Notes: Phwee, another chapter.  I bet you're all so excited… heh.  Thank you, again, for the reviews.  Of course, now that I have thirteen, since that's an unlucky number, knowing my luck, not a single 'nother person will review.  Ever.  Depressing.

Read.

Disclaimer: I don't own Inuyasha.  Rumiko Takahashi does.  So there; you can't sue me.

- Watching Over –

- Chapter Three: Of All the Times For It to Be Now -

"Kagome! Wake up!" Souta called through the floor/ceiling.  Kagome moaned, her eyes fluttering open with an effort.  Buyo's face, blurred and up-close, was pressed against her own.  She couldn't seem to remember –

     Oh.  Yeah… Inuyasha had brought her home sometime around an hour ago, if her bedside clock was to be believed.  Even the steady glow of its numbers, showing 6:15, hurt her worn-out eyes.  Her head felt as through a metal mallet was smashing into her skull every second or so, and every single one of her limbs was throbbing with a dull ache.  There wasn't even room for thinking in her head.

     "Kagome!  Mama says if you don't get down right now, she'll – hey, are you okay?  Kagome?" Souta tiptoed up to her bed and shoved Buyo off of Kagome's face.  "Your face is all white, 'nee-san… should I get Mama?"

     "Yeah," she coughed.  She couldn't remember ever feeling this utterly terrible before in her life.  Exhaustion permeated every defense her body could destruct, and all she wanted to do was lie here, under her warm covers on her soft bed, and sleep for about a year.

     The diagnosis was this: Kagome was sick.  Really sick.  Really, really sick.  Mrs. Higurashi couldn't imagine the cause of such a horrible illness, but prescribed bed rest, lots of fluids, and an aspirin now and then to ease the headache.  Souta's initial jealousy was overridden by a firm 'mom-monster,' and he was steered off to school.

     The rest of the day was spent firmly in bed.  With Buyo acting as guard, Kagome's mama and grandfather stood by, ready to cater to her every whim.  Many, many different varieties of herbal tea were consumed, with varying degrees of success in treating her illness.

     She lay in bed, as she had done for the entire day, reading Angelic Layer and sipping at lemon tea with honey in it.  On her radio, a piano picked out the melancholy notes of its solo during a rather sad song.  Fat water drops crawled down her window, leaving trails of cleanliness in the dust and grime layered on the glass.  A half-drunk glass of water had spilled on the floor near her bed, but so long as the water didn't get into any stuffed animals or manga, she didn't care.

     Tap, tap.  Kagome's heart leapt into hyper mode, and her eyes flicked about the room.  Buyo's rumbling purr trailed off into nothingness.

     Tap, tap.  "Ah, gods!"  It was louder this time, and she jumped straight into a sitting position, despite the ache behind her eyes and the stabs of pain in her shoulders.  The cat on her stomach bared his teeth at her and stalked off with as much dignity as he could muster.

     Now her gaze turned to the window, and her breath caught in her throat.  She had that familiar feeling, like her heart was caving in on itself.  Outside her window, balanced with lazy ease on a spindly limb and fixing her with a look of half-concern, half-imperiousness, stood Inuyasha.  One furred ear flicked towards her as she saw him, and she couldn't help wanting to rub those ears like she did her neighbor's dog.

     She approached the window, unsteady on her legs like a newborn giraffe, still wearing the pajamas from the 'escapade' the night before.  Leaning heavily on the windowsill, she cranked open the window enough to let the proud half-demon through and into her room.  A frigid gust of air made her shiver, and her cheeks flushed pink in the cold.  Hurriedly, she closed the window and scrambled back into the haven of her bed, where a warm hollow had been created in the mattress.  Inuyasha seated himself at the foot of her bed, flicking away a doe-eyed stuffed cat.  The headache had returned, only now it had taken steroids, and had brought a few – a few? more like a party's worth – friends.

     Buyo cowered in the closet.

     They had yet to speak.  Yet all they did was stare.  She didn't even think about what would happen if her grandfather or mother came in, or about the fact that she was alone in a room – her room – with what was, technically, a guy.  A really cute guy, the back of her mind cackled.  She ignored it.

     "So," Kagome began, rolling over and burying her face in the flannel softness of her bright blue pillows.

     "I… came for two reasons."  He was uncharacteristically nervous.  Combing his bangs back with his claws, he continued.

     "First.  I… well.  I wanted to make sure you were all right.  'Cause, you know."  He seemed to find his bare, calloused heels very interesting right at that moment.  "Just in case, even though I could never make any mistakes.  I knew you were fine.  Just, Shippou wanted to make sure."  Sho' nuff, his cocky attitude and self-confidence were resurfacing with a vengeance.

     That pompous smirk of his twisted his lips as he spoke.  "I mean, I'd never care, right?  Right – wait.  What's wrong with you, idiot?"

     Half of Kagome's face was buried in her pillow, and she knew her skin was something like the colour of wax.  Pale wax.  Souta always had this look in his eye, too, when he was sick – the spark in him died out and was replaced with a dull sheen.  Perhaps that had happened to her.

     "Are you sick or somethin'?" he prodded at her, and instinctively she winced and curled up into a tighter ball.  Something inside her hurt, but she didn't know why, exactly.  "Come on, you idiot.  Say somethin'!"

     "… Hi."

     He rolled his eyes with an over-exaggerated groan.  "I mean, somethin' useful.  Like, 'oh, thank you, Inuyasha!'"

     Since when did we get this friendly? Kagome sighed.  "Um… okay, I guess it was kind of sweet of you to come see me."

     "… That's the spirit, I guess." Inuyasha snorted.  "I didn't come just to check up you, though.  I have to tell you something."

     "I'm not exactly feeling eloquent right now.  Out with it."

     Inuyasha shifted uncomfortably in his seat.  One ear drooped at a slight angle, the other was towards Kagome.  His half-closed eyelids blotted out the golden of his eyes.  "Well… Sesshoumaru summoned me a few hours ago."

     "Sesshoumaru…?"

     "My half-brother… a full dog-demon.  Hate the guy.  Anyway, he 'summoned' me to his 'chamber.'  Naraku – that's the head of our stupid little organization thing, not that it could really be called an organization; s'more like a bunch of misfits trying to stay alive and hidden – was there with him.

     "They said… well.  They want to kill you.  More specifically, they want me to kill you."

*****

Kagome's eyes widened in shock as Inuyasha looked on with a stoic grimace.  He didn't like how sickly she looked – her face was white except for the two pinpoints of red in the center of her cheeks.  Her hair lay limply around her face, like fouled straw.  Whenever she coughed, her entire body shuddered.

     He didn't even know why he cared.  She was just a stupid human girl… a stupid human girl who he'd rescued… a stupid human girl who he'd rescued, and was supposed to kill… a human girl who he'd rescued, and was supposed to kill, who was sick.  The 'stupid' had been dropped from his losing mental argument.

     Her mouth dropped open, but no words came out.  "I know," he said.  Then he saw the look she was trying to mask.  A pang of … what? … pierced his chest.  He stood, drawing himself up to his full six-foot-two height.

     "Listen to me!" Inuyasha hissed.  "I'm not gonna fucking do it!  I would've already done it if I was gonna!  I'm not heartless, you know!  They know I'm not going to.  They just like to toy with people."

     To his inexplicable relief, the look of saddened suspicion vanished from her face and was replaced with simple fear.  White tinged her already-pale knuckles as her fists clenched, and her eyes were alive with both anger and panic.  Were those…?

     "No, no!  Don't cry, c'mon!" Inuyasha pleaded.  He didn't like it when girls cried… it scared the hell out of him, because he never knew what to do.  Fighting he could do… comforting was something else entirely.  "Please!  Don't cry!"

     Sniffing with a disgusting gurgle, Kagome wiped her tears on her pillowcase, leaving darkened wet spots.  She swiped at her salt-encrusted eyelashes with one hand.  "I'm sorry… but I've never been… going to be killed before."

     Inuyasha's panic receded.  "Well.  Now you are."

     That was obviously the wrong response.  Kagome bit at her lip and closed her eyes, taking in a slow, deep breath.  "What do I do?"

     He sat himself back on her bed, one hand worrying absently at the hem of his black jeans as he thought.  "…Nothing, yet.  I'll keep 'em away (somehow)… eventually they'll forget you ever existed."

     Relief shone in her eyes, giving Inuyasha a strange feeling of happiness.  It was that stupid human part of him, making him all 'soft,' as Mayane liked to tease him.  Of course, there was the matter of actually distracting Naraku and his little puppets long enough for them to dismiss the Higurashi Death Case, as they called it.  He'd think about that later.

     "Thank you," Kagome exclaimed, and, before Inuyasha could begin his plan at valiant escape, was giving him a tight squeeze around the shoulders.  A hug, they called it.  The sweet smell of sickness enveloped him, making him more than a little uneasy – he couldn't afford to catch something as serious as this.

     No one's ever hugged me before… The realization hit him with the force of a blackjack, swung full force.  He knew about blackjacks, too.

     Her breath was hot on his neck, and he rubbed the spot in unease as she drew back, beaming at him.  He didn't understand her – how could she be so happy all the time?  It wasn't perky-annoying-happy, like Shippou used to be when he was young.  It was just optimism: a way of seeing all the good things about people.  A way of seeing the politeness of a newly-licensed teenager stopping for the old woman to let her cross the street, and ignoring the cranky businessman who had nearly run the elderly lady over.  And it perplexed him.  He'd known her officially for about twelve hours, and she already confused him.

     "How can you be happy?" Inuyasha inquired, frowning.

     Kagome stopped for a second to blink at him before answering.  "I'm not… happy, exactly.  Not about the situation, anyway.  I'm just grateful."

     "Weird."

     Now Inuyasha felt… terrible, and he hated it.  Hated having these stupidweaksoftmushyvulnerablehuman feelings.  The words he and others had used to call his softer side – human side – had somehow merged into one teasing, taunting, unbearable mass of scorn.

     It's your fault, it's your fault, it's my fault, my fault, my fault, and they're going to kill her and it's your fault my fault my fault my fault my fault my fault and she's grateful but it's your fault.  She couldn't be grateful!  It was his fault Naraku was going to kill her, anyway!  How could she be grateful?

     "Hey." A slender, pale finger poked at his shoulder.  "Are you all right?"

     Inuyasha's head snapped up from his inner war.  Kagome was looking at him with concern, her china-coloured cheeks flushed.  One eyebrow was slightly raised.

     "Yeah," he answered, smirking.  "Of course I'm all right.  What's there to worry about?"  He crossed his arms over his chest as he spoke, inwardly hurrying to glue in fresh bricks to his mental wall.  If he wasn't careful, though, if the bricks were too heavy, they fell and crushed his fingers.

*****

It was slipped into the thin pages of her science textbook, folded in a perfect square three times exactly.  The creases were crisp and never done twice in an attempt to mend a sloppy mistake.  The ink was bright red, and it was written in some of the best calligraphy she'd ever seen.

He is watching you now, but he cannot stay near forever.  When he lets up his guard, even if for a mere second, we will kill you.  Why are we telling you this?  It is because fear is entertaining, don't you agree?

Kagome chanced a fleeting glance out the drizzle-covered window, her hands quivering.  Yes.  There was Inu-Yasha, slumped in typical 'casual guy posture,' the knit cap hiding his ears and his waist-length hair pulled into a loose ponytail.  A pair of sunglasses rested on his nose, but she could tell he was watching her with fierce intensity.

     "…You are dismissed," she heard her teacher saying.

     Finally!  She nearly toppled over her desk in her hurry to escape, making a neat leap over a stack of chairs.  There was Inuyasha again – slouching against a locker in the hallway.  Even without a uniform, he looked the perfect part of an upperclassman.  The sunglasses had disappeared into his jeans pocket.

     "Come on," Inuyasha growled, grabbing her upper arm.  "No time!"  His grip was quite strong, and when she flinched, he lessened the force of it with a quick look of apology.

     Kagome was quickly marched out of school, dragging her oversized backpack behind her.  Their steps were hurried as they marched down the semi-crowded sidewalk, and she barely saved herself from tripping over her own feet several times.

     "How could I forget, how could I forget?" Inuyasha hissed to himself.  "Of all the times for it to be now!"

     "Um…" Kagome said timidly, "What's wrong?"

     He seemed to ignore her question, instead letting loose a string of expletives, some of which Kagome wasn't sure existed.  "Whatever you do, don't get anywhere near any open windows tonight.  Do not, under any circumstances, leave the house.  Make sure all the doors and windows are locked, try not to leave too many lights on, and no loud music."

     Inuyasha's grasp on her arm locked tighter, sending a shiver of apprehension through Kagome's nerves.  "Why?" she questioned, straining to look him full in the eye.  This was a difficult task, as he was about six inches taller than her, was standing right next to her, and was looking skyward as if deep in thought.  What she could see of his golden eyes had clouded over slightly, and darkened to a burnished bronze.

     He once again let her questions go unanswered, only speeding up a little.  His sneakers slapped the pavement in a rhythmic pattern, answered by her own footsteps just behind his.  With one hand she tugged her coat further around her, the other was immobilized from Inuyasha's unrelenting grip.  Tiny shoots of pain were unleashed down her arm as his claws pricked her, but she remained silent.

     "How much homework do you have?" It was sudden, and it took her a moment to fumble for the answer.

     "Not too much… just math, which could take a while, and I have to read a chapter in history."

     "Good.  Finish it before nightfall, and don't sleep in your room.  That's where they'll expect you to be… Sleep on the couch, or something, I don't know!"  A single fang was protruding from his mouth, resting on his scowling lips.  Despite the gravity of the situation, it gave him an undeniably cute look, like a baby crocodile.

     Kagome was now completely freaked out.  "O-Okay," she readily agreed.  Why?  But she knew she wouldn't be able to squirrel an answer from him.

*****

The rain had yet to stop, plump drops slipping down the window and gouging out chunks of the already-formed puddles.  Kagome Higurashi saw none of this.  She sat cross-legged in her closet, trying to make her eyes focus on her textbook.  It was just before sunset, and the fiery sphere was resting low in the dismal grey sky.

     "Dynasty…" Kagome read the same sentence again and again.  Downstairs, Mrs. Higurashi prepared Souta's lunch for the next day, and Souta himself busily killed things on his Playstation.

     "Ah… I'm never going to finish this."  I can't stop thinking about Inuyasha… why was he so worried about tonight?  Is something going to happen?

     The doorbell rang throughout the house, startling her into dropping her textbook onto a pile of clothes.  She took a cautious peek out of the closet door.

     "Kagome!  Can you get that, please?  My hands are full!"  And Souta's too busy blowing up cars, Kagome added mentally.

     "Sure, coming!"  She pushed open the door and slid on her stomach to the stairs, using her elbows to propel herself.  Then she crawled down the stairs on her knees, backwards.  Inuyasha, in all his intensity, had scared her pretty well – she was being uncharacteristically paranoid.

     She froze just before the door.  What if it was Naraku, coming to kill her?  Oh, gods.  Stretching upwards on tiptoe, she peered through the peephole in the door – it was a familiar, frowning face.  "Inuyasha," she breathed as she opened the door.

     "Come on, lemme in, dammit!"  Relief, relief he was trying so hard to hide, was written all over his face.  "Hurry!"

*****

Notes: Whee!  That's the closest to fluff they can get right now, you know – they've known each other for a few hours.  Anyway, in this fic, I'd just like to warn you: I've made Naraku into a sadistic maniac.  (You'll see in the next chapter…)

You will review.  This is not a request.  It is a demand.