Disclaimer: Yui doesn't own Inuyasha.

Belonging nowhere
By miyamoto yui
Part 9 – Not until the demons inside of my head become quiet…
A chibi Sesshomaru was walking by a lake and turned his head to look at his reflection.

"Hey!" a little girl ran to him and skidded next to him. "You seem new around here."

He said nothing.

She pouted and poked him. His eyes opened wide as he blinked in horror at the girl not knowing who he was.
"What's your name?" the girl asked as she tried to be nice again.
"…" He just looked at her.
The girl shook her head in frustration. "Why won't you talk to me?"
"You are a human," he arrogantly answered.
"And you are too," she replied with a matter-of-fact tone.
His eyes darkened at the remark. "No, I am a youkai."
"You are?" The little girl bit on her index finger as she stared at him with a confused expression.

He nodded quietly.

"Let's play tag." Then, she poked him. "You're it!"

"I have no time to play with you!" he shouted at her.

"Oh…" she said, finally getting the hint.

Sesshomaru then found the girl walking sadly away.
"Sesshomaru-sama…" the brown-haired little girl had said to him. But she was no longer little anymore. She held a bamboo stick towards him. "I will kill you if you step inside of my village."

He remembered her fierce eyes as she said them.
She didn't hold the same affection as she did when she used to talk to him on her excursions outside of her village...

"Could Rin be like her?" he thought to himself as the sky grew dimmer above him.

She was one of the reasons that he hated humans. They were even worse at being two-faced as an oni wanting a fresh human child for a feast…
Granting the woman to have a child, only to have an oni eat it later…
While Sesshomaru was trying to find a place to rest for the night, the wind suddenly grew a bit violent. Yet, he did not stop.
"Sesshomaru…" a voice called in the wind.

A whoosh of the wind went by as Sesshomaru stopped walking and his eyebrow twitched slightly at the annoyance.

The voice laughed eagerly. "You are a fool."

He smirked at the idiotic comment. "One who knows others' faults usually have them as their own."

"How long do you plan to stay this way? Without your fur, you must live like that of your half-brother. Powerful, but still has the scent of having touched a human."

He said nothing and would not react. So, the voice pressed further, "You are no longer a full youkai."

Though his temper was rising, he answered, "Don't deter me if you have nothing amusing to say."

"Because your weakness is that girl," the voice said with disdain. "A _human_ girl."

"My strength is that human girl." He turned around slightly with unwelcoming scalding look that would have killed mere mortals by now with their fury.

The voice became impatient and angered as it said, "Go and take the fur back and claim your rightful place as the son of your great demon father. Abandon the woman completely and marry the one whom you were engaged to before you wandered around this pathetic island."

"I will do as I please." Sesshomaru replied as he turned around and walked away knowing that this conversation was useless.

"You cannot continue long without your fur, remember that? To your father, a fang may have cost him a 1/10 of his power to give to his young one…" the female voice laughed heartily at Sesshomaru. "What will you give to your child?"

"That is assuming that youkai will let her grow it until term…kukukuku…." She bellowed evilly.

"You underestimate humans as I once did." With his arrogant attitude, he left without another word.

For decades of years that had gone by like months, Sesshomaru had thought the same thing, but Rin had made him see something he never wanted to realize. That was part of the anger that drained within his blood.
And so, he had to go on this journey to answer the questions.

Could he survive with Rin? Of course he could…
…if he had been the same as he was many years ago.

Physically, he could anything, and his mental prowess was unquestionable.
But he had somehow wanted to understand if Rin would become the same as that woman…


As he sat under the evening sky, he looked up to the moon with a stern face.

He, who had always been conscientious of humans, was beginning to act differently towards humans. When they passed by him, they would pay no attention and he wouldn't say anything either.
Somehow, the villages weren't as harsh as they had once been. That was probably due to the joint effort of Kagome and Inuyasha in finding the Shikon shards.
When he was wrapping his arm, one day, someone was compassionate to offer him bandages while they were passing him by. Sesshomaru found himself bowing his head in thanks to the old woman as she smiled and left him standing under a tree.
Whenever he passed a child, he would wonder what did he see in Rin that was so different from all the children that he had ever met? Push aside that she gave him food when he didn't need it. But what was it that he was so fascinated that he loved her to death, almost cringing in his blood to comprehend its complexity.
If only he could understand beyond what he was accustomed to.
This wasn't something that involved looking at all the strategies he had…

…he had to look deeper.
But was he willing to go any further?

Somehow, when he looked at some children, he wondered what would his own child look like, and what would he think of him. Of course, he expected resentment on his part, just as Inuyasha and he had, for different reasons.

"Why…why must I wonder now about things that never troubled me before?" he asked himself.

What was happening to him? And could he find the answers?
Would he be alive to even answer them?

At one point, he looked at the ground with a soft look on his visage. In all honesty, he thought quietly to himself, "I want to return to her."

He knew he couldn't though.
Not until he found what he was looking for…
--
The next morning…

Rustle, rustle.

"And I must leave now," Rin said as she packed the few belongings she had.
"Thank you for your hospitality. We have overused our stay," Jaken said as he looked up to Kinnosuke.
"I will not allow you to leave my village," Kinnosuke firmly answered.
Rin shook her head as she stubbornly answered, "Kinnosuke, I will not argue with you."

"You have nowhere else to go," he responded, wanting not let her go at all. "And who will take care of your child? You can't survive out there."

"When I was little, my family died because of bandits. When I came back to li-" then she stopped as she continued, "When I came back to my village, the wolves had killed everyone. If I can survive then, there is no way that I will be a coward now. I am not weak."

"Rin, calm down," Jaken said as she patted her leg while she eyed Kinnosuke.

Jaken, of all people, knew this look. The look of defiance that made Rin so lovable to Sesshomaru because she was so fearless. Even to him.

It was then that Kinnosuke opened a chest and threw a beautiful cloak to the feet of Jaken and Rin. "Marry me."

Rin stopped packing as she looked at him in shock.

Frustrated, Rin replied, "I will not be pitied just because-"

Kinnosuke shook his head as he finally found his hands on her shoulders. "You don't understand. When you came to this village, you gave me more confidence of protecting this village.
"You are intelligent and clear-headed. As long as you are by my side, I know that this hope can be attained of no longer fearing youkai but actually being able to live with them. I'm not pitying you, I'm asking you because I love you for being the way you are."

Rin's eyes opened wide as she looked away.

Kinnosuke let go as he turned around and left without hearing her answer. Jaken's jaw was opened and he so desparately wanted to tell his master of this incident.
Was this all part of the big scheme?

Deep inside of him, he knew that was Sesshomaru's purpose. And at this, he was disappointed with him.

Jaken then looked up to Rin, who was still looking at the doorway.

"Where _will_ I go?" she whispered to herself as she thought of Sesshomaru.

He had given her his fur, she knew, as a final goodbye. For with all the times that he left her, he never left anything…

This was it. It didn't mean he would ever return to her. She knelt down to Jaken and hugged him as she was now feeling the impact of everything.

She whispered to his ear, "I wish I could be a child again."

He asked because he didn't want to see her any more troubled, "Before you met, Sesshomaru-sama?"

"No, never." She shook her head as she calmly sighed, "Before I troubled him with my childishness."

She continued, "I gave him food and water that day thinking that I could be of use to somebody instead of running around scrounging to live."
Rin smiled with melancholy. "And when he looked at me, I knew this was the person I didn't want to leave me once I awoke from a bad dream. He dressed me up and took care of me because he respected me. I was no longer treated so badly…"
Then, he eyes began to become wet with tears. "Now, I know that it was all in my head. I was a burden to him."

She got up and wiped her tears as Jaken said, "No, that's not true."

She smiled as she was shaking her head while going to the front door. "You don't have to be so nice to me, Jaken. You don't have to lie to me to make me feel better because I am no longer a child."

At that, she sighed as she left to take a walk to the shrine of the village.
The smile was becoming harder to pull off as she thought,

"I don't have to wait for him.
He doesn't want me to anymore…"
Tsuzuku…
--
Author's note: The outline is done! Now to see how to do everything…