Oh goodie, a new chapter!^^ It's Miroku's turn now… The review turnout was absolutely STUNNING, the most I've EVER gotten on one chapter! Oh, sorry this took so long. You see, lack of sleep finally caught up with me, and I got that new SARS virus. Not really, I just got abducted by aliens(aka my family). Actually, I lied again- I REALLY had this little accident involving a heavy storm and downed power lines. ONE if those was true ^_^.
Disclaimer: "dis-" a negating prefix. "claim"- to pronounce as one's own. "er"-… er. ANYWAYS! Put the three together.
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I couldn't be happier if I had gotten my curse lifted. Well, maybe I could've been if that happened, but nothing short of that. Or if Naraku was killed. Or if Sango agreed to bear my child.
Oh, forget it.
My point is, there's almost nowhere I'd rather be than here, holding the beautiful, naked, love of my life. Never mind that she's currently a penguin.
"It's getting dark," Shippou noted. "Maybe we should stop for the night."
"NO!" Sango and Inu Yasha objected simultaneously.
"I'm tired!" Kagome protested. "Besides, Sango, maybe the curse will have worn off by morning."
Sango snorted. I patted her head comfortingly. I felt so sorry for my Sango, being turned into something so useless.
"Don't TOUCH me!" she shrieked, ignoring the fact that she was in my lap. She attempted to slap me, which threw her off balance. I attempted to catch her, which threw me off balance, so both of us fell. As if my battered skull needed any I didn't feel very sorry for her anymore. At least we weren't very high. Kirara landed and prodded Sango. My concern shot sky high as I remembered that she, as a penguin, was bound to land in an awkward position. What if she had broken her neck? What if she was dead?"
"Penguins," Sango moaned, "are not built to land on two feet."
"Let's just get a good night's sleep so we won't be cranky in the morning," Kagome-sama suggested. "That way, nobody will feel like smacking anybody and we can fix this without too many casualties."
"That sounds pleasant," I agreed.
"I'm going to feel like smacking someone until I'm a human again," my Sango muttered sulkily, but she was content with waddling over to slump against a tree and glare at us all. Even as a penguin, she's so cute when she's mad. I tried to sit down next to her, but she gave me a look that stated quite clearly that if I tried anything, I would have my skull split open when she was a human again. Contrary to popular belief, I'm persistent, but not suicidal. I went to gather firewood, crossing my fingers and hoping I wouldn't come back a penguin.
~*~
Morning dawned early.
Way too early.
The sun was barely over the horizon when a shouting match erupted between Inu Yasha, who thought we should've been moving hours ago, and Kagome-sama, who thought we shouldn't be moving for a few hours. This ended in a few 'osuwari's and us all getting started anyways. Unfortunatley, Inu Yasha was accidentally 'osuwari'ed onto Kirara's paw, causing her to limp and us to walk. Even in the early morning, it was uncomfortably warm, and I envied Sango for her lack of clothing. All in all, it was not a pleasant start to the day. The rising headache wasn't helping matters, but I suppose that tends to happen when one is slammed into a tree at high speeds.
"Kagome-sama, do you have any of that headache medicine?" I didn't want to worry her, but I didn't want to slow us down, either.
"Yeah," Kagome-sama confirmed, nodding. "It's not the usual stuff, but it should work."
She dug one of her strange water containers out of her backpack, then started taking out other things, frowning.
"Um… it's in here… somewhere…"
"May I have some water?" Sango asked. Kagome-sama nodded, still rummaging in her pack. Sango tried to pick up the container. Predictably, it slipped from her fin. She glared a glare that could freeze hell, but the water bottle cheerfully defied her, rolling back and forth at her feet. I suppressed a chuckle and opened the bottle for her, holding it to her mouth. Erm, beak.
"Aha!" Kagome-sama cried triumphantly, producing a small bottle of pills. I accepted them gratefully as she flung her backpack over her shoulder and continued up the path.
"What's taking you all so long?!" Inu Yasha's voice demanded from somewhere in the direction Kagome-sama had went.
"Coming," I called back. A few irritated mutterings could be heard. I quickly gulped the pills and ran to catch up with Inu Yasha before he killed something.
"Wait!" Sango yelled. I turned around to see her waddling for all she was worth, trying to keep up.
Was it worth it? I don't know- it would be great to see her face, but she would positively clobber me when she had the curse lifted.
Too late.
I scooped her up, flapping fins and angry protests, and carried her all the way to Inu Yasha before putting her down. She promptly bit my arm.
"Sango," asked I, "What are you doing?"
She growled and bit harder. Naturally, it didn't break the skin- penguins don't have teeth. Still, it's uncomfortable to have an oversized bird hanging off your arm.
"Um… could you stop that? It kind of hurts, you know."
She released me and waited a minute, watching me. Then she groaned in pure frustration.
"Damn! It works for werewolves!"
~*~
It must've been the heat.
We were all moving so sluggishly because of it. Even Kagome-sama, in all her scantily clad glory, was drooping. So we inched along at the pace of a rather sickly turtle, and Inu Yasha barely complained. All the same, everything was going fairly well. Until the world insisted on spinning wildly around me all of the sudden. I can't exactly keep going when I can't take a single step without either falling over or walking into a tree, so I stopped, leaning on my staff for support. A moment passed in which everything grew a little too fuzzy for anything to be coherent, and then I felt Kagome-sama grab my shoulders and firmly lead me to sit on a rock.
"Oooh, I hope you weren't allergic to those pills," she said, wringing her hands nervously.
"I'll be fine," I assured her,
Then of course, because Lady Fate does love irony, I fainted.
The first thing I noticed when I woke was that it felt kind of breezy. A nice change, I must say. I opened my eyes, and everyone was crowded around me. Even Inu Yasha, which struck me as unusual. He looked positively dumbstruck. I vaguely wondered how long I had been out for this sort of reaction. I didn't wonder long before I observed the second thing.
Sango was wearing my robes.
My mind raced desperately, trying to recall why she might be, and in this panic it took me a moment to realize that she was no longer a penguin.
Not a penguin…everybody worried… hit head hard yesterday…
It didn't take long for me to conclude that the penguin had been a figment of my imagination and I was waking up for the first time since the bird incident. Sango wearing my robes and my strange lack of a headache could be explained away later.
"Ah…hello," I said, because everyone else was still staring at me. I rose, feeling more than a little awkward because they were all still staring, and reached for my staff. I noted that my grip was rather stiff, and the staff slipped away. I felt the beads sealing my air rip start to slide, and hastily stopped them.
"What's going on?" I asked, bewildered.
"You're a penguin," stated Kagome-sama.
"Am not," I said indignantly.
"Then why am I so much taller than you?" Kagome-sama asked.
I didn't have an answer. I gave my orange feet and slick fin a good long glare, then resigned myself to the idea that I was, in fact, a penguin.
"Oh," said I glumly, "I am a penguin."
"So you are," Kagome-sama agreed.
"Woah," Sango contributed, "That was major déjà vu right there." She stretched gleefully. "And I'm a human!"
She proceeded to dance and tumble until she got horribly tangled in my robes.
"How can you stand these things?" She asked disdainfully.
"Why are you wearing them?" I said accusingly.
"Because my clothes are in Kagome-chan's backpack and penguins don't wear clothes, so it was a quick solution. Would you rather I was naked when you came to?"
Images that don't belong in any respectable piece of prose flashed through my head.
"Yes," I replied earnestly.
Predictably, my Sango hit me repeatedly over the head.
Love hurts.
To make matters worse, I lost my grip on my beads after the second hit, and things just went downhill from there. At the end of this downhill, I was in a crater on the ground, and my Sango was in what I shall call a compromising position on top of me. So we hit the bottom of the downhill and started digging. Seconds later, the penguin monk sits on one end of the path with a huge red handprint on his face, and the taji-ya on the other end, muttering various obscenities. The peacemaker takes center stage.
"Hey, Miroku-sama, don't do that, Sango-chan, don't hit him when his beads are loose, you'll kill us all," Kagome-sama said jovially.
"Fasten them," snapped Sango.
"You want to try?" I challenged her.
"Maybe if I break your arm in the right way…"
"I think duct tape is a better idea," Kagome-sama said hastily. She produced a roll of the aforementioned substance and wrapped it tightly around my 'arm'.
"Are we ready to go now?" Inu Yasha whined impatiently.
"Not quite," Kagome-sama said, "Sango-chan still has to get her clothes on."
~*~
I was beginning to see the difficulties of being a penguin. There were many. Short legs was the most obvious, of course. Another, the one that probably bothered me most, was that I couldn't hold my staff. Call me weird, but if I've had that staff for as long as I can remember, and if I can't hold it, I feel a lot less comfortable, more vulnerable, so… so… naked. Well, I was naked. Never mind. The disadvantage that I hadn't really thought about was, although they could accept Sango being a penguin, they couldn't seem to accept that she wasn't anymore and that now I was. Now sure, I thought it a bit odd, too, but they were obsessive.
"What on earth might've made that happen?" Kagome wondered aloud for the twentieth time in the last hour.
"I dunno," Shippou sighed for the twentieth time.
"As long as I'm human, I'm glad!" Sango replied for the twentieth time.
"Feh," Inu Yasha spat for the fifty-seventh, because he didn't wait for his turn to say 'feh' most of the time.
"As I've said," said I, "It's quite possible that the curse passes from person to person somehow."
"That's obvious," Sango-darling snapped.
"Curses aren't like the common cold," Kagome pointed out. "Maybe they're just as annoying-"
"More so," I interrupted.
"-but they don't pass from person to person. Do they?"
"Apparently so," said I. "But I haven't a clue how."
"Feh," said Inu Yasha, and the loop repeated.
~*~
By the time that we had reached the next village, I was exhausted (waddling takes a lot of energy you know), Inu Yasha was complaining in advance about having to stay in an inn, Shippou was pouting because my shoulder was no longer a good perch, Kagome was arguing with Inu Yasha, and Sango-honey had finished rejoicing, save the occasional spontaneous cheer. By the time the first inn came into sight, I was going over my spiel in my head. By the time I knocked on the door, Kagome-sama had stopped arguing and was waving her arms wildly and squeaking something incoherent. By the time the door had opened, I remembered that penguins are unusual, unable to talk, and certainly don't see ominous black clouds, much less exorcise them, hence the cause of Kagome-sama's distress. The woman at the door stared dumbly at me. I stared dumbly back.
"It's my pet," Kagome-sama explained hastily.
"Pet?!" I cried in indignation, my mouth moving before my brain got a chance to. Kagome clapped her hand over my beak.
"It…talks?" The woman asked dubiously.
"N-no! I'm a ventriloquist, see?" she nudged me, and started moving her mouth wordlessly.
"I can make it look like it's talking," I said, going along with the act and hoping Kagome-sama's mouth was moving to my words, which it almost definitely was not.
"Well," she continued, "I, um, we, were wondering if we could stay here tonight. Aack! I mean, how much is it to stay here?"
Smoooooth. Real smooth. Yeah, like I had room to talk.
"Stay here…with 3 youkai?" This woman either had some sort of speech impediment or was just not expecting 2 humans, 2 youkai, a hanyou, and a penguin to drop in. Probably the latter.
"Oh, don't worry, the one in red is a hanyou," Kagome-sama assured the stunned woman.
Oh, that made it all better.
"I…see…" said the woman.
"And he doesn't want to stay in an inn," she continued slyly, "So he'll be outside tonight."
"What!?" Inu Yasha shouted.
"You said so yourself before you came," Kagome reminded him brightly, "So I figured this'll make you happier. Don't make me say it," she warned as he started to sputter protests.
"What about the other two?" the woman wanted to know.
"Harmless," Kagome-sama guaranteed. Kirara growled and Shippou pouted. "Behave," she whispered. They stopped, slightly sulkily.
"Well… if you're sure…(I'm too lazy to find out the ancient currency so insert price here)."
Kagome faltered, blinking.
"Um… hold on a minute…" she ran up the path, motioning for us to follow. Sango-angel and I exchanged a vaguely curious glance, she shrugged, and we obeyed. Inu Yasha spat something about it not involving him, but Sango tugged him off by the ear. I was thankful that, for once, I wasn't the victim of her wrath. Although it was always worth it… ahem. As I was saying.
When we reached the crest of the hill that led down to the village, Kagome cleared her throat importantly. Then she paused, decided her feet were suddenly fascinating, and rubbed the back of her neck embarrassedly.
"Do any of you have money?"
"…"
I certainly wasn't willing to admit that a lady pickpocket had gotten the better of me again. Inu Yasha and Shippou never had money. As for Sango dearest…
"Depends. Do youkai bones count?"
"I'd say not," Kagome-sama sighed. "Okay…what don't we want that we could trade?"
Inu Yasha's face lit up and he raised his rosary, opening his mouth to offer it.
"SIT!"
At least Sango can't do that to me.
"Ow! What was that for, wench?" Inu Yasha whined.
"As long as I can still SIT you, we're not giving SIT up! Now what was my name again?"
"Wench!"
"SIT!"
"Candy!" Sango exclaimed.
"Huh?" Asked Kagome, echoing my general sentiment.
"We can give her candy in exchange for a place to say," Sango explained.
As always, my lovely, strong, sweet, gorgeous, perfect, angelic, charming- where was I? Oh yes. My Sango had come to our rescue once again with a flawless plan.
Well, almost flawless.
"We can't give up our candy!" Shippou wailed despairingly.
"Actually, I think it's a good idea," Kagome declared.
"I don't!" persisted the kitsune.
"Nobody cares what you think, squirt!" Inu Yasha taunted.
"WAAAAAAAAAAAAAH! KAGOME, HE'S BEING MEAN AGAIN!"
"SIT!"
"Ow! Wench!"
"SITSITSITSITSIT…"
I watched wide-eyed as Kagome proceeded to hammer the poor hanyou into the ground.
"What's wrong with her today?" I wondered aloud.
"It's a girl thing," Sango confided.
"Scary," Shippou whimpered.
"About the candy," said I, "I know how much you love candy, but we're a team, right?"
Shippou nodded, grinning.
"Well," I continued, "Sometimes we have to make personal sacrifices for the sake of the team, right?"
"Yup!" Shippou chirped. "Mine is tolerating Inu Yasha!"
"It's the other way around!" Inu Yasha complained.
"Inu Yasha…
"Oh hell…"
"SIT!"
"Um, one of them, I guess," I confirmed, ignoring the crashing in the background, "Or, for example, I would give my life to protect any of you. And in my experiences, so would Sango."
"Except when she's trying to kill you."
"Except when she's trying to kill me."
"That's not funny," Sango sniffed. I ignored her.
"So, Shippou, are you ready to make a personal sacrufuce for the sake of the team?"
"You bet!" Shippou cheered.
"Wonderful! Okay, let's go find that candy to trade!"
"We can't give up our candy!" Shippou wailed despairingly.
Why do I feel like I've been here before?
Eventually, it was my Sango who came to our rescue again. When we went down to trade, the woman took the trade after a little convincing and a sample. Shippou was the main problem, but here's where Sango came in. Every time he opened his mouth to protest, she was armed with a gobstopper to stuff in it. After the fifth one, he stopped trying to talk. So we got a room and all's well that ends well for now.
Except that I'm still a penguin.
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I'll have you know that I'm writing this from somewhere in Indiana. That's why this won't be up for a while. I live in Georgia, see. Did you know there's a Gnaw Bone, Indiana? And French Lick? Oh, and another good one- Cementville. Yeah, I really wanna live there.No offense to any Indianans, of course. Ja ne!
~Kaylana