"Swingin' Demon" or "The Hammock from Hell"

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an Inuyasha fic

by

mkh2

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Disclaimer: Me no own Inuyasha. Me poor. You no sue.

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"" – indicates speech

'' – indicates thought

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Inuyasha yawned and stretched out along one of the higher branches of the Goshinboku. It had been a while since he had time to relax.

"Ya know, this would be a great place to put up a hammock! Lots of trees and shade – not too public. Me likes!"

Inuyasha cringed. 'Oh no, not that Mikki-girl again.' Sitting up, he crawled to the end of the branch and peered out from behind the thick veil of leaves to the commotion below. That's funny – Kagome is down there, but the other girl… where is Mikki?

Mikki slowly tiptoed from around behind the Goshinboku. Even if her sight wasn't the greatest, she was pretty good with distinguishing even very slight variations in color, and the little bit of red and silver-white was a dead give-away that her favorite ill-tempered hanyou was cat-napping in the sacred tree.

"Boo!" Inuyasha yelped and jumped forward. Realizing his error, he twisted in midair to grab the tip of the branch, which, being the thin end of the branch, snapped under his weight and *thud*

"Eh heh heh, sorry about that Inu-kun, didn't expect you to react that extremely," Mikki rubbed the back of her head sheepishly.

"Feh, as if that really hurt," snorted Inuyasha as he sat up and gingerly touched the end of his nose. 'Ouch… hope it isn't broken.'

"Oh, in that case… wanna help us hang our hammock?" Mikki grinned, kneeling next to him.

Inuyasha blinked.

~

'How did I get talked into this?' wondered Inuyasha as he kept scooting first one inch one way, only to be told to scoot two inches the opposite way. Back and forth, back and forth, the whole time with his arms extended just six inches from his chin, holding onto a rather heavy, rather large piece of red canvas and thick white rope… something about 'Nigh-Rons' – he hadn't particularly paid attention.

Inuyasha sighed – the sad thing was, he was actually hoping Mikki would step in and save him from Kagome… He glanced pitifully at Mikki, who sat a little ways away from him, slurping on a Pepsi.

Noticing the sad puppy eyes, Mikki spoke up. "You know Kagome, maybe I could pick out a different place to hang it, if you can't make up your mind…"

"No! This place is just perfect, if only Inuyasha could get it right."

"You can only adjust a hammock so much, you know. Why, I remember this one Goofy cartoon…"

"Does this look like a cartoon? No! Now, if we could just find a way to move that tree closer… hey Inuyasha, how do you feel about digging?"

Mikki groaned, moving a hand over her eyes and Inuyasha started howling about not being a slave. 'Not a cartoon indeed…'

~

"Come on Inuyasha, you can climb trees, so… climb already!" Kagome was tired. She was tired and cranky and angry and she wanted her hammock set up already. Mikki, after pretty much not being given anything to do, was sitting off to the side sighing pitifully about how they "stole" her lovely hammock and weren't letting her have any say in the matter while sipping her Pepsi. Mikki is weird. Mikki should be in the house, making lemonade and oden for her instead of sitting and sighing and saying such strange things.

Inuyasha was beyond annoyed. He had tried climbing that tree, he honestly had, but the stupid thing was so weak that the branches would break or the tree would bend, unnaturally so, making this horrible creaking sound.

Mikki was shaking her head. 'My mother could have set up twenty hammocks by now,' she thought, 'by herself, in the dark, one hand tied behind her back.'

"Are you guys sure you just don't want me to do it? I have a great idea for where to hang it up." Mikki stirred the straw in her Pepsi glass, watching the tiny sliver of lemon swirling around in the bubbly brown liquid. She picked a cookie off the small plate next to her and wondered if the specks were nuts or chocolate.

"We can do it ourselves," Kagome called back.

"At the rate you're going, you'll end up breaking all the trees around here and wind up having to hang it in your bedroom," Mikki wrinkled her nose and tugged her ear. "Will you at least listen to me? I could think of several locations without desecrating a single thing."

"No! We want to do it ourselves, right Inuyasha?" Kagome peered up at Inuyasha, who was now hanging from a branch.

"Please help me." Inuyasha turned sad puppy eyes at Mikki before… *creeeeeaaaaaaakkkkkkkk-crak!* *thud!* Inuyasha was lying in a pitiful silver and white heap on the ground, the hammock and tree branch peeking out from under him.

"I can't believe you broke another tree!" shrieked Kagome.

"Kagome, that's because you're picking trees that are too young and weak," Mikki interjected before Kagome rushed into her "sitting" streak. Mikki winced, 'I could just imagine all the holes we'd have to fill if she kept this up and her temper stayed uncontrollable.'

"I know what I'm doing," Kagome snapped. My, she's a determined little thing, isn't she?

"No, you don't." Oh, Inuyasha, just 'cause we're human doesn't mean we're deaf, you know.

"That's it! Oswurai! Oswurai-oswurai-oswurai-oswuh-muhmf! Ermf! Grrrrrll…" Kagome glared at the owner of the offending hand, who had shoved a rather large cookie in her mouth just before covering her mouth with said hand.

Mikki sighed. "Simmer down. Inuyasha's just frustrated. He really wants to try out that hammock too, right Inuyasha?" Mikki shot him a look that said, "You better agree before your back is broken in five places."

Inuyasha nodded from his little hole in the ground. "Yeah, right. I'm hungry too."

Mikki nodded back. "Right. Why don't we break for lunch and plot out where to hang the hammock so hopefully we don't break any more trees or waste any more time trying to tie it around trees that are too far apart or too close together?"

Kagome sighed, shoulders slumping forward. "Okay… I want oden."

"How about no?" Mikki sighed, rubbing the bridge of her nose. Kagome forgot that they ran out… again.

"Ramen!" Inuyasha cheered, sticking both hands in the air.

"We ran out." Kagome shook her head.

"Let's just get take-out… I feel like being lazy," Mikki suggested. "That way, we can all get what we want, and we never have to leave the house."

"Yay!" "Yay!"

~

"Mikki, this is definitely one of your better ideas," commented Inuyasha as he alternately slurped up ramen and chomped on a chicken wing.

Mikki sweat dropped. "Uh, thank you, Inu-kun. How's your back?"

He shrugged.

"Oden, oden, oden, oden…" Nobody needs to ask how Kagome is doing.

"So," Inuyasha leaned over the table, whispering conspiratorially, "Where do you think we should hang the—"

Slam!

The duo jumped back and looked over at the source of the sound. Kagome had slammed her bowl of oden on the table, the fishy concoction splashing all over the place. You could practically see the battle aura radiating off of her petite frame. Inuyasha and Mikki could honestly say they have never been so frightened in their lives.

"And exactly what are you two planning?" Kagome smiled evilly.

"Nothing!" Inuyasha squeaked.

"Nothing at all!" Mikki agreed, nodding her head furiously.

"Good!" chirped Kagome sweetly, going back to her food. "Oops, now how did this mess happen? What a waste! I'm going to get some more oden." She got up and went to the kitchen.

Inuyasha and Kagome sat, sighing in relief before looking at themselves. They had latched on to each other in sheer terror and their sides were so tightly pressed against each other you couldn't fit a sheet of paper between them. They leapt apart as if burned, pointing accusing fingers at each other.

"Hey! What are you holding onto me for?" barked out Inuyasha in annoyance.

"Me? You're the one who grabbed me!" hissed Mikki, equally irritated.

"Feh!"

"Keh!"

~

"I think that tree and that tree… no, that tree!" Kagome was randomly pointing at trees again, trying to decide where to hang the red hammock.

Inuyasha sighed, depressed. He had tried to get outside before Kagome did and bury the stupid thing, but to no avail. No sooner had he touched a corner of the accursed length of cloth and rope than Kagome appeared hovering over him, that saccharine smile on her face as she suggested, sweetly, of course, that they get back to business. He was resigned to his fate. 'I must be in Buddhist hell… Purgatory… or something… evil, it's pure evil,' he thought.

Mikki meanwhile, was contemplating just grabbing her hammock back from Kagome and making a run for it.

*Thud!* Inuyasha landed on the ground, yet again, after trying to tie the hammock at an insanely high-elevation on the sickly tree. Kagome may have been the "Grand Overseer", as she put it, deciding where to place the tree… but why was he doing all the grunt work? He didn't even care about the durned hammock, so how'd he get involved? He glanced over at Mikki, who seemed to be in deep thought, before trying to scale the stupid tree again. True, she "invited" him to help set it up but Kagome threatened him with 25 Oswurai if he didn't. However, Mikki better not abandon him. He glanced back at Mikki, only to panic as he saw the foreign girl had disappeared.

"Mikki! Where'd you go!?" hollered Inuyasha before he went crashing to the ground again.

"That's not important right now!" shrieked Kagome, who had somehow taken on an even wilder (if that truly was possible) look in her eyes. "What's important is—hey! Let me go!" Kagome squirmed, trying to loosen the rope that had mysteriously appeared around her.

"Bwahahaha! I always wanted to try my hand at using a lasso!" Mikki grinned, giving a firm tug on the rope and making Kagome land on her butt with an audible thump.

Inuyasha stared at Mikki. In the ten-second span between seeing her sitting and thinking and now, it looked as if she had undergone a costume change. She now wore cowboy boots and a big cowboy hat, thick gloves and a bandana around her neck, though he couldn't tell if she had on a different shirt than before (long-sleeves… were they rolled up earlier?); her blue jeans were definitely the same though. She had a firm hold on the thick rope that had tied up Kagome.

"Howdy pardner, thought you could use a hand," Mikki winked. Turning, she started to walk to the back of the house, the rope going over her shoulder and Kagome getting dragged on the ground. "Please pick up my hammock and follow me."

~

Slurp! Inuyasha sighed, relaxed. Mikki had tied the hammock under the balcony of Kagome's mom's room, so there would be plenty of shade and shelter from the sun and rain. After one mishap getting in (Mikki was crowing about how he looked just like Goofy getting tied up in the hammock), he was now relaxing in the hammock, slurping up ramen and drinking some Coke (the sweet tartness of Pepsi was a bit much for him, not that Mikki cared – "more for me!") and swaying gently in the breeze.

"Isn't this nice?" Mikki smiled as she sat on the other end of the hammock. "When I was really little, we'd lie down in it, head at one end and feet at the other end, my sister or myself or both, and pull up the sides of the hammock so we'd be a "blue banana", that's what Mom called it, and she'd rock us. It was nice, and we were happy we had such a nice, large balcony to lie in the hammock under because it got so hot sometimes, well into 100 degrees Fahreheit. Oh, wait, how much is that in Celsius again? Kagome?" Mikki turned to Kagome, who was sitting in between her and Inuyasha, and tugged the gag down from Kagome's mouth. Kagome promptly started shrieking.

"Why'd you tie me up? Why didn't you let me set up the hammock? Why—" Kagome was promptly gagged.

Inuyasha pulled his fingers out of his ears.

"Don't tell me you forgot why you tied and gagged her up again, Mikki?" Inuyasha sighed dryly.

"Oops. Well, alls well that ends well, or something like that. At least we gotta try out the hammock before the sunset." Mikki nodded. "Hey, it's my hammock."

~Owari~

I don't own Goofy or any other Disney character.

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Sorry I'm late in getting this out, but I typed it originally at school and the disk went berserk or something, said it was done in notepad, and added about a billion little rectangles. Don't know how that happened.

Also, the ending is not as funny as it originally was… that comes with losing a good part in the email. Yeah, I saved the last half on my Yahoo account (I do that when I don't have a disk with me.)

You know, I had a small piece that Mikki was supposed to say to Inuyasha after she scared him out of the tree but I totally forgot it, and the sad thing is that all I can remember that it was so much funnier. I went running around like crazy trying to find paper and a pencil (I had no access to the computer) but by the time I found them I forgot. T.T Makes me sad. ::sniffles::

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My mom lived in Puerto Rico for 20 years. She's very good with hammocks, and yes, we did used to have a blue hammock under my parents' balcony.

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To the reviewers:

To: Sailor-Knight Shadowstar
I went back and looked at my story - thanks for pointing it out... I thought I corrected all the errors (took me five times to correct Happosai's name though at least I hadn't spelled it the way my sister did 'Happysigh')
To: osaka_girl
Actually it's both - depends on the region you are from (in your case, I'm guessing Osaka)... you know, different dialects. Thanks for the info though (and seriously, in the episode where they first meet Shippou, Kagome does "Oo! Kawaii." and that's the original Japanese - watched it subbed.)