Author: taiyoukai-kai
This is not the sequel to my last fanfic "Fukai Mori: Darkness" but, I hope you enjoy it just as much.
Comments: I realize for those that have read my previous stories, my writing style has not changed much. So if you feel that you are reading the same lame story over and over again, I apologize. I'm sure my improvement is a very gradual one… Also in case I never make it clear, this story takes place in the year 2010, when technology is advanced but there aren't exactly any flying cars yet.
Disclaimer: Fear his claws…because I don't own him. Characters © Rumiko Takahashi.
Summary: Years after Kagome left the Feudal Era, she never expects have anything but memories left. But tragedy strikes, and she's had to live a life of sorrow and betrayal. Now, a new development threatens her very sanity. Again. [Sess/Kag]
Chapter Two...:
Kagome looked down at the small piece of paper in her hand. Then she looked up at the gate in front of her. Well, this was the place. But now that she was here, she began to have doubts. Sesshoumaru had always been distant and reserved. Particularly condescending toward humans. And she wasn't sure whether she wanted to face that again.
However, she then thought about her bow. It wasn't special or anyhow unique. It was just she didn't exactly want to go through the process of breaking in a new one. She expelled a deep breath and gathered her courage up.
She pressed the doorbell and waited. After a few moments, a male voice responded over the intercom speaker. "Yes?"
She nervously cleared her throat. "Hn, yes. Um, I'm here to see Sesshoumaru-sama."
The voice crackled for a moment. "What is your name?"
"Higurashi. Higurashi Kagome."
"Just a moment." The intercom clicked off and left her waiting.
She fidgeted as she waited. She was just about to leave when the intercom crackled on again. "Sesshoumaru-sama will see you." The gate gave a loud click and it began to smoothly swing open. She hesitated for a moment before steeling herself, advancing across the yard with her back ramrod straight. At least she thought it was a yard. It could have easily been a golf course. It was that huge, full of lush green grass and bright flowers. Who on earth would want to live in such a large but strangely empty place?
"It give me solitude."
She whirled around and saw who it was. She glared at him. "Must you always do that?"
He glanced at her and shrugged elegantly. "Of course." He walked over to a stone bench, shaded by a weeping willow. "Sit down." He gracefully extended a hand to her.
She cautiously gave him her hand and he grasped it softly, gently tugging her to the bench. When she was comfortably seated and him next to her, she stared off into the garden. "You have my bow."
Sesshoumaru also stared off into the flowers. "Do I?"
She didn't reply. They both quietly watched the scenery.
After a few moments, Sesshoumaru spoke up, thoughtfully. "I should not return it to you."
Kagome glanced at him. "Why not?"
He reached a slender arm and grasped a drooping willow branch, gently playing with it. "It is harmful to your health."
She looked at him sharply, but he ignored it. The leaves rustled overhead with his tugging.
She searched his face. "Why do you care?" She snapped. Sesshoumaru let go of the branch and it slowly swung back to its place, undamaged.
"I do not."
He abruptly stood and strode away toward the house.
"Where is Rin-chan?" She called out to him and saw his stride falter, but he quickly recovered.
"She was a human in dangerous times. I trust you to remember that."
He could feel her stare boring into his back. It did not matter to him what she thought. The years had taken a toll on him. At first it had surprised him when he felt disgusted at all the heedless deaths of youkais and humans alike.
Whenever he walked out, he could smell the stink of burning bodies and rotting flesh. It had gotten to a point when he could not stand it anymore.
He watched as time wore on, and humans begin to conquer over youkais with their new weapon. New technology. The youkais were content to stay as they were, and did not change with the times, eventually leading to their demise. Except for the few like him, who watched all this with a detached and distant eye. Always knowing that they would be brought low and forced to assume a human guise, discarding their youkai features. But never their power. They would never relinquish their power.
He felt her pad up to catch up to him.
Youkais no longer ruled over the world. Humans did. And it rankled him to no end.
"Sometimes I wish youkais still dominated the world." Kagome commented as if she read his mind. He looked at her, surprise faint on his face.
"Why?"
Kagome just shrugged. "At least everything made sense. Now, we humans," she spat out the term as if it was a curse. "We cannot be content with what we already have. We can't leave nature as it was, and has been for thousands of years, way before we even existed. Now, when you pass a rose bush, you can't be certain if it is a pure rose, naturally born and raised, or something bio-genetically altered to last longer and look prettier. Everything is so false now." She shook her head. "We even alter human genetics to become stronger and immune to disease." [A/N: Pay attention to this statement. It becomes very relevant later on.]
"Is that not good?" he asked, curious at her sudden change. This was a side of her he never saw before.
"Good?" she scoffed. "No, it isn't. We do it to survive, but we have survived so successfully, we have pushed everything else to extinction. There is no balance. Just humans. What humans want, humans get."
"You are human." He pointed out.
She smiled coldly. "Am I? Sometimes, I'm not so sure."
He was startled. Kagome, not human? "Of course you are, you cannot change that."
She laughed bitterly. "You would be surprised. No, I'm not human. I'm a guinea pig. One that will never be set free." [A/N: again, another very relevant piece of the puzzle..store it in the back of your head.]
He stopped in his tracks and turned her around to face him. Gently, he traced the scar running down her cheek. "How?"
She didn't pretend to misunderstand. Instead, she swatted his hand away. "I want my bow." She stared past him, never looking at him.
He shrugged, dropping the subject. He walked with her into the house.
She couldn't bear it. The pain tore at her mind, making her insane.
"You are nothing. You are less than nothing. You do not even exist." The voice taunted her.
Please, she moaned. Make it stop.
"You are only something because I wish it."
The pain intensified, but she couldn't move. Couldn't get away. She couldn't speak, couldn't breathe.
"Without me, you are dirt, fit only to grind beneath the feet."
Make it stop. Soon even her mind shut down. Nothing existed except the pain. There was nothing but the pain. Nothing.
Except for her torturer.
He would always exist. He was always there and always will be, for all eternity. Laughing at her. Taunting her.
Hurting her.
"You should thank me. I gave you a mind. I gave you a soul."
No, no. I had a soul.
"No."
Its true…
The pain pulsed within her, reminding her who's in charge.
"What were you then, before I found you?"
…don't remember…
"What were you before I taught you to feel?"
…don't…remember…
"You were nothing. A speck of dust drifting through existence. You were Nothing."
No!
The horrible voice laughed, making her shudder, whether because of the pain or the evil that resonated in his voice, she did not know.
"You stupid thing. After all I've done for you. You are still stupid. But soon, my little nothing, you will awaken and see yourself for who you were…you were…"
No, no, no, no, no.
The voice roared with glee. [OMG…this is corny…]
Sesshoumaru waited patiently for the man to speak. The man had hesitantly walked in five minutes ago and nothing has happened ever since.
He silently tapped his fingers on his desktop. Inside, he was fuming. He seemed to be doing that a lot recently. First Inuyasha's reincarnation. Then Inuyasha's ill-timed arrival, disrupting all his plans. Now, he had not idea why this man was here.
"It is Naraku, isn't it." He asked sharply.
The man trembled. He had known he shouldn't have taken this job, but the pay had been too good to pass. Now, he had bad news, and he wondered if it was worth it. After all, it wasn't all that uncommon among the higher classes of society to kill the messenger of ill new.
Sesshoumaru began to get tired of waiting. "What is the news you bring?"
The man flinched at the hard edge in his voice. The fear managed to abate enough to allow him some semblance of speech. "Naraku, sir, has been reincarnated."
Sesshoumaru rubbed tiredly at his eyes. Kami definitely was not looking down at him with favor. "How long ago?"
The man's eyes shifted, his fear palpable in the heavy silence. "Almost thirty years ago."
"Then why the bloody hell did it take you so long to locate him?!"
"No one expected him to be reincarnated as Higurashi-san's brother, sir."
"The Sota child is Naraku?"
"No, sir."
Sesshoumaru waited, but the man didn't reply. "Are you going to explain, or must I drag it out of you, you imbecile?"
The man started. "Oh." He cleared his throat nervously. "It appears that Kagome's mother had an affair when she was younger and got pregnant. She gave the child up for adoption, but she never named the father."
"She is dead, I presume?"
The man looked puzzled. "Who?"
Sesshoumaru couldn't believe the stupidity of the man. How in the world did he become his investigator? "Higurashi's mother. Keep up with the conversation if you would."
"Oh, yes." The man said, obviously flustered.
Sesshoumaru felt like giving the man a smack across the head to shake the cobwebs out of it. A thought suddenly occurred to him and he leaned over the desk. "Do you, by any chance, have a wife and children?"
The man was clearly surprised at the turn of events. "Yes sir. Two wives and a children." Hearing what he said, he blushed. "I mean a wife and two children."
So, he was correct. "I am a reasonable man." He eyed the man. "I will not go after them in the off chance that I get displeased with your services. You have my word. But I pay you extremely well, so I expect a certain level of work. I will not tolerate laziness and stupidity." He fixed the man with a cold glare, a small remnant of his time in the Feudal Era. "Is that understood?"
The man's Adam's-apple bobbled up and down. "Y-yes, sir."
Sesshoumaru nodded sharply and leaned back in his chair. "For now, follow Higurashi-san. Report who she talks to and where she goes." He dismissed the man with his head. "That is all."
"Uh, sir? If she's in trouble…should I intervene?"
Sesshoumaru's lips thinned at the thought of Kagome in trouble. "Yes, but keep in mind her safety at all times. If she is harmed because of your ineptness and stupidity," he smiled coldly. "You will pay with your soul."
I just wanted to say sorry for all the lousy update times. I hate typing…so I postpone it until the guilt becomes unbearable. Really..I'm that lame.
Anyway, the first four chapters of this story was actually written before the more recent story I have "THY NAME IS DEATH" even became an idea [Go check it out ^.~] . I stopped because I couldn't see where it was going..but after starting the other story..I finally found a way to continue it. Too bad..I have another idea in my head..and its waiting to bust out..
But I can't do that..three stories?! At once?! No way. Too unfair to you guys.
Over and Out. Kai.