Author's Notes:

This piece is moved from its original category - it started out life in the Inuyasha section, but after finishing it I got bored and started a "sequel" to it. I've left the footnotes and such the way they originally were in the Inuyasha section, so some of them, particularly the big one at the bottom of this first chapter, is going to be pretty "well, duh, baka" for this audience. The piece I'm working on now will pick up where this one leaves off; hopefully it won't be too much spoiler now to say that the sequel takes place entirely post-movie. In true Nadesico form, I even leave a bit of a blank. ;-) Its subplot's a little too grounded in Nadesico for me to not lose people who've seen none of the series, even if the main plot's pretty straightforward. At least, I hope that's the case. For those that have only seen the series, hopefully I can spark some interest in you to research into the Blank of Three Years and Prince of Darkness, the latter of which should come out in time for the holiday season. We think. I'm also going to plug my two favorite Nadesico resources - www.rurihosino.com and www.peacefuldays.org, both of which are fantastic sources of Nadesico goodness. Both are active sources and the latter hosts a forum for Nadesico fans - drop on by and post something. For those unfamiliar with Inuyasha, I recommend hitting up www.iridescent-dreams.net, it's a pretty good resource, especially if the Inuyasha section here seems intimidating.

I'm not a big fan of long introductory author's notes, but I'm tossing this one in anyways. Yes, the story's winding down to a close - it will work out to be 25 chapters. Looking at my stats, it seems I have 5-6 dedicated readers, so I thank you for your patronage. :) This note mainly is aimed at you guys - a few days after 25 finishes posting don't look for this story in the Inuyasha section. Why? I intend to move it over to the Nadesico section for a "permenant" home. There is method to this madness - I'm working on a "sequel" of sorts which picks up where this one will end, literally. (As in "later that evening...") Plot on this current story's pretty straight forward, but on this other one I'm trying to do things the Nadesico way - fluffy moments at the beginning masking dark undercurrents. At least, that's what I'm hoping I'll accomplish with it. ^_^; It'll be a bit before it's ready to begin posting - the first draft isn't even fine yet. While it will certainly remain an Inuyasha/Nadesico crossover, it relies too much upon Nadesico events to merit posting in this section. (Yes, I'm also aware of the irony of this statement as compared to the original footnote at the bottom of this chapter. oh well. This is the next story, that's this one. We need some antecedants here.) While nothing Nadesico I've done is canonical, the Inuyasha part of the sequel is so far outside of canon it's laughable. :) Anyways, on with what you've paid for...

Standard Disclaimer:

I don't own any of the characters from Inuyasha, Nadesico, or other series. This work contains Miroku, some suggestion, language, and a bit of the old ultra-violence. Don't say I didn't warn you.

And without further ado…

******

There and Back Again

Chapter One: Youkai Exist?

"So, you actually believe these fairy tales about a magic bead?"

"Fairy tales or no, I don't care. You saw the newspaper that day, and you were the one who suggested commissioning that report. Besides, we saw that... thing's corpse ourselves and have photographs of it decaying as soon as that pink thing popped out of its head."

"Yeah but that was before I read this," the first man replied, pointing at the two-inch-thick binder on the table.

"Look, we know moving forward in time is possible. Einstein proved it mathematically, and her ship proved it in practice," the second man retorted, jerking a thumb at the third and final person at the table, a young girl. "Why don't we at least find out if Einstein might be wrong and that travel backwards in time is at least possible?"

The third person at the table continued to remain a spectator to the debate before her. It was taking all of her self control not to say "baka" anyway. Though her adopted parents really weren't that much older than she was, they had tried to make her believe that telling the entirety of the truth all the time might not necessarily be a good thing. This was especially when it came to pointing out stupidity in others.

The phone in the middle of the table beeped, disrupting the disputing colleagues.

"Sir, Inutaishou-san is here, as is his, um, assistant."

A screech of "I am the VASSAL to Inutaishou-SAMA!" could be heard through the secretary's headset.

"Er, yes. Inutaishou-san and his VASSAL are here to see you sir."

"Very well, send them in," the first man replied. He was really going to have to send his secretary on vacation. She was getting more stressed out every day.

The office's door opened, and a staff wavered in. The table's occupants stood, whereupon they saw that the floating staff was actually being carried by a rather short and ugly creature. Behind the disturbing creature strode a man with flowing white hair.

"Inutaishou-san, I'm Mark Laymen, and this is Mike Johnson," Laymen gestured at the man who suggested the report, "and this," he concluded, motioning to the lone woman in the room, "is-"

"Hoshino Ruri," Inutaishou stated, bowing to her. Hoshino blushed slightly and returned the bow.

The creature who walked in with Inutaishou addressed the room, "And I am Jaken, vassal to Lords Inutaishou Inuyasha and Inutaishou Sess ---"

"Baka."

Laymen and Johnson glared at Hoshino then turned to apologize to Inutaishou. That appeared to be unnecessary, as he was smiling at the child. "Shut up and sit down, Jaken. You may have considered yourself a vassal to my father, but I am not a Lord."

"Er, yes, Inuyasha-sama."

Laymen started to look for a chair for the bizarre little guest, but found it unnecessary when the creature planted himself on the floor next to the drink cart and apparently began to meditate.

Inutaishou took the fourth, formerly unoccupied, seat at the table, which was opposite Hoshino. Laymen and Johnson quickly resumed their seats. Johnson was clearly the subordinate here, shuffling the papers in front of him while Laymen didn't even bother to uncap a pen.

"So, I suppose this is about my little stunt a few weeks ago." Inutaishou said flatly. Johnson shuffled more papers and started immediately breaking a sweat. Inutaishou had to smile. These were obviously corporate types who didn't like bluntness very much. Laymen was faring better, but couldn't mask the fact that his smell changed slightly. Hoshino was unchanged, but if any of the stories were true, then bluntness wouldn't be rude to her at all. If it had been pairs poker it would have been an interesting match with the way the table was arranged.

"Yes," Laymen responded, trying to match the newcomer's bluntness. "As you may or may not be aware, Nergal is interested in researching all aspects of Boson jumping. We're interested in chasing a few rabbits along the way, so long as the cost isn't too great. After you killed that... thing... some digging into your background turned up some stories from about 150 years ago that claim that one of the ancestors in your family was able to travel backwards and forwards in time thanks to a bead of some kind.

"We would like to find out the validity of these claims, and if possible scientifically examine this item which might allow time travel..."

"Thereby proving Einstein wrong about traveling backwards in time, blah, blah, blah. Laymen-san, do you believe in the existence of youkai?"

"Huh?" Laymen was obviously caught off-guard.

The visitor stood, dragging Johnson to his feet along with him. The two moved to the center of the room where there was open space. Inutaishou's traveling cloak flew to the floor, revealing a sword at his side. Johnson's discomfort with the situation increased a notch.

"Obviously, you do not. It is the twenty-second century, and demons and ghosts are things that only exist in children's books. Science is our god, and if we cannot prove empirically something exists, it cannot exist. Especially magic and demons." Johnson wasn't liking the visitor's tone at all. Inutaishou withdrew the sword from his side, and tossed the still-sheathed blade to Hoshino.

"Hoshino-san, please test the sharpness of this blade on some inanimate object."

"Hai," she replied, unsheathing the blade carefully. Grasping the sword in both hands, she rather crudely pruned a nearby potted tree down to its stump. Having only expected to put a notch in the trunk, Hoshino was more surprised than anyone in the room at the shrubbery which now lay on the floor, its trunk propped up on its little white fence. She even more carefully returned the blade to its sheath and handed the weapon back to its owner. She sat back down in the chair she had left and calmly looked at the now profusely sweating Johnson.

"Now, Hoshino-san, if I could trouble you for a second favor," the visitor continued, placing the sword back in his belt at his side, "Please observe the next few moments carefully and, afterwards, tell me what you saw."

Hoshino nodded, Johnson started praying, and Laymen started jotting figures on the price of funerals on a nearby pad. Inutaishou Inuyasha turned away from Johnson and gripped the sword he had just loaned Ruri. "Johnson, I would like to introduce you to Tenseiga."

Even Hoshino Ruri flinched as Inutaishou spun and drove his sword across Johnson's body with lightning speed. She did not, however, close her eyes, and noted the definite lack of blood on the thick carpets.

"OH MY GOD I'M DEAD! I'M A GHOST!" Johnson screamed.

"Baka."

Inutaishou returned to his seat, Jaken smiled, and Laymen failed to remember to close his mouth. Johnson was slowly realizing that he wasn't floating around staring at his body, and that there was indeed a lack of blood anywhere. Hoshino was the only person to acknowledge that Laymen's secretary had stuck her head in the room and ducked back out, seeing that the only thing that was apparently wrong was a plant missing its top. She made a note to call the plant people later for a replacement. Normally they just died because her boss didn't water them. Oh well, what's one more?

Johnson slowly returned to his seat, and Laymen slowly closed his mouth. Once the two men had somewhat regained their composure, Inutaishou looked squarely at Hoshino Ruri. "What did you see?"

"You drew your sword and performed a strike on Johnson-baka's person which should have cut him into two. I saw the blade pass through his body, but never saw any blood. Johnson-baka is unfortunately still alive." Hoshino's words appeared to re-assure Johnson enough to stop feeling for wounds on his chest. Johnson also started thinking long enough to remember that "baka" wasn't supposed to be an honorific.

Reality was also settling in on Laymen, and he was beginning to become outraged at the display that had just happened in his office. Guest or not, killing his employees shouldn't be tolerated, even if the employee was as annoying as Johnson. Inutaishou was apparently reading all of this and was settling back to enjoy the poison about to spew from the man's mouth. Laymen stopped and tried to regain composure once more. Beating him to words, the guest spoke.

"Science clearly dictates that what did just happen, should not have happened. This is a concept I have spent much of my lifetime trying to reconcile." Laymen was obviously sizing up the visitor's age as a fraction of his own. His eyes were laughing at Inutaishou spending any part of a young man's life in pursuit of science and accomplishing anything. He continued, "I see that your research isn't quite complete. You have no idea how old I really am, do you?"

"Somehow your family doesn't have any records on file! How can we?" Johnson interjected.

Inutaishou laughed, almost cruelly. "Everything about my family for the past several centuries is properly recorded, I assure you."

"LIAR!" Johnson didn't enjoy people saying that the people he had under him didn't do their research properly. "If that's true, then there haven't been any births, deaths, or marriages in your family since 2075!"

Ruri looked at the white-haired guest and watched his expression soften. "Baka," she replied for him, "There haven't."

Inuyasha's face smiled at Ruri. Laymen and Johnson's brains were frying in their skulls, their mouths trying to form objections, but only making odd gurgling noises.

"Indeed. Kagome-sama died in late 2074, having lived her life happily with my uncle. It was my uncle, Inuyasha-sama, son of the great Inutaishou-sama, who died in January of 2075, of what can only be described as a broken heart at losing Kagome-sama. It was the only time I saw my father...no matter.

"Everyone at this table has a separate agenda in this. Some are not even aware of their entire agenda here." Ruri felt very odd at his saying this, but wasn't sure why. "Your agenda, Laymen-san, is evident and obvious, and you do not care what the agenda is for anyone else here. You wish to control moving forwards and backwards in time. I strongly urge you not to continue down this path, but there is the chance of profit down this path. Men such as yourself are not dissuaded by morals when money is involved. Therefore, the clan of Inutaishou shall be an intermediary."

******

Footnotes:

All footnotes here are pretty much clarifying things if you haven't seen Nadesico (the series – seeing Prince of Darkness, the movie, isn't vital at all to the story).

For those who have seen the series but want to know where in the timeline things are, here goes. The events with Nadesico occur around 2145, and once it's over everybody goes about their daily lives or tries to. The Nadesico timeline says that after the series is over, someone has to take care of Ruri, and it ends up being Misumaru Yurika, the Captain, who gets the job. Remember, Ruri is about thirteen. Yurika's father, one of the top dogs in the military, doesn't like her relationship with Tenkawa Akito, and she ends up moving in with him. I assume that she takes Ruri with her (it'd only make sense). This is the point things are set at – Tenkawa and Misumaru do get married and en route to their honeymoon their shuttle explodes with no survivors (the voice from nowhere sounds "Or ARE there?"), but that's after this story and shortly before Prince of Darkness. I call Ruri thirteen in this, but in the "real" timeline she may between 12 and 14. I know that Prince of Darkness is at 16. The point that matters to the story is she's pre-puberty (#^_^#;)

Nergal is the "mega-corp" of the Nadesico world. They have their hand in everything, and own several warships which are loaned to the military.

"Her ship" is the Nadesico, on which she was the computer operator. (She will be the captain later ^_^)

The world of Nadesico does not have faster-than light engine technology. They do, however, have a variant of Bebop's Hypergates, called Chulips. Chulips are activated by Chulip Crystals, or CC's, which are little blue diamond-shaped (as in playing-card diamond-shaped) which are "keys" to the Chulips. The Chulips create large amounts of Boson particles which is how they jump a ship through space, and hence the term "Boson jumping". All of this is controlled by a massive supercomputer an ancient race built into Mars' South Pole. When humans terraformed Mars, the as-of-yet-unknown supercomputer somehow subtly re-wrote the DNA of the humans on the planet so that they could use the Chulip gates and Boson jump. If a ship tries to make a boson jump without someone from Mars (e.g., with the computer-modified DNA) onboard, most likely it will come out the other end with all its crew dead.