AN: Sorry! I haven't updated in ages… I'm so lazy right now. Anyway, I got the idea for Inuyasha's little 'apology speech' when my boyfriend told me the same things (obviously different because I don't like Oden or the colour yellow and not in so much depth because normal boyfriends aren't that observant) – but it was sweet so I asked if I could steal it for my story ^_^ How romantic of me.

Rules of Acquisitions

Love Rivals

~Inuyasha~

"I can't believe you actually talked me into this." I grumbled as I paced the wall beside the main road in Giiza's shopping district. Miroku just rolled his eyes at me and carried on tapping something into the small lap top on his lap.

"I can't do this alone. My arm still hurts." He shrugged with one arm. "It was pretty soundly broken."

"I can't believe I'm actually helping Dad out." I grumbled again as I turned to pace past him again.

"Because you love him so much."

He turned and gave him a stony glare that he seemed to feel rather than see since he quickly tried again. "I mean… subconsciously… deep, deep down… you like him a little."

"I'm only doing this for you." I barked and resumed pacing. "Or I'm just really bored… I'm not doing it for Dad."

He shrugged again.

I looked up the road again and sighed. The whole area was vacant of any kind of life. No traffic, a few parked cars outside the shops… the windows of such shops were shuttered and locked down. Well, that was typical since it was about five in the morning. "Where's the van with the blasted jewel then?"

"It's coming." Miroku sighed tolerably, glancing up the road towards a bridge that crossed over the canal. "Hopefully we'll get it before they do."

I followed his gaze and narrowed my eyes when I spotted the two shadowy forms of two girls sitting on the same wall as us, but further up on the bridge. Kagome and Sango… they couldn't see us because we were wearing black like they were, plus we were covered by trees.

It wasn't certain who would get to the armoured van first. They were on the bridge and we were a hundred metres to the right, further up the road. If the van came along from the right… we'd get it. If it came from the left, then the girls would get it…

Miroku can crack codes like coconuts, but he can't tell left from right.

"Jaken said it was coming from the left." Miroku spoke, as if reading my thoughts. "But depends on your point of view. On this side of the road, left is up by the bridge… but if we cross over to the other side, left is up our end."

"Didn't he say which side of the road you have to stand on for it to be left?" I asked, barely following the thread of Miroku's logic.

"Well… he said stand on the left side of the road, facing the road, and the van will come up on the left…" he scratched his head. "But… depending on where you're standing, left of the road could be either this side or the other-"

"Just stop!" I snapped and folded my arms angrily. I resumed pacing and he went back to doing computer stuff… after a moment I got bored and glanced at the small plasma screen. "What are you doing?"

"Programming." He shrugged.

"Why?"

"So we can break the electric locking system on the back of the van so you can get inside." He said like he was explaining to a school child.

"Yeah?" I guess I should be impressed.

"You see, the computer will relay a signal when I tell it to, out to the lock on the van. It'll take the code from within the memory of the lock and send it back to me – so that I can bounce it back along the same frequency and encode the code to unlock the lock." He smirked up at me. "It's called hacking. Then you can open the door without any resistance and get the Shikon before the girls try the same stunt. But it means you better turn your mobile off otherwise it'll interfere with the signal."

"You really thought this out didn't you?"

~Kagome~

"I don't see any armoured vans, Sango." I heaved a sigh as I pulled myself up onto the wall beside her. I decided not to look down, since it was a long drop to the canal below the bridge we were on… but this was where the van was supposed to pass through with the Shikon no Tama.

"Maybe there was a traffic jam. Just delayed… it'll be here soon." She responded, fists clenched in either annoyance at me or nervousness.

"Unless it's already been intercepted by Miroku." I suggested dubiously, pulling the balaclava like mask to the side so I could breathe. "In which case we've failed the mission before we've even begun."

"Too early in the morning for you, huh?" she reached over and pulled my mask back on. "Don't pull it off, you don't know who's watching."

"If anyone normal comes along they'll think we're bandits." Though it was too early in the morning to actually worry about that possibility. People didn't tend to do their Tuesday shopping at five o'clock in the morning, just as the sky was beginning to lighten.

"So how do we do this again?" I asked, nervously looking up the road for the approach of a vehicle.

"Van comes up the road, passes over the bridge – has to slow down because it's a narrow way – we jump the van, stop it, pull out the driver and then open the back where the jewel should be."

"But doesn't the back of the van have an electric code locking system?" I pointed out. "How do we get past that one?"

Sango hefted something out of her bag that lay on the wall next to her, and held it out without looking at me. "Crowbar." She said simply and set it down on the bricks with a clang.

"You really thought this out didn't you?"

~Inuyasha~

"One, two, three, four, I declare a thumb war, five, six, seven, eight, try to keep your thumb straight."

We stopped twiddling thumbs together, preparing to do battle. "Bow, kiss, begin."

"That part's just gay." I told him as I began to try and manoeuvre my thumb over his and pin it down. Surprisingly it was quite hard, and we were both nearly toppling off the wall with our efforts to overpower the other's thumb.

"You know…" Miroku tried to twist his hand to the advantage. "This'll be a lot fairer if you didn't have a claw as an extension of your thumb."

"Well you have double jointed thumbs, so we'll call it even."

"We're not even – my arm was broken – it's still weak!" he protested.

"You're not using your broken arm!" I shot back.

By now we were getting quite a few odd looks from passers by. We'd been siting on the wall for two hours now, and finally the traffic was beginning to appear and a few pedestrians were out to do their shopping early or walk their dogs. I guess they didn't see two muppets dressed in black from head to toe having thumb wars on the roadside every day.

"I can see your hair." Miroku said, obviously only trying to distract me because I knew my hair was hidden perfectly.

"Liar!"

"Your contacts have fallen out!"

"No they haven't!" I could still feel the uncomfortable little beggars on my eyeballs. Plus my vision was tinted purple still.

"Vans coming!"

"Like I'll fall for that one-"

"No really." He dropped my hand and quickly picked his lap top up. "Coming up to the bridge!"

I spun and cursed as I saw the grey metallic coloured van approaching the bridge about two hundred metres away. It had slowed down considerably because the area was heavy with pedestrians, even at this time in the morning. I cast a look to the bridge and saw Kagome and Sango had gone… shit…

"Don't unlock the back till I get there!" I yelled to Miroku over my shoulder as I hoped down off the wall and shot off towards the bridge. The plan was to stop the van, pull out the drivers and/or guards and grab the jewel before they could stop me. Simple. Except for the part where Kagome and Sango came in. What were they planning to do?

Then I saw them both… just as the van started to slow further as it passed over the bridge. Sango moved first, ran straight in front of the van, making it screech to a halt to avoid hitting her, whilst Kagome disappeared round the back.

I cursed again and pushed past random pedestrians as I sped up towards the bridge. I blew past Sango who was busy taking control of the vehicle, shoving the driver and the guard onto the road. In seconds I swerved around the back and blinked in surprise to find the armoured doors had been forced open, the lock broken and a crowbar lying haphazardly on the tarmac.

Before I could reach up to open the doors, they were thrown back to reveal the unmistakable figure of Kagome with a metal briefcase under one arm. She locked gazes with me and I felt my mouth grow dry.

Seeing her eyes cloud over with anger and hate was definitely a strange experience when she normally looks at me with love and adoration.

"You're not getting it this time!" she hissed and vanished, literally, into thin air.

The whole weird experience just got weirder. My girlfriend can turn herself invisible and make doubles of herself… not as kinky as I would have liked it to sound.

A sharp, unseen, blow caught me around the head and I staggered back, unintentionally giving Kagome room to escape the van.

"No you don't!" I located her merely by the sound of her rustling clothes alone. I grabbed her around the waist and heard her yelp indignantly. I kept a hold of her shirt with one hand and groped around blindly to find the metal briefcase she held. Accidentally, or not so accidentally as it might have seemed, I brushed against parts of her that normally only I would be permitted to touch.

"Pervert!" a hand connected with my cheek in a rather lame blow. I caught her wrist and struggled to locate her other hand which would undoubtedly be attached to the case.

It must have looked strange. Pedestrians had stopped to stare at me, grappling with myself apparently.

But in her panic to keep me from getting the case, Kagome must have thrown it… but this only meant it reappeared as it skidded along the road a few metres away. I saw my chance and set her aside… maybe before had I thought she was someone else I would have pushed her or deliberately knocked her down… I just didn't have the heart to hurt her like that.

I raced over to pick it up, but no sooner did I have it in my hands then Kagome's visible arms encircled my neck, pulling me back in strangle hold. "I won't let you have it!"

She was freakishly strong, and it didn't help that she was pressing against my Adam's apple… probably the most painful thing she could have done besides get me in the nads again. "Get… off…!" I coughed hoarsely.

And just to make the moment worse, Sango was the one who stepped up before me and picked up the case. She smirked at me. "I'll be taking this then."

In one smooth motion she cracked open the case and caught the small pink bead before it fell onto the road. With that she discarded the metal case, throwing it over the wall into the canal below. She opened her mouth to gloat some more when someone tackled her from the side. Miroku.

A few moments after they rolled away to begin fighting each other elsewhere, did I realise the Shikon had been knocked from her hand to land before me. I began reaching out, but Kagome saw the movement and wrenched me back, diving forward to grab the jewel as I fell onto my back. I could have easily overpowered her, kicked her away. She left herself open so much it was unbelievable. But I couldn't. The least I could do was kick the jewel aside, sending it skittering towards the middle of the road.

She lunged after it immediately, running straight into the road without a second thought. I heard the blaring horn of a motorist and the screaming of braking wheels on tarmac. The car was moving too fast, it wouldn't stop in time.

Like Kagome, without thinking, I bolted after her, nearly throwing her out of the path of the vehicle a split second before it impacted my hip and dragged me underneath.

~Kagome~

I heard the car coming, but I didn't even have time to panic or turn and look before someone smacked into me and threw me into the pavement. I nearly got whiplash I was thrown so hard. I landed on the hard ground and jarred my knee. I heard a bang and a thud behind me…

But right then my attention was taken up too much by the Shikon that was fast rolling towards the wall at the edge of the bridge… towards that hole where the bricks had fallen away to be more exact.

"No!" I gasped and lunged forward, trying to stop it from doing the inevitable, but I was too slow. My hand cam down on nothing but air as the jewel happily tipped through the hole and fell out of sight. My breath hitched as I scrambled to stand, despite the pain in my knee, and leaned over the wall to look down.

There it was… the little speck of pink… floating away with the current of the water… surprisingly fast. I felt a little feeling similar to that when I lost games of river sticks… where you drop a stick off one side of a bridge and see whose comes out first on the other side.

"No…" I whimpered falling limply against the wall.

Sango's hand touched my shoulder and I glanced up at her. "Where's the Shikon?"

I pointed miserably. Surprisingly she didn't look too upset. "It's ok, we can still get it back. And better yet, the guys don't know what's happened."

"Guys?" I looked around and saw the small calamity we'd caused. The armoured van, vandalised and stationary. Behind it was the car that had nearly hit me, and behind that was a line of cars building up in a jam.

"Where'd they go?" I asked. There had been two… I was sure. I had been certain I was strangling Miroku, until I'd seen him tackle Sango… so who'd been with me? And better yet – who'd pushed me out of the path of that car? And where were they now? Surely they would have been hit… but there was no sign of anyone being run over.

"Come on… we'll go tell your father." Sango pulled on my arm to get me moving. I didn't bother arguing as I followed her somewhat stiffly. I ached all over, not surprisingly, and I had a big graze on my palm as well as on my knees.

It just wasn't my day…

~Inuyasha~

It just wasn't my day. First I'd lost six times at thumb wars and then the Shikon no Tama had eluded my capture. Oh yeah, and I got hit by a car, but that's not important. Ok… I was sore… all over actually… and a little miffed too. There I was being all heroic and valiant by pushing my enemy out of the path of the car, and she hadn't even had the decency to turn and see if I was ok.

No I was not ok!

The bumper had bruised my hip, the wheel had left a nice bug tire track mark over my forearm and not to mention as I went down I not only cracked my head back against the road but the licence plate slapped my chin.

And annoyingly Kagome had been more interesting in chasing a ball of glass off a bridge than the condition of her heroic boyfriend…

Ok… so she hadn't known it was me who saved her.

People were beginning to rush over to see if I was ok, something I didn't want happening. So with sheer force of brute strength (something I pride myself in) I reached up with one hand and grabbed the car's bumper, rolling it backwards so it released the arm it had pinned down with the wheel. Once I was free I dragged myself out from under the metal monster and staggered off, pushing past people to find Miroku.

Naturally, once again Sango had left him looking short of dead. Poor guy. Well, we both looked pretty bashed up so we decided to call it a day and head home to go to bed, despite it being only seven fifteen in the morning. I think I would be taking a day off work. I was too knackered to go there… though I might just go into hospital for the free morphine…

"The only good thing I can think of that came of this…" Miroku sighed as he stopped and leaned on a chain link fence. "Is that the Supei's no longer have the Shikon."

"Yep. It belongs to the canal now." I remarked dryly, leaning on the fence beside him and dragging off the cloth that hid my hair and face. I winced as my injured arm was shot through with pain.

"And where does the canal lead?" Miroku raised an eyebrow.

"To the sea?"

"Well eventually, probably. But before it goes anywhere near there, where does it go?"

"Portugal?" I shook my head with a scowl. "Don't test my brain, Miroku, it's not quite up to the task right now."

"Is it ever?" he cleared his throat. "The point is, before it rejoins the river, it will pass through the filters."

"The what?"

"The plant that removes the pollution from the canal before allowing it to rejoin with the river." He touched a bruising eye tentatively. "Wow… Sango sure didn't hold back today…"

"The plant has filters…" I slowly caught on. "So it'll stop the jewel before it reaches the river and is lost for good?"

"Should do." He nodded. "They have grids that stop solid material first… the Shikon should be caught on the mesh. If you follow the canal, it'll eventually lead to the plant. It won't be going anywhere once it's caught on the filter."

"Great."

We both relaxed and leant back as one on the fence… which unfortunately hadn't been made to support our weight and keeled back, taking us along with it. We toppled straight into someone's back garden and groaned collectively in pain.

~Kagome~

"Looks like you already used up half of these on yourself?" I shook the contents of the first aid box, looking for some stray plasters and band aids.

Inuyasha sat down stiffly beside me on his sofa, wincing in pain as he did so. I glanced up at him and grimaced. "You look like you've been hit by a car." I smiled jokingly.

He stiffened further, looking offended. "I told you – a crate fell on me."

"Alright, alright!" I picked out a plaster and peeled off the back. The hard part came when I tried to stick it down on my hand, one handed, I kept making a mess of it. Inuyasha watched my progress, shaking his head and tutting in typical know-it-all style.

"Give it here." He took the plaster without permission and half turned towards me and pulled my grazed palm towards him. His aim was a lot better with two hands and he soon had the cut covered and smoothed his thumb over the plaster. I turned my eyes up to his face and saw his expression unusually apologetic. "What?" I asked.

"I'm sorry."

"What for?" I smiled. "It's not like you pushed me off my bike."

"I suppose…" he winced at my comment. "I'm sorry… that you fell though. It must have hurt."

"Must have hurt when that crate fell on you too." I countered.

"Flattened like a bug."

I laughed and leaned up to gently kiss the bruise under his eye. "You're such a klutz."

"Well you attract injuries like a magnet by the way." He told me, wrapping an arm around my waist and pulling me against his side. I laid my head on his shoulder and we turned our eyes back to the Television set, half-heartedly watching the match I'd come over to see. Actually, I'd come over really just to spend some nice alone time with him, only to find he was as battered and bruised as me. What a coincidence?!

Well now we could both be a pair of crocs together.

"Nice apartment." I told him and he grunted. "The dust adds a nice rustic quality I find most new apartments lack."

"Well it is an attic." He retorted. "In my opinion attics should just stick to doing attic stuff instead of being apartments."

"Attic stuff?" I looked up at him. "What's that then?"

"You know." He shrugged. "Storing dead pigeons… hard core porn magazines… Granny…"

"Well it's nice you have a place of your own. We can just sit here and watch TV together without anyone hassling us."

"Yeah, well it was either this place or a box under a bridge."

"Hey, do you hear me complaining about your choice?"

"Box under a bridge is less stuffy." He pointed out.

"I guess." I snuggled closer to his warm body. "Oh by the way… I was gonna ask you…"

"Ask me what?"

"Can I stay the night here?" I sat up to face him again. "I mean, it's getting dark and I don't fancy walking home alone later."

"You don't even have to ask." He smiled. "Of course you can. Though there's only one bed and we're sitting on it."

"That's ok." I leaned up and kissed him gently on the lips. After a few moments he tilted his head slightly, deepening it before I had a chance to pull back – not that I wanted to or anything. I smiled into the kiss as I felt his hands work their way under my shirt, kneading my back lightly. My tongue flicked out shyly to meet his, my eyes fluttering closed as I allowed myself to feel rather than see.

His hands moved to my waist again to drag me across into his lap and I brought my own hands to brace them against his shoulder as the kiss deepened and took on a more passionate nature, nibbling, plundering and exploring each other's lips. My brain was ceasing to function as swiftly as it normally did, and I was beginning to act on instinct and desire alone. I had an inner feeling that Inuyasha was in the same state of mind.

I leaned forward against him, allowing my hands to free up and lodge in his hair in an effort to curb the kiss towards my domination, but I quickly lost interest in that as my fingers brushed against his ears which twitched in response to my touch.

I was vaguely aware of shifting further as his hands gripped my behind to ease me nearer.

We probably would have gone much further… if we hadn't simultaneously broken off the kiss with a round of 'ow's. My hand had accidentally clamped onto his injured forearm whilst his hand had brushed against my black and blue bruised knee.

We released each other and I slumped back to his side, my head on his shoulder again and I tentatively touched my knee whilst he did the same for his arm. "Not a good idea when we're all ouchie…" I whispered hoarsely… still out of breath.

"Yeah." He winced as his good arm wrapped around my waist. "We should hold that off for a while."

"Mm." I snuggled closer and closed my eyes, no longer interested in watching the match. I just wanted to nap, but before I did I wanted to tell him something before I forgot. "I love you so much you know."

I heard him chuckle above me. "I know. You don't have to tell me. I love you too."

It was a simple as that. I smiled happily and relaxed.

AN: Should be back soon with another chapter, I hope, I just got distracted with Life Exchange ^_^