Of This World and Yesterday
Until the sands of time see through our eyes
We could be lost perhaps forever
But there's space in the air
And it's ages till sunrise....
-Nature's Kingdom, Lyrics by Kirsty Hawkshaw
*
Chapter 13- Distortions
Sunlight fell in a square patch on the floor, brightening the room with afternoon light. The door was open a crack, allowing the voices of the people in Kagome's room to drift downstairs on occasion, though their conversations were generally kept muted.
There was a desire to let the Higurashi family know that the 'peer tutors' that came home with Kagome were nothing more than that. Mrs. Higurashi seemed somewhat startled at their appearance, not so much that her daughter was getting help studying- reasons for that were clear enough- but that Inuyasha seemed to be perfectly fine with it. At least as fine as Inuyasha looked about much of anything. In his human disguise, Mrs. Higurashi could see little reason to question it. The same went for Shippou, who conveniently made his tail, paws and pointed ears disappear in front of the two girls. He'd spent most of the day that way, though still in his clothes from the sengoku jidai...though on a child, it was not nearly as conspicuous an outfit. Just another cute little kid, though Shippou still insisted he was not cute. On top of the human appearances of the two youkai, and the fact she was used to strange events coming and going around her household, Mama just let it pass.
Souta and Jii-chan lost interest in the newcomers fairly quickly, Jii-chan going out to sweep leaves from the sidewalk, Souta to play video games. From inside Kagome's room, Inuyasha's ear would twitch occasionally, hearing one of the various bad guys fall to one of Souta's heroes. It was more interesting to listen to than the drone of schoolwork that was taking over now.
Most of the way home had been spent discussing their situation with Usagi and Ami. The two senshi, meeting them at Kagome's school after they were released, were startled at the realization Kagome came to the previous night; Karasu knew who they were. Worried glances were exchanged. Then, Usagi turned solemn blue eyes on them and said; "That's not good. But there's not much we can do about it, until we find out where she is, or until she makes a move against us. We've fought exposed before, when Nehelenia came with the Dead Moon Circus. She attacked us each individually...this'll be the same. She can't gain anything by telling people. If she does, then we'll deal with it when the time comes. Someone's bound to find out someday, sooner or later anyway...."
Inuyasha glanced out from under his dark bangs, looking from girl to girl, sitting in a lopsided circle on the floor of Kagome's room. Books were spread around them, pencils and paper with scratches for numbers scrawled on them. Kagome continuously tapped on a small thing called a 'calculator' to get answers, while Ami seemed to be able to come up with the same numbers just by thinking. Usagi, like him, seemed utterly lost by the entire process, and even the calculator wasn't helping much. Shippou had just lost interest after a few minutes, popping back into his usual, kitsune form and sprawling out on Kagome's bed with another interesting bit of modern media, something called a 'magazine.'
"Ami-chan?" Usagi was asking, "is this right?" the odangoed Moon Princess was scratching at the side of her head, then tugged at her hair a bit nervously as she waited for Ami to check her answer. The blue haired girl leaned over, turning away from Kagome to scan the sheet for a moment. A smile formed on her face hesitantly, then bloomed.
"Yes, Usagi-chan. Second try, too. You got it."
"Yes!" she cheered, happily taking her paper back and erasing her doodling calculations in the paper's margin. "I'd better clean it up to hand in...thanks, Ami-chan."
"Okay, I'm lost again," Kagome sighed, setting down her paper. "This is my worst subject...thanks for all the help...you really don't need to do this too...."
"Oh, it's no trouble...with everything going on, school worries are the last thing we need on our minds-"
"Ami-chan!" Usagi gasped, scandalized. She leaned forward and pressed a hand to Ami's forehead to check for a fever, as the other girl backed away laughing. "Last thing? Are you feeling all right? Are you sick? Did she get to you?"
"Usagi-chan, you didn't let me finish!" Ami scolded, lifting a finger in warning. "School is very important, but worrying about failing entrance exams should not be weighing on your mind while fighting. Best to get studies completed ahead of time, so that you're prepared for anything that may come up."
"Yeah...it's so easy to get behind though...." Kagome sighed, running a hand through her hair and biting her lip. "I don't know how you guys can keep up...."
"We study at Rei-chan's all the time," Usagi told her with a nod, holding up a pencil. "Even I passed the entrance exams. Together, we can fight even the deadliest battles."
"You make it sound like your 'exams' are harder than fighting youkai," Inuyasha sniffed, shrugging and looking out through the window in boredom. He didn't see Ami stifle a smile, or the annoyed look Kagome was giving him. However, he, and everyone else, heard Shippou say:
"Well, then why don't you show them how easy it is?"
The kitsune was looking up from his magazine, watching for the reactions. Usagi was wide eyed, looking back and forth for the reaction. Ami folded her hands in her lap, tilting her head to the side and waiting for Kagome to speak. Kagome, of course, thought this was a grand idea, her eyes narrowing mischievously in mock anger. "Inuyasha...Ami's a great tutor...why don't you have her show you how, and then you can try fighting the geometry that I'm having trouble with?"
"Feh!"
Inuyasha realized he was somewhat stuck. Over the course of the last few minutes, Kagome had repetitively called her homework a monster. Usagi called it various kinds of things; dumb, mean, evil, horrible, a nightmare...and he wasn't at all under the impression Kagome was stupid, so he doubted Usagi was exaggerating too much. So maybe math was a hard beast to kill. Normally, he would have no problems beating up a monster, but one that existed on paper was another deal entirely.
"Shut up, Shippou."
"I was just saying," he shrugged and flipped a page. "You always say school is stupid. Why don't you try it instead?"
"I like the idea," Kagome said, reaching over and tugging on Inuyasha's sleeve, hard enough to pull him over. "You're doing my math problem."
"Feh!"
"I'll show you how," Ami told him, scooting closer to Usagi as Inuyasha was dragged into the circle, looking generally pissed. "It's not so hard, really. It's just geometry, not trig. We're doing triangles."
"This is stupid."
"It's not stupid," Ami chided him gently, handing him paper and pencil as she slid the textbook onto her lap. "Here."
Kagome leaned closer to watch over Inuyasha's shoulder as Ami began to explain. Not wanting to miss any of this, Shippou abandoned his magazine for the security of Usagi's shoulder. She looked a bit startled for a moment as he peeked out from under a lock of her blonde hair, but then they exchanged grins, both aware this was going to be good.
"All right. We're finding the area of an equilateral triangle with a side of eight centimeters. That means all three sides are equal in length, like this," with her pencil, she sketched in a triangle on his paper. "Follow?"
"Uh...yeah."
Ami glanced at his face. The hanyou was concentrating hard on what she was doing on the paper, but was obviously lost already. Probably once she got to the word 'equilateral.' Part of her wanted to play along with the joke, confusing him and saving Kagome some worry later. Another part wanted to go blow by blow, to see if he could actually follow it. "This is about eight centimeters. Each side, all right? Equilateral...equal sides. Like a delta in the Greek alphabet."
"Feh...like I know what a delta is."
She suppressed a smile, biting her lip. He was worse than Kami when she first arrived. "The area can be found by using the equation," she wrote it down, "1/2bh...one half base times height. So you multiply this, by this."
"I've got it," Kagome said, picking up her calculator and typing it in. "Then I get mixed up."
"Next, you draw a perpendicular line from the apex...the point..." she tapped a finger on the tip of the triangle, "down to the middle of the base forming a right angle...there."
Kagome was scribbling in her notebook, while Inuyasha just sat still and stared at the white paper, remarking on how nicely Ami could draw triangles.
"This is where we use the Pythagorean theorem, ne?"
"Yes," Ami agreed, writing down, 'a(^2)+b(^2)=c(^2)' on Inuyasha's sheet of paper, Kagome copying the formula. "Let 'a' be half the base...that's four centimeters... 'b' is the height...and 'c' is eight centimeters, the hypotenuse of the right triangle. Kagome, can you plug that all in?"
Kagome was already tapping away, and Usagi and Shippou leaned forward to see what she came up with, while Inuyasha sat stock still, wishing he was fighting some big, random youkai instead.
"Forty-eight...which is...6.92820323...so then...twenty-seven point seven centimeters squared?"
"Correct," Ami told her, and the two girls exchanged smiles of triumph.
"Ami-chan's awesome, I told you!" Usagi exclaimed, as Shippou leapt over to see the correct sheet of paper. "You should teach this stuff."
"I already do," she laughed, settling back to relieve her numbing feet from her kneeling position. After a moment, she sighed, "I wonder how the others are coming. They must be all at the Crown by now...."
"Just so long as Miroku-sama keeps his hands to himself, I'm sure they'll do fine..." Kagome commented, setting down her calculator and taking the notebook away from Inuyasha, who was looking grumpily at Shippou now, for suggesting the math lesson in the first place. "We'll have to finish up here soon and catch up to them."
"Yeah...Rei-chan said she'd be late too today," Usagi told them smugly, thinking of all the times Rei scolded her for her tardiness. Though of course, that was usually because she was either eating or sleeping, not heading home to help her Grandpa with shrine chores. "She'll be meeting us there later-"
Usagi was interrupted by the ringing of a phone. Inuyasha and Shippou both started at the sound, but calmed after a moment, reminding themselves of an incident last night when the house received a 'phone call' from something called a 'stupid telemarketer.'
From downstairs, they heard Mama's voice echo up, "Kagome! Phone!"
"Got it!" she called, twisting around and reaching up for the phone on her desk, pulling the cradle along with and lifting the receiver. "Mama! I've got it!" she lifted the phone to her ear and heard her mother hang up on the opposite end with a click. "Hello?"
"Ah, Kagome? Higurashi Kagome?"
Kagome was expecting it to be Yuka, Ayumi or Eri-chan, calling to talk. She'd get rid of them quickly, saying she was studying. That was true enough...though the voice on the other end was odd, somewhat tinny, the way a cell phone would sound and the voice echoing, as though in a large room. A puzzled frown began to crease Kagome's face as she mentally raced to identify the voice. The others had suddenly quieted at her serious expression, drawing silent and watchful.
"Yes...this is Kagome."
"Excellent. This is Karasu."
Kagome's half gasp pulled everyone up straight, Ami lunging across Inuyasha to grab the receiver, as her blue mini-computer popped out of subspace. On the papers and textbooks, she began to link the two, scrambling to crack open the plastic cover on the back of the phone and link the two. Usagi began to make broad gestures at Kagome to keep Karasu talking, to buy Ami time to trace the call.
"You have my phone number?"
"Oh yes," the voice continued absently, the background still making her voice hollow. There was also a weariness to her voice, and Kagome mentally registered the information. But she was already continuing, "I hate to resort to these terrorist-type tactics, but I really do hate it when my schedule gets thrown off. If I were you, I'd duck down."
Click.
Ami sighed in irritation as her computer bleeped, then registered the words, "Trace Incomplete. City: Tokyo. District: Juuban. Street: Unconfirmed Data. I have a supercomputer and I still can't get a lock."
"What'd she say?" Shippou queried.
Kagome blinked at the dial tone emanating from the receiver. "She said...duck down?"
"Duck..." Ami began.
"...down?" Inuyasha finished, and then the two of them launched themselves forward, Inuyasha grabbing Shippou by the tail and smashing the protesting kitsune down, as he flattened himself on top of Kagome. Ami had made the same movement, shoving Usagi onto the carpet and covering their heads with her hands, just as there was an explosion from outside, the force of it rocking the house and shattering Kagome's window into a hurricane of crystalline shards.
Under Inuyasha, Kagome squeezed her eyes shut, waiting a moment for the air to grow silent from the tinkling falls of glass. The quiet drifted in slowly, and she slid out from the protective dive, scrambling over the ground and screaming, "Mama! Souta! Jii-chan!"
A moment later, she was in the hallway as sounds began to erupt behind her, Shippou shouting questions, Inuyasha snarling for him to shut up, and then the sounds of two female voices lifted at once.
"Mercury Crystal Power! Make up!"
"Silver Moon Crystal Power!"
Still in the hallway, moving to the stairs, blue and silver light poured through her open door, streaming past Kagome and showing her moving shadow on the steps below.
Souta was in the doorway of the living room, huddled down with his hands still over his head and eyes shut. Behind him, one of the windows had been blasted inside, and their floor, sofa and television sat in a pool of glass. Souta had been moving when the explosion went off.
She bent down and pulled his arms away from his face, shaking him slightly to make him look at her. Large eyes turned upward, and he looked too shocked to react. "Souta! Souta, where are Mama and Jii-chan?"
"I...in...the kitchen..."
"Souta, come on, we're going to go get Mama and Jii-chan. Come on," she pulled at him, dragging him along and out of the living room. "Inuyasha! Shippou-chan!"
Inuyasha was already moving along the hallway as Shippou leapt down the steps. "It came from the back?"
"Yes!"
"The other two are out there now," Inuyasha told her as they entered the kitchen, Kagome still hanging onto Souta, partly for reassurance, partly to comfort him. Mama and Jii-chan were crouched beside the countertop, the windows in the kitchen having faced away from the side of impact. Food was cooking on the stove, the smell of fish just beginning to char from over exposure, and a bottle of soy sauce had overturned, dribbling over the table.
"Mama? Jii-chan?"
Two sets of eyes lifted upward, "Kagome? Kagome! Are you okay?"
From the floor, Shippou looked up at Inuyasha as he frowned at the family reunion, the group checking on each other and making sure they were all right. The hanyou was back into his normal form, white hair and red kimono melting away as he ran after Kagome as she ran out for her family. "Inuyasha...what was that?"
"I don't know," came the reply, and his frown deepened. A hand strayed to the hilt of Tetsusaiga, palming up the blade to readiness. "I don't hear or smell anything...it must be gone now. I'm going to head out to find the other two. Stay here and keep an eye on Kagome and them."
"I will...."
He turned and ran through the house, heading outside to where the two senshi stood. At first, he thought he was correct. The thing was gone. Each sailor suited soldier of love and justice had her back to him, neither in battle positions, though the Mercury one was again fiddling with that damnable computer thing of hers. Sailor Moon, however, had a hand to her mouth, and was staring at what lay before her.
After a moment, Inuyasha followed her gaze, and suddenly felt his blood run cold.
The wellhouse was gone.
***
In its place stood rubble, the smoking rubble of wooden planks that gave off a bitter smell, mingled with the smoke from the explosion. Splintered fragments of dirt and wood lay strewn around the epicenter of the thing, blackened and with bits of fire hemming the edges, embers burning slightly as the wind began to pick up char and send it into a thin, hazy film in the air that clogged his nose.
Very, very quietly, he heard Mercury murmur a word to Sailor Moon, a strange, unfamiliar word he did not know or understand.
"...bomb...."
"You're sure...?"
"Yes...readings say plastics...concentrated in one place...she's targeting things...she could have killed us...I'd like to know why not...but...."
"The well!" Kagome cried from behind him, and both Inuyasha, Sailor Moon and Sailor Mercury spun to see her and Shippou standing at the back door, slowly walking forward, face paling with each step, until she was a ghastly shade of white, eyes round and turning from the destruction to Inuyasha, then back again and again. "Inuyasha...the well...."
Shippou was clinging to Kagome's shoulder, arms buried in her hair, wrapped around her neck tightly as she reached the hanyou, grasping his hand for reassurance. For a moment, the three of them simply stood there, looking beyond the silhouettes of the senshi, their shadows streaking back across the stones of the courtyard.
Another shadow joined theirs, a new arrival that bobbed and darted across the ground, growing still after a moment and solidifying into the shape of Tuxedo Kamen, who hesitated as he saw the situation. The danger he sensed was momentary, past already, but the consequences were becoming profound.
After a long moment, he moved forward slowly, sending glances at Inuyasha, Kagome and Shippou. His entrance into their line of vision broke their gazes, and instead they began to look at each other, as though asking, 'now what?'
"Usako...?"
Both girls turned to look up at him, exchanging glances on the way. After a moment, Sailor Mercury tentatively began, "Karasu called Kagome. She must have found out about the time traveling and traced it here...Kagome and Inuyasha said they thought she knew about us...then she had to know about the well too...."
"Can't we just talk to Pluto? She can re-establish something like that, can't she?" Sailor Moon suggested, clasping her hands together hopefully and looking from Tuxedo Kamen to Sailor Mercury for confirmation of her idea.
"In theory..." Mercury murmured, casting a blue eyed glance towards the other three. They were silent again, now facing each other uncertainly. "But...we'd better talk to her first...."
"The others should be on their way by now," Tuxedo Kamen told them softly, keeping his voice low so it would not carry towards the other group of three. "We had a run in with Eudial."
"Eudial!" Sailor Moon exclaimed, then covered her mouth with her hands. "Eudial?" she repeated, quietly this time. "How? She's...."
"Dead. Sango called it a 'kugutsu,' a puppet, right before I left. With more of the hydra creatures. Uranus and Neptune are back. We'd best call everyone together. Figure out what to do. Weaver, Saturn, Chibimoon and Pluto are absent, and Venus was injured."
"They're here," Mercury said, pointed skyward as she spotted Kirara coming in from very high, to better escape notice. From the ground, two more figures leapt to the top of Higurashi jinja's torii, a sword and mirror each in hand. "Kagome's family won't stay inside forever...."
Calls were coming forward from the sky as Kirara swooped downward, and shouted from Uranus and Neptune as they approached, shouts of "Is everyone all right?" and "Princess?" echoing forward.
Uranus and Neptune moved closer to the other senshi there, checking to see what had happened, if everyone was all right, as Kirara landed in the courtyard, Jupiter sliding off quickly, being precariously balanced on the end. Sango was still cradling the unconscious Venus while clinging to Kirara's mane with her other hand, stiffening slightly when Miroku's grip on her waist suddenly went very tight.
"Houshi-sama!" she began, swiveling around and releasing Kirara to smack him. Miroku, however, was looking far beyond Sango, face blank but eyes fixed on something before him. The expression was so strange that she turned forward again, trying to follow his vacant gaze. It took barely a moment for her to find what he saw. After a moment, she breathed, "The well...oh gods, the well...."
Jupiter was pulling Venus out of Sango's arms, the blonde mumbling as her eyes fluttered open, then closed again. Easing her to the ground, Jupiter called over her shoulder, "Mercury! Tuxedo Kamen?"
The two with medical training turned their heads, Mercury breaking away and heading over to help as Miroku and then Sango slipped off of Kirara. Both seemed somewhat stunned, Sango with a hand pressed to her mouth. Smoke was still steaming up from the wooden boards, scattered on the ground across the courtyard. She took two rapid steps forward, as though to check on the ruin, then stopped, the futility of the thing giving her pause. From behind her, Kirara nudged her hand, which slowly wrapped itself into the firecat's fur.
Uranus and Neptune stood close to Sailor Moon and Tuxedo Kamen, now satisfied that any attack was over. They took in their surroundings, assimilating the situation and the shock registering on the faces of the strangers. "Sailor Moon...Tuxedo Kamen...who are they?"
Keeping her voice low, Sailor Moon pointed each in turn. "The girl is Kagome...the kitsune is Shippou-chan. Inuyasha with them...."
Neptune gasped out, "He's a youkai!"
"Hanyou," Tuxedo Kamen corrected her quickly, "and not an enemy. The others are Sango, a youkai exterminator, and Miroku, a-"
"We've met the houshi and taiji-ya," Uranus said somewhat sourly, glancing sideways at Neptune. "Pluto didn't say much, but they said they're from the past...what the hell is going on, and why are they all staring at the blown up building?"
"That was the portal to their era," Tuxedo Kamen informed her, glancing at the destruction. "We'll need to contact Pluto and the others, get them here and figure out what to do now. The well inside opened a distortion into the sengoku jidai, and Kagome has been traveling there, collecting shards of a magical jewel, the Shikon no Tama."
Uranus' frown deepened, the golden glow of her sword fading somewhat as she deliberated, thinking. "Who blew up their timegate?"
"A Death Buster," Sailor Moon said, almost inaudibly. "A Magus calling herself Karasu."
"Death Buster?" Neptune murmured, drawing her mirror closer to her, then tilting it back to look across the reflective surface. Her face looked back at her, somewhat pale. "A new one? Pharaoh 90 is dead, Mistress 9...."
"Hotaru hasn't..." Uranus started worriedly, glancing around for the younger girl. "Hotaru hasn't...where is Hotaru?"
"Safe. Probably home," Sailor Moon fidgeted, looking from the various faces of the time travelers. Kagome was slowly walking forward, almost dreamily, towards them. Inuyasha walked beside her, a frown on his face as he clutched at the hilt of Tetsusaiga. It was reassuring, somehow, to make a familiar gesture. As the three approached, Sailor Moon began, "Kagome...."
"It was a bomb, wasn't it? She planted a bomb in the wellhouse shrine...."
"Yes," came the reply, Sailor Moon's voice laced with sympathy. "I'm sorry...we should have kept better watch on your home...."
"I didn't even smell it...if she sends this 'bomb' thing back, I'm going to..." he thumbed up Tetsusaiga meaningfully. Kagome rested a hand on his arm for a moment, shaking her head.
"No, Inuyasha...the bomb...it's not a person....it's a thing. A trap...you've seen things like it before...made out of gunpowder?"
"But wouldn't we know if there was gunpowder around, Kagome?" Shippou asked, disentangling himself from her neck and peering curiously towards Uranus and Neptune, then leaping to the ground. "We'd smell it or something. Smells like volcano rocks or something. Sulfur. I remember."
"Modern explosives don't require that kind of thing," Uranus said, sizing up the three of them. "She wouldn't even have to be nearby to set it off. Remote detonators can do that kind of thing, or timers. The right chemical compounds, and she could have blown the entire jinja away."
The casual reality of that sunk into Inuyasha and Shippou's heads for a moment, as Kagome bowed hers, squeezing her eyes shut a moment and fighting back tears. The well was gone. The well was gone. She could see a dug out crater before them, bits of rubble and soil rolling downward into the mess. It was precisely targeted; just enough to destroy the wellhouse. Nothing more, nothing less. No more trips to the past. No more hunting the shikon no kakera. No more fighting Naraku. Inuyasha, Shippou, Sango, Miroku...all were there with her, and for that she was glad...but it was wrong. All wrong. There were times she wondered what it would be like, to see what they thought of her time, to have them as guests; she knew that was off limits, something that should never happen...but it had. But this was not how she wanted it to be.
Resisting tears, she looked up again, determined, meeting Uranus' eyes. "I've met senshi from all planets but two...which one of you is Uranus, and the other Neptune?"
The tallest of the senshi replied, "I'm Sailor Uranus."
And the woman beside her finished, "And I am Sailor Neptune. You are Kagome, then?"
"Higurashi Kagome. Shippou-chan, and Inuyasha."
The two of them bowed slightly in greeting, as someone called out, "Kagome-chan?"
Lifting her head, she saw her mother, Jii-chan and Souta edging their way out of the house slowly, looking around as they moved. The scene before them was a confusing one, the destruction of their home, the time displaced friends, and a handful of the mysterious Sailor Senshi. Jii-chan suddenly slapped his hands to his face, looking horrified as he noticed the missing wellhouse. "My well!"
Mama was slowly walking forward, her usually neatly combed hair was slightly disarrayed, and she held a hand up to her chest, worried. Jii-chan and Souta followed her, Jii-chan mourning the destruction, Souta looking at the various senshi in awe. At least until he noticed Kirara suddenly, and then he stared at the youkai cat instead. Senshi were human, after all. Not every day you saw a giant two tailed firecat.
Her eyes wide, Mama looked at the group of people her daughter was standing with. It took her only a moment to figure things out, glancing at Sailor Moon, then around again and spotting Mercury, who was kneeling beside Venus. "You...and the other girl...the tutors who came to help Kagome...that's you two...."
"Eh..." Sailor Moon giggled nervously, glancing at Uranus and Neptune, who both had very serious expressions. The Outers were unlikely to take things such as revealed identities as lightly as the Inners, and she hoped they wouldn't do anything hasty. "Sorry, Higurashi-san. It's kind of a long story...."
"I see..." she murmured, nodding and folding her hands in her lap. Then she peered a bit closer at Sailor Moon, who backed up a step at the scrutiny. "Are those wings real?"
"What? Oh! Well, sort of," she said, half turning around to appraise her wide white wings, which sprouted from her waist. She never did really understand why they came from there, but then she'd never really had much say in what any of her fukus looked like. "They come with the henshin."
Mama was nodding thoughtfully, and the others in the group were staring, Inuyasha rolling his eyes as Kagome buried her head in a hand. Flashbacks to the first time anyone met Inuyasha...at least Mama hadn't tried to tug on the wings the way she had Inuyasha's ears.
"Cool!" Souta exclaimed, moving forward and looking up at Uranus. She arched her eyebrows, glancing down mildly. "That sword is awesome!"
Uranus looked slightly bemused, shrugging as Neptune chuckled lightly. "It's my Space Sword. And yes, it is rather awesome."
"My well!" Jii-chan repeated for about the fifth time, eyes glazed over as he contemplated the loss of part of his shrine. "We'll have to rebuild it...."
"Higurashi-jii-san," Neptune smiled, stepping in front of the man as he began to head forward. "Your well was destroyed by a very dangerous enemy of ours. Rebuilding will have to wait until the area is safe again."
"What enemy?"
"Senshi business," Uranus snapped, but at the same time, Tuxedo Kamen spoke.
"A Witch, who we have been fighting with recently. Neptune is correct. This area is no longer safe. We thought she would not target your family, but it seems we were wrong."
Through this, Inuyasha was scowling. A tinge of guilt was starting to lay on his shoulders, the feeling that this was his place to protect, his territory that had just been invaded and attacked. And he had been able to do nothing. Fury was welling up slowly, rage at the bitch Magus Karasu of the Death Busters.
"You mean leave?" Mama asked, looking from face to face. "Leave the jinja? If this...Karasu...woman is trying to hurt us...."
"She's after this," Kagome told her mother, drawing out the Shikon no Tama on its chain. "The shikon no kakera I have. She's targeting me. Us. All of us."
Souta edged closer to his mother, and she placed her hands on his shoulders lightly. He'd seen what the Noh Mask could do, tearing into their house after the thing Kagome had. More youkai around was not something he was looking forward to.
"Is there somewhere you can go, Higurashi-san?" Neptune was asking quietly.
Mama glanced down at Souta, then at Jii-chan, exchanging looks with them. "I...I suppose we could find a hotel...."
"What about another jinja?" Sailor Moon asked suddenly, eyes lighting up. "Somewhere else in Tokyo? I mean, you're a shrine family, wouldn't another one take you in? That's charitable and everything, I'm sure they would! There's another one in Juuban! Why don't you tell them something and see if they'll board you for a couple days?"
Tuxedo Kamen put a gloved hand on Sailor Moon's shoulder, trying to warn her to keep her excitement to a minimum. The others seemed to have picked up on the idea as well, and its benefits. They could easily get in contact with Rei before the Higurashi's left, and with things as they were, having a senshi around to keep an eye on things could be beneficial. Hikawa Jinja did not have a wellhouse, nor did it have anything else to target.
"You mean old Hino's jinja?" Jii-chan was saying, smoothing out his beard as he considered that. "Heh! Pop up on his door. I remember him. I think he's got a granddaughter about your age, Kagome. We could try that...give the Hino's a call and say something like Kagome's sick and she's catching...."
"Or the house is getting fumigated!" Souta chimed in excitedly.
Mama, however, had turned to look at her daughter, who was standing there silently through the debate on excuses for arriving at the Hino's doorstep. "Kagome-chan...you won't be coming with us, then, will you?"
"I'll be okay..." she tried to smile, the grin faltering. The concept of putting her family in danger was one that she did not want to contemplate. Mama, Jii-chan, Souta...any of them could have been caught outside in the blast range. Because of the shikon no kakera she carried. Because of Sango and Miroku-sama, who were uncertainly gazing between the ruin and their group of speakers. "I'll be with friends. I'll call. And...well, I'll call...it's just til we get rid of this Witch, Mama...."
An unreadable expression crossed her mother's face, then it slowly broke into a wide smile as she reached out an arm and drew Kagome into a hug. "My little girl, helping to save the world. I'm so proud of you."
That, Kagome had not quite expected, but was somehow glad to hear.
"Thank you, Mama...."
She released Kagome, looking at Jii-chan and Souta, who were still debating the idea of what excuse to tell the Hinos. "Jii-chan. Souta. We're telling them our wellhouse shrine was attacked by vandals, and we're installing some security." Mama glanced along the line of new faces. "That's true enough. Come on. Let's get some things together to take with, and Jii-chan, you can call Hino-san."
Herding the other members of her family together, she began to usher them back towards the house. "Inuyasha..." Mama called over her shoulder a moment later. The hanyou's ears pricked up, swiveling around as he turned to face her. Kagome's mother was smiling softly as she scooted Souta along, the dimming sunlight gentle on her face. "Bombs are considered a cowardly way of attacking. No honorable enemy would use such a dirty trick." She smoothed a bit of her short hair back into place, and met his eyes squarely. "Be careful."
Then, swiftly, she turned away and followed her son into the house.
drumrolls
It really feels odd...it's only at this point you've hit the main stride of the fic. So far, it's all been setup until Chapters 12 and 13. Things start getting tangled from here, weaving in and out. At the moment, I'm ready to start work on chapter 28...wai! If 28 paces the way I think it will, then it will be chapter 28 out of a total of 29 chapters. So I'm almost to the end. One of the things I dislike though about posting before the fic is complete (such as in this case...this is the first time I ever have....) is that I get to see more of the series as it's coming out, and it alters little bits of the fic. Once posted, it's harder to go back and change a plot point...it's not a big alteration, but there's a tweak I decided to do in chapter 28 that I wasn't going to do before. You'll see when you get there....
In the manga, Usagi uses 'Silver Moon Crystal Power' to transform on the Eternal level rather than 'Moon Eternal! Make up!' of the anime. At least that's what she uses in the English translated manga, which is what I'm looking at now. Chibimoon uses 'Pink Moon Crystal Power' in comparison.
As for Inuyasha's doing homework...hehehe...bwahahaha...personally, I'm terrible at math, so I must thank Mina Maxwell and Miss Chiba Usagi for going through their textbooks and picking out a math problem for me. Arigatou! Anyway, I thought it'd be funny to make Inuyasha fight a different kind of evil creation for a change, (that being geometry....) and mess with his head. evil grin
Mama Higurashi's seeing the senshi...at first I wasn't sure how she'd react. Then I thought about how understanding she seems to be about Kagome's time travelling, and how she first reacted to seeing Inuyasha. (Tugging on his kawaii ears. ^-^) So I just paralleled it with her meeting Sailor Moon. Originally, I thought I might have the senshi already detransformed in the scene. This replaced Souta recognizing Haruka and having a fit because for some reason there was a famous racer at his home. Of course, that didn't work out right, so he just comments on the Space Sword instead. ^.~
Well, that's it for this week.
Til next storytime.
~Queen
Coming up next, in Chapter 14: Manipulation-
Kagome felt it happening before anything else, and from the corner of her eye, saw Miroku also suddenly jerk forward. She was moving without thought, an arm out as though to ward off what was coming....
Inuyasha doing geometry?! No, this isn't an AU fic! Conned into doing some math by Shippou and Kagome, Inuyasha discovers the perils of homework, while Kagome recieves a strange phone call, resulting in the loss of something very important....
Inuyasha doing geometry?! No, this isn't an AU fic! Conned into doing some math, Inuyasha discovers the perils of homework, while Kagome recieves a strange phone call, resulting in the loss of something very important....