Ch. 120- Inuyasha's Makeover
Inuyasha © Rumiko Takahashi
Arashi © Me
Birds chirped as they sat in the branches of the Sacred Tree, preening their feathers and warming themselves up in the light of the sun. Nearby, at the Bone Eater's Well with twitching tails, there sits Arashi, the little demon dog sitting on his haunches as he stared at the wooden structure. He lifted his leg to scratch at an itch in his neck, but then continued to sit with vigilant eyes.
"Arashi's been sitting there ever since Kagome and Inuyasha left, hasn't he?" asked Shippo as he watched from a safe distance.
"He hasn't moved once since they've been gone, too," Sango added while Kirara sat on her shoulder. "I'm actually getting a little worried about him."
"How long has it been since Inuyasha and Kagome left, anyway?" Shippo asked.
"Hmm...I think it's been about 3 days, now," Sango answered.
"I noticed that this always seems to happen," Shippo mused. "Kagome takes Inuyasha with her to her world, sometimes. Whenever he comes back, he's usually happy and he learns some new things about Kagome's world, too."
"Really?" Sango asked. "I wonder what it's like over there."
"I've already tried going to her world, once," Shippo said before he rubbed his head. "I only ended up hitting my head. For some reason, only Kagome and Inuyasha can go through the well."
"I see," Sango said. "Too bad, then."
Kirara then jumped down from her mistress' shoulder and sauntered to Arashi's side, nuzzling her face against his. At first, he didn't seem to react...until his two tails wagged back and forth, causing Sango and Shippo to smile.
"Now, isn't that sweet?" asked Shippo.
"Yeah," Sango said before she looked around. "Hey, I just realized...where's Miroku?"
"Oh, you know him," Shippo shrugged. "Probably went off to bother one of the village ladies."
Sango could only sigh and shake her head. "Of course, he is..."
For some reason, the slayer felt this...odd tinge in her chest, but she decided to shrug it off. After all, people were going to do what they wanted, right?
XXX
Concurrently, at the Higurashi Shrine, things seemed to go on normally...well, except that Inuyasha had been staying for the past 3 days. At first, it was almost like he wasn't even there...mostly because he stayed in Kagome's room. Since she was gone at school for 3 days, he didn't really have anything else to do except help Atsuko with the chores and wait for her to come back. It wasn't easy, though, since he was so used to being in wide-open spaces and he often found himself running around Sanosuke in circles. There was even a time he accidentally knocked over the old shrine keeper's favorite vase, and boy, did the old-timer really let him have it, then.
Although, on the day they came back to Kagome's time, Inuyasha heard Atsuko tell Kagome that someone named Hōjō had brought the girl the homework that she had been missing...as well as some bath salts for her "eczema".
"Who's this Hōjō guy?" Inuyasha asked.
"Don't worry about it," Kagome said, quickly and nervously.
"But-"
"I said don't worry about it!"
"But who's-"
"DON'T WORRY ABOUT IT!"
"Okay, okay! Sheesh, wench, you don't have to yell!"
Deciding to ask her about it another time, Inuyasha mostly spent the day just sitting in Kagome's room. Needless to say, it wasn't really how he thought of spending his "break". He honestly felt like he didn't need one since he what he really wanted was to track down Naraku...as well as Kikyo.
Kikyo...how could she do such a thing to Kagome? Why would she go so far as to steal her jewel fragment and then try to push her into a gorge? Did she really feel that threatened by Kagome's presence?
And what of Kagome's vision? The one she saw in the forest? Why would he ever agree to go to hell with Kikyo?
Thinking about those things only made him stressed out...so he did the only thing he could think of: he binged on ramen and potato chips and whatever snacks he could find in the house, and then he'd fall asleep after stuffing himself after a while.
Atsuko was getting a bit worried. Not about his figure, of course. Being a half-demon, Inuyasha tended to burn calories even when he wasn't doing much. She was more worried about his mood. Sure, he'd help her out with housework, but he'd mostly just lie around and mope.
He missed Kagome's company, Atsuko could tell that much. It wasn't like she could help it, of course. She did have school to go to.
Thankfully, it was Saturday, today, which meant Kagome didn't have to worry about studying...at least not for a little while.
"Kagome!" Atsuko called from the kitchen. "Can you come here, please?"
Kagome soon came downstairs, wearing a blue shirt with a frilly white skirt, as well as her favorite necklace made of red beads.
"Yes, Mom?" Kagome asked.
"Kagome, dear," Atsuko said. "I was thinking...it's been a while since you brought Inuyasha with you, and...well...I'm not complaining or anything, so much as I'm worried about him."
"What's there to worry about?" asked Kagome.
"Well...take a look in the living room," Atsuko whispered, prompting her daughter to turn around and see Inuyasha, lying on his side on the couch...which was littered with empty ramen cups, chip bags, soda cans...basically, it looked like a pigsty. Even he didn't look much better. His face and clothes were both covered in stains and he looked like he hadn't washed in quite some time. In fact...Kagome could practically smell him from where she stood.
"Ugh...he does look like a bit of a slob, huh?" Kagome asked.
"I wouldn't call it that, dear," Atsuko said. "I think he's just lying around because he doesn't have anything to do. He's bored and...maybe a bit lonely. Isn't that why you brought him with you, this time? Didn't you say that you were taking a break?"
"Yeah, but I meant to take a break from everything that's happening in the Feudal Era," Kagome answered. "I mean, I did have school and I missed tons of homework and-"
"But it's Saturday, today," Atsuko interjected. "You're allowed to take the day off...in fact, I was thinking that maybe...you could take Inuyasha into town with you, just to spend time together!"
Kagome's jaw went slack. Surely, she did not hear her mother right...but when she saw that smile on her face, she knew she was serious.
"Are you kidding?!" she questioned. "Mom, I can't take Inuyasha into town with me! I mean...hello! We're in the 20th century! I can't just take Inuyasha out into modern-day Tokyo with me! Not with how he looks! Do you know what people might do if they see him?! He could put in a freak show! Or worse, he could get taken away to a lab and get experimented on!"
"Kagome, you're overthinking things," Atsuko said. "If you're that worried about how he looks, then all you have to do is change his appearance. Make him look a little more...modern."
"Uh...I don't know, Mom," Kagome said, hesitantly.
"Kagome...would you rather him just sit there, looking all depressed?" Atsuko asked as she looked to Inuyasha, again, and Kagome pursed her lips in contemplation.
"...Well...maybe if we took some of Dad's old clothes and...found a way to cover his ears..." Kagome said.
"That's the way," Atsuko smiled, "but before you get him dressed...you should give him a bath." She soon covered her nose with her hand. "He really is a sweetheart, but he smells like a dead rat..."
"Good idea," Kagome said as she covered her nose, too. "Hey, Inuyasha!"
"Huh?" Inuyasha muttered as his ears pricked up but his eyes never left the TV screen.
"Can you come here for a minute?" Kagome asked.
"Uh...can't it wait?" Inuyasha asked.
"No," Kagome answered, causing him to sigh.
"Okay, I'm coming," he muttered as he got up, cans, cups, and bags scattering all over the floor. "Oops."
XXX
"You want me to what?!"
"Take off your clothes and get in the tub! It's that simple!"
Inuyasha stood in the bathroom with Kagome, who had just finished running a bath for him. The half-demon looked apprehensively at the steaming water with those big, soapy bubbles. He didn't like the looks of it. He had baths before, but not as often...and he never took his baths with bubbles.
"Come on, Inuyasha," Kagome said. "I made sure it's nice and warm!"
"No way," Inuyasha groused.
"Would you rather I pin you down and strip you?" Kagome asked with a glare, causing him to tense up for a moment...but then he sighed.
"Oh, all right!" he said in resignation as he began to strip off his clothes (and Kagome had to fight with everything she had not to stare at his pectoral muscles). Once Inuyasha had taken off his clothes, Kagome soon gathered them in her arms and walked out.
"I'm just taking these to be washed," she said. "Try not to be in the bath for too long!"
Once she was gone, Inuyasha soon got in the tub...and sighed in content as he felt the warm water on his skin. He had to admit, the bubbles actually did feel pretty nice. As he sat in the bath, he grabbed the soap bar and began to wash himself off. As he did, he heard the door open and turned to see Kagome walking in, holding some kind of bottle.
"Hold still, Inuyasha," she said as she squirted some funny-smelling substance onto her hand.
"What's that stuff?" Inuyasha asked as Kagome began to scrub it into his hair. "Ah! Hey!"
"Don't move," Kagome said as she scrubbed his scalp. "Shampoo really stings if it gets in your eyes."
Inuyasha grumbled as he sat in the tub...but then he smiled a bit as he felt Kagome's fingers rub into his hair and particularly at his ears. It actually felt pretty nice, getting his hair washed. Come to think of it, he hadn't washed his hair in a long time. It just got so long, he couldn't really do it by himself. His mother always washed it for him.
"How's it going, Kagome?" Atsuko asked as she peeked her head inside.
"I think he's liking it," Kagome said as she kept scrubbing Inuyasha's head, then picked up a basin. "Close your eyes, Inuyasha, and hold your breath."
Inuyasha did as he was told as Kagome dumped water over his head, rinsing out the shampoo before she began to scrub his hair again, causing him to sigh pleasantly as she kept washing out his hair.
"See?" Kagome asked. "Bath time's not so bad!"
"Keh..." Inuyasha snorted.
After a while, though, it was time for him to get out. Whatever. The water was starting to get cold, anyway.
"Okay," Kagome said as she unplugged the drain. "Now that you're done, let's get you dry."
"Oh, that's fine," Inuyasha said as he wore a towel around his waist. "I can do that, myself." He then sat down on his haunches, and it was then that Kagome realized what he was about to do.
"No, wait!" Kagome cried. "Inuyasha, not that-"
Too late. Inuyasha soon began to shake violently, sending droplets of water everywhere...especially onto Kagome.
"AAH! NO!" Kagome shrieked. "STOP! INUYASHA, STOP! YOU'RE GETTING ME WET!"
Inuyasha finally stopped shaking before he looked up at Kagome, who glared at him as water dripped from her face and hair, causing him to grin sheepishly
"Uh...whoops," he said.
In spite of herself, Kagome couldn't help but giggle a little, and Inuyasha began to laugh, too.
Soon after, Kagome began to dry out Inuyasha's hair with a blow dryer, although he complained it when he said that the air blowing out of it was too hot. After turning it down a bit, Kagome continued to blow out his hair, which puffed out a bit once she was finished. Kagome tried her hardest not to laugh at the half-demon, who gave her a grumpy glare before she began to brush it down back to its regular smoothness.
"Oh, yeah..." he crooned, causing Kagome to laugh.
After a while, Inuyasha was finally finished getting his hair brushed, but now there was something else he needed: a new wardrobe.
"Hmm..." Kagome hummed as she and Inuyasha were in her room while she searched through a cardboard box full of clothing. "There has to be something here you can wear."
"What's wrong with me wearing my Robe of the Fire Rat?" asked Inuyasha.
"There's nothing wrong with it," Kagome answered as she searched through the box. "It's just that if you're gonna go out into town with me, you have to look like you're from this century. These are all clothes that my Dad used to wear
"Your grandfather doesn't dress like everyone else in your world," Inuyasha countered.
"My Grandpa's old-fashioned," Kagome rebuked. "He's always been that way. Now then..." She pulled out a green shirt and a pair of black pants. "Why don't you try these?"
Inuyasha blinked before he took the clothes, then went to get dressed in them while Kagome had her back turned. When she turned around, though, she noticeably grimaced at how he looked.
"No good?" Inuyasha asked.
"Uhh...no," Kagome replied.
"This is stupid," Inuyasha muttered. "Why can't I just wear my regular clothes?"
"Inuyasha, just trust me on this, okay?" Kagome asked as she pulled out another outfit consisting of a red hoodie and a pair of gray sweats. "Here, try this one. It's kinda like your old clothes!"
Inuyasha soon went to put on the attire...but as he looked in the mirror, he growled in disdain as he stared in reflection.
"I hate this!" he exclaimed. "Kagome, can't I just wear my clothes?!"
"Inuyasha, please just work with me!" Kagome pleaded. "Look...just one more outfit, and if you don't like it, we can stop. Okay?"
"...Fine," Inuyasha huffed, "but this is the last one."
Kagome soon pulled out another outfit, which consisted of a black shirt with the word "WAN" in big gray letters and a paw print pattern, and a pair of loose-fitting blue jeans. She sighed before she handed the outfit to Inuyasha, who snatched it out of her hands and proceeded to change. Kagome sat, waiting for him to say something...but all she got was silence.
"Inuyasha?" Kagome asked as she glanced back. "How's it going? Do you like...it...?" She trailed off as she saw Inuyasha staring in the mirror, not out of disgust or disdain...but fascination.
"Inuyasha?" Kagome asked as she came and stood next to him. "What do you think?"
"...I think...I like it," Inuyasha replied as he looked himself over. "It kinda feels like me."
Kagome beamed, glad that she finally got him to settle on an outfit that he liked...but there was still this nagging feeling that she might have been forgetting something.
It was then that her eyes landed on Inuyasha's twitching ears.
"Oh, right...I almost forgot," she said as she looked inside the box, again. "Hmm...there must be something...aha!" She then pulled out a black baseball cap with some sort of emblem on the front. "Here, Inuyasha, put this cap on."
"...'Cap'?" Inuyasha repeated.
"Hold still," Kagome said as she placed the cap over his head, covering his ears. "And...there! See? It's perfect!"
Inuyasha then looked himself in the mirror, again...only this time, he seemed to be a bit unsettled.
"What's wrong?" Kagome asked in concern.
"Why are you making me cover my ears?" Inuyasha asked. "You never had a problem with that, before."
Kagome felt her heart sink as he looked at her with those sad eyes. She didn't even stop to think that this might hurt his feelings in some way. After all, Feudal Era, she never asked Inuyasha to hide his looks from others.
How could she explain this to him?
"Look...Inuyasha, it's not that I have a problem with your looks," Kagome said. "It's just...we live in modern Japan. Demons don't exist here, anymore!" She paused. "Okay, some more than others, but not everyone here will be tolerant of you as me or my family! If anything, that might have gotten worse."
"Worse, how?" Inuyasha inquired.
"Well...I don't know how to say this," Kagome said. "It's just...remember how you used to say that some people are afraid of things that they don't understand?"
"Yeah," Inuyasha replied.
"Well, the same thing goes for here in my world," Kagome replied. "If people see a man with dog ears walking around, they'll immediately sense something's off. They could...they could take you away...send you to some kind of freak show...or worse, you could get sent to some kind of lab where they do painful experiments on you."
Inuyasha's eyes went wide at the explanation. Was she trying to tell him that this world was just as dangerous? If that was the case, why were they going out?
"Look," Kagome said. "I'm not trying to hide who you are...I just don't want anything to happen to you." She then held his hand and squeezed it tightly. "You don't have to wear these clothes all the time...just when you go out into town or something. I don't want people to know who you are...I don't want you to get taken away from me."
Inuyasha's eyes softened as he thought back to what she said the other day...about her vision of Kikyo taking him away to hell with her.
Hearing that...now it all made sense.
"You're still afraid, aren't you?" he asked, and she nodded her head in response...and soon after, he suddenly pulled her into his arms. "You idiot...you can't get rid of me, that easily."
Kagome chuckled a bit, causing him to laugh, too.
XXX
Later on, as Kagome and Inuyasha made their way downstairs, Sota and Sanosuke all looked up as they noticed the half-demon in his new clothes.
"Wow, look at you!" Sota exclaimed. "I almost didn't recognize you! You look really cool, Inuyasha!"
"Uh...thanks...?" Inuyasha asked.
"You wear my son's clothing rather well," said Sanosuke. "I remember how he would always wear those when he was Kagome's age. I could never throw it out, so I kept it...glad I finally found a use for it, again."
"Oh, wait!" Atsuko exclaimed as she noticed Inuyasha's bare feet. "You're not going out without anything on your feet, are you?"
"I already tried getting him to wear shoes," Kagome said, sheepishly.
"I see," Atsuko said before she went out of the room for a moment, then came back with a pair of black sandals. "How about these, then?"
Inuyasha blinked before he put the sandals on, wiggling his toes a little to get a good feel of them before he smiled.
"Thanks, Kagome's mother," he said, causing Atsuko to laugh and pat his shoulder.
"Of course, honey," she said, then she handed him something else: his haori, now nice and dry. "I think maybe you'd like this back, too...if you want."
Inuyasha looked over at Kagome, who smiled and nodded his head, causing him to smile before he pulled it on.
"Ready to go?" Kagome asked as she prepared to head out the door.
"Yep! All set!" Inuyasha replied as they prepared to head out.
"Oh, Kagome, one more thing, sweetheart," Atsuko said as she handed her daughter some yen notes. "Here's some money. Don't spend it all in one place, understand?"
"Yes, ma'am," Kagome nodded before she and Inuyasha headed out the door. "Come on, Inuyasha!"
"Have fun!" Atsuko called. "And be careful! Keep an eye on each other!"
"We will" Inuyasha called back as they left the house, walked across the yard, and descended the shrine steps. As they did, though, Kagome suddenly tensed up as she glanced over her shoulder.
"Kagome?" Inuyasha asked. "What's up?"
"Uh...nothing," Kagome answered before she soon walked down the street, heading into town. "Come on! I'll show you around!"
'That's weird...I thought I sensed the Sacred Jewel,' she thought as she and Inuyasha walked away...unaware that a shadowy figure was leering at them from around the corner.
Uh-oh...
Review, please!
