Barriers and Dreams
The kazaana was getting wider.
Kagura had told him, but Miroku knew it instantly, as he sat alone in the dead of night far away from the camp, without being told. He always got extremely sick and began to shake badly. He hid such a weakness from all of his companions, much in the same manner that Inuyasha had tried to hide the secret of the new moon from them. Miroku did not want the other's sympathy, and he especially never wanted to see pity in her eyes.
had been with many women during his short life. To him they had been a way to keep his mind off the inexorable death that was nestled in his had. They had kept his tired mind occupied when it could have turned towards darker things. He had never once considered a single one of them seriously, until he had met her.
She had not melted into his arms, and he respected that. She was as strong as he was, an no stranger to pain. During the long and tiresome journey they had undertaken he and slowly grown to understand her and love her.
Sango.
It was something sacred to him, these feelings that he had discovered for her. More than anything he wanted to share his treasured feelings with her. He wanted to tell her that he loved her, but there was no way that he ever could. It was all because of his damned kazaana, the kazaana which was getting wider.
He did not want Sango to pledge her heart to a dying man. He did not want her to grieve when he died. That was why he was always womanizing, always being a letch. He was trying to keep her at a distance, just as she, in turn, attempted to keep him away. However, in his innermost heart he had always believed that there might be a way to save himself. He had dreamt often of the day when Naraku would fall, dead at last, and release him from the curse that his family and companions so much grief.
Miroku was beginning to lost hope that such a day would ever come in time.
Already he could feel the kazaana widening, like a hungry monster, ready to devour him into it's inky depths. Such thoughts tormented him daily. The sickness was growing increasingly worse, and he was running out of time. Kagura had told as much, and Miroku knew it for fact. He had counted the days with grim resolve, determined not to look away and not to fear. He counted the days that had passed and subtracted them from the approximate amount of time Mushin had given him. Silently he totaled up the difference. Three months.
Dread forced itself up into his throat and he violently repressed it. There was no point in him pitying himself. He had only one choice, and that was kill or be killed. Slowly and calmly he inhaled and tried not to think to hard. He wanted to scream. He wanted to tell Sango he loved her. He wanted to kill Naraku. He did none of these things, he merely sat staring out into the darkness of the forest. The ominous phrase hung over him as he slowly drifted off into the darkness of sleep. Five days. He couldn't help but wonder if it would be like sleep when the kazaana devoured him entirely.
Dreams were always darker than reality...
He stood on a cliff, facing east into the winds of mourning. At first Sango looked at him with her eternally sad eyes and Miroku did his best to smile back. She slowly walked towards him and moved to embrace him when Miroku felt the sickness take him again. He backed away but all she did was move forward and Miroku felt the kazaana grow and an alarming rate. Suddenly there was no feeling in the arm where he had just a second ago felt the burning pain of the growing kazaana. He looked on in horror as the kazaana ate up his existence like a ravenous beast, devouring himself, the landscape and Sango, her melancholy stare now accusing.
Sango heard him all the way on the other side of the camp. She could hear his tortured gasps. She could almost sense his pain, and it hurt because she knew that there was nothing that she could do for him.
Damn that Kazaana of his, Sango thought angriliy, damnt that hole in his hand that causes him so much pain. Damn the barriers that the kazaana puts between us
She knew though, that it was more than just the kazaana that kept them apart. It had become subconcious, really, saying it...
Houshi-sama
Completely respectful and completely impersonal. Another barrier. No, indeed, it was not just the kazaana that kept them apart, but nor was it just that. They distanced each other in so many little ways. Miroku grouped women and Sango fretted about Kohaku. It was a dance where they both alternated between falling in love with one another and pushing one another away. It was a dance that Sango was beginning to hate.
Every time I we try to get closer, things always interrupt. The kazaana, my shyness, his womanizing, and moreover...
...Kohaku...
She had said it. That wind demon had said it. He's coming to kill us, Sango though grimly. He's coming to kill me, he's coming to kill Miroku. He's coming to kill Inuyasha, Kagome, and even Shippou. If Naraku ordered him to do it, he would. He's going to take away every thing I love. I just found new people that I can care about, and they are going to be taken away from me as well, just like before...
Sango had a scar on her back that would never heal. No matter how hard she had tried to leave it behind, that scar would never heal. She could still recall with frightening clarity the burning pain as Kohaku's chain-blade as it ripped into the skin of her back initially. She could still recall it as it tore muscle and sinew. However, the worst thing about the memory was not the clairity of the physical pain, it was the clairity of the mental pain. She could remember the burning sense of betrayal. She recalled how it had felt so surreal, as if it was not really happening. At the same time, she had known it in the very core of her being...That this was real.
She wasn't willing to give up yet, there was still a chance. There still might be some way for them to bring Kohaku back to life. There still might be some way for them to save his soul. She had to hope, she couldn't merely give in to Naraku's scheme and merely kill him.
She couldn't give into Naraku's plot and sacrifice her brother for her own life
She could kill if it meant saving her friends.
If it meant saving him she thought she could bring herself to do just about anything.
Now that I think about it, it's kind of funny. I couldn't stand him for the longest time, but now, my life seems incomplete without him by my side, with his smiling, sad face. I don't know when it happened, but...
...I'm glad it did
Miroku...
Here in my thoughts I can say your name without fear that we might come to close together. Here in my thoughts I can say your name without fear of your rejection. You said that you wanted to keep me safe. How could you comdemn a woman to a life without the man she loves. We can't be together because you don't want to hurt me with you death, so we push each other away. I can't stand it. Sometimes I think that we can't let this chance pass us by. Isn't it better to love and lose than to never love at all?
Please let these barriers fall, please, let us one day live together.
I want to be with him...
...not Houshi-sama...
...someday I want to call him by his name...
...Miroku
In dreams we can see parts of our soul that we would rather not see...
She stood at a crossroads. Indecision coursed though her veins like blood as she stared blankly at the two paths before her. One was dark and stained with blood. Along its path were dead youkai as well as her dead brother, Kohaku. His death had not been easy, his body was twisted into and odd shape. All across the path his entrails were strewn. Hi eyes had been gouged out. She stared at the disfigured corpse until she finally had the will to look up. Her eyes looked upward and she saw Miroku. He looked tired at fatigued, but alive, and that was enough for Sango.
She looked down the other path, and saw, her village. It was still nothing but smoldering remains, butit was now spring and flowers grew everywhere, painting a joyous picture. Sango closed her eyes in denial, until she saw two fresh graves, one with her Hiraikotsu laid upon it, and the other with Kohaku's chain-blade. Above those grave stood, at first glance, her friends, all alive and well, albeit sorrowful. It was upon second glance that she notcied that Miroku was not there, and that Kagome clutched his staff with barely withheld tears in her eyes.
Disclaimer: I am so very sick of writing this, but INUYASHA IS NOT MINE!!!
Note: I suppose anyone readint this thought the entire story was about Kagome, right? Wrong. This also has alot about Miroku, Sango, ans Sesshoumaru (as well as Inuyasha and Kikyou) I just had alot of the first bit centering around Kagome, but we're not going to see her for a while...