A/N: So…um..hi guys. *checks last update date* Oh wow, it's been a hot minute. I know most of you have probably given up on this story and, frankly, for awhile I think I probably did too, as well as writing entirely, buried under the realities of life as I have been. But I stumbled on my old notes for this fic and after years of going without, I've missed it, and as I sit here writing this I realize that I kind of needed it.
Does this mean I'm returning to fanfiction? Ish. I would like to continue to write, and I do have a few ideas for a couple long-term stories but updates will be unlikely to be very frequent. Honestly, I need someone to harass/motivate me into it like a personal trainer so unless anyone wants to volunteer for THAT job, a strict schedule is unlikely at this point.
Now, on to what everyone actually wants to know about.
We're in the final stretches of the story here; the next chapter will be the finale with an epilogue to follow. Will there be a sequel? Maybe. Somewhere down the road it is a possibility, depending on the demand for it and my muse's willingness. For now, I have new plot bunnies that have been pestering me (yes, more Kagome-centric crossovers). Please keep in mind that given the admittedly obnoxious length of time it's been since I have written, my writing style has changed and grown from when I first started this project.
This chapter has not been reviewed by a beta.
Genre: Romance/Angst/Drama- and what story is complete without a bit of action in there somewhere?
Rating: M
Disclaimer: Yeah, I'm secretly a rich manga-ka and write fanfiction in my rare free time…just for kicks.
She had made this trek so many times now. With a startling sense of clarity, an understanding that had swept through her since her epiphany by the well, she acknowledged the cycle that they'd been trapped in. The push and pull of what was to be a never-ending struggle and suffering. It would be different this time. She could feel it in her bones.
The cycle ended today.
The red glow of the demon realm sky had an odd sort of beauty to it, Kagome decided. It wasn't like the feudal era. The feudal era was alive and aware, made of a unified population of humans and demons who knew of one another's existence. The clean blue sky of the past, the unhampered wilderness of an untamed Japan that was filled with life and activity was something that she could never forget and would never see again.
Nothing would ever compare to the picturesque wilderness that had been the warring states era.
The demon world was a wilderness of an entirely different sort. The sky, though beautiful, possessed the haunting glow of an endless sunset. The air, at least to a human like herself, was a suffocating fog of demonic energies, all constantly pushing and struggling to be dominant, yearning for the freedom that they'd once had, the balance that had once been there stripped away in the segregation of demons and humans.
From what she had learned, it had been the brilliant plan of some god –Enma, if she recalled properly- to separate demons from humans. If it had been an act to protect humans from demon kind, he had done it entirely wrong.
Without the awareness there were no defenses. It was only by the grace of the Shikon and the journey that her soul had been so tied to that she even knew the taste of her own reiki. If she'd been less wizened, or perhaps more, she would have been uncertain whether to consider it a blessing or a curse.
She knew better. Knowledge was power. The loss of that knowledge was what had stripped humans of that power to begin with, to be little more than sitting ducks. Reiki existed in all humans to varying degrees, active or not, as had been evidenced with her bother. She almost mourned that she wouldn't be able to teach him the things she'd had to learn on her own, but he would become stronger for it. He would still have the others, she was sure.
She could only scowl at the thought of it and supposed she would have tried to change that, had she not had her own ghosts to put to rest. They weren't even her ghosts, not really.
Never in a million years would Kagome ever try to claim that she was not bitter towards Kikyo. She was over the childish resentment that she once harbored and she certainly empathized with the woman more, but that bitterness remained nonetheless. The mercy that Kikyo had shown Onigumo was not really mercy at all; it was condemnation to a life of suffering, to survive only on the kindness of others. Even growing up in a sheltered modern day life, Kagome wasn't so foolish as to think that the kindness of strangers was so common a thing. It was an ideal, but not a standard.
Oh no, the current standards for what had become of the world were far more daunting. However, rallying against those who upheld such things would not fall to her this time. She was a priestess, meant to sacrifice herself for the sake of others, not a revolutionist.
"Oh, but since when have you ever conformed to traditional expectations?"
For a brief, horrifying moment, Kagome thought that her seal on the portal through the well had not worked. Looking behind her at the towering shape of her beloved Goshinboku, she saw nothing. Expanding her senses she felt the buzz of demonic energy that was expected of the demon world, but nothing further.
"Don't fear so, little guardian. They have not followed."
The title made her take pause, and Kagome looked downwards hesitantly. "S-Shikon?"
The little hum of energy that suddenly echoed through her told her that she'd been correct. She reached down to grasp the jewel and it thrummed with power that suddenly mingled with her own. She hadn't felt such power since her first incidental use of it when she'd met Mistress Centipede.
It was unnerving.
Despite that, and perhaps more frightening, it was intoxicating. A weaker person might have gotten drunk on the sensation with just that faint taste of power. There was a sudden pang of empathy for all the demons they had put down during the shard hunt, driven to madness by the power of the jewel, even fractured.
Closing her eyes, Kagome took a breath to steady herself. Little wisps of purity flickered to the surface of her skin and she felt the tendrils of the jewel's influence loosen.
"Clever little guardian…don't you want our power?"
"You won't fool me, Shikon. I know you're more than Midoriko." Stepping over a downed tree, the priestess continued her trek with a frown. The jewel praised and insulted her intelligence in a single breath. However much it prickled her ire, she knew better than to be goaded. It would be the end of her just as it had been Kikyo, who hadn't even been so intertwined with the cursed artifact.
The jewel was eerily silent.
The forest around her very suddenly seemed too quiet as well. The hairs on the back of her neck stood up, an instinctive fear crawling over her skin at the stillness. It took a moment, but she very suddenly understood. In the thickness of the realm's natural youki, she hadn't noticed the change in the air at first. A thin fog of miasma hovered through the air. It was enough to ward off weaker creatures, or at least those that knew better, and so faint that she had not even noticed her own aura pushing it back and purifying it so seamlessly. Looking up, she almost could have laughed.
The shadow of an old-world castle loomed tauntingly in front of her, shimmering with a barrier of demonic energy. In five hundred years, the spider's taste hadn't changed. It was almost as if she was back in the feudal era once more. She suspected it was intentional but, as devious as Naraku was, he did have his whims.
The faint flicker of very human energy beyond the walls shattered her brief sense of amusement. Her lips thinned as she recalled the accusing stare of the avatar's angry green eyes. Still, she did not blame him for his anger, just as she had not blamed Yusuke. 'It was my fault, after all…I deserved neither of them.'
Suddenly, the barrier shimmered, parting in a mocking welcome.
"Well…who am I to turn down such an obvious invitation?" Kagome mused to herself, an odd sense of detachment coming over her as she stepped through the threshold of the first gate. She was almost all the way through when a sudden grip caught her wrist, making her stop with a startled jolt. She lifted her free hand, coated with purification, as she spun to face her would be captor. Her breath froze in her throat, stunned.
"K-Kuwabara-kun?" Her eyes widened, her lips parting wordlessly as she gaped at the taller man. "How did you…"
"A hunch…you stood inside my spirit when you pushed…him out and if he could use his spirit to control me... used the remnants of your reiki to pull myself through after you jumped."
"But why would you-"
"You said we were friends. Friends don't leave each other behind." He let go of her wrist to cross his arms over his chest, but the corner of his lips still quirked upward with a warmth she hadn't realized she needed. "And friends don't let each other fight alone."
A few tears burned her eyes, but she blinked them away, choking on a sound somewhere between a sob and a laugh. With a watery smile she shook her head but said nothing. Instead, she looked down at the hand that had caught her and gingerly wrapped her smaller one around it. He returned the gesture, his grip firmer than hers as they exchanged one last glance and walked the rest of the way through the gate together. The energy behind them slammed back into place with such force it practically reverberated through the air as the proverbial door slammed shut.
There was no turning back.
An eerie silence settled in the air over Sunset Shrine. At a glance, the night was peaceful, with a stillness about that spoke of the advancing hour. When the last remnants of the priestess' power finally faded, pandemonium erupted, and that peace was shattered.
"We need to go after her!"
If not for a hastily enforced ward, courtesy of one exasperated fox god, Souta was certain that even with their remote location the neighbors would have called the police. For a long moment he could only stand there, dumbfounded as he stared at the well house where his sister had vanished. The others began arguing, loudly, but it only came through as noise.
"You have to know what she's planning! She can't do it on her own, not with that other miko-"
"You leave Kikyo out of this, wolf!"
There was a feminine shout of indignity from what could only be the demon slayer -Sango, his mind supplied- and Souta hunched his shoulders.
"Kagome might be walking into her death and you're still worried about denying that woman's effect on her?! Inuyasha, no matter your feelings she's hurt Kagome!"
"Sango, it ain't Kikyo's fault Kagome couldn't handle-"
"Finish that sentence, Inuyasha. I fuckin' dare you." The challenge was spoken low, a feral tone to it that undercut all the noise and chatter with an echo that drew the attention away from each other's throats and to the red fox who had spoken.
It seemed they had forgotten exactly who alpha status had fallen to in Sesshomaru's absence.
Perhaps it was because he was typically so laid back by nature. Perhaps it was because they had only ever known him as a child or a prankster, but as Shippo strode out of the well house, his front a little singed from where the priestess had struck him with her ward, they all froze. Even Inari was suspiciously silent.
"I'm done sitting around here waiting." The words came out a snarl, the reverberation of it so feral that it sounded eerily two-toned for a moment.
Beside them, the Goshinboku hummed almost nervously.
When the red fox suddenly whirled on the ancient tree, they paused in unison to watch him with a mutual concern that the fox had finally snapped. "Open it now¸ Kwannon!"
"Is…is he yelling at the tree?"
Souta snorted at the detective, crossing his arms as he watched the display, just as confused but not inclined to be terribly polite to the man who'd made his sister cry – or so he'd been told. "Not the usual effect that tree has on people…"
"Please, calm down…"
The disembodied voice danced through the air, echoing from everywhere and nowhere all at once. A few of them shivered at the sensation more obviously than the rest.
"Then get out here and open the damn portal." For those who'd known him, the ice of his tone left them startled, wondering if the demon stood before them was really the Shippo they had known.
The wind blew gently in a quiet sigh. Then the aura of the Goshinboku became tangible. It was a soft glow at first, the taste of pure spiritual energy dancing through the air as it slowly began to solidify into a humanoid form.
Sango was the first to react, straightening with a start. "R-Rin?!"
The apologetic smile that the -now taller- girl offered the slayer was confirmation enough.
"Y-you're…"
"A Kami." The ease in which she supplied the words confirmed it further. "Rin always was…but Rin did not always know."
"But…didn't Sesshomaru…" Inuyasha clapped his mouth shut when she turned to look at him instead, unnerved by the knowing look on the face of the young human girl he had known, however fleetingly.
"What greater lesson in the value of mercy than a taiyoukai who scorned weakness coming to raise and protect a human child?"
There was a long moment of silence as the implication settled over them.
To the side, Yusuke shared a look with Hiei, shrugging with a defeated sigh when the hybrid looked at him as if he could drum up an explanation for what was going on. He couldn't. He didn't know. He hadn't known what they were getting into from the start. None of them could have predicted just how deeply this had all run.
It was far more than a simple power struggle for one magical artifact. For once, this was a fight that he was not looking forward to. That wasn't to say that he even understood what they were fighting anymore.
'It was just supposed to be a rogue miko…' He almost laughed, but wearily dragged a hand over his face with another sigh instead. 'Well, I guess it still is if you think about it…'
The familiar taste of guilt gnawed at him as he wondered how differently things would have gone if he'd handled things better. Their whirlwind romance seemed so far away now, though still felt as if it had only been yesterday.
He still couldn't even eat popcorn without thinking of her.
His musings were cut short at a sudden flare of what he oddly couldn't distinguish between demonic or spiritual energy and he looked over just in time to see the tree spirit -the kami- grimace at the angry fox.
"Open the portal Kwannon. You let Kagome do it."
"She's-"
"About to walk into her death. Isn't she worth your mercy at least one more time?"
The girl almost flinched, looking wounded, but sighed and turned towards the well house. A sense of energy that they hadn't consciously realized was missing suddenly hummed from the old building.
"It is open…you should hurry if you wish to join them." She closed her eyes and faded back into the tree.
"Them?" Yusuke frowned, confused -that seemed a constant tonight- and looked around at their ranks. 'Kagome went through alone…that's why everyone panicked so who-'
Kuwabara was missing.
"Well, fuck. I'm going to pound that idiot. What's he thinking?"
"You can ask him if they're still alive when we get there." The fox was gone, through the well before Yusuke could so much as growl his anger at the suggestion. He wouldn't let that creature take his friend again. The others seemed to snap to attention as he settled his own inner demons, the eerie calm of resolve settling over him as he followed behind the slayer.
The wolf and the half demon were already gone, the first ones behind the fox.
"I'm going too!"
He froze, just at the well house door, or what was left of it, and turned to look at the kid. He'd forgotten about him. His mouth suddenly ran dry and Yusuke frowned. Reikai already had their eyes on him, their attention drawn to his active spiritual power if the paperwork he'd spied on Koenma's desk was any indication. "Kid, I don't think-"
"That's my sister you're talking about." Souta snapped, his gaze flickering with a brief violet hue that spoke of his tenuous control. "I won't just-"
The boy froze suddenly, his eyes dimming before he even knew what hit him. Then he crumpled.
Yusuke sighed, his shoulders slumping in relief and looked to the hybrid who had knocked him out. "Take 'im to Genkai's? We can't just leave him here…"
"Hn."
Watching the demon vanish with the kid, the detective was suddenly very aware of how alone he was. With a grunt, he rotated his shoulder and stalked into the well house. He hesitated only a moment longer before he jumped in with a new resolution. He had some mistakes to make up for.
"Kagome, Kagome, Kagome…did you really think it would be as simple as just walking in?"
Of course she hadn't. Though Kagome supposed she shouldn't have assumed they would have been given the chance to breathe before all hell broke loose. It had just been the swarm at first, but there were many very suddenly. Her arrows cut through them well enough in the beginning but they started getting closer and the barrier at her back had her trapped firmly in place.
Kuwabara had stepped in then. The large man was suddenly between her and the hoard of advancing demons, cutting them back with a sword he'd not had before. When she looked closer she realized it was made of raw spiritual energy.
A little smile curled her lips as she'd watched him force them back. No wonder Naraku had feared him.
Allowed a little room to breathe, Kagome fell into step with him, seamlessly loosing an arrow over his shoulder as he pivoted to cut a swath through an advance at her left. They moved in tandem in a way that somehow shook her to her core and brought her a sense of peace.
She had only ever fought with Inuyasha so seamlessly.
Once the swarm had thinned, Hakudoshi stepped out, a wild look in his eyes as he lunged for them, blocked only by the other man's spirit blade. "Tsk. My pet needs retraining, I think."
"Kuwabara isn't the pet here, Hakudoshi." Shooting down another demon, Kagome inclined her head to check on her friend and eye the troublesome incarnation. "Are you even that much to Naraku?"
She must have hit a sore spot because he was suddenly in front of her, hefting her from the ground with a bruising grip of her throat. She heard Kuwabara shout her name, but it was muffled beneath the sudden violent buzz of demon energy that swirled around them, angrily threatening to suffocate her.
"Kagome…" He cooed, looking almost amused as she wrapped her fingers around his wrist. "Trying to use my own tricks against me?"
She suddenly stopped struggling, looking at him with a weak little smile that made him pause, even as she strained to breathe.
"…it…worked though…"
He was given no time to question her before he suddenly froze. He looked down slowly, his movements stiff as his fingers slowly went slack. The priestess hit the ground with a gasp, his gaze only having a few seconds to comprehend the spirit blade sticking through his front before the little tingle of purity swept through him.
Panting, Kuwabara wrenched his spirit sword from the demon that had once controlled him. Straightening, he managed a glare as he caught his breath, watching as the tendrils of purification spread out from the wound, leaving ash in its wake.
"Kazuma Kuwabara is nobody's pet."
Once the incarnation was no more, Kuwabara sank to his knees beside the priestess with a gasp, barely noticing the way he gathered her to his chest in a hug. She returned it, patting his back comfortingly. Their moment of reprieve in the wake of brief victory wasn't going to last.
Kagome barely managed to throw up her own barrier as that thought almost immediately proved correct. Her legs quaked a little as her companion helped her stand, arms still wrapped around her until they were both upright, and she offered him a hesitant smile.
"Thank you, Kuwabara-kun."
At their feet, the thin, previously ineffective, mist of miasma slowly thickened. Together, they stared at it for a moment before looking back up to each other. With a shared nod, they fell back into step. Kuwabara's sword reformed in his hand and the barrier already at Kagome's expanded, pushing back the weight of the miasma as their linked power danced around them in sync.
"Hey, 'Gome?"
She didn't look at them as they moved but hummed a quiet acknowledgment. "Hm?"
"When we get out of this…I want chocolate chip."
If she hadn't needed to block a shot aimed at his head, Kagome might have stumbled but managed simply to choke out a surprised giggle instead. "All you can eat, Kuwabara-kun. Promise."
A wide grin spread over his face at that and Kuwabara felt a renewed sense of excitement roll through him, invigorating his movements as they neared the castle doors.
Cookies be damned, she had promised to live.
A/N: Welp, not much to say that wasn't in the opening AN other than another resounding 'I'm sorry' for how hideously long it's been. I have been living in a soap opera for the last 10 years at least. Also, no, you are not going crazy, I have indeed changed my penname to reflect some of the many changes that have happened since I first began here at FF as CherryBlossomLove.
Any questions, drop them in a review or a PM.
~Huntress