Spider, Part Eleven
"Dreamtrap"
by Vega
I pushed on his shoulders, but the boy did not move.
"Stop it, Kagewaki!" I cried. Kohaku's eyes, still burning that horrid red that I knew from behind the death's head mask, narrowed, but he did not stop.
I bent over, resting my forehead on his chest, starting to grow disoriented by the strange combination of pain and pleasure. I still pushed, but his hands continued to burrow, unstopped. It hurt.
I was not aroused, so there was no lubrication for his probing and I could feel my flesh split, smelled the blood flow over his knuckles, saw it stain the futon below me.
"Please stop," I whined. "You're hurting me..."
Kohaku spoke in Naraku's voice: "Where is it? This is the only part of your body that my gaze cannot penetrate. Where is it?"
"I don't know, please stop..." I was full-out crying by this point, my breath hitching in my throat, forcing shudders to rack my entire frame.
His response was to move the hand that was around my neck down, resting it between my breasts, and to push hard. I was shoved onto my back, the air leaving me in a woofing rush as I felt my spine come up to meet my stomach and my head knock against the hard wooden head-rest.
Black spots danced before my eyes and the room began to spin. I could feel my gorge rising and the could hear the wet smacking sound of Kohaku's hand. I felt my kimono shoved up higher on my waist, my thighs yanked apart. I could feel Kohaku's hot breath on the side of my leg and guessed that he was peering inside of me, trying to see the jewel shard.
Out of pure desperation, I jerked my leg and kneed him solidly in the temple.
I heard Kohaku grunt in pain and fall to the side, on top of my other foot. I jerked that foot out from under him and drove my heel into his ear.
The boy screamed and I hauled myself to my feet. Moving as fast as I was able, which was at a light jog thanks to my few days of rest, I rucked the long ends of my robe in my good hand, tucked the other into my waistband at the wrist, and sprinted for the door.
I shoved it aside and began to barrel down the hallway. It was pitch black and only the watery light of the moon through the rice-paper screens kept me from running head-long into the pillars that dotted the way.
I ran for a good few minutes, through the most twisted halls I could find, hoping to slow down any who may be following me, to trick them and hide.
Somewhere deep in the bowels of the place, I came to a "T" intersection and paused, panting. Which way? Did I even know where the door to the outside of this palace was? And once there, would I be able to get past the servants that were already, no doubt, looking for me?
Hearing footsteps behind me I panicked and ducked into a room to my left, skidding as my socked foot slipped on the highly polished wooden floor. I went down hard on my right side and choked back and agonized scram of pain. Tears collecting on my eyelashes I painfully pulled myself to my knees and dragged myself to the wall that divided the room I was in from the room next to it. I pulled myself up to my feet, painfully, and flattened myself along the wooden wall so my shadow would not be seen by those passing.
I held my breath, trying to stop the wheezing of my exertion, my eyes glued to the screen-wall that opened onto the hallway, praying that they didn't find me. I had to get out of here.
I was surprised to hear as they got closer, however, that the footsteps were falling not the heavy rapid rhythm of pursuers, but the even steady steps of many people walking together.
"My Lord is very sick," I heard one man say as they passed by. "I am very glad, Miko, that you have decided to help him. They say great things about your powers - that you can take even death away."
"I am but a simple Miko," I heard a female voice reply with humility, and I recognized it in an instant - it was the green-clad bow-wielder from the battle with Sango!
"No," I whispered to myself, "...a trap?"
The party paused outside the room I was hiding in and I feared that I had been heard. For a tense second I watched as their silhouettes arranged themselves as a group beside the door to the room I was hiding in. They entered the room beside mine, however, and I froze as I heard Kagewaki's distinctively low rumbling voice ask, "Who is this?"
"This Miko is a great healer, my lord," the same servant said, and I listened carefully to the scrape and swishing sounds that told me he had bowed and left the room. After a second came the tamp tamp of the rest of he and the servants leaving.
There was a pregnant pause, and then Naraku spoke.
"Come closer," Kagewaki ordered her and I shook my head, willing her not to. Didn't she recognize him? "What is your name, Miko?"
"Kikyou," she said softly.
"Kikyou," he repeated. There was something in his voice, however... some sort of... satisfaction?
I placed my ear against the wooden wall, straining to hear more, perhaps to find a clue that would help me and this deceived Miko to escape. I was so focussed on Naraku's plotting, however, that I did not hear the door to my own room slide open.
I did not hear the footsteps approach.
I did not even know Kohaku was behind me until I felt his hand on my mouth, his arm around my waist, and it was too late.
~~~
I tried to scream for the umpteenth time but still no sound leaked past the wad of fabric that had been forced into my mouth, then bound in place by another rag.
I watched Kohaku as he paced along the rice-paper screen that separated this room from the garden outside. Left, to right, to left again, his eyes on his feet, no longer that glowing red, and my bright blue eyes flicking back and forth to follow him.
I was sitting on the ground with nothing to cushion my bare legs from the cool hardwood flooring. My hands were tied at the wrist in front of me, hooked over my knees, and connected by a thin cord to the ropes that bound my ankles similarly.
I couldn't move. I couldn't speak. I couldn't help that Miko who may or may not be dead now. I couldn't help myself.
When Kohaku looked at me briefly on passing I shot him the most pathetic 'help me' look I could muster. The boy paused, hesitated, looked around him as if fearing he was being monitored, then swiftly and silently knelt before me and with gentle hands removed my gag.
I sucked in a great breath, trying to rid my mouth of the tastes of fabric by scraping my tongue with my teeth. "Thank you."
"Don't speak," the boy said, "he's fallen asleep in the room right there." He pointed to the wall that divided this room and the one next door.
"Lets get out of here," I whispered, ignoring his command, "Let's get that Miko and go find your sister."
Kohaku blinked at me. "I cannot."
"Kohaku!" I hissed, "Cut me loose and let's go! You owe him nothing!"
Kohaku stood and took a few steps away from me. I could see a faint magenta glow build, coming from the back of his right shoulder - his Shikon Shard was making a low thrumming sound.
His eyes suddenly flared red and he smirked Naraku's smirk and said in Naraku's voice, "He owes me his life. And so do you, Ashirinu. You're both staying here, with me."
The glow dissipated and I watched as Kohaku slowly came back to himself, shaking, tears pooling at the bottom of his brown eyes. "I-I c-can't get away..." he chattered, fear making him cold and unsteady. He dropped to his knees, and I winced at the loud cracking sound they made. "I c-can n-never get away..." He crawled forward slowly, cringing every time he put his full weight on one knee or the other. He picked up my discarded gag and held the wad of fabric back up to my mouth.
I pressed my lips tightly - no way was I going to willingly let him stuff that thing back into my mouth.
Kohaku sighed and shook his head. "I'm sorry." Then he grabbed my jaw in a bone-cracking grip and forced his fingers and thumb into the joints at the hinge of my jaw, prying my mouth open. He stuffed the rag back into my mouth and tied the fabric around my head to keep me from spiting it back out.
When he let me go I glared at him, and he turned away, to sit by the outside wall with his legs stretched out before him - I could already see the purple bruises blossoming on his skin and wondered briefly if he had broken his knee caps when he had collapsed.
And then I curled in on myself, resting my forehead on my own knees, tipping myself so I fell slowly onto me left side and lay there on the floor.
It looked like neither of us had anything better to do than wait.
~~~
I smelled the Sandalwood before I even realized that I had fallen asleep.
In the dreamscape I was unbound and back in the hut in the burning village. There were no monsters around, no Naraku, no magenta glow of the Shikon Shards.
Carefully I stuck my head out the door, smelled the acrid smoking tang in the air of the burning houses, heard the thick and sickening sizzling of the corpses on fire, watched as people ran too and fro screaming, fleeing from demons and trying to abate the fire.
The smoke made my eyes water but I forced myself clear of the untouched hut I stood in and out into the square. I felt as if I were moving in slow motion - everything around me was precise, steady, rhythmical. I felt like I was watching a carefully choreographed ballet rather than mass genocide.
A child ran by me, screaming, his little robe on fire. Reaching out, my hands moving so slowly but so perfectly, I snatched him by the waistband and shoved him down into the dirt at our feet, rolling him onto his back to douse the flames. The little boy screamed, his face scrunched up, contorted with agony, his skin blistering and charred. His hair was half burnt away on one side of his face.
With a gasp I released him and staggered back a few spaces. Then I looked down at my own right arm - it was pure and whole. I forced myself back to the wailing boy's side, forced myself not to be repulsed by his appearance. I reached out with my right arm and touched the side of his face, intending to cool and soothe his hurt - what happened was the stuff of pure nightmare.
The burn leapt from the flesh of his face onto my fingertips. I screamed, my voice lost in the sea of wails around me, the crackle of the fires and the roars of the attacking demons. The burn started to crawl up my arm, I could feel it, hot, painful, as it penetrated my blood and lapped at my bones. I could see the skin where it crawled up bubbling and smoking, liquid evaporating in a boiling pop on the surface. It was eating it's way up my arm.
"Stop it!" I screamed, "Stop it!"
The child sat up, a smile on his face. But it was an evil smile. He got to his feet and stood before me, his arms folded behind his back, his head eerily and fully healed.
"How did you appear here?" the boy asked as his eyes began to glow red. "Why are you here?"
"Make it stop!"
"Answer me and I will."
I doubled over myself, thrashing in the dirt, rolling, my back arching. I was crying so hard I thought I would stop breathing. The burn had begun to eat it's way over my elbow.
"I dreampt this!" I finally screamed, not knowing where this strange answer had come from, but in my desperation, knew that it was true. "I had a nightmare about this, back at home! I knew these people, but I didn't know how! I saw their faces and I wanted to help them!"
"How did you know them?"
"I've... I've seen them before! In other dreams!" I screamed, the sound loud and high-pitched, "Make it stop!"
The boy waved his hand and the pain stopped. I curled into the fetal position, cradling my arm, crying, panting, feeling like I was about to be sick. He reached out and his hand was soft when he brushed my hair back from my neck, his small thumb rubbing away the tears on my cheeks.
"You've dreamed of this place before?"
"O-of t-th... the past, y-yes..." I sobbed, my eyes squeezed shut.
"The past?" the boy inquired. "This is the past?"
I nodded.
"I see now," the boy said, but his voice was different. With each word it grew deeper. His hand drew larger, his touch rougher. His palm and fingers rested menacingly on my neck. "I understand who you are, where you are from. You are the descendant of these people, these doomed demon exterminators, aren't you? You carry ancient clan memories. You've watched them die in your sleep many nights, haven't you?"
I nodded, finally remembering. With the scent of the smoke had come the flood of memory. Yes. I was Aslin. Aslin Volpe. I lived with my mother. My father had died when I was young. I was a Japanese-American! I lived in the States.
Flashes of my dream of my great-grandmother filled my mind - yes, Mom had hated Dad's family ... we had moved away, to America, to get away from them. My great-grandmother had something hiding underneath her hair-buns. Something important. And her hair was red, even though she was so old... like my hair was red...
My eyes widened and I finally understood.
"Yesssss..." I heard the boy hiss, and I looked up at him. It was Naraku. The boy had been Naraku the whole time. I felt a a surge of anger blaze in me but I was in too much pain to fight him off. "You remember. Who are you?"
"I am Aslin Volpe," I replied automatically, unthinkingly. This was his dream - I could still smell the sandalwood. I couldn't lie.
"Where are you from?"
"Far in the future. Five hundred years."
"Why are you here?"
"I wanted to save them."
"But they're already dead." He laughed. "You know that."
I struggled to grapple at what sanity I had left and kicked at him. He pinned my leg in his other hand, the one around my neck tightening threateningly. I could feel his nails pierce my flesh and I cringed.
His expression was calm underneath his skull mask, which he had tipped up so I could see his face, his blazing red eyes. I looked... amused. "How did you get here?"
I made a gurgling sound and he loosened his grip on my throat slightly. "I just wanted to be here, is all," I admitted, "I don't know."
He said nothing and I realized he was thinking this over. "Your youkai blood and the Shard may have acted as elements to fulfil that yearning to be here - the Shikon no Tama has the power to grant wishes, they say."
I shook my head - no, that can't be possible! By just wanting to be here, I was? But then... I WAS here, so it had to have happened somehow, didn't it?
Naraku let me go, suddenly, and stood. With a flick of his head, his mask fell back into place and he was once more the white fur-clad demon with the fire eyes and the death's head mask. I cowered away, trying to drag myself backwards with my good arm.
He chuckled. "Your fear is delightful. Now I understand it all. You are the offspring of many generations of filthy interbreeding between the last demon exterminator and a taiyoukai. You are the descendant of Sango."
I shook my head, and he took a step forward to menace over me. I pulled myself backwards and he took another step, matching me move for move.
"Or perhaps Kohaku," he mused, a smile growing in his voice. "I wonder if it is possible for him. Then again, you may even be the result of a rape..." he suddenly fell on me, grabbing both my wrists in one hand and yanking them above my head, oblivious of the burns. He pinned me to the hard ground with his weight, his other hand moving downwards. "... I could send a demon to violate Sango, see if she swells with child... or," he smiled again and moved his face closer to mine. His breath was sour and I turned my head away. "Perhaps I shall do it myself. What do you think of that? Perhaps you are my offspring as well..."
"Let me go!" I shrieked. He only laughed.
"Oh, no, my dear. You see, I have one puzzle solved..." I felt him flick aside the folds of my robe as casually as one draws apart the curtains in the morning. I closed my eyes, not wanting to see his grin spread. "But there is still another. Why is there a Shikon Shard imbedded in your womb?"
"My... my what?!"
"I have finally realized why I cannot see the Shard inside you, and can only sense it's presence. The female vessel is a place of magics - a place that even demons cannot violate. This has protected this secret from me, but now that I know where it is, I will have it."
"No!" I screamed, but Naraku had stopped listening to me. He pressed himself down on me, holding me still, his nails digging into my wrists. His other hand he plunged inside of me, and I felt a burning tearing. I screamed again, so loudly that I ...
...I woke myself up.
I could smell the sandalwood, see the incense hanging heavily in the air around me, swirling like some sort of obsessed dragon around my limbs and hair. Naraku was still on top of me, his hand up inside, but this time he wore the face of Kagewaki.
"Ha!" he crowed and I saw his eyes flash with triumph.
In a moment of pure frenzy I licked hard, aiming my heel at his nose. I connected, and there was a loud crunching sound and a spray of blackened ichor. He was thrown onto his back and I felt the agony of his hand pulling out of me. Blood issued from between my legs but I ignored it and scrambled to my feet, bolting for the door that lead tot he courtyard and freedom.
I wouldn't get far, I knew. And I was leaving a trail - but better to try to escape than lay there and wait for him to kill me!
For he had the Shikon Shard. I had seen the magenta glow pinched between his fingers when I stood up. He therefore had no more use for me.
With a keening wail I pressed my hand to my belly and continued to stumble through the half-dead garden. I felt barren - I felt violated. Fuck, I felt like he had reaching into my belly and stolen a child from me!
A low throbbing and a small spot of warmth pressed back against my hand and I paused in shock for a moment.
But I had SEEN the shard in Naraku's hand. I had SEEN it – and yet I felt it inside me as well. So... did this mean that Naraku hadn't gotten all of it? That there was still a part of it in my body?
Not wanting to risk him discovering this for himself I started to run again, looking behind me frantically to see if he was following, and consequently bashing right into Kohaku and landing on my ass.
"Oh, no, no," I sobbed, coving my face and knowing that there was now no escape. He was dressed in his full warrior's regalia. "Kohaku, please..."
"I can't," he whispered. He shifted his grip on his weapon, and the threat was obvious. "I'm sorry. I can't."
~~~
Author's Note:
Well, there it is. Past the halfway mark and hopefully a lot revealed. If you're wondering who her ancenstors are, hang on, I WILL tell you... just not yet! I'm glad everyone is still enjoying this fic. *roots for over 100 reviews* I'm also noticing a lot of similarities between this story and "Across Time", but I think it's mostly because they're both about a female from a different era tossed into a completely alien situation, written in the first person. ^_^
Review Replies:
Sandalwood: *snicker* Apparantly her penname scared a few of this story's reader's... can't think of why... *innocent look*
Bonessasan: I DO like your name! And I'm glad YOU got it from the beginning! Yay for people who pay attention!
Aldea: Flatter - I KNOW when you live... I will kick you next time...
Sashlea: Thank you for recommending to Sandalwood. I hope you liked this chapter. I kept it tame on purpose, so I could still post on ff.n but it was still very suggestive.
Kairinu: Yes. I think "Ew" sums it up.
anime-luvver: PLEASE no leet-speak. I hate the stuff and it takes forever for me to translate it into real English. But thank you for the compliments all the same.
"Dreamtrap"
by Vega
I pushed on his shoulders, but the boy did not move.
"Stop it, Kagewaki!" I cried. Kohaku's eyes, still burning that horrid red that I knew from behind the death's head mask, narrowed, but he did not stop.
I bent over, resting my forehead on his chest, starting to grow disoriented by the strange combination of pain and pleasure. I still pushed, but his hands continued to burrow, unstopped. It hurt.
I was not aroused, so there was no lubrication for his probing and I could feel my flesh split, smelled the blood flow over his knuckles, saw it stain the futon below me.
"Please stop," I whined. "You're hurting me..."
Kohaku spoke in Naraku's voice: "Where is it? This is the only part of your body that my gaze cannot penetrate. Where is it?"
"I don't know, please stop..." I was full-out crying by this point, my breath hitching in my throat, forcing shudders to rack my entire frame.
His response was to move the hand that was around my neck down, resting it between my breasts, and to push hard. I was shoved onto my back, the air leaving me in a woofing rush as I felt my spine come up to meet my stomach and my head knock against the hard wooden head-rest.
Black spots danced before my eyes and the room began to spin. I could feel my gorge rising and the could hear the wet smacking sound of Kohaku's hand. I felt my kimono shoved up higher on my waist, my thighs yanked apart. I could feel Kohaku's hot breath on the side of my leg and guessed that he was peering inside of me, trying to see the jewel shard.
Out of pure desperation, I jerked my leg and kneed him solidly in the temple.
I heard Kohaku grunt in pain and fall to the side, on top of my other foot. I jerked that foot out from under him and drove my heel into his ear.
The boy screamed and I hauled myself to my feet. Moving as fast as I was able, which was at a light jog thanks to my few days of rest, I rucked the long ends of my robe in my good hand, tucked the other into my waistband at the wrist, and sprinted for the door.
I shoved it aside and began to barrel down the hallway. It was pitch black and only the watery light of the moon through the rice-paper screens kept me from running head-long into the pillars that dotted the way.
I ran for a good few minutes, through the most twisted halls I could find, hoping to slow down any who may be following me, to trick them and hide.
Somewhere deep in the bowels of the place, I came to a "T" intersection and paused, panting. Which way? Did I even know where the door to the outside of this palace was? And once there, would I be able to get past the servants that were already, no doubt, looking for me?
Hearing footsteps behind me I panicked and ducked into a room to my left, skidding as my socked foot slipped on the highly polished wooden floor. I went down hard on my right side and choked back and agonized scram of pain. Tears collecting on my eyelashes I painfully pulled myself to my knees and dragged myself to the wall that divided the room I was in from the room next to it. I pulled myself up to my feet, painfully, and flattened myself along the wooden wall so my shadow would not be seen by those passing.
I held my breath, trying to stop the wheezing of my exertion, my eyes glued to the screen-wall that opened onto the hallway, praying that they didn't find me. I had to get out of here.
I was surprised to hear as they got closer, however, that the footsteps were falling not the heavy rapid rhythm of pursuers, but the even steady steps of many people walking together.
"My Lord is very sick," I heard one man say as they passed by. "I am very glad, Miko, that you have decided to help him. They say great things about your powers - that you can take even death away."
"I am but a simple Miko," I heard a female voice reply with humility, and I recognized it in an instant - it was the green-clad bow-wielder from the battle with Sango!
"No," I whispered to myself, "...a trap?"
The party paused outside the room I was hiding in and I feared that I had been heard. For a tense second I watched as their silhouettes arranged themselves as a group beside the door to the room I was hiding in. They entered the room beside mine, however, and I froze as I heard Kagewaki's distinctively low rumbling voice ask, "Who is this?"
"This Miko is a great healer, my lord," the same servant said, and I listened carefully to the scrape and swishing sounds that told me he had bowed and left the room. After a second came the tamp tamp of the rest of he and the servants leaving.
There was a pregnant pause, and then Naraku spoke.
"Come closer," Kagewaki ordered her and I shook my head, willing her not to. Didn't she recognize him? "What is your name, Miko?"
"Kikyou," she said softly.
"Kikyou," he repeated. There was something in his voice, however... some sort of... satisfaction?
I placed my ear against the wooden wall, straining to hear more, perhaps to find a clue that would help me and this deceived Miko to escape. I was so focussed on Naraku's plotting, however, that I did not hear the door to my own room slide open.
I did not hear the footsteps approach.
I did not even know Kohaku was behind me until I felt his hand on my mouth, his arm around my waist, and it was too late.
~~~
I tried to scream for the umpteenth time but still no sound leaked past the wad of fabric that had been forced into my mouth, then bound in place by another rag.
I watched Kohaku as he paced along the rice-paper screen that separated this room from the garden outside. Left, to right, to left again, his eyes on his feet, no longer that glowing red, and my bright blue eyes flicking back and forth to follow him.
I was sitting on the ground with nothing to cushion my bare legs from the cool hardwood flooring. My hands were tied at the wrist in front of me, hooked over my knees, and connected by a thin cord to the ropes that bound my ankles similarly.
I couldn't move. I couldn't speak. I couldn't help that Miko who may or may not be dead now. I couldn't help myself.
When Kohaku looked at me briefly on passing I shot him the most pathetic 'help me' look I could muster. The boy paused, hesitated, looked around him as if fearing he was being monitored, then swiftly and silently knelt before me and with gentle hands removed my gag.
I sucked in a great breath, trying to rid my mouth of the tastes of fabric by scraping my tongue with my teeth. "Thank you."
"Don't speak," the boy said, "he's fallen asleep in the room right there." He pointed to the wall that divided this room and the one next door.
"Lets get out of here," I whispered, ignoring his command, "Let's get that Miko and go find your sister."
Kohaku blinked at me. "I cannot."
"Kohaku!" I hissed, "Cut me loose and let's go! You owe him nothing!"
Kohaku stood and took a few steps away from me. I could see a faint magenta glow build, coming from the back of his right shoulder - his Shikon Shard was making a low thrumming sound.
His eyes suddenly flared red and he smirked Naraku's smirk and said in Naraku's voice, "He owes me his life. And so do you, Ashirinu. You're both staying here, with me."
The glow dissipated and I watched as Kohaku slowly came back to himself, shaking, tears pooling at the bottom of his brown eyes. "I-I c-can't get away..." he chattered, fear making him cold and unsteady. He dropped to his knees, and I winced at the loud cracking sound they made. "I c-can n-never get away..." He crawled forward slowly, cringing every time he put his full weight on one knee or the other. He picked up my discarded gag and held the wad of fabric back up to my mouth.
I pressed my lips tightly - no way was I going to willingly let him stuff that thing back into my mouth.
Kohaku sighed and shook his head. "I'm sorry." Then he grabbed my jaw in a bone-cracking grip and forced his fingers and thumb into the joints at the hinge of my jaw, prying my mouth open. He stuffed the rag back into my mouth and tied the fabric around my head to keep me from spiting it back out.
When he let me go I glared at him, and he turned away, to sit by the outside wall with his legs stretched out before him - I could already see the purple bruises blossoming on his skin and wondered briefly if he had broken his knee caps when he had collapsed.
And then I curled in on myself, resting my forehead on my own knees, tipping myself so I fell slowly onto me left side and lay there on the floor.
It looked like neither of us had anything better to do than wait.
~~~
I smelled the Sandalwood before I even realized that I had fallen asleep.
In the dreamscape I was unbound and back in the hut in the burning village. There were no monsters around, no Naraku, no magenta glow of the Shikon Shards.
Carefully I stuck my head out the door, smelled the acrid smoking tang in the air of the burning houses, heard the thick and sickening sizzling of the corpses on fire, watched as people ran too and fro screaming, fleeing from demons and trying to abate the fire.
The smoke made my eyes water but I forced myself clear of the untouched hut I stood in and out into the square. I felt as if I were moving in slow motion - everything around me was precise, steady, rhythmical. I felt like I was watching a carefully choreographed ballet rather than mass genocide.
A child ran by me, screaming, his little robe on fire. Reaching out, my hands moving so slowly but so perfectly, I snatched him by the waistband and shoved him down into the dirt at our feet, rolling him onto his back to douse the flames. The little boy screamed, his face scrunched up, contorted with agony, his skin blistering and charred. His hair was half burnt away on one side of his face.
With a gasp I released him and staggered back a few spaces. Then I looked down at my own right arm - it was pure and whole. I forced myself back to the wailing boy's side, forced myself not to be repulsed by his appearance. I reached out with my right arm and touched the side of his face, intending to cool and soothe his hurt - what happened was the stuff of pure nightmare.
The burn leapt from the flesh of his face onto my fingertips. I screamed, my voice lost in the sea of wails around me, the crackle of the fires and the roars of the attacking demons. The burn started to crawl up my arm, I could feel it, hot, painful, as it penetrated my blood and lapped at my bones. I could see the skin where it crawled up bubbling and smoking, liquid evaporating in a boiling pop on the surface. It was eating it's way up my arm.
"Stop it!" I screamed, "Stop it!"
The child sat up, a smile on his face. But it was an evil smile. He got to his feet and stood before me, his arms folded behind his back, his head eerily and fully healed.
"How did you appear here?" the boy asked as his eyes began to glow red. "Why are you here?"
"Make it stop!"
"Answer me and I will."
I doubled over myself, thrashing in the dirt, rolling, my back arching. I was crying so hard I thought I would stop breathing. The burn had begun to eat it's way over my elbow.
"I dreampt this!" I finally screamed, not knowing where this strange answer had come from, but in my desperation, knew that it was true. "I had a nightmare about this, back at home! I knew these people, but I didn't know how! I saw their faces and I wanted to help them!"
"How did you know them?"
"I've... I've seen them before! In other dreams!" I screamed, the sound loud and high-pitched, "Make it stop!"
The boy waved his hand and the pain stopped. I curled into the fetal position, cradling my arm, crying, panting, feeling like I was about to be sick. He reached out and his hand was soft when he brushed my hair back from my neck, his small thumb rubbing away the tears on my cheeks.
"You've dreamed of this place before?"
"O-of t-th... the past, y-yes..." I sobbed, my eyes squeezed shut.
"The past?" the boy inquired. "This is the past?"
I nodded.
"I see now," the boy said, but his voice was different. With each word it grew deeper. His hand drew larger, his touch rougher. His palm and fingers rested menacingly on my neck. "I understand who you are, where you are from. You are the descendant of these people, these doomed demon exterminators, aren't you? You carry ancient clan memories. You've watched them die in your sleep many nights, haven't you?"
I nodded, finally remembering. With the scent of the smoke had come the flood of memory. Yes. I was Aslin. Aslin Volpe. I lived with my mother. My father had died when I was young. I was a Japanese-American! I lived in the States.
Flashes of my dream of my great-grandmother filled my mind - yes, Mom had hated Dad's family ... we had moved away, to America, to get away from them. My great-grandmother had something hiding underneath her hair-buns. Something important. And her hair was red, even though she was so old... like my hair was red...
My eyes widened and I finally understood.
"Yesssss..." I heard the boy hiss, and I looked up at him. It was Naraku. The boy had been Naraku the whole time. I felt a a surge of anger blaze in me but I was in too much pain to fight him off. "You remember. Who are you?"
"I am Aslin Volpe," I replied automatically, unthinkingly. This was his dream - I could still smell the sandalwood. I couldn't lie.
"Where are you from?"
"Far in the future. Five hundred years."
"Why are you here?"
"I wanted to save them."
"But they're already dead." He laughed. "You know that."
I struggled to grapple at what sanity I had left and kicked at him. He pinned my leg in his other hand, the one around my neck tightening threateningly. I could feel his nails pierce my flesh and I cringed.
His expression was calm underneath his skull mask, which he had tipped up so I could see his face, his blazing red eyes. I looked... amused. "How did you get here?"
I made a gurgling sound and he loosened his grip on my throat slightly. "I just wanted to be here, is all," I admitted, "I don't know."
He said nothing and I realized he was thinking this over. "Your youkai blood and the Shard may have acted as elements to fulfil that yearning to be here - the Shikon no Tama has the power to grant wishes, they say."
I shook my head - no, that can't be possible! By just wanting to be here, I was? But then... I WAS here, so it had to have happened somehow, didn't it?
Naraku let me go, suddenly, and stood. With a flick of his head, his mask fell back into place and he was once more the white fur-clad demon with the fire eyes and the death's head mask. I cowered away, trying to drag myself backwards with my good arm.
He chuckled. "Your fear is delightful. Now I understand it all. You are the offspring of many generations of filthy interbreeding between the last demon exterminator and a taiyoukai. You are the descendant of Sango."
I shook my head, and he took a step forward to menace over me. I pulled myself backwards and he took another step, matching me move for move.
"Or perhaps Kohaku," he mused, a smile growing in his voice. "I wonder if it is possible for him. Then again, you may even be the result of a rape..." he suddenly fell on me, grabbing both my wrists in one hand and yanking them above my head, oblivious of the burns. He pinned me to the hard ground with his weight, his other hand moving downwards. "... I could send a demon to violate Sango, see if she swells with child... or," he smiled again and moved his face closer to mine. His breath was sour and I turned my head away. "Perhaps I shall do it myself. What do you think of that? Perhaps you are my offspring as well..."
"Let me go!" I shrieked. He only laughed.
"Oh, no, my dear. You see, I have one puzzle solved..." I felt him flick aside the folds of my robe as casually as one draws apart the curtains in the morning. I closed my eyes, not wanting to see his grin spread. "But there is still another. Why is there a Shikon Shard imbedded in your womb?"
"My... my what?!"
"I have finally realized why I cannot see the Shard inside you, and can only sense it's presence. The female vessel is a place of magics - a place that even demons cannot violate. This has protected this secret from me, but now that I know where it is, I will have it."
"No!" I screamed, but Naraku had stopped listening to me. He pressed himself down on me, holding me still, his nails digging into my wrists. His other hand he plunged inside of me, and I felt a burning tearing. I screamed again, so loudly that I ...
...I woke myself up.
I could smell the sandalwood, see the incense hanging heavily in the air around me, swirling like some sort of obsessed dragon around my limbs and hair. Naraku was still on top of me, his hand up inside, but this time he wore the face of Kagewaki.
"Ha!" he crowed and I saw his eyes flash with triumph.
In a moment of pure frenzy I licked hard, aiming my heel at his nose. I connected, and there was a loud crunching sound and a spray of blackened ichor. He was thrown onto his back and I felt the agony of his hand pulling out of me. Blood issued from between my legs but I ignored it and scrambled to my feet, bolting for the door that lead tot he courtyard and freedom.
I wouldn't get far, I knew. And I was leaving a trail - but better to try to escape than lay there and wait for him to kill me!
For he had the Shikon Shard. I had seen the magenta glow pinched between his fingers when I stood up. He therefore had no more use for me.
With a keening wail I pressed my hand to my belly and continued to stumble through the half-dead garden. I felt barren - I felt violated. Fuck, I felt like he had reaching into my belly and stolen a child from me!
A low throbbing and a small spot of warmth pressed back against my hand and I paused in shock for a moment.
But I had SEEN the shard in Naraku's hand. I had SEEN it – and yet I felt it inside me as well. So... did this mean that Naraku hadn't gotten all of it? That there was still a part of it in my body?
Not wanting to risk him discovering this for himself I started to run again, looking behind me frantically to see if he was following, and consequently bashing right into Kohaku and landing on my ass.
"Oh, no, no," I sobbed, coving my face and knowing that there was now no escape. He was dressed in his full warrior's regalia. "Kohaku, please..."
"I can't," he whispered. He shifted his grip on his weapon, and the threat was obvious. "I'm sorry. I can't."
~~~
Author's Note:
Well, there it is. Past the halfway mark and hopefully a lot revealed. If you're wondering who her ancenstors are, hang on, I WILL tell you... just not yet! I'm glad everyone is still enjoying this fic. *roots for over 100 reviews* I'm also noticing a lot of similarities between this story and "Across Time", but I think it's mostly because they're both about a female from a different era tossed into a completely alien situation, written in the first person. ^_^
Review Replies:
Sandalwood: *snicker* Apparantly her penname scared a few of this story's reader's... can't think of why... *innocent look*
Bonessasan: I DO like your name! And I'm glad YOU got it from the beginning! Yay for people who pay attention!
Aldea: Flatter - I KNOW when you live... I will kick you next time...
Sashlea: Thank you for recommending to Sandalwood. I hope you liked this chapter. I kept it tame on purpose, so I could still post on ff.n but it was still very suggestive.
Kairinu: Yes. I think "Ew" sums it up.
anime-luvver: PLEASE no leet-speak. I hate the stuff and it takes forever for me to translate it into real English. But thank you for the compliments all the same.