Disclaimer: I don't own Inuyasha and co….
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Epilogue: Adopted
"Why….Why…." Kagome whispered as she sat on her leg's on the floor of the living room. Boxes were everywhere making her feel a little claustrophobic. Kirara mewed as she rubbed against her hand. She pet the neko-youkai's head lightly. "I'm a miko….how can I live here if there's….if there's nothing I can do…..in this time?" she asked herself.
"Maybe we can blow up the well?" Shippo asked as he leaned against her white yukata.
"It won't work. There's some kind of barrier around it." She explained quietly.
"Kagome-chan. Let's go shopping for you." The little boys' mother said as she came in a knelt in front of the spaced out girl.
Kagome turned to the woman. "Alright."
*--*--*
"Look at that girl."
"Are they shooting a movie?"
"Look, there are blood stains."
"Look at his little tail? A costume?"
The woman, known as Asuka, looked down at the teenager. She was quiet. Kirara was sleeping on her shoulder and the little kitsune was walking very closely next to her. "Kagome-chan? Ignore the gossip. We'll get you some normal clothing and set you up at a nice high school." She said as she put an arm over the girls' shoulder.
"I….I can't stand this noise." Kagome muttered.
"What is that, dear?"
"It's so loud!" Kagome cried as she covered her ears.
*--*--*
In a department store Asuka looked from rack to rack with Kagome looking around curiously. Shippo was running from aisle to aisle.
"Here you go." Asuka held out a pair of black jeans. "These should fit you." She said.
"Asuka!" a woman called to the older woman.
Asuka turned. A woman with long red hair walked over to the black haired woman. She was trailed by three girls, about Kagome's age who was talking amongst themselves and seemed to be engrossed in the conversation.
"Who is this?" the woman asked.
"This is Kagome. She's sort of….orphaned. I found her staring at the well in the shrine. We here to by some clothes that'll make her fit in with this time." Asuka gasped.
Kagome looked up at her with cold eyes. "Thanks…." She said coldly.
"I'm sorry dear. No one'll believe me anyway." she pet Kagome's head.
"Kagome…Kagome what?"
"Kagome nothing." Kagome said quietly. "I'm empty without Inuyasha." She looked sidelong at the woman who was staring at the girl like she was a misunderstood artist dressing in black smoking crack and walking through a church.
"What?" Kagome growled.
"Nothing dear. So…your Kagome Nothing, empty with out an Inuyasha." She said. "Why would you want a dog youkai?"
"It's a personal thing." Kagome sighed.
"Hi, I'm Eri!" a girl with curly hair came over to her.
"Hello." Kagome turned to the three girls'. "I'm Shikon no Tama no Miko."
"You're a…a miko?!" the three girl's cried excitedly.
"I am…have you not heard of me?"
"Hear how perfectly she speaks?" Eri said excitedly. "So…where do you come from?"
"I'm a wanderer." Kagome said.
"Obviously, see her clothes?" the head banded girl said.
"Shut up. Maybe it's the uniform of her village!" a girl with short hair said.
"What high school do you go to?" Eri asked.
"High….school?" Kagome asked slowly as she looked at the girl's.
"Yeah. Do you go to….Kazimazuki High, or maybe you go to Rumiba, or maybe Techoni."
"What are these names?" Kagome muttered.
"Kagome! Look at this!" Shippo held up a bra. "What is it?"
"What a perverted little boy!" the short haired girl snatched the bra out of his hands. "Hey, your so cute." she pinched Shippo's cheek's and the other girl's giggled.
"Is he your brother?" they asked.
"Yeah. I guess you could say that." Kagome said.
"Here you go, Kagome-chan! New clothes for the new aged miko." Asuka bought the clothes and they left.
*--*--*
"School?" Kagome asked. She sat Indian style in the middle of the living room floor, the young boy named Souta watched TV over her head while the young miko, the kitsune, the neko-youkai, and Asuka discussed Kagome's education.
"Yes. It is required by law that you have to go to school." Asuka said as she sat in a chair in front of the girl.
Kagome, who was wearing the black Jean's they had bought earlier, a red cardigan, and a blue button down shirt underneath, stared at the woman with a raised eyebrow.
"I will also adopt you so…you can legally live in Tokyo." She said and smiled.
"You mean Kagome's going to be my sister?!" that was probably the only thing he wanted to hear. Souta nearly jumped on Kagome.
"Not biologically but-."
"Adopt?"
"Yes, dear. Are you angry?"
"What kind of adopt? Like, I'll trade you this field for your child kind of adopt or take care of my child if I die kind of adoption."
"Whoa." Souta gaped at her.
"Oh dear, not like that. We use papers now a day's and meeting's and attorney's and lawyer's and all that fun stuff."
"Attorney's? Lawyers? Meetings?" Kagome raised an eyebrow.
"It's all hieroglyphics to me." Shippo said as he sat on the couch next to the now settling Souta.
"Are you adopting Shippo too?" Souta asked happily.
"I guess. We'll be one big family!"
"What about ji-chan?" Souta said. "You still didn't get him back form the old shrine."
"He's coming….someday." Asuka said awkwardly.
*--*--*
"Here you go dear. Your uniform." Asuka straightened the long dark blue skirt on Kagome's waist.
"It's kinda frilly don'tcha think?" Kagome asked as she looked at herself in the mirror.
"It's like a sailor's outfit." Souta said.
"Pirate's?!" Kagome seemed to get in battle mode. "Where?"
"It's just the type of style, Kagome-chan." Asuka said as she laughed. The girl was still Sengoku Jidai material. You could give her nothing and she'd think that was too much.
"I'll take you to the school office. My friend, the woman you met yesterday, and her daughter and her friends go to this high school. I would think it only convenient seeing that you three hit it off yesterday."
"Hit it off?" Kagome raised and eyebrow for the twentieth time that day.
"Sure. Anyway, c'mon. We're a little late." Asuka rushed out of the room. Kagome looked at herself one last time before taking out her usual ribbon. Her long black hair fell over her shoulders and made her look even prettier. The one chunk of her bangs that always seemed to fall in her face made a more independent sort of look to her but still innocent.
*--*--*
"Class, today we have a transfer student from Kansai….excuse me…it doesn't say a name here." The teacher whispered to Kagome.
"Oh….uh…." Kagome looked up at the ceiling a bit. Think….back to in that moving thing that made you feel sick, she thought.
Remember Kagome. It's Higurashi Kagome. Got that?
She remembered Asuka's words and smiled.
"I'm Higurashi Kagome! Shikon no Tama no miko…oops." she remembered what Souta had said.
If you say that people'll think you're weird.
"You're a miko? At the Higurashi shrine?" the teacher asked, interested.
"I guess…heheheh." Kagome scratched her head.
"You may take a seat."
"Take it where?" she asked.
The kids laughed.
"You want an arrow through your eye?!" she threatened as she pushed up her sleeves and reached out of habit to her shoulder. No arrows. "Damn." She reached her waist. No katana. In her book case she had a series of weapon's like small daggers her bow which was bent in a shape that would probably break had she not added a little of her miko power's to it. There was also a few arrows in there along with a 'gun' thing she had found in the house and some poisons dart's she had found when she had pulled up the carpet out of curiosity in her bedroom.
"Please sit in one of the chair's provided, Higurashi-san." The teacher sound frustrated.
The kids watched in envy as she walked, in a slightly bent knee position to a chair. Eri smiled at her as she took the chair next to her. The peppy weirdo. Kagome sighed as she rested her head on her hand. I can learn to deal with these people for a while, she thought. "I gotta unseal it!" she cried and knocked over her desk which she jumped up. "Oop's." it had hit the boy in front of her square in the noggin.
"Higurashi! Detention!" the teacher bellowed.
"What's a 'detertion'?" Kagome asked.
The teacher blew a fuse.
"Run Kagome!" Eri cried.
Kagome ran to the window, punched through it and jumped out, landing haphazardly in a tree and almost falling out of it.
*--*--*
"Class this….uh…what's your name child?" the woman asked.
"Higurashi Shippo." Shippo said proudly. He had shape shifted with the help of one of the jewel shards to a handsome young boy with long reddish brownish hair in a high ponytail with lightly tanned skin. He was short and had the uniform of the boy's in the elementary school.
Souta put the thumbs up at him and motioned to the desk next to him.
"Please take a seat." The teacher said.
"Take it where?"
The teacher smacked her forehead. "Sit down, Shippo dear."
"Hai."
*--*--*
"Where is Kagome-chan?" Asuka tapped her foot restlessly. "Maybe she got lost?"
"No…she knows her way alright." Souta said.
"I'm home, Asuka!" Kagome called through the house.
The four inhabitants of the house charged for the front door. There, with plenty of scrapes, bump's bruises, and cut's on her face was Kagome.
"Did you pick a fight with a wrestler or something?!" Asuka cried as she helped the girl inside.
*--*--*
After Asuka had bandaged all of Kagome's wounds she left her to explain. "Well….at first that teaching guy said that I had this 'detention' thing so after Eri-chan told me to run I jumped out the window. The teacher's all surrounded me and took me to this dark room filled with squashy chairs and sat me down, as they said so perfectly. I don't know what they said because…obviously I wasn't listening. I went to this detention thing, came home and this man in rags tried to attack me. He had these big dog's and they were all biting me and stuff and then I poked their eyes' out with the ends of my arrow's." she explained.
"Wow. You're popular already." Souta said.
"Thank you."
*--*--*
That night Kagome fell unceremoniously on the cushiony fluff of a bed. Kirara had been sleeping all day, recovering herself and being lazy and Shippo was just plain exhausted.
She flipped over onto her back and looked up at the ceiling. "Inuyasha….I…I love you."
The End
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What a crappy ending, right? Oh well….the last chapter's were….fast but fun to write!!! Cant' wait till the Sequel.
Sequel: Feudal Recollections
Summery: Kagome, trying to get back, Inuyasha sealed to the tree. Time will not keep these two apart. New adventure's old and new friends! The crew's back from We Aren't Much Different!