The Call of the Heart

A/N - The events of Chapter 25 and 26 are connected, but I decided to split them into two smaller chapters instead of having one obnoxiously huge one. There might be a delay with Chapter 27 due to important events happening in my life and my beta reader/editor's life. Thank you for reading this far. I hope you're enjoying it.

A sigh of relief was breathed when the brush slid through his hair smoothly. He knew better than to let his hair go for even a day, but he actually forgot to tend to it in the midst of his experiments. It took a shower, a few rounds of conditioner, and patience when he had to swap out the brush and comb, but his hair was now tamed. The split ends displeased him, but he knew it was time for a trim anyway.

'I should have tried it in a different spot,' he frowned when he saw the thin line of pink tracing down the top of his arm to his wrist. His goal was to gradually increase the injuries' severity to observe how long they healed, but he didn't take how obvious it was into account. The higher the severity, the more solution he added, so the glow was more noticeable. 'I usually think of those things beforehand, but- what is that?' Naraku leaned forward and tilted his head forward. Using a comb, he singled out the reflective strand of hair and plucked it from his head straightening his posture to examine it.

"Hah," he choked out a laugh, but he grit his teeth instead of smiling. It was a gray hair. He dropped it into the trash and leaned forward again, carefully inspecting his hair for any others. A second one appeared, so he plucked it and banished it to the trash can with its brother.

After wrapping his arm in gauze to cover the glow, he dressed and left to teach the last lab class of the semester. Fortunately for him, it was an exam, so he didn't have to teach or even speak. He didn't need Jade's assistance, either, but she already told him she was showing up anyway.

'I don't want her anywhere near the heart and it's almost like she knows.' The thought was sarcastic, but a cold blade of terror pierced his chest; what if she did know subconsciously? What if the heart's influence over her was stronger than it appeared? 'I'm being paranoid. Jade has always wanted to be around me.' That thought melted the previous one and warmed his whole body. It made him severely uncomfortable. He even shifted around in his seat as he waited for the light to turn green.

The room was quiet, but not silent. Pencils scratched away, buttons on calculators were tapped, papers flapped, and, Naraku's favorite, the hopeless and annoyed sighs and groans of the students who couldn't solve the equations he created for their final exam. Since the lab class was ending a week earlier than regular classes, he figured he would send his students off with a final, "Fuck you."

'I don't care what anyone says; this is better than sex.' Naraku chuckled with delight when he caught one student, a brown-haired girl with glasses, glaring at him heatedly. When their eyes met, she rolled hers and looked down at her exam to continue writing. His eyes closed as he savored the moment.

While the students suffered, Jade was gathering the glassware and organizing them onto a cart to return to the storage room. Naraku debated helping her, but then remembered there was a room full of people. He tried once more to convince her not to show up, but Jade insisted that she would find something to do. That wasn't the issue, but he didn't argue any further. It wasn't like he could come up with a good reason to keep her away other than the truth, which was the last thing he wanted to use. He even tried to think of errands to send her on, but nothing would have kept her away entirely. She was too good of an assistant...and he preferred her presence, even if it meant she was in danger.

The first student handed Naraku his exam and left the room promptly. Naraku pulled out a red pen, ready to color the young man's entire exam red, but Naraku's hopes were dashed after viewing the first five answers.

'This one studied.' Naraku almost despised that fact, but then he realized that was less work for him in the end, so he quickly got over it. The soft clanging of glass alerted him that Jade finished collecting the equipment and was delivering it to the storage room.

Three more students finished their exams by the time Jade returned. She immediately walked to the desk and leaned down in front of Naraku.

"Want me to start grading?" she asked in a low voice. Naraku stared her down without blinking, slowly holding up the grading key. She shook her head. "Just say yes or no, dude."

"Yes." Naraku said quickly. Jade reached up to grab the paper, but Naraku bent his wrist and pulled it from her reach. She tried again and Naraku pulled it farther away. Jade lunged forward and grabbed his wrapped wrist and he panicked and pulled her forward onto the desk with a blunt thump.

"Seriously?" she grumbled.

"Jade, I told you not right now. There are people in here." Naraku said loudly in a fake scolding tone. Everyone was staring at them now; some were smiling, some were too upset to smile, and the rest looked completely unamused.

"Fuck you, dude." Jade pushed herself up and back onto her feet.

"I said later."

"You're hilarious." she replied dryly. Naraku opened his mouth to reply, but stopped when the loud scraping of a stool cracked the silence. He glanced over in time to see Sara the Rainbow Girl sprinting out of the room. Her materials and exam remained at her seat. Kagome grimaced as she waved Jade over. Jade walked over to her friend, who leaned up and cupped her hands around Jade's ear, whispering something that seemed to simultaneously humor and disturb her as her face twisted from a smile to a cringing, inaudible scream.

"Why?" Jade whined softly.

"I don't know." Kagome shrugged. Naraku cleared his throat, using his finger to signal Jade to approach him. She did with a heavy sigh, leaning down in front of Naraku once again.

"Explain," he ordered.

"Uh...you can't guess?"

"Was she irritated by our public display of affection?"

"If by irritated you mean jealous, yeah,"

"Jealous?" Naraku was taken aback. He thought it was clear that he was embarrassing Jade for his own amusement...and defense.

"She tried getting with you over a month ago,"

"I gave her your workplace number and told her to go away,"

"That just means that you're, uh, shit, what's that word," Jade held her finger up as she pulled out her phone, typing away to search for something. "A tsundere,"

"Where did you learn that?" Naraku asked slowly, feeling the cold, tingling sensation of realization creeping up his body.

'Does she think that about me because I've stopped tormenting her?' he blinked. His jaw clenched tightly. 'I...am not a tsundere!'

"I told you, a chunk of my viewers are weeaboos. I'm pretty sure Sara is a weeb. I've seen the mangas she carries around. I also live with Japanese roommates. I work with several Japanese men." Jade looked up. "That's all weird, now that I think about it."

"So, she has a fetish for Japanese men?" he nodded in the direction of the rainbow girl's seat.

"Probably. In her defense, though," Jade paused, waving her hand to showcase Naraku. He couldn't help but to snort and smirk in response. He had no disagreements there. Naraku leaned back and waved the grading key at Jade. She snatched it from him and shook her head. "Thank you, Tsundere-Senpai."

"I will quarter you, scatter your limbs across the country, and keep your skull as a mug. Your family will never find a single piece of you."

"Oooooh, touchy. I think I found a new nickname for you." Jade snickered. "Daddy Tsundere-Senpai."

"On second thought, I'll keep you alive, but just barely."

When class was over, Naraku walked back to his office. Jade offered to follow and help him finish grading, but he insisted they would finish later and told her to go study for Bruce's exam. Naraku placed the folder holding the lab exams on his desk and sat down, opening his laptop to check his emails. He saw he received one from the seismologist he contacted the previous week, so he was curious to know what answers he had.

'Please excuse the informality of my response. My phone doesn't believe in formats. Thank you for your interest in my research. I do have additional data of that area if you're interested. The questions you've asked me are unique and complex. Would you be willing to schedule a video chat with me so I can explain them in person? It's easier than writing out a novel.'

'He's far more prompt than Bruce.' Naraku exhaled and sent a response accepting the researcher's offer.

The crystal heart's beating had slowed down and remained slow for almost a week. It reminded Naraku of the heart beats of hibernating animals, so he wondered if it was doing just that. It built up and expended energy just to...what? Call to Jade and hypnotize her for five minutes? Is that all it did or was there more?

'Will it be stronger the next time it happens? What will it do if it has her fully under control? What is its goal?' Naraku couldn't deny his curiosity. It overpowered everything else in his mind. As much as he regretted involving Jade, he couldn't help but to also be intrigued by her responses to the crystals. 'My sediment samples show the microscopic life being completely overtaken by the substance, so what does it do? Does it institute a hive mind?' A small, dark part of him wanted to text Jade and ask her to come to his office to see if the heart would do anything. He sighed and shook his head. He still couldn't figure out why it didn't affect him. He swallowed a drop of the pink solution and Jade swallowed a drop of the purple; the heart was a mixture of the two, so why was he left alone?

"Would it do the same to me if I swallowed a drop of the purple?" he murmured as he scratched his head. A rampage was inevitable, but would he become violent if no one was around?

The sun was setting by the time Naraku finished grading the last of the exams. He turned his desk lamp on, but it didn't turn on, which annoyed him. He switched the light bulb out a couple of days prior.

'The lamp must have faulty wiring.' He walked to the light switch next to the door and flipped it.

Nothing. The only source of lights were the setting sun and the crystal heart. Cursing under his breath about the old building, he packed up his things and decided to head home.

When he arrived home, he received a response from the researcher, asking if chatting in an hour was possible. Naraku quickly responded with a yes. He decided to clean his apartment in the meantime. It wasn't dirty, but it wasn't up to his standards and hadn't been for a few weeks. His illness, whatever it was, finally subsided. His stamina needed some work, but otherwise, he felt fine.

Naraku waited patiently for the researcher to call him. He had several pages of notes he typed out. The green phone icon appeared on his screen and he clicked on it, straightening his posture and preparing himself.

"Ah, Naraku, I assume? Dr. Anderson's grad student?" the old man asked. His hair and beard were snow-white, which helped his blue eyes shine.

"Yes. You know Bruce?"

"Know him? Not too much. Know of him? Yeah, I've reviewed several of his articles over the years. Your name was on one of them a couple of years ago. That's impressive for someone who was an undergraduate at the time."

"I designed and built the isolation box they tested the samples in."

"Huh, well then, you should put your name out there more often. People would kill to have someone build those kinds of devices if that meant saving a few bucks." the man laughed lightly. "Well, I'm Dr. Weiss. You said you have questions about my seismic data from Japan?"

"That and I also wanted to pick your brain about what you remember from that area,"

"I remember it was a bitch." Dr. Weiss said with a smile. Even his teeth were flawlessly white. "We ended up staying a few weeks longer than we originally planned because of interferences."

"The interferences are the sets of data on the smaller table?"

"That's correct."

"The reason you separated them was because they were constant; what did you mean by constant?"

"There were constant tremors registering at the same two frequencies while the others varied. Now, Japan sits where four tectonic plates meet, and it's volcanically active, so tremors are normal. Those aren't normal."

"Nearby city or town interference?"

"No, we ruled that out. So, the Y value is how strong they were, the X value is the recorded time, but the time is wrong on the paper. It was a typo, but by the time we realized it, it was too late. So we posted a corrected paper, but most people only see that paper due to everything being organized by dates."

"What should the time be?" Naraku frowned.

"It should be in intervals of single seconds, not intervals of three."

"Odd."

"That's for a reason; the points of data spread out more when you do that, and they couple up," Dr. Weiss scribbled on a piece of paper in front of him. "It should look like this," he held the paper up.

'One, two, nine second pause, three, four, nine second pause, five, six, nine second pause,' Naraku recognized the pattern immediately. It looked exactly like the graphs he made of the crystal's heart beats. The only difference was his heart's beats were faster than these.

"This happened constantly?" Naraku pressed, trying to keep his leg from bouncing with excitement.

"Constantly. All day, every day, and it never changed. We have ideas of what caused it, but we weren't able to confirm any of them." Dr. Weiss sighed. "I'm curious, though; what does this have to do with a chemistry student's thesis?"

"I need to understand the area if I'm going to understand why-"

"Why your stuff is purple?" he interrupted coolly. "My colleague saw your presentation in Colorado. He thought it was ironic that it was over an area within the area we studied. I find it ironic that you contacted me a month later."

"Indeed."

"Did they cut your funding like they did to us?"

Naraku kept his expression calm, but his blood was pumping. This man knew more than he was letting on. "Yes."

"When we studied the area, we weren't allowed to go near the totally-not-dead-or-dangerous lake. People talk, though, and some of them went missing. We were there a month and nine people, including one child, disappeared from the nearby town. I'm not saying it had anything to do with it, but if it looks and quacks like a duck,"

"People are also superstitious. They believe the lake is cursed."

"After what I saw, if someone told me it was the literal gate to Hell, I would believe them." Dr. Weiss stated. His entire demeanor had changed. He transitioned from a cheerful grandfather to a traumatized veteran within seconds. "I was told to never speak of it, but they can't stop me now. How open open-minded are you, son?"

"Extremely." Naraku answered seriously, refraining from flinching at, "son." It had been several years since he was called that and it was an insult throughout his life more often than not.

"Heh, I take it you've found more than colorful microbes, then."

"Oh yes."

"It was the last night we were allowed to camp in our study area. Here we are, a group of geologists, petrologists, seismologists, volcanologists, and we can't camp outside? We had certain places marked on our maps to help orient us if we got lost or too drunk; there was a swelling on a mountain that looked like a tit, which meant you were looking West, and four miles almost directly East was a decaying deer lying between two trees facing West, and the lake was couple miles East from that point,"

'Does every person in a geology-related field have a crude sense of humor? Perhaps I pursued the wrong field.' Naraku rarely used the word, "love," but he did love chemistry. A good portion of the professionals and students had stiff senses of humor, though. Bruce was one exception.

"The reason I tell you that is because I want to emphasize this point; I saw that deer's fresh carcass decay over the period of time we stayed in the area. Some animals picked at it, but it was mostly left alone; that's pretty weird. I didn't think too much of it then, though. So, I knew that deer by sight pretty well."

"What? Did you see it walking around at one point?" Naraku joked sarcastically. Dr. Weiss inhaled through his nose and when he exhaled, he smiled gently while nodding.

"Yeah, actually, I did. It was the last night we were allowed to camp. There was some drama between two researchers who were screwing each other, so my colleague, the one who saw you in Colorado, went for a walk and I went with him. We got a little turned around, but we knew what to do. I found the tit mountain, oriented myself, and walked, and walked, then I turned around and walked back...where was the deer? My colleague found the two trees, but no deer carcass. Whatever, right? A scavenger must have dragged it off." Dr. Weiss closed his eyes and almost looked like he was in pain. "I had this sudden feeling of dread, I felt heavier somehow, it was hard to breathe, and my colleague felt it, too. It was almost like some primal instinct of ours knew something before we did. I heard that high-pitched bleat and turned East and there it was, standing right at the edge of the forest, staring back at us. I almost thought it was a statue. And the chunks of flesh that were missing were being replaced by some purple or pink material, glowing. I couldn't quite tell what it was. We ran. We told everyone. Most of our colleagues actually believed us, because we're respected scientists, so why would we make that up? But we were told to not speak of it and we were restricted from camping from that point on and our funding was constantly under threat."

"I see." Naraku was unsure of what to think. It wasn't that he didn't believe the man; he grew a literal heart. He wasn't sure what to think of dead creatures walking around, though.

'The heaviness he felt, the breathing difficulty - I felt that last week when Jade...even her cousin called her zombie-like.'

"Well, you're not laughing, so I'm assuming you believe me a little."

"I do." Naraku nodded. "Did you see anything else?"

"No. The institute in charge of rehabilitating the area began patrolling more, so they were making sure we didn't see anything else." Dr. Weiss shrugged. "That's really all I have."

"It's helpful and not at the same time."

"I can only imagine. I don't know what's going on over there, and I don't know what you're doing, but the dead should be left alone. No good can come of something that reanimates dead bodies."

"I beg to differ."

"You're a man, a young one, an ambitious one, and intelligent - why do you think they willingly sent you samples?"

"My guess is they're either fishing for other opinions or they're running out of scientists and need the additional help, hence asking a graduate student and not an established professional. Their first mistake was assuming I would play by their rules."

"How sure are you that you're not an experiment to them?"

"Please, I'm my own experiment."

"Don't be shocked if they offer you a job next," the professor used his fingers to air-quote the word, "job." Naraku knew what he was implying.

"Let them."

"Hah, well, you have a set on you - I'll give you that." the old man sighed heavily; a tired smile appearing on his face. "They're desperate and people do terrible things when they're desperate. If they can't hurt you, they'll hurt someone you love."

"It must truly suck to be them; I don't love anyone." Naraku replied, seeing Kikyou's face in his mind and quickly banishing it.

"I guess they chose the wrong guy this time. Well, best of luck to you, Naraku. This will stay between us."

The call ended and Naraku closed his laptop, mulling over the entire conversation. If his suspicions about how the crystals worked were correct, then he was willing to bet everything that sitting at the very bottom of the lake was another crystal heart, and judging by the, "tremors," it was a large one.

'It might be an entire organism at this point if the approximate guess of five-hundred years this has been occurring is taken into account.' He inhaled deeply and looked up, leaning back on his couch. It was then he realized Dr. Weiss touched upon two sore spots of his; son and Kikyou. He clearly didn't mean to, but it burned all the same. 'How irritating. I didn't love her. I was a boy and desperate; nothing more.'

000000

"Close," Sesshomaru said, crossing his arms. "A couple of your molecules are out of place."

"Damn it." Jade turned back to the dry-erase board and huffed. The structure she drew was her best guess, so she didn't know what else to do. She placed the cap back onto the green marker she was holding and bit her lips together.

'I don't even have an idea.' she uncapped the marker and began to slowly draw a second structure, hoping her mistakes would become obvious.

"Stop," he ordered. "There is your first mistake. You can find your second."

"I seriously don't know. I'm guessing."

"Your guesses are too close to be made out of thin air. You know what you're doing; you just aren't confident." Sesshomaru picked up the blue marker and pulled off the cap. "These are the individual structures,"

"Okay."

"Has Naraku not taught you this?"

"He has, I'm just not a genius, so I don't know what the fuck he's saying."

"You should work on your confidence while you study."

"When I understand this, I'll be confident." Jade said with a frown. She threw her hands up when she saw that Sesshomaru had drawn dots and lines she had never seen before. "Okay, I blinked. What are you doing?"

"This is a 3-D model. The hydrogen and bromine are sticking out of the board and the carbon and carbenium are flat."

"Single bonds? Between the carbon ions?"

"Yes."

"Cool. I know one thing."

"Your original structure is close. You would score above average with it."

"I need more than that to maintain my grade."

"Let's try a different one," Sesshomaru suggested, grabbing the eraser to clear the board of their structures. He glanced down and saw Jade slowly massaging her temples with her eyes closed. "Let's take a break instead."

"Yeah," she replied defeatedly. Sesshomaru walked back to the other side of the table to continue organizing his papers. Jade stared down at her notes. Different molecules and their definitions were color coded between red, black, green, blue, and purple pen marks.

'She is overwhelmed and has been since her coma.' Sesshomaru noted.

"I'm so fuuuuuuuucked, dude!" she cried out dramatically.

"You will do fine. Bruce will curve the final." Sesshomaru told her.

"You sure?"

"I am. He told me not to tell anyone, so," he cut off and locked gazes with her.

"I didn't hear you." she replied with a smile.

"Did you measure out the salt for me?"

"Yeah. I did a lot of shit because I didn't want to look at this." she pointed at her notebook.

"Good. That will save me time." Sesshomaru debated thanking her, but decided against it.

An hour of silence passed between them before Jade decided to call it a day and go home to get some rest.

000000

"Jade, dismiss your alarm!" Sango sang out as she knocked on the door.

"Looking for it," Jade replied, noticing her hands were shaking as she peeled the blankets back.

"Let's go work out! It'll be fun!"

"Yeah, okay," Jade breathed, dismissing her alarm when she found her phone.

After cleaning up and getting dressed, Sango drove Jade to the gym with her. Jade felt bad for not giving Sango her full attention while she chatted lightly about her winter break plans, but her mind was frantic and she wasn't sure what to do about her exam.

"Working out before a final always helps me." Sango stated proudly as she lifted a weight and slid it onto the bar.

"That's because you like it." Jade grumbled.

"Come on, give it a shot,"

"Okay." Jade huffed, sitting down on the bench and laying under the bar. She grabbed the bar and waited for Sango to grab it between her hands.

"Now, don't just use your arms when you bench press, alright? You want to use your chest and shoulders, too." Sango explained. "Keep your feet flat,"

"Okay." Jade inhaled through her nose and lifted the bar, her eyes widening when she realized how light the weight was. It was almost like air!

"What? Too heavy?"

"Too light. This is nothing."

"Huh. Well, I did start you out at the recommended low for a beginner, but we can toss a couple more on if it's that easy."

"Yeah, it's like a cardboard box to me."

"That's good, though. You're stronger than average." Sango pointed out, sliding on a couple more weights.

"Sure." Jade replied. She waited for Sango again before lifting the bar and pumping a few reps before sighing heavily. "It's still really light, Sango."

"Really?" she looked down at Jade incredulously. "Still?"

"Mhm."

"Well, then, we can go to one-hundred," Sango walked away to grab a few more weights. Jade huffed and looked around slowly, wondering if Koga and Ginta were working out, too.

"How much can you bench, Sango?" Jade asked when her friend returned.

"One-twenty-five," Sango answered, grunting as she bent down to pick up another weight. "I'm kind of jealous. It took me a while to bench one-hundred."

"Really?"

"Mhm. You ready?"

"Yeah," Jade lifted the bar again, holding back a curse when she realized how light it still was. She decided to go with it to keep the peace. "I have a question,"

"I'm listening,"

"When I had that meltdown, they told me that I was...I was able to tackle a dude to the ground and beat him senseless. I was able to break free of two different holds. I outran Naraku and, well, you know,"

"Yeah, he's fast and has plenty of stamina,"

"He put me in a hold and I broke free," Jade placed the bar back on the stand to rest. "How am I capable of doing something like that? Physically? He should've been able to overpower me without breaking a sweat."

"Well, it's hard to say,"

"Look, I'm a computer and video game nerd, so working out isn't something I really focus on. These past couple of months with you have been the most fit I've been,"

"I think you were more fit than you think. You hiked around a lot all your life."

"Yeah, that's how I stayed lean, I guess, but I was never strong, you know? I never had super defined muscles like you. I was never fast or couldn't run for long periods of time."

"The only thing I can think of is that your adrenaline kicked in." Sango took a quick drink from her bottle of water. "I've heard of cases where drug addicts become stronger. The drugs kind of inhibit their brain's ability to regulate the body's restraints."

"Restraints? So when I work out, I'm not doing my best?"

"You're doing the best your brain will allow you to do." Sango pointed to her bicep. "Everyone has the ability to lift more than they can, a lot more, but that makes the muscles over-extend and hurt themselves. So, without even thinking about it, your brain already has alarms set up to make sure that you don't do that. Drugs can sever that link."

"Oh," Jade scratched her head. "I was a crack baby, so maybe that's why I'm stronger than I real-"

"Oh my-" Sango covered her mouth to stop the stream of giggles erupting from herself. She then looked at Jade worriedly. "I'm sorry! I'm so sorry! I shouldn't laugh at that! I didn't- you were a crack baby?"

"It's okay. I think it's funny. But yeah, I was born addicted to crack. Could that be why I'm stronger when my adrenaline is going? I have some superhero ability to turn off my brain so I can be stronger?"

"Uh, I don't know. I don't think there are any studies on that kind of thing. It might be possible." Sango replied, rubbing her mouth in an attempt to make her smile disappear.

"Hm, I'll have to ask Naraku. He might know."

"Oh no, Jade, pleeeeeease don't tell him you were a crack baby," Sango whined.

"Why not? What's he going to say?" Jade asked with a shrug.

"He's going to make fun of you!"

"You laughed." Jade pointed out dryly.

"I...you caught me off guard! You said it funny!" her friend insisted strongly. Jade simply shook her head and smiled.

When they finished their bench presses, Jade and Sango moved over to the dumbbells to begin working on their curls. Jade glanced at the weights Sango chose so that she would know to go lower. Sango worked hard and Jade didn't want to take that pride away from her.

'Maybe I'm just overreacting to this stuff. Maybe I've always been this strong and never really tested it out.' Jade tried to console herself, but she knew for a fact that her reaction to first-frame movements in video games was recent. None of it explained her body's faster healing process, either. The more she thought about it, the more she wanted answers.

"You just have your chemistry final today?" Sango asked, placing her dumbbells down to rest.

"Yeah."

"It must be nice only having one exam."

"To be fair, I've worked with Naraku all summer and this entire semester."

"Right." Sango sighed. "Although, that was all your choice."

"I know." Jade snorted. "So, would you and Kagome like to visit my family's mountain resort for Spring Break next semester? Or sometime in the summer?"

"I would love to. I'm sure Kagome would, too. You'll have to ask her, though."

"I will."

"I'm curious to see what it's like up there and how you turned out the way you did. And Lucy, for that matter."

"It's just mountains and plateaus, ranches and superstitions, that stuff,"

"So, calm?"

"Uh-huh. Very relaxed, very go-with-the-flow,"

"That kind of sounds like my home. I come from a small village that's in some small mountains. A lot of people are farmers, some commute to the city, and then there are some who have traditional inns that tourists visit,"

"That sounds cool."

"Would you like to visit my home, too?"

"Sure!"

"We will have to plan this out. Kagome lives in Tokyo; she's the city girl."

"I noticed." Jade snorted.

The only thing the workout seemed to do for Jade was stress her out more than she already was. It didn't help that the room was freezing cold when everyone began taking their O-Chem exam. Bruce griped about the temperature, but also admitted there was nothing he could do about it.

'Fuuuuuuuuuuuuck. Me. Sideways. Question one and I don't even know.' Jade's leg shook anxiously. 'I should've smoked instead of working out. Lesson learned.'

"What are you doing here?" Bruce's voice cut through the silence swiftly. Jade looked up and saw Sesshomaru, who was holding a stack of papers.

"He showed up. I left. You still haven't given me an office." Sesshomaru listed off quickly as he strode towards Jade.

"Fair." Bruce sighed, sitting back down at the desk. "I'll send the email now before I forget again."

"Yo," Jade whispered when Sesshomaru sat next to her. He eyed her carefully, but then nodded and began to read one of the various articles he possessed.

'The first few are multiple choice, so I have a chance,' Jade began crossing out the answers she knew were wrong. 'This one seems like the right answer.'

"Hm," Sesshomaru hummed, sounding skeptical. Jade slowly turned to look at him and he stared back, raising his eyebrows slightly. "My apologies; I just saw something I didn't like,"

"Ah," Jade looked back down at her test. Then it hit her.

'Yeah, you didn't like my fucking answer!' she erased her answer and purposely chose the one she knew was wrong. Sesshomaru made the same noise and Jade bit her lips closed to prevent herself from smiling or giggling. 'This guy right here,'

"Sesshomaru, why are you sitting next to her?" Bruce asked curiously. The other students looked over at them, too.

"Emotional support!" Jade blurted out. "I asked him to! He lied to you about being here because he's embarrassed!"

"You just blew his cover," Bruce held his hand out. "Does he even have emotions?"

"Nope. That's why he's here; his void of emotions eat mine...out of me," Jade said with a wide smile. From her experience, sex jokes were the ultimate conversation deflectors. The other students snorted and laughed, returning to their exams peacefully. Bruce stopped moving entirely; he didn't even blink. He just stared; his eyebrows furrowed, wrinkling his already wrinkled face more while his mouth hung open slightly. Even his hand hovered in the air, still gestured towards his two lab students.

"Those aren't the particular words I would have used," Sesshomaru added softly.

"Eat me." she snapped back playfully as she looked back down at her exam.

"Ew." Bruce finally grumbled.

'Shit. Fill-in-the-blank.' she thought after she turned the page over. 'Bruce gave us a word bank, but his wife must have closed her legs because he put ten extra words in here to spite us!'

She returned to her original strategy of crossing out ones she knew were not possible. Sesshomaru was clever about signaling her, but at one point he became impatient with her terrible guesses and asked her if she was single - the answer had to be single bonds. She was on her own when it came to drawing the chemical structures and their bonds, though. He would let her know when she was wrong, but she had to figure out what was correct. Her confidence dissolved within minutes.

'I'm still going to fail! Fuuuuuuuck! I hate structures! Give me numbers!' she groaned and rested her head on the table, allowing her arms to dangle below her. A hand lightly rested on her back, right between her shoulder blades.

"That's the worst display of emotional support I've ever seen." Bruce announced dryly.

"I can't necessarily whip my dick out right here and now, Bruce." Sesshomaru retorted coolly. The class erupted into laughter and Jade reared up to stare at Sesshomaru, holding back her laughter. He simply shrugged.

"I'm not even mad." she told him.

"I'm...just...you're not wrong, but," Bruce couldn't even look at them anymore. He was massaging his temples with his eyes closed. "How long?"

"Twelve inches." Jade chirped with a cheeky smile. The only one who didn't find it humorous was Bruce. He looked like he was in pain.

"I meant how long have you two...I'm just going to shut up now." he whined.

"That is a wise decision, professor." Sesshomaru agreed, taking the opportunity to point a few things out to Jade before sitting back and holding up his paper again. Jade erased her mistakes and fixed them as best as she could and stood up to turn in her exam. Sesshomaru followed her quietly.

"Are you two fucking with me?" Bruce asked as he cringed.

"Why would we lie to you?" Sesshomaru asked back.

"To get revenge over not having an office and over my difficult exam,"

"I don't want an office," Jade replied flippantly.

"I doubt the exam is difficult." Sesshomaru added.

"Leave." Bruce growled irritably.

"Man," Jade huffed once they reached the elevator. "Bruce must think I'm super easy."

"To be fair, you do sell ridiculous lies rather convincingly." Sesshomaru tapped the button for the main floor.

"Ahaha, true." she giggled before looking up at him. "Thanks for doing that."

"I'm shocked you went along with it. Although, I purposely lied to you about a few of them. Turning in a perfect exam is suspicious."

"That's fine. I just want to maintain my grade. But seriously, thanks. You didn't have to-"

"You didn't have to finish all of my sample prep, so we're even."

"Cool." she nodded, crossing her arms and following him off the elevator. "Soooo...we fuckin' or what?"

For the first time, Sesshomaru openly smiled and chuckled with her.

000000

Before Jade knew it, she was finished with her double shift after her exam that morning and it was time to shower and go to bed so she could be fully rested the next day. She stared at her ceiling, wondering where her day went, and slipped into a deep slumber. Her body felt unnaturally heavy that night.

She was running, but from what? Why? Jade slowed down and came to a complete stop, looking around aimlessly. It was dark, but she could still see somehow. Trees surrounded her and she realized she was in a forest. Immediately, her eyes caught something that stood out.

'Something is glowing,' she told herself, carefully starting in that direction. She remembered the dream she had in the coma; the pink light woke her up, so maybe it would do it again. Jade realized how insane she sounded, but what else was she going to do? She was trapped in her dream, fully aware of it, and able to move around. Standing still didn't sound like a good idea, especially if she was running in the first place.

"Why?" she whined after emerging from the trees. She was on a cliff now, which was overlooking a lake...a glowing lake. The color shimmered between pink and purple; Jade scratched her head.

'I know dreams usually don't make sense, but I usually don't realize that until after I wake up!' Jade exhaled loudly, looking around to see if there was an easy path down the cliff to the lake's edge, but there wasn't any she could see. 'Do I really want to go down there, though? Something doesn't feel right.' She looked down the cliff and bit her lips together in thought. It wasn't that she couldn't descend - she grew up in a mountainous region - but she wasn't sure if it was the right decision. Staying in one place seemed unwise and getting closer to the glowing lake seemed like bait...like it wanted her to.

"No," she whispered to herself condescendingly. Why did she think that? There was nothing around giving her any indication that it was a trap; it was just a feeling, a thought that she buried long ago and was now being unearthed by her fear...of what? "What am I scared of?"

"Me," a deep voice answered from behind her. Everything happened rapidly; she gasped, a hand shoved her, she tried to turn, to reach out and grab something, a hand grabbed her wrist, and she dug her heels into the side of the cliff.

'What is-' she looked up and felt her entire world shatter. She couldn't speak, she couldn't hold back the expression of pure shock, and his grin sparked an urge, a primal, instinct-driven urge, to grab his arm and pull away from him! The drop from the cliff no longer concerned her!

"I need you to do something for me, my dear lab assistant," he began, steadily pulling her to himself. Her attempts at freeing herself from his grasp only seemed to amuse him. He even giggled!

"Stop!" Jade shouted after finally finding her voice. Naraku's smile disappeared, but he didn't look angry; just disappointed. After a moment of silence, he raised an eyebrow.

"Have it your way," and he shoved her off the cliff with both hands. The force was enough to guarantee that she wouldn't be able to reach anything to save herself. She couldn't even scream.

A loud splash.

A coldness so overwhelming it soaked even her bones.

Everything went black.