She woke to find herself in a place that was grey and misty and she knew immediately that she was still unconscious and in some sort of important dreamscape. She looked around and saw a lot of nothing.

'This is... this is very typical. I'm not sure what I was expecting.'

The soft, melodic strumming of a guitar drifted from out of the fog and a familiar voice shocked her as it broke the rest of the eerie silence.

"Probably expecting too much. As usual."

She spun around and nearly broke at the sight that greeted her.

Sitting on a log, plucking out simple, pretty notes on the guitar in his hands, black hair cropped short and brown eyes dancing with mirth and teasing and love and looking so real she wondered if the last two years of her life might have been a long nightmare was a man she hadn't even hoped to ever see this way again.

"Kisho..."

She breathed his name like a prayer and he smiled sadly, lovingly, achingly familiar.

"Hey babe." He looked her up and down and lifted his brows, the teasing returning to take over his expression. "You look great."

She glanced down at herself and paled. Grass and mud stains mottled the crisp red and white of her miko clothes and bark and leaves stuck out of her hair. She crossed her arms and huffed.

"You're always such an ass."

He winked at her, completely unfazed by the fire in her eyes.

"Love you too."

The exchange was so easy and familiar, just like the rest of him that she couldn't breath. Tears ran unchecked down her face and a little sob escaped her throat. Kisho put his guitar down and stood, holding out his arms with a look of profound sadness and understanding.

"Come here."

With another sob she ran to him and he wrapped his arms around her. He let her cry into his shoulder, stoking her hair and crooning softly into her ear. Finally she calmed and addressed her most pressing question.

"What's with the guitar? You didn't know how to play guitar..."

"I didn't?" He asked, and she shook her head no, giggling a little at his silly look of confusions

"Oh. Well, I guess I didn't. Not in this particular life anyway, but I did in another one. Or I will know, in a future life. It can get a little hard to keep it all sorted."

She took a couple steps back, needing space to fully see his face but unwilling to go too far. She remembered the last time she'd seen him in that nightmare about the dark cave. That had certainly been a conjuring of her subconscious, but this...

"This... this isn't a dream is it?"

He tucked her hair behind her ear and pulled a bit of bark out and then sighed.

"No it's not. This is real."

"How... how are you here?"

"You are both asleep right now, and we do share a soul. I thought you could use a little of my infinite wisdom before you do something stupid." He grinned and she couldn't help but laugh.

"We're both asleep? Who- oh! Inuyasha! Oh my gosh, I've got to make sure he's okay, we were fighting Naraku and I was knocked unconscious, I've got to-"

"Hey hey, easy." He cradled her face and stopped her frantic babbling, making her focus on him once again. "He's alright, I promise. I wouldn't be here if he wasn't."

Her face fell in guilt and relief, tears falling once again. Kisho wiped them away with his thumbs and she leaned into his touch even as her heart threatened to shatter.

"Kisho I... I think I might... Inuyasha, I think I..."

"Love him?" He finished for her when it was clear she couldn't get the words out. She nodded and her expression crumpled further, but her eyes snapped back open at Kisho's harsh snort.

"Of course you love him stupid, we're soul mates."

"What?"

He rolled his eyes and pulled her back into his embrace. She fell into him with no resistance, resting her cheek above his heart and marveling at feeling it beating again.

"I said- we're soul mates aren't we?"

She nodded and he ran his fingers through her hair once more.

"Then why are you so broken up about this? It makes sense that you'd love him."

She squeezed her eyes shut against the torrent of feelings battling inside her heart. Love and contentment and guilt and heartache.

"But, just because he's your preincarnation doesn't mean-"

"That's exactly what it means Kagome. Our souls were made for each other, not our bodies. Why does it matter what the outside looks like when the inside is what you're after?"

She couldn't deny that that made some sense, but there were still too many things haunting her.

"But he's so different from you. Not in everything of course, but you're hardly the same person with different skin. I don't want to think I've grown feelings for him just because I can pretend he's you. He deserves more than that."

Kisho pushed her away slightly by her shoulders so he could look in her eyes.

"That's not it at all. Of course we're different, we aren't the same person even though we look alike. But the fact remains that you do love him, and it's not because of me. It's because of your soul. Your soul, my soul, his soul, Kikyo's soul... it's all the same Kagome. The name, the face, the hair, the time, none of that matters at all. Together is what matters, do you understand?"

She stared wide eyed at him as her mind opened to the truth he was offering. She accepted it and peace washed through her.

But a little sadness would always linger. She took another look at his face and re-memorized the way his short black hair fell over his forehead and into his eyes; every fleck of varying shades of brown in his irises; the scar on his left eyebrow from a biking accident when they were 7... their souls may very well be what mattered most, but that didn't mean the person didn't matter at all.

"I miss you. I'll always miss you."

He cradled her face once more and kissed her forehead, and one tear fell from his eye and landed on her cheek.

"I know. I miss you too. And I'm so, so sorry I had to go so soon. I hope you know that I would never have chosen that."

She nodded silently, closing her eyes as he kissed her forehead one more time and wiped away her tears again.

"It's time for you to go now. Remember what I said okay? There's no room to feel guilty or conflicted, there's only together."

"Yes, I remember."

"Good. I'm so happy you're going to be happy." He smiled at her one last time as he began to slowly fade away, and though she knew she'd never see him this way again, she did not feel panicked that this was their last goodbye.

—————-

They woke at the same time and then Kagome wrapped herself around Inuyasha and squeezed as tightly as her limited human strength allowed her. He squeezed her back, rocking them back on forth on the floor of the small, hidden cave he'd found, and they both began babbling out all the pain and fear that had built up inside them both.

"You stupid wench, you scared the shit out of me, you know that? How could you just stand there and let him-"

"I'm so so so so sorry Inuyasha! I'm so so sorry, I-"

"He could have killed you! What the hell am I supposed to do without you-"

"I was so worried something had happened to you while I was unconscious. Gods I'm so glad you're okay-"

"I'm so sorry I failed you Kagome, God's if I'd lost you because of that-"

"I'm okay, I promise I'm okay, I-"

They both pulled away and locked eyes, blushing at how closely they were clutching on to each other. Kagome noticed a thin sheen of moisture over Inuyasha's eyes and her heart broke at just how scared he really must have been.

"Inuyasha... are you crying?"

He blinked and a thin tear trailed down his face.

"No." He sniffed petulantly and she tucked her head under his chin to hide her amusement. He stroked her hair and cleared his throat, bucking up his courage.

"Kagome, I need to.. talk to you about something. Those things Naraku said to you... they weren't-"

She gently placed her hand over his mouth to halt him, smiling regretfully that he'd spent this whole time believing she'd been injured directly because of those horrible lies Naraku had been spewing.

"I know. I know they weren't true, not about you anyway. But I... I worried that they might be true about me."

His head tilted in that cute way he always did when he was confused, like a puppy's might. So many little things about him she'd noticed, she'd been a fool to ever think it wasn't him she'd grown to care so deeply for.

"Inuyasha, do you remember when we first met? How you called me Kikyo and I called you Kisho?"

He nodded silently, and she was grateful he was going to allow her to rio this awful bandage off no interruptions.

"Well... Kisho was your reincarnation, much like I am Kikyo's and I... I loved him. I loved him very much. And he died."

He was barely breathing, simply staring at her in disbelief. She plowed ahead, wanting completely clear air and no misunderstandings.

"When Naraku said that you were using me as a substitute for Kikyo it scared me. Not because I believed that's what you were doing, but because... I was scared that's what I was doing. You don't... you don't deserve that Inuyasha. You're so good and honorable and strong and you deserve to be loved by someone because of that and.. and I do. I do love you for all those things and more and I'll do anything you ask to prove it. I'd never ever use you to replace someone else and whatever you need to trust that I'll-"

The sudden presence of his lips on hers stopped her. He pulled away quickly, framing her face with his hands and resting his forehead against hers.

"I told you already, I don't give a shit about this soul recycling business. Not your soul, not mine. Gods you're the best thing that's ever walked into my miserable life Kagome. I'd be a damn fool to walk away from it because you knew me in the future. None of that matters. It's all bullshit. What matters is that we stay together, okay? We have to stay together."

Kagome gasped as deja vu buzzed between her ears and two sides of a coin blurred into one.

Together.

Yes. Together.

They were right. They were both so right. They'd both come to that conclusion in different ways; they were both so different.

But they were both so so right.

She kissed him again, firmly, repeatedly, and she whispered her love against his lips again and again. She embraced her future, their future, and her place at his side in this new journey fate had set her on. Her destiny had been tied up in a jumbled, knotted, red string of souls but she'd finally straightened it out and set it all to rights.

They would get through this; they would get through anything.

Just as long as they were together...

Where they belonged.