THERE with that scene, I will tell you now...no, that's not where it's going. It shall be perfectly innocent. (That'll make more sense once you get down to the end...)

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Shortly after Inuyasha disappeared into the kitchen, Miroku sneezed suddenly.

His first thought was that Inuyasha and Kagome must be gossiping about him. Then he corrected himself-they wouldn't be doing that. Then he corrected himself again-this was Kagome after all, her favourite pasttime was talking about people!

His curiosity thus piqued, he put his book down and stealthily tiptoed with cat-like grace over to the kitchen door and hid there in the darkness to find out what he could hear. The first sentence he heard confirmed his suspicions.

"Don't you think he'll just end up hurt if he's just looking for another Sango?" That of course was Kagome's voice.

"I'm telling you, leave him alone," answered Inuyasha's voice. "Let him do what feels right to him."

Thank you Inuyasha, Miroku thought to himself.

"Well, if he doesn't get hurt, Sachiko certainly will," Kagome said. "If you ask me, it's unfair and selfish on his part to expect that girl to live up to Sango's legacy."

Miroku's face darkened in anger. He couldn't believe that they hadn't even bothered to ask him about his intentions and feelings before coming to such a conclusion. Suddenly he didn't want to hear any more of that conversation. He skulked back to his sleeping place and sat there, turning the words over and over again in his mind.

A few hours later, at 2 am, he was still bothered by those words. He lay on his back in the darkness, glaring up at the ceiling. Selfish, indeed! Not since his younger days of being frequently called a "pervert" had a word annoyed him quite so much.

He kicked his blanket off and sat up. His mind was thinking too much to be able to sleep. Perhaps a glass of water would help. He unhurriedly made his way into the kitchen and stood in the darkness, looking thoughtfully out the window at the starless sky as he sipped from a refreshingly cool glass of water. No matter how many times he saw it, he found the night sky in this era to look so strange...so empty. It made him feel vaguely lonely. He entertained the notion of seeing if Sachiko was awake, or perhaps if she felt lonely or uncomfortable sleeping in a strange place-in which case she may want him to keep her company in her room.

Slow footsteps startled him out of his reverie. Even though he knew that he was safe here, out of habit his muscles tensed, preparing to defend himself if a threat should present itself. A shadow approached the doorway. He squinted in the darkness, as the figure came into the kitchen. It was a female shape, that much he could tell...as it came closer, he could see that the hair was too short to be Kagome.

It must be Sachiko. But...

As shiver ran up his spine as his brain processed what he was seeing. There she stood, clad in a far too familiar pink and white kimono and green skirt. Evidently she had found the clothes of Sango's that he'd brought back from his own time and decided to try them on.

"Hey," Miroku barked. "You shouldn't be wearing those!" he knew he probably shouldn't sound so gruff, since she didn't know what she was doing, but the shock of it overrode his sensibilities.

Sachiko lifted her head slowly and uncertainly as if she were a marionette being controlled by an inexperienced puppetmaster. She appeared to be trying to fix her half closed, vacant eyes on Miroku but was obviously having trouble focusing. Miroku looked at her in confusion. Was she...sleepwalking? He waved his hand in front of her eyes.

"Sachiko? Are you awake?"

Her mouth slowly spread into a placid smile and she hung there eerily for what seemed like an eternity before she finally spoke.

"Sachiko's not awake. But I am."

"Er...what?" was the only reply that Miroku could muster.

"What's the matter, houshi-sama? Don't you recognise me?"

Miroku felt as if he'd been simultaneously punched in the stomach and kicked in the back.

"Look," he said. "I don't know where you got the idea to do this, but please stop it. It's not funny."

She lurched forward with her awkward puppet-like steps and tried to embrace him. He stepped backwards to avoid her.

"What's wrong, houshi-sama? Or perhaps I should call you my beloved husband?"

Miroku blinked back the tears that were welling up in his eyes. "Sachiko, please. I'm begging you, stop it right now."

"I told you, Sachiko is asleep. Don't you recognise me? I've waited so long for the chance to see you again and you don't even recognise me? Look at my eyes, houshi-sama."

"Stop it..."

"But it's me. It's Sango. Aren't you happy to see me?"

Miroku let the glass he was holding drop to the floor and shatter into shards, much in the same way his heart seemed to be shattering, and sank to his knees in shock. Sachiko-Sango, he wasn't sure what to call the figure standing before him, knelt on the floor next to him and put her arms around him comfortingly.

"Don't cry," she whispered. "I wanted our reunion to be a happy event."

"How...how?"

"I felt so guilty for leaving you alone so abruptly. I made a promise the moment my soul left my body that I would find you in another lifetime so that I could tell you it wasn't your fault. Lifetime after lifetime I never saw your soul reappear in another body. Now I know why, it's because you came to this time. I had a feeling this would be the lifetime I'd meet you again, I knew Kagome and Inuyasha would look after you. I've been waiting so long to see you again."

Miroku grimaced. Clearly this was the work of some demon or apparition. If there was a subject that he, as a monk, knew plenty about it was reincarnation. And if there was one thing he knew about reincarnation it was that while the soul moves on, the thoughts and consciousness of the individual do not. But before he had a chance to say so, Sachiko/Sango opened her mouth.

"You're going to say that because you're a monk you know all about spiritual matters such as reincarnation. And you're going to say that's not how reincarnation works."

"So you're a mind reading demon, are you?"

Sachiko/Sango laughed. "No. I just know you too well, you silly creature. And I can understand your scepticism. It's only because of the fact that at the moment of my death every bit of my consciousness was focussed on my intention to see you again that makes this even possible."

He reached up and tentatively touched her face. "And what of Sachiko?" he asked.

"Don't worry. This life belongs to her and I have no intention of taking that away from her. I can only awaken when she falls asleep...poor darling, you look like you're in shock."

"I'm not sure I believe you. For one thing, Sango stopped calling me 'houshi-sama' years ago."

She laughed. "I know that, silly. But it was the only way I could guarantee that you'd recognise me. And I think you of all people should remember that I still used that as a pet name from time to time even after we were married!"

Miroku managed a slight smile. "That's right. Because it made me laugh..."

She reached out and gently stroked his face. "So now that I've finally found you, I can tell you what I've been wanting to tell you for so long. I'm sorry. I'm sorry I never got a chance to give you a son I'm sorry that I was so reckless and left you alone so early. I'm sorry that you had to see me die. And please never think it was your fault." She took a deep breath. "And now I can rest in peace."

"Wait, what do you mean? Are you going to leave me right after coming back into my life?"

"Of course. I've done what I needed to do. I can't intrude on your life now that you've moved on."

"I could never move on from you."

"In the morning, I'll be gone. This is Sachiko's life, not mine. Now stand up, Miroku-it's not good to be sitting on the cold floor in your nightclothes."

"I see you're still bossy," he joked feebly but he stood up anyway.

She stroked his arm. "You don't have to sleep alone tonight. I am your wife, after all."

"I have so much to say to you, so much to tell you about. Please tell me this isn't the last time I will see you."

She sighed. She should have expected nothing less from him, that she knew. But, this could only lead to complications.