Disclaimer: I don't get any profit out of these stories, only enjoyment.
Though it's too bad I don't get money... sigh...
(A/N: having a hair-pulling stress day. My hamster escaped yesterday and I've been searching the entire house for the stupid mouse... I found I this morning... well... I heard it... and it's in the walls. Why me? Well... it's either my hamster or a rat, and I'm really hoping it's a hamster. If anyone has any idea how to get a hamster out of a wall then please tell me... I'm desperate...)
Two Faced:
Cooties
"I can see the tree line up ahead."
"About damn time." Kagome remarked, she would have taken a look, but she'd been slung over Inuyasha's shoulder again and didn't really have a good view. Though... it could be considered a good view because the only thing she could see was Inuyasha's ass... definitely not a bad thing. Of course, she'd never dare tell him, otherwise he'd probably just drop her.
"Oh look..." Inuyasha sounded surprised.
"At what?"
Inuyasha gently let Kagome slide down his arm to find her feet and she quickly turned on one leg (like a flamingo) to see they were at the edge of a rather small... fairly primitive looking village. "How quaint." Kagome said with a pleased smile. Maybe they were closer to finding her father than she'd thought.
"I'm surprised it's still here." Inuyasha said.
"Why?"
"Because villages close to the dark forest often high mortality rates." He slanted a look at her.
"Right... because of demons..." Kagome noticed that up ahead the small village seemed to have quite a few residents. From here she could see that they wore the clothes of farmers and poor people, no vogue magazines to be seen for miles. Though it wasn't surprising, since this place was overrun with demons most of the time and the fast paced world of technology had been moved to the other side of the forest where demons wouldn't get at it.
"We should ask someone if they've seen my dad or Sango and Miroku's group." Kagome was already limping away before Inuyasha could argue with her. She waved to a nearby villager. "Excuse me - I need some help!"
The villager glanced up to see Kagome rushing towards him, obviously injured, and behind her a demon was rapidly catching up. He drew his own conclusions. "Raid! Demon! Raid!"
At once several other villagers suddenly looked up to see the same sight and grabbed whatever weapons they could find and charged at Inuyasha who had stopped just behind a surprised looking Kagome.
"Out of the way, lass!" one man yelled and Kagome was tugged out of the way as several poles and planks of wood hit Inuyasha.
"Wait!" Kagome yelled.
The poles and planks of wood shattered and Inuyasha remained standing where he was, looking just as surprised as before. "Well, hello to you too." He remarked.
"It's ok - he's a nice demon!" Kagome told the people quickly.
There was a moment of silence as the villagers processed this before shrugging or apologising, but walking off nonetheless.
Kagome had just about forgotten what she was about to ask after that little interlude, but it suddenly came to her as she saw the people walking away. She grabbed one of the men by the sleeve. "Excuse me, sir, but have you seen any plane crash victims around here?"
"Dead ones?" he looked at her peculiarly.
"Um... no, alive ones."
"I haven't seen any, but ask Mayu - she works at the inn, she sees a lot of people come through these parts." The villager offered.
"Thank you." Kagome smiled as the man walked off again. When Inuyasha arrived at her side she switched her worried gaze to him. "You alright?"
"Huh - oh yeah, fine." Inuyasha rubbed his slightly sore head. He should really have seen this coming, but it had totally slipped his mind. Living with his stepfather's people had been a pretty cushy life... no one usually came chasing after him with planks of wood with nails in them. Well... not any more... maybe when he had been a kid and kept stealing cookies...
"That guy said we have to go see the lady at the inn - she might know where my father is..."
"That's presuming he isn't dead." Inuyasha pointed out as Kagome started limping in the direction of the building with the signpost outside indicating it was the local inn.
"I'll kill him if he's dead - so he better not be." Kagome said breezily as she limped along on her way. Inuyasha slipped ahead of her and held the door open for her so she wouldn't strain her arm... that little moment of thoughtfulness on his part made her slightly surprised... but he didn't seem to think much of it.
"Excuse me, miss..." Kagome leaned on the front desk with her good arm while the lady behind the counter turned and smiled automatically. "Are you Mayu?"
"Yes. How can I help?"
"Um... we were just wondering if you'd seen any plane crash victims around here..." Kagome asked.
"You mean, besides you two?"
Inuyasha whistled. "Wow, she's good."
"Yeah." Kagome nodded. "Have you seen anyone?"
"Hmm... well I heard tell that a village in the east was recently housing some plane crash victims... a large group of men and a few women."
"Young or old?" Kagome pressed.
"Not sure, my friend at the inn over there didn't elaborate." Mayu shook her head.
Kagome glanced back at Inuyasha. "That could be either dad's crew or Miroku's..."
"It's probably dad's lot." Inuyasha shrugged. "Miroku's group wouldn't have had time to travel that far."
"Ok - thanks a lot!" Kagome smiled and turned. "Come on Inuyasha, we better get a move on if we are going to catch up-"
"Where do you think you're going?" Inuyasha scoffed. "We just got here!"
"So?"
"So -I'm tired and hungry and my feet are sore from carrying your weight around all day." Inuyasha folded his arms. "I want a bath too..."
Come to think of it, Kagome felt exactly the same way. Maybe it wouldn't hurt to take a rest, after all, neither of them had got much sleep the night before and they were both very weary and dirty. "Ok..."
"You want rooms for tonight?" Mayu asked, getting out her checking in book.
"Yep." Inuyasha said happily.
"Two rooms costs three thousand yen." Mayu said easily.
"What? I don't have that kind of money on me!"
"That's for each room." Mayu added.
"Is that with or without caviar and champagne?" Inuyasha remarked sarcastically.
Kagome sighed as Inuyasha slipped once more into his jerk role and let her gaze wonder to the posters and leaflets around the desk. Then she noticed something rather interesting. Something that could save them a lot of money... Inuyasha wasn't going to like it, but he would have to if he wanted that bath.
"It's ok darling," Kagome suddenly stepped forward and slipped her arm through his. "I'm sure we can find more cheaper accommodation for our honey moon somewhere else..."
Inuyasha stared at her. "You've finally lost it, haven't you...?"
"No, it's ok, I don't mind finding somewhere else." Kagome smiled up at him with love and adoration. "I mean... we did blow all our money on the flight here for the holiday... and it crashed as well... so maybe we'll get lucky and find an old refrigerator box to sleep in tonight."
"Wait - are you two newlyweds?" Mayu asked suddenly.
"No..." Inuyasha scowled.
"Yes!" Kagome said cheerfully, giving him a nudge. "No need to be shy, honey bun."
"That's great!" Mayu pointed to a poster behind her. "We have a newly wed discount for new couples seeking holidays in the South... I can knock a few hundred yen off if you're strapped for cash... I'd really hate to make you sleep in boxes... again by the looks of you two."
Kagome smiled. "Thank you!" she glanced up at a rather still Inuyasha. "Isn't that great, honey? Looks like our year is finally looking up!"
"Yeah..." he nodded dumbly. Well at least he was playing along now.
Mayu handed out their room keys. "Down the hall and turn left - the honeymoon suit is the one at the very end."
Inuyasha's eye was beginning to twitch but Kagome just smiled. "Thank you very much!"
She dragged Inuyasha off down the corridor.
When they had entered the room and shut the door, Inuyasha remained frozen to the spot while Kagome flopped down happily on the bed. "Ah... god bless the man who invented mattresses."
"I don't believe you..." Inuyasha shook his head with a frown.
"Brilliant, aren't I?" Kagome smiled at him before picking up a little leaflet that had been laid on the silk sheets. "Hmm... free dining in the dining room from nine p.m. onwards - oh - free mints!"
She grabbed one of the mints that had been laid out on the pillows and sighed happily as she popped it in her mouth. "It's been too long... I love chocolate..."
"This is ridiculous! How can you lie like that?!" Inuyasha turned to start pacing.
Kagome sneaked his mint while his back was turned. "Easy, I just open my mouth and-"
"We're not married - you can't pretend to be married - we barely even like each other!" Inuyasha whirled on her.
Kagome sealed her lips firmly. That had been a little harsh of him.
Inuyasha spied the mint in her hand. "Is that my mint?"
She looked down at the mint in her hand and quickly swallowed the one she had been chewing. "No..."
"How many have you had?" he frowned.
Kagome decided not to answer and went to pop her second mint into her mouth.
"Oh no you don't-"
He lunged at her and Kagome shrieked and fell back to avoid him. He began tickling her sides, half grappling for the mint in her hand. "No!" Kagome laughed and manoeuvred her hand so he wouldn't get it.
"That's not fair! You've had yours already!"
"So?" Kagome giggled as his fingers poked at her sides - her most ticklish spot so far. "S-stop it! You're n-not allowed..." she broke off in laughter before managing to catch her breath. "Not allowed to touch me!"
"So?" Inuyasha grinned, echoing her earlier response.
"You're not getting it!" Kagome quickly licked the mint and held it out. "You want it? Take it!"
"Fine." He grabbed the mint and stuffed it in his mouth. Kagome started at him.
Just then Mayu entered. "Here's the menu for tonight's... oh!" she froze as she saw Inuyasha positioned on top of Kagome, halfway through chewing a mint. "I-I didn't think you'd be so fast - goodbye!"
She scurried out again, bright red. The door slammed shut before the menu hit the floor.
Kagome and Inuyasha stared at the door before leaping away from each other. Kagome ran a hand through her hair, slightly flushed. "That's disgusting! I can't believe you ate that."
"Why not?" He swallowed the mint.
"What about cooties?" Kagome frowned.
"Look - if you didn't kill the toad when you kissed it, Princess, then cooties probably won't kill me either." He smirked.
"No jokes!" Kagome threw a cushion at him, but with a good-natured smile.
Inuyasha suddenly stared at her though. "You used your bad arm."
"What?" Kagome looked down at the arm she'd just used to complete the throw and flexed it in its sling. "It feels better..."
"Maybe now you'll stop using your injuries as a guilt trip, hm?" he smirked.
^_^
"So you don't have any family at all?" Kagome asked as she leaned on the table with one arm and stirred her piping hot soup with her other hand, obviously taking full advantage of the fact she didn't have to use the itchy sling anymore.
"Apart from my dad... I have a brother." Inuyasha shrugged as he rolled peas around his plate.
"Brother?" Kagome looked up at him. "My dad never mentioned him."
"No wonder, he's demon. My step father's never met him." Inuyasha stifled a yawn. Damn he was tired.
Seeing Inuyasha's yawn she had to fight to keep from yawning herself, being that it was contagious. "Your father's son?" she guessed.
He nodded. "What about you?"
"Nope... no demons in my family."
"No, I meant if you had any other family."
Kagome thought for a moment. "I have my mom... and Souta - my little brother and Grandpa."
Inuyasha seemed surprised. "I though you only had your dad."
"Why?"
"Because... I would have thought you'd be living with the rest of the family." He rested his chin on his palm.
"My dad liked to keep me under his thumb a lot... he thought I was safer when I was surrounded by armed guards and whatever." Kagome smiled, but her eyes were cast down to her plate. "You know... for a while back there I thought... I thought if dad was really gone... then I could go home to the country."
"I bet your dad would love to hear you say that."
"But I still love him." Kagome said quickly. "I still have every intention of finding him and going home before this prophecy thing comes to pass."
Inuyasha frowned. "So... what is this prophecy thing exactly?"
"Like you don't know."
"I mean... what exactly does it forecast? What does it say?" he watched her carefully.
"Ohhh..." Kagome sighed and sat back. "My dad... he showed me a bit the prophecy - or a copy of it - when I was a kid. Actually... he's showed it to me so many I've memorised it."
She lapsed into quiet and she mulled in her own thoughts for a few seconds. Inuyasha just waited and watched her patiently.
"It starts of talking about a land divided into darkness and light with a wooden dam divider."
"The northern and southern territory divided by the forest?" Inuyasha asked.
Kagome nodded. "It goes on about the evils of the dark beings against the light beings... and that there shall be the one grey being that will cleanse the land and lead the people into light."
"Are you the grey one?" Inuyasha frowned. "You don't look grey."
"It's a metaphor." She shook her head. "The demons are the dark ones and the white ones are the humans... I'm grey because I'm supposed to be human but have the powers of demons."
"How do they know you're the grey one?"
"The prophecy says that the grey girl will have the name every man, woman and child will have known and sang." Kagome sighed. "You know... the Kagome, Kagome nursery rhyme?"
"I never sang that." Inuyasha folded his arms.
"I think it's going on assumption that everyone's heard it." She shrugged. "It then went on about to talk about a day of darkness that would rise within the dark lands..."
"And...?"
"I think... some of the prophecy was edited..." she sighed again. "It got a bit sketchy at that point - it just got very blunt."
"What do you mean?"
"It's like it suddenly jumped to the point. It just said - 'and the world shall be cleansed of and black'"
"Don't you mean 'cleansed of black'?" Inuyasha frowned.
"No it said 'of and'. I thought it was a typo or something, but I checked other copies and they said the same thing."
"Hey, maybe the guy who wrote it wasn't entirely sane in the membrane anyway." Inuyasha shrugged.
"Yeah... but now everyone's got it in their head that I WANT to kill demons." Kagome scowled. "I used to know a bodyguard... everyone thought he was human - but he told me he was kitsune."
Inuyasha started. "Was he employed to kill you?"
"No." Kagome laughed. "He heard that I didn't want to be a part of the prophecy and wanted to help me... he was the first demon I ever got within three feet of..."
"So what happened?"
"He was killed..." she smiled sadly. "He took a bullet from a sniper."
"Oh..." Inuyasha frowned.
"So... you can see why I don't detest demons. It's not like all of them are going to be evil. I mean - you're not evil, and you're half demon." Kagome scowled. "In fact the most evil people in the world are the human activists who pick on demons."
The same human activists that had killed his parents.
Kagome suddenly looked past Inuyasha and noticed that the staff was watching them with delighted little smiles. She hid her smile behind her hand.
Inuyasha stifled another yawn. "You done, yet? I'm beat, I wanna go to bed."
"Yep, I'm done."
He started to get up.
"Wait!" Kagome whispered and he sat back down with a frown.
"What?"
"The staff are watching us - they think we're a real couple of newlyweds." Kagome said under her breath. "No - don't look!"
"Well you did tell them that so it IS understandable." He shrugged.
"Kiss me."
He stared at her like she'd grown another head.
"Oh - don't look at me like that! We're newlyweds remember?"
"Did you hit your head or something and FORGET reality?" he hissed.
"They're expecting us to be all lovey-dovey!" Kagome reasoned. "We have to prove that we really are newlyweds otherwise they might suspect something and kick us out."
"But how can we prove it if we're NOT married?" he growled.
"My kissing me." She smiled like he was being unreasonable. "Oh come on, you're acting like I'm asking you to chop off your own hand."
"Same effect." He pulled a face. "I'm just irrational that way when girls ask me to kiss them out of the blue."
"Is this because you've never kissed anyone before?" Kagome asked slyly.
"I have SO kissed people before." He growled.
"Then prove it to me." She smirked. "Or are you too chicken?"
"I better get a bonus in my salary for this, you know."
"You'll do it?"
"Yeah, whatever..." he sighed and leaned before with a grimace.
Kagome's expression mirrored his own as they both closed their eyes briefly as their lips met. They both drew back simultaneously and wiped their mouths with their sleeves.
"Blargh..." Inuyasha pulled a face. "And you were worried about cooties before..."
Kagome smiled despite his sour expression. "First one to the room gets the bed."
"Huh?" he looked up to see Kagome dashing away. "Wait! I don't want the couch!"
The two raced out the dining room and the staff cooed. "Aw... young love..." a waitress commented.
"Can't wait to get into bed."
Seriously, they couldn't wait at all.
(A/N: I'm knackered and it's only ten thirty... Oh well... next chapter will be 'Torn'.)
(A/N: having a hair-pulling stress day. My hamster escaped yesterday and I've been searching the entire house for the stupid mouse... I found I this morning... well... I heard it... and it's in the walls. Why me? Well... it's either my hamster or a rat, and I'm really hoping it's a hamster. If anyone has any idea how to get a hamster out of a wall then please tell me... I'm desperate...)
Two Faced:
Cooties
"I can see the tree line up ahead."
"About damn time." Kagome remarked, she would have taken a look, but she'd been slung over Inuyasha's shoulder again and didn't really have a good view. Though... it could be considered a good view because the only thing she could see was Inuyasha's ass... definitely not a bad thing. Of course, she'd never dare tell him, otherwise he'd probably just drop her.
"Oh look..." Inuyasha sounded surprised.
"At what?"
Inuyasha gently let Kagome slide down his arm to find her feet and she quickly turned on one leg (like a flamingo) to see they were at the edge of a rather small... fairly primitive looking village. "How quaint." Kagome said with a pleased smile. Maybe they were closer to finding her father than she'd thought.
"I'm surprised it's still here." Inuyasha said.
"Why?"
"Because villages close to the dark forest often high mortality rates." He slanted a look at her.
"Right... because of demons..." Kagome noticed that up ahead the small village seemed to have quite a few residents. From here she could see that they wore the clothes of farmers and poor people, no vogue magazines to be seen for miles. Though it wasn't surprising, since this place was overrun with demons most of the time and the fast paced world of technology had been moved to the other side of the forest where demons wouldn't get at it.
"We should ask someone if they've seen my dad or Sango and Miroku's group." Kagome was already limping away before Inuyasha could argue with her. She waved to a nearby villager. "Excuse me - I need some help!"
The villager glanced up to see Kagome rushing towards him, obviously injured, and behind her a demon was rapidly catching up. He drew his own conclusions. "Raid! Demon! Raid!"
At once several other villagers suddenly looked up to see the same sight and grabbed whatever weapons they could find and charged at Inuyasha who had stopped just behind a surprised looking Kagome.
"Out of the way, lass!" one man yelled and Kagome was tugged out of the way as several poles and planks of wood hit Inuyasha.
"Wait!" Kagome yelled.
The poles and planks of wood shattered and Inuyasha remained standing where he was, looking just as surprised as before. "Well, hello to you too." He remarked.
"It's ok - he's a nice demon!" Kagome told the people quickly.
There was a moment of silence as the villagers processed this before shrugging or apologising, but walking off nonetheless.
Kagome had just about forgotten what she was about to ask after that little interlude, but it suddenly came to her as she saw the people walking away. She grabbed one of the men by the sleeve. "Excuse me, sir, but have you seen any plane crash victims around here?"
"Dead ones?" he looked at her peculiarly.
"Um... no, alive ones."
"I haven't seen any, but ask Mayu - she works at the inn, she sees a lot of people come through these parts." The villager offered.
"Thank you." Kagome smiled as the man walked off again. When Inuyasha arrived at her side she switched her worried gaze to him. "You alright?"
"Huh - oh yeah, fine." Inuyasha rubbed his slightly sore head. He should really have seen this coming, but it had totally slipped his mind. Living with his stepfather's people had been a pretty cushy life... no one usually came chasing after him with planks of wood with nails in them. Well... not any more... maybe when he had been a kid and kept stealing cookies...
"That guy said we have to go see the lady at the inn - she might know where my father is..."
"That's presuming he isn't dead." Inuyasha pointed out as Kagome started limping in the direction of the building with the signpost outside indicating it was the local inn.
"I'll kill him if he's dead - so he better not be." Kagome said breezily as she limped along on her way. Inuyasha slipped ahead of her and held the door open for her so she wouldn't strain her arm... that little moment of thoughtfulness on his part made her slightly surprised... but he didn't seem to think much of it.
"Excuse me, miss..." Kagome leaned on the front desk with her good arm while the lady behind the counter turned and smiled automatically. "Are you Mayu?"
"Yes. How can I help?"
"Um... we were just wondering if you'd seen any plane crash victims around here..." Kagome asked.
"You mean, besides you two?"
Inuyasha whistled. "Wow, she's good."
"Yeah." Kagome nodded. "Have you seen anyone?"
"Hmm... well I heard tell that a village in the east was recently housing some plane crash victims... a large group of men and a few women."
"Young or old?" Kagome pressed.
"Not sure, my friend at the inn over there didn't elaborate." Mayu shook her head.
Kagome glanced back at Inuyasha. "That could be either dad's crew or Miroku's..."
"It's probably dad's lot." Inuyasha shrugged. "Miroku's group wouldn't have had time to travel that far."
"Ok - thanks a lot!" Kagome smiled and turned. "Come on Inuyasha, we better get a move on if we are going to catch up-"
"Where do you think you're going?" Inuyasha scoffed. "We just got here!"
"So?"
"So -I'm tired and hungry and my feet are sore from carrying your weight around all day." Inuyasha folded his arms. "I want a bath too..."
Come to think of it, Kagome felt exactly the same way. Maybe it wouldn't hurt to take a rest, after all, neither of them had got much sleep the night before and they were both very weary and dirty. "Ok..."
"You want rooms for tonight?" Mayu asked, getting out her checking in book.
"Yep." Inuyasha said happily.
"Two rooms costs three thousand yen." Mayu said easily.
"What? I don't have that kind of money on me!"
"That's for each room." Mayu added.
"Is that with or without caviar and champagne?" Inuyasha remarked sarcastically.
Kagome sighed as Inuyasha slipped once more into his jerk role and let her gaze wonder to the posters and leaflets around the desk. Then she noticed something rather interesting. Something that could save them a lot of money... Inuyasha wasn't going to like it, but he would have to if he wanted that bath.
"It's ok darling," Kagome suddenly stepped forward and slipped her arm through his. "I'm sure we can find more cheaper accommodation for our honey moon somewhere else..."
Inuyasha stared at her. "You've finally lost it, haven't you...?"
"No, it's ok, I don't mind finding somewhere else." Kagome smiled up at him with love and adoration. "I mean... we did blow all our money on the flight here for the holiday... and it crashed as well... so maybe we'll get lucky and find an old refrigerator box to sleep in tonight."
"Wait - are you two newlyweds?" Mayu asked suddenly.
"No..." Inuyasha scowled.
"Yes!" Kagome said cheerfully, giving him a nudge. "No need to be shy, honey bun."
"That's great!" Mayu pointed to a poster behind her. "We have a newly wed discount for new couples seeking holidays in the South... I can knock a few hundred yen off if you're strapped for cash... I'd really hate to make you sleep in boxes... again by the looks of you two."
Kagome smiled. "Thank you!" she glanced up at a rather still Inuyasha. "Isn't that great, honey? Looks like our year is finally looking up!"
"Yeah..." he nodded dumbly. Well at least he was playing along now.
Mayu handed out their room keys. "Down the hall and turn left - the honeymoon suit is the one at the very end."
Inuyasha's eye was beginning to twitch but Kagome just smiled. "Thank you very much!"
She dragged Inuyasha off down the corridor.
When they had entered the room and shut the door, Inuyasha remained frozen to the spot while Kagome flopped down happily on the bed. "Ah... god bless the man who invented mattresses."
"I don't believe you..." Inuyasha shook his head with a frown.
"Brilliant, aren't I?" Kagome smiled at him before picking up a little leaflet that had been laid on the silk sheets. "Hmm... free dining in the dining room from nine p.m. onwards - oh - free mints!"
She grabbed one of the mints that had been laid out on the pillows and sighed happily as she popped it in her mouth. "It's been too long... I love chocolate..."
"This is ridiculous! How can you lie like that?!" Inuyasha turned to start pacing.
Kagome sneaked his mint while his back was turned. "Easy, I just open my mouth and-"
"We're not married - you can't pretend to be married - we barely even like each other!" Inuyasha whirled on her.
Kagome sealed her lips firmly. That had been a little harsh of him.
Inuyasha spied the mint in her hand. "Is that my mint?"
She looked down at the mint in her hand and quickly swallowed the one she had been chewing. "No..."
"How many have you had?" he frowned.
Kagome decided not to answer and went to pop her second mint into her mouth.
"Oh no you don't-"
He lunged at her and Kagome shrieked and fell back to avoid him. He began tickling her sides, half grappling for the mint in her hand. "No!" Kagome laughed and manoeuvred her hand so he wouldn't get it.
"That's not fair! You've had yours already!"
"So?" Kagome giggled as his fingers poked at her sides - her most ticklish spot so far. "S-stop it! You're n-not allowed..." she broke off in laughter before managing to catch her breath. "Not allowed to touch me!"
"So?" Inuyasha grinned, echoing her earlier response.
"You're not getting it!" Kagome quickly licked the mint and held it out. "You want it? Take it!"
"Fine." He grabbed the mint and stuffed it in his mouth. Kagome started at him.
Just then Mayu entered. "Here's the menu for tonight's... oh!" she froze as she saw Inuyasha positioned on top of Kagome, halfway through chewing a mint. "I-I didn't think you'd be so fast - goodbye!"
She scurried out again, bright red. The door slammed shut before the menu hit the floor.
Kagome and Inuyasha stared at the door before leaping away from each other. Kagome ran a hand through her hair, slightly flushed. "That's disgusting! I can't believe you ate that."
"Why not?" He swallowed the mint.
"What about cooties?" Kagome frowned.
"Look - if you didn't kill the toad when you kissed it, Princess, then cooties probably won't kill me either." He smirked.
"No jokes!" Kagome threw a cushion at him, but with a good-natured smile.
Inuyasha suddenly stared at her though. "You used your bad arm."
"What?" Kagome looked down at the arm she'd just used to complete the throw and flexed it in its sling. "It feels better..."
"Maybe now you'll stop using your injuries as a guilt trip, hm?" he smirked.
^_^
"So you don't have any family at all?" Kagome asked as she leaned on the table with one arm and stirred her piping hot soup with her other hand, obviously taking full advantage of the fact she didn't have to use the itchy sling anymore.
"Apart from my dad... I have a brother." Inuyasha shrugged as he rolled peas around his plate.
"Brother?" Kagome looked up at him. "My dad never mentioned him."
"No wonder, he's demon. My step father's never met him." Inuyasha stifled a yawn. Damn he was tired.
Seeing Inuyasha's yawn she had to fight to keep from yawning herself, being that it was contagious. "Your father's son?" she guessed.
He nodded. "What about you?"
"Nope... no demons in my family."
"No, I meant if you had any other family."
Kagome thought for a moment. "I have my mom... and Souta - my little brother and Grandpa."
Inuyasha seemed surprised. "I though you only had your dad."
"Why?"
"Because... I would have thought you'd be living with the rest of the family." He rested his chin on his palm.
"My dad liked to keep me under his thumb a lot... he thought I was safer when I was surrounded by armed guards and whatever." Kagome smiled, but her eyes were cast down to her plate. "You know... for a while back there I thought... I thought if dad was really gone... then I could go home to the country."
"I bet your dad would love to hear you say that."
"But I still love him." Kagome said quickly. "I still have every intention of finding him and going home before this prophecy thing comes to pass."
Inuyasha frowned. "So... what is this prophecy thing exactly?"
"Like you don't know."
"I mean... what exactly does it forecast? What does it say?" he watched her carefully.
"Ohhh..." Kagome sighed and sat back. "My dad... he showed me a bit the prophecy - or a copy of it - when I was a kid. Actually... he's showed it to me so many I've memorised it."
She lapsed into quiet and she mulled in her own thoughts for a few seconds. Inuyasha just waited and watched her patiently.
"It starts of talking about a land divided into darkness and light with a wooden dam divider."
"The northern and southern territory divided by the forest?" Inuyasha asked.
Kagome nodded. "It goes on about the evils of the dark beings against the light beings... and that there shall be the one grey being that will cleanse the land and lead the people into light."
"Are you the grey one?" Inuyasha frowned. "You don't look grey."
"It's a metaphor." She shook her head. "The demons are the dark ones and the white ones are the humans... I'm grey because I'm supposed to be human but have the powers of demons."
"How do they know you're the grey one?"
"The prophecy says that the grey girl will have the name every man, woman and child will have known and sang." Kagome sighed. "You know... the Kagome, Kagome nursery rhyme?"
"I never sang that." Inuyasha folded his arms.
"I think it's going on assumption that everyone's heard it." She shrugged. "It then went on about to talk about a day of darkness that would rise within the dark lands..."
"And...?"
"I think... some of the prophecy was edited..." she sighed again. "It got a bit sketchy at that point - it just got very blunt."
"What do you mean?"
"It's like it suddenly jumped to the point. It just said - 'and the world shall be cleansed of and black'"
"Don't you mean 'cleansed of black'?" Inuyasha frowned.
"No it said 'of and'. I thought it was a typo or something, but I checked other copies and they said the same thing."
"Hey, maybe the guy who wrote it wasn't entirely sane in the membrane anyway." Inuyasha shrugged.
"Yeah... but now everyone's got it in their head that I WANT to kill demons." Kagome scowled. "I used to know a bodyguard... everyone thought he was human - but he told me he was kitsune."
Inuyasha started. "Was he employed to kill you?"
"No." Kagome laughed. "He heard that I didn't want to be a part of the prophecy and wanted to help me... he was the first demon I ever got within three feet of..."
"So what happened?"
"He was killed..." she smiled sadly. "He took a bullet from a sniper."
"Oh..." Inuyasha frowned.
"So... you can see why I don't detest demons. It's not like all of them are going to be evil. I mean - you're not evil, and you're half demon." Kagome scowled. "In fact the most evil people in the world are the human activists who pick on demons."
The same human activists that had killed his parents.
Kagome suddenly looked past Inuyasha and noticed that the staff was watching them with delighted little smiles. She hid her smile behind her hand.
Inuyasha stifled another yawn. "You done, yet? I'm beat, I wanna go to bed."
"Yep, I'm done."
He started to get up.
"Wait!" Kagome whispered and he sat back down with a frown.
"What?"
"The staff are watching us - they think we're a real couple of newlyweds." Kagome said under her breath. "No - don't look!"
"Well you did tell them that so it IS understandable." He shrugged.
"Kiss me."
He stared at her like she'd grown another head.
"Oh - don't look at me like that! We're newlyweds remember?"
"Did you hit your head or something and FORGET reality?" he hissed.
"They're expecting us to be all lovey-dovey!" Kagome reasoned. "We have to prove that we really are newlyweds otherwise they might suspect something and kick us out."
"But how can we prove it if we're NOT married?" he growled.
"My kissing me." She smiled like he was being unreasonable. "Oh come on, you're acting like I'm asking you to chop off your own hand."
"Same effect." He pulled a face. "I'm just irrational that way when girls ask me to kiss them out of the blue."
"Is this because you've never kissed anyone before?" Kagome asked slyly.
"I have SO kissed people before." He growled.
"Then prove it to me." She smirked. "Or are you too chicken?"
"I better get a bonus in my salary for this, you know."
"You'll do it?"
"Yeah, whatever..." he sighed and leaned before with a grimace.
Kagome's expression mirrored his own as they both closed their eyes briefly as their lips met. They both drew back simultaneously and wiped their mouths with their sleeves.
"Blargh..." Inuyasha pulled a face. "And you were worried about cooties before..."
Kagome smiled despite his sour expression. "First one to the room gets the bed."
"Huh?" he looked up to see Kagome dashing away. "Wait! I don't want the couch!"
The two raced out the dining room and the staff cooed. "Aw... young love..." a waitress commented.
"Can't wait to get into bed."
Seriously, they couldn't wait at all.
(A/N: I'm knackered and it's only ten thirty... Oh well... next chapter will be 'Torn'.)