A/N: I come bearing Chapter 33. I hope you all like it. Thanks to
everyone who reviewed. As always, you are much appreciated.
Disclaimer: I don't own Inuyasha. I am, however, formulating an ingenious plan to kidnap him.
Synthetic Emotions
Kagura toyed with her fan absently as she watched Inuyasha and his mistress exit the little shop. She saw no reason for her master's sudden obsession with this one. Indeed, she took it as a sign that underneath it all, Naraku was far less stable than he seemed. A Companion youkai shouldn't present a difficulty for them. True, this one had shown that he wasn't a standard Companion, but he still wasn't designed exclusively for combat, or to infiltrate other systems, or any of the risks Kagura knew to look for.
Yet Naraku insisted upon watching him closely, sending agents whose services would be better suited elsewhere to tracking his movements, as though he posed a serious threat. So he stopped a dilapidated old industrial youkai. Big deal.
"He isn't even that handsome," the military youkai observed quietly, boredom seeping into her voice. "Too young."
The only problem Kagura saw with Inuyasha was that, for some unknown reason, he hadn't been taken care of already. Kikyo had met with him earlier today, yet here he was, still functional and autonomous. That woman was going to prove to be more trouble than she was worth.
She snapped her fan closed at the thought of the untrustworthy Replica. Why Naraku chose to use such a tool was beyond her comprehension. With any luck, she would turn on him and end this whole foolish mess.
But for now, Kagura had a job to do.
She hopped down from her perch on a neighboring fire escape and sauntered up to the shop's front window. 'Youkai Repair,' was written in neatly painted black characters over the door, with the address below.
Kagura ran the address, scanning for the building's lease so she could find out whom Inuyasha and the girl had been meeting. After a brief search, she was supplied with a name: Iijima Miroku.
The youkai's lips turned into an arrogant smile. Naraku would want to know of this.
*~*~*
Kagome 'trudged' back toward her home. She had never really trudged before, but now that word seemed the most apt. She felt as though she were dragging her body through clinging mud with every step. It didn't make any sense, but since seeing Kikyo, it had been that way.
Inuyasha had belonged to Kikyo once, long before he was Kagome's. He had loved her. That fact turned into a heavy knot in Kagome's chest. Inuyasha had loved her, and she had shut him down and locked him away.
He had mistaken her for Kikyo when she first turned him back on. She'd thought it was only because his optics had been switched off and his sensors misadjusted, but now she wasn't so sure. What if there was more to the mistake?
What if he had been thinking of Kikyo when he kissed her?
She didn't want to believe it, but the thought kept gnawing at her, worrying at the edges of her thoughts, like a dog intent on working the last scraps of meat off a bone. She didn't want to think about it, didn't want to even consider that it might be possible. . . yet the doubt was there, nagging at her.
Inuyasha walked behind her. He wasn't letting her get too far ahead of him; she was fairly sure it would be quite a while before she managed to get away from him again. But his attention was somewhere beyond her, past the street with it pedestrians and lampposts, to watch ghosts only his darkened amber eyes could see.
Kagome bit her lip, wondering if she ought to interrupt his thoughts. They had to talk. She knew that much, at least. She wouldn't be able to think of anything else until they did. She just wasn't sure she was brave enough to start.
She took a deep breath, then let is out slowly.
"Inuyasha?" Her voice didn't waver, of which she was infinitely proud.
"Huh?" He looked up, eyes focusing on her. "What?"
"Inuyasha, I--" she paused, trying to work out precisely what she was trying to say. Finally she settled on, "Was that Kikyo?"
"It couldn't be Kikyo," he told her. His voice was gravelly, but then, it always was. It was the way his gaze dropped to the sidewalk, and the way he let his bangs hide his face from her that betrayed him. "That was just a machine."
"You know," she said, looking forward again so she didn't have to see his face, "you're not a very good liar."
"Kikyo died."
Kagome suppressed a sigh. This wasn't going anywhere. What could she do to get him to open up to her? Too bad Inuyasha hadn't come with an instruction manual.
"She said. . ." Kagome tried again, "Kikyo told me that you said you loved her."
"Did she say that?" he asked, then under his breath he added, "She didn't believe it."
'So he did,' the girl confirmed. 'He did love her.' She swallowed hard against the lump that formed in her throat and consciously stopped herself from biting her lip.
'So what if he loved her?' her thoughts continued. 'Just because he loved some other girl once doesn't mean he can't. . . He can't what? Love me, too? Of course he doesn't. He's only known me a couple of weeks.'
Her reverie came to an abrupt focus, 'It doesn't mean that he wasn't kissing 'me' when we kissed.'
She couldn't help but feel a sour pang of dread at that. It was what scared her. The idea that when he had kissed her, he had been thinking of Kikyo.
The far away look in his eyes when he had caught her at fantasizing came back to her in a flash. Had he been thinking of her then? Was that what his look meant? He had said his feelings were real. But what if they had been for someone else?
She gave up on fighting, and started chewing nervously on her lower lip. 'Even if he does feel. . . whatever it is he could feel for me, he still loved Kikyo.'
Kikyo's words came back to her: "He was that true to me, at least."
"Oh gods," she whispered to herself. Nothing was better.
*~*~*
They hadn't accomplished much with Miroku and Sango. Aside from establishing that it made sense for Naraku to want to be free to act outside his established parameters, and that Kikyo believed he wanted some numbers, they hadn't come up with a single useful idea between them. They didn't even know if the two things were related. Perhaps they were, but it was only one of more possibilities than he could even guess at.
Inuyasha shook his head. There was too much they didn't know. For the most part, he didn't care that they weren't sure what Naraku was after, or what he was capable of. All he wanted to know where the bastard was, so he could kill him.
Kikyo. . . Naraku was responsible for killing her. He was certain of that, at least. He had killed her, because for some reason, she had those fucking numbers. The other mysterious deaths at Inutaiyoukai were probably his fault as well.
Naraku would die for what he did to Kikyo--or be destroyed, since youkai could not die. Whatever remained of him would be unsalvageable. There would be no repairs, no downloading old personality and memory units into a new shell. There would be nothing left.
Inuyasha noticed his fingers had curled into trembling fists, and consciously willed them to relax. He could feel the first tingle of energy gathering in his claws. Blinking, he raised his hand and eyed it dubiously. He could see the faint light of the energy pathways opening up beneath his skin.
"Inuyasha? Are you okay?" Kagome asked over her shoulder. She looked worn, her face pale, her dark eyes vague.
"Fine," he responded tersely, shaking the prickly sensation out of his hand.
The girl's gaze searched his face briefly, and for a moment he thought she was going to press for more, but she just looked away. He blinked, a little surprised. Not that he wanted to explain himself to her, but he had expected her to show more interest. He'd thought she would. . . and when she didn't he felt rather small. That odd shrinking feeling again, only it was different this time. This time he felt more insignificant.
The anger bled out of him at that feeling, leaving him oddly hollow. He hadn't even realized he'd been angry until the emotion faded. It was easiest to be angry. Crossing his arms, he followed the girl the rest of the way home in an uncomfortable silence.
Kaede was waiting for them when they got there.
The old woman looked like she'd just had the day from hell. The lines around her eyes and mouth were more deeply written than they had been, so her whole face seemed crumpled and sunk in on its self. She was frowning when they reached her.
"Kagome, are you alright?" the old woman asked, taking the girl's arm and leading her toward her own apartment.
"Yeah," Kagome told her uncertainly. "Why? What's up?"
"You saw her too, didn't you?" Inuyasha guessed.
Kaede nodded. "Yes. I saw her. She visited me before she went to you."
"What happened?" Kagome asked, gently freeing herself from the old woman's grip.
"There is something you ought to know about my elder sister," Kaede explained. "Come with me. I'll tell you everything I know."
Inuyasha's ears perked at the promise of an explanation, and followed without complaint as the old landlady brought them to her dining room. He waited as patiently as he could while she put a pot of water on the stove for tea, settled her mass in a chair across the little Formica table from Kagome. He could almost hear her joints creaking as she moved.
Fighting down a growl, he prompted, "Well? We haven't got all day."
"Patience is a virtue, Inuyasha," Kaede scolded him.
"Just get on with it."
"Inuyasha," Kagome warned him wearily, then turned back to the old woman. "Go on."
"More than fifty-six years ago, my sister got a job as an assistant at the Inutaiyoukai Corporation."
"I know where she worked," the hanyou grumbled irritably, only to have Kagome hush him.
Kaede gave a resigned sigh. "I was well aware you knew that, Inuyasha. What you don't know is how she got the job. At that time, she was engaged to the CEO's son, Amori Ichiro."
A snide remark died on Inuyasha's tongue. Engaged? To Taisho's son?
"Amori Ichiro," Kagome repeated. "I've never heard Taisho referred to with a family name."
"It wasn't his," Kaede explained. "Amori was his mother's name, I believe." Kaede paused, looking from the girl, to the still stunned hanyou and back again. "Perhaps this will be easier if I show you."
"Show us what?" Inuyasha asked. To his own ears his voice sounded distant, and lacking its usual bite.
Kaede levered herself back up, and hobbled into the living room. She seemed much older today than she had the last time they'd seen her, more fragile. Inuyasha tracked her slow course to one of the end tables, where she picked up a framed photograph.
Curiosity plain in her expression, Kagome followed. Inuyasha moved after them with more reluctance. He wasn't sure he wanted to see what the picture was of. A sinking feeling grew in the pit of his stomach, and a strange sense that he knew what he was about to see overtook him.
Kagome plucked the photo out of Kaede's hand, her eyes falling on something the hanyou couldn't see.
Whatever it was caused the girl to give a strangled gasp, and her eyes darted back and forth from the picture to Inuyasha. She was staring at him when she handed over the picture.
"Inuyasha," she said weakly, "it's you."
*~*~*
A/N: Yay! That one was so much easier than the last one that I can hardly believe it. I hope everyone's still enjoying. Look! An answer! Well, sort of. . .
Later.
Disclaimer: I don't own Inuyasha. I am, however, formulating an ingenious plan to kidnap him.
Synthetic Emotions
Kagura toyed with her fan absently as she watched Inuyasha and his mistress exit the little shop. She saw no reason for her master's sudden obsession with this one. Indeed, she took it as a sign that underneath it all, Naraku was far less stable than he seemed. A Companion youkai shouldn't present a difficulty for them. True, this one had shown that he wasn't a standard Companion, but he still wasn't designed exclusively for combat, or to infiltrate other systems, or any of the risks Kagura knew to look for.
Yet Naraku insisted upon watching him closely, sending agents whose services would be better suited elsewhere to tracking his movements, as though he posed a serious threat. So he stopped a dilapidated old industrial youkai. Big deal.
"He isn't even that handsome," the military youkai observed quietly, boredom seeping into her voice. "Too young."
The only problem Kagura saw with Inuyasha was that, for some unknown reason, he hadn't been taken care of already. Kikyo had met with him earlier today, yet here he was, still functional and autonomous. That woman was going to prove to be more trouble than she was worth.
She snapped her fan closed at the thought of the untrustworthy Replica. Why Naraku chose to use such a tool was beyond her comprehension. With any luck, she would turn on him and end this whole foolish mess.
But for now, Kagura had a job to do.
She hopped down from her perch on a neighboring fire escape and sauntered up to the shop's front window. 'Youkai Repair,' was written in neatly painted black characters over the door, with the address below.
Kagura ran the address, scanning for the building's lease so she could find out whom Inuyasha and the girl had been meeting. After a brief search, she was supplied with a name: Iijima Miroku.
The youkai's lips turned into an arrogant smile. Naraku would want to know of this.
*~*~*
Kagome 'trudged' back toward her home. She had never really trudged before, but now that word seemed the most apt. She felt as though she were dragging her body through clinging mud with every step. It didn't make any sense, but since seeing Kikyo, it had been that way.
Inuyasha had belonged to Kikyo once, long before he was Kagome's. He had loved her. That fact turned into a heavy knot in Kagome's chest. Inuyasha had loved her, and she had shut him down and locked him away.
He had mistaken her for Kikyo when she first turned him back on. She'd thought it was only because his optics had been switched off and his sensors misadjusted, but now she wasn't so sure. What if there was more to the mistake?
What if he had been thinking of Kikyo when he kissed her?
She didn't want to believe it, but the thought kept gnawing at her, worrying at the edges of her thoughts, like a dog intent on working the last scraps of meat off a bone. She didn't want to think about it, didn't want to even consider that it might be possible. . . yet the doubt was there, nagging at her.
Inuyasha walked behind her. He wasn't letting her get too far ahead of him; she was fairly sure it would be quite a while before she managed to get away from him again. But his attention was somewhere beyond her, past the street with it pedestrians and lampposts, to watch ghosts only his darkened amber eyes could see.
Kagome bit her lip, wondering if she ought to interrupt his thoughts. They had to talk. She knew that much, at least. She wouldn't be able to think of anything else until they did. She just wasn't sure she was brave enough to start.
She took a deep breath, then let is out slowly.
"Inuyasha?" Her voice didn't waver, of which she was infinitely proud.
"Huh?" He looked up, eyes focusing on her. "What?"
"Inuyasha, I--" she paused, trying to work out precisely what she was trying to say. Finally she settled on, "Was that Kikyo?"
"It couldn't be Kikyo," he told her. His voice was gravelly, but then, it always was. It was the way his gaze dropped to the sidewalk, and the way he let his bangs hide his face from her that betrayed him. "That was just a machine."
"You know," she said, looking forward again so she didn't have to see his face, "you're not a very good liar."
"Kikyo died."
Kagome suppressed a sigh. This wasn't going anywhere. What could she do to get him to open up to her? Too bad Inuyasha hadn't come with an instruction manual.
"She said. . ." Kagome tried again, "Kikyo told me that you said you loved her."
"Did she say that?" he asked, then under his breath he added, "She didn't believe it."
'So he did,' the girl confirmed. 'He did love her.' She swallowed hard against the lump that formed in her throat and consciously stopped herself from biting her lip.
'So what if he loved her?' her thoughts continued. 'Just because he loved some other girl once doesn't mean he can't. . . He can't what? Love me, too? Of course he doesn't. He's only known me a couple of weeks.'
Her reverie came to an abrupt focus, 'It doesn't mean that he wasn't kissing 'me' when we kissed.'
She couldn't help but feel a sour pang of dread at that. It was what scared her. The idea that when he had kissed her, he had been thinking of Kikyo.
The far away look in his eyes when he had caught her at fantasizing came back to her in a flash. Had he been thinking of her then? Was that what his look meant? He had said his feelings were real. But what if they had been for someone else?
She gave up on fighting, and started chewing nervously on her lower lip. 'Even if he does feel. . . whatever it is he could feel for me, he still loved Kikyo.'
Kikyo's words came back to her: "He was that true to me, at least."
"Oh gods," she whispered to herself. Nothing was better.
*~*~*
They hadn't accomplished much with Miroku and Sango. Aside from establishing that it made sense for Naraku to want to be free to act outside his established parameters, and that Kikyo believed he wanted some numbers, they hadn't come up with a single useful idea between them. They didn't even know if the two things were related. Perhaps they were, but it was only one of more possibilities than he could even guess at.
Inuyasha shook his head. There was too much they didn't know. For the most part, he didn't care that they weren't sure what Naraku was after, or what he was capable of. All he wanted to know where the bastard was, so he could kill him.
Kikyo. . . Naraku was responsible for killing her. He was certain of that, at least. He had killed her, because for some reason, she had those fucking numbers. The other mysterious deaths at Inutaiyoukai were probably his fault as well.
Naraku would die for what he did to Kikyo--or be destroyed, since youkai could not die. Whatever remained of him would be unsalvageable. There would be no repairs, no downloading old personality and memory units into a new shell. There would be nothing left.
Inuyasha noticed his fingers had curled into trembling fists, and consciously willed them to relax. He could feel the first tingle of energy gathering in his claws. Blinking, he raised his hand and eyed it dubiously. He could see the faint light of the energy pathways opening up beneath his skin.
"Inuyasha? Are you okay?" Kagome asked over her shoulder. She looked worn, her face pale, her dark eyes vague.
"Fine," he responded tersely, shaking the prickly sensation out of his hand.
The girl's gaze searched his face briefly, and for a moment he thought she was going to press for more, but she just looked away. He blinked, a little surprised. Not that he wanted to explain himself to her, but he had expected her to show more interest. He'd thought she would. . . and when she didn't he felt rather small. That odd shrinking feeling again, only it was different this time. This time he felt more insignificant.
The anger bled out of him at that feeling, leaving him oddly hollow. He hadn't even realized he'd been angry until the emotion faded. It was easiest to be angry. Crossing his arms, he followed the girl the rest of the way home in an uncomfortable silence.
Kaede was waiting for them when they got there.
The old woman looked like she'd just had the day from hell. The lines around her eyes and mouth were more deeply written than they had been, so her whole face seemed crumpled and sunk in on its self. She was frowning when they reached her.
"Kagome, are you alright?" the old woman asked, taking the girl's arm and leading her toward her own apartment.
"Yeah," Kagome told her uncertainly. "Why? What's up?"
"You saw her too, didn't you?" Inuyasha guessed.
Kaede nodded. "Yes. I saw her. She visited me before she went to you."
"What happened?" Kagome asked, gently freeing herself from the old woman's grip.
"There is something you ought to know about my elder sister," Kaede explained. "Come with me. I'll tell you everything I know."
Inuyasha's ears perked at the promise of an explanation, and followed without complaint as the old landlady brought them to her dining room. He waited as patiently as he could while she put a pot of water on the stove for tea, settled her mass in a chair across the little Formica table from Kagome. He could almost hear her joints creaking as she moved.
Fighting down a growl, he prompted, "Well? We haven't got all day."
"Patience is a virtue, Inuyasha," Kaede scolded him.
"Just get on with it."
"Inuyasha," Kagome warned him wearily, then turned back to the old woman. "Go on."
"More than fifty-six years ago, my sister got a job as an assistant at the Inutaiyoukai Corporation."
"I know where she worked," the hanyou grumbled irritably, only to have Kagome hush him.
Kaede gave a resigned sigh. "I was well aware you knew that, Inuyasha. What you don't know is how she got the job. At that time, she was engaged to the CEO's son, Amori Ichiro."
A snide remark died on Inuyasha's tongue. Engaged? To Taisho's son?
"Amori Ichiro," Kagome repeated. "I've never heard Taisho referred to with a family name."
"It wasn't his," Kaede explained. "Amori was his mother's name, I believe." Kaede paused, looking from the girl, to the still stunned hanyou and back again. "Perhaps this will be easier if I show you."
"Show us what?" Inuyasha asked. To his own ears his voice sounded distant, and lacking its usual bite.
Kaede levered herself back up, and hobbled into the living room. She seemed much older today than she had the last time they'd seen her, more fragile. Inuyasha tracked her slow course to one of the end tables, where she picked up a framed photograph.
Curiosity plain in her expression, Kagome followed. Inuyasha moved after them with more reluctance. He wasn't sure he wanted to see what the picture was of. A sinking feeling grew in the pit of his stomach, and a strange sense that he knew what he was about to see overtook him.
Kagome plucked the photo out of Kaede's hand, her eyes falling on something the hanyou couldn't see.
Whatever it was caused the girl to give a strangled gasp, and her eyes darted back and forth from the picture to Inuyasha. She was staring at him when she handed over the picture.
"Inuyasha," she said weakly, "it's you."
*~*~*
A/N: Yay! That one was so much easier than the last one that I can hardly believe it. I hope everyone's still enjoying. Look! An answer! Well, sort of. . .
Later.