The Feeling
Summary: You know it...that feeling...the one you get when someone's watching you...following you...stalking you. The feeling you get when you're watching a scary movie, and you need to look over your shoulder or lock your doors. Turning on all your lights and shutting the door to the room with all the dolls. Cuddled safely beneath the cotton blanket; your sanctuary is your car; your relief is finally being in the presence of your most trusted friends and family. Alone, a new home, starting over. Kagome knows no one. With that feeling, who will help her feel that security? Where is her shelter?
Anime: InuYasha/Death Note
Pairing: Kagome/L & (Slight Kagome/BB)
Genre: Romance/Horror/Suspense/Angst
Rated: M for Mature Content
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One Days Reprieve
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Police were called by Mello as soon as they arrived. It didn't matter though. She heard his voice and had an idea of how tall he was, but with no visuals to work with, they couldn't do too much. Her assailant was still very much so, a phantom.
After talking with one of the office attendants, Kagome had dropped her dance classes, which she hadn't even had a chance to attend yet, and had switched to the early morning violin classes.
"Mr. Morrello, you wanted to see me?"
The professor in front of her smiled charmingly up at her from where he sat comfortably behind his desk. Grading papers, a red pen in hand. He motioned for her to take a seat before capping the pen and pushing the papers aside. Running his fingers through his blonde hair, he popped his neck before focusing his attention on the girl in front of him.
"You've had the opportunity to meet with the Principal already, yes?"
"Concerning..."
"Last night. A good number of the staff were informed about it, to keep an eye out for anything suspicious happening on the school grounds. To do this, Principal Wammy asked for me to sit down with you and go over the details of the situation. Are you comfortable with this?"
"... to be honest, I don't know if I'll be much help. I've only heard him, felt him, and seen a vague silhouette of him. Yet even the police said that it wasn't enough to go off."
"Then, let's start with, when was the first time you noticed you were being followed? I'm assuming that this isn't the first encounter you've had with him."
Shaking her head, she sighed, "you'd be wrong. That was the first encounter. The first time that I thought I was being followed. My first day on campus, after moving all my stuff into my dorm. I went out to get groceries," she watched a pencil skirt across a notepad, "it wasn't too late. I'd called my mom at eight, and that was just before going out."
"How long do you think you were on the phone with her for?"
She could give an exact answer to that. Pulling her phone out, she pressed on her moms' number and watched it pull up all incoming and outgoing calls. The last call happened on her first night on campus, so it wasn't like she had to search hard for it. "I called her at eight o'seven, and the call lasted twenty-seven minutes. Getting dressed, leaving the dorm, running into Matt before reaching the elevator, it all happened in a matter of minutes. I didn't want to waste too much time, and I knew it was already pretty dark."
"So, you only ran into Matt on your way to the store?"
"No, I ran into L too. He had just arrived on campus. He nearly ran me over with a dolly."
A small smirk flickered to and from the man's lips before he continued taking down the conversation with careful details.
"I was fine, walking to the market, there was no trouble. I didn't feel like someone was watching me or following me. I was fine. Giddy even. New home, new school, new friends, I had nothing to worry about. Then, on the way back to the dorm, it's like, everything grew still, and quiet. I could pick up every hollowed sound around me, should any be made, and I did. At first, it was nothing more than footsteps in the distance, but then, they got closer. I looked back behind, but there was no one there. The sound had stopped while I surveyed my surroundings. When I turned back and continued my way, they had returned. Again, I stopped and looked back behind me. Those footsteps were close, but every time I looked for the source of their sound, they would stop, and I would see nothing that could be held responsible for them. The next time I heard them, I ran... they pursued. I saw L up ahead and didn't even think about what I was doing. I threw myself into him, hid behind him, looked around for whoever had been chasing me. Again... no one."
Nodding, the teacher in front of her flipped the paper on the pad over as he finished writing all that she recapped for him. "Then you were attacked?"
"...no... then I saw him outside, two nights after the first incident. It was dark...so I could only see his silhouette."
"What were you doing when you saw him?"
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Mello looked up from the book he was reading when he heard the door to their Etiquettes Theory Instructors office open. The guy doubled as one of three councilors, but more importantly, he was another pair of eyes and ears for Wammy. Trusted, eyes, and ears. Tierry Morello, or, as Mello had often heard him called, Aiber, was among those who had come from the opposite side of the law, to assist teach at this university. Though that information wasn't privileged to most, it was privileged to him. After all, Mello had his own personal information source.
Watching Kagome step out of the office after a moment of hushed whispers, she gave what he perceived to be the most despondent sigh he'd ever heard. "That bad?"
"No, no,"
Mello stood and tugged a bit at his sweater before closing his book and tucking it under his arm. He held his hand out to Kagome and grinned when she took it without a second thought. She'd become so comfortable and trusting of him and Matt in such a short time, it was no wonder the two of them wanted to protect her. Normally, he would call her an idiot for being so trusting, but right now, he needed her to trust him. To trust that he and Matt would protect her, at any cost.
Pulling her in closer, he wrapped an arm over her shoulder and walked her back to his dorm. For the time being, she was staying with him and Matt. Near had offered to help by watching over her occasionally but putting Near at risk was something Mello resoundingly refused to do. It wasn't that he didn't trust Near. He did. However, his albino lover couldn't physically fend off a puppy, much less a stalker. No, Near was not an option. He didn't mind Near taking care of Kagome during the daytime, but not the nights. Not now that her assailant had made himself very real to Kagome.
"Oh, let's stop and pick up some snacks. Matt wants to watch a movie."
"Alright. What movie are we watching?"
"Uh... he said you can pick the movie. We have everything."
"... everything?" She thought back to his dorm room, not recalling a single DVD, she frowned, "I didn't see any movies at your dorm though."
"Well, of course not. I told you before, Matt's an aspiring hacker. Well, he's technically already a hacker. He said to think about it while picking up snacks. I've got orders to buy Barbeque chips..."
Bouncing the word 'hacker' around a bit in her head, Kagome was sure they'd been joking when they had first met. 'Where does one attain the ambition to become a hacker.' Shaking her head, she frowned, "given my current state of mind, nothing psychological, thriller, or horror-based."
Mello agreed completely. "No mysteries either."
"Which is a shame, because I do so love mystery movies."
"Sherlock Holmes is Mystery and Comedy; we could watch that."
"We could!"
The two came to a consensus, Mello pulled his phone out and shot a text to Matt tell him the Movie and asking if there was anything else, they needed at the market. It wasn't late. Despite that it was a school night, it was early enough that they could enjoy a movie before sending their troubled friend off to sleep.
"Oh, if I order a pizza, will you guys eat some?" Kagome was eyeing the Zella Pizzeria across the street from them.
"We're college students... what do you think?"
"Right, right. I'll make a salad instead."
"No, no! Pizza!" Mello grinned as he listened to Kagome laugh.
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Matt was staring hard at his laptop. He'd been looking into the cameras of every corner around where they had found Kagome. Her assailant was smart. There was only one camera that had caught him, but in the distance, in that darkness, you could only vaguely make out his outline. 'He knew where the cameras were. Even in the one he was caught in; he's facing away from it. He stands in the darkest part of the street, concealed by shadows, waits for Kagome to walk past her, and...' Matt paused the footage as the shadow encased man stepped into a slightly more visible spot, but only just visible enough to make out his figure.
"He kept at a distance, scaring her, waiting for her to look all around. Kagome was blind to the shadows; she would have never been able to see the guy...damn it." He re-watched the video again, and again... and... "wait, what's that?" Zooming in and fixing the screen pixelation as much as he could, his eyes began widening at the realization of what exactly it was that he was seeing. "A camera!?"
"Matt, hey," Mello opened the door with Kagome walking in behind him. The two looked at the tech curiously, "what's going on? Why are you yelling?"
"I, oh, nothing. I was looking into security cameras for the dorms." Closing his laptop, he pointed to another that sat open next to the large flatscreen in front of the couch. "Sherlock Holmes is set up and ready, you brought the goods?"
Quirking a brow, Mello placed two bags down on the table in front of Matt, "the goods? What do you think this is? Live Hard, Sell Hard?"
Matt grinned, "Kagome, do you know when the first commercial flight went smokeless?"
Frowning, Kagome shook her head as she took a seat on the couch. Curling up with a warm fleece blanket, she brought her knees up against her chest as she gave Matt and Mello her undivided attention. "No, I don't."
"Don't fucking start, Matt."
"1973!" Matt stood and made his way to Kagome, pulling a pack of smokes from his back pocket as he did, "and did you know that in 1969, when smoking was allowed on all flights, we put a man on the moon?" Popping a cigarette in-between his lips as he said this, his eyes twinkling playfully as he watched Kagome smile. She watched Matt as he pushed Mello down next to her, the blonde already closing his eyes in utter abhorrence as Matt quoted his favorite movie.
"It starts with ashtrays, and it ends with all of our precious freedoms being stripped away. I remember back in the day when you got on a plane and you knew you were in for a good time. And now you can't do one damn thing without someone reporting you to the Department of Homeland Security." Lighting the end of his fag, he walked off towards the window and laughed as he took a drag. Cracking the window open, he shook his head, "that's a good movie."
"What was that from?"
"The Goods: Live Hard, Sell Hard. You can watch it with Matt, but not me. I've seen it enough with him." Starting the movie on the screen, he relaxed against the cushion as a cool chill snuck up on him from where Matt had let in a cold draft. It was dark out now, and his eyes met Matt's in the reflection of the window. A cocky green stare and playful smirk found Mello's eyes as he watched the redhead inhale another long drag from the cancer stick he held in his hand.
Pulling Kagome in close, he held her next to him while they watched the movie. Matt would join them once he finished shortening his life one drag at a time. 'Fucking cigarettes.'
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Me: Here is chapter 8. I'm glad I got to hear from some of you. It feels like 2020's chaotic energy is bleeding into 2021. I don't rightly know what to think at the moment, but for now, everyone, please be safe.