Author's Note: Eh… Not too happy with this chapter. I had originally wanted to explain a lot more things in it, but, as you all will see, that didn't happen. So, I guess you'll all have to be in the "dark" for a while longer. Yeah, the story is starting a little slower than I thought it would. Curse my need for lengthening the chapters and yet saying nothing! Oh yeah, and some of you might think that Miroku is a bit OOC in part of this chapter, but it's just a side of him that you don't see often in the anime/manga. And I also want to apologize for doing all these scene changes. I really hate them, but I'd rather do a scene change than a badly written transition. I'll try to do less scene changes as I get more chapters up and everyone starts being in the same place at the same time.
FluffyLemonn: Alright, a third chapter!! Aren't you incredibly proud of me? –ahem-
Surfergirl16: On your favorites list? Thanks so much!
FeathersInTheWind: Here's the update you were waiting for. ; Love the name, by the way.
KaguraImmortal: Yeah, I do know that she's passed on in the manga. (Thus my one-shot tribute to her.) I'm still waiting and praying for a pretty unlikely scenario that ends with Kagura being brought back to life. (I might write a one-shot about that too if I get around to it, but I'm just rambling now, aren't I?) Yeah, I know that my chapters are a bit flitty right now and that there is an endless amount of information that no one but me knows, but eventually it will all be revealed. A lot of it by Kagura, come to think of it.
Disclaimer: I own this plot (or however much of it exists) and the setting, but that's about it. Wish I owned more though.
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Beep... Beep... Beep...
Miroku was awoken from a deep slumber, and from a very good dream too - the sort that would never happen in reality - at about six in the morning by his phone ringing somewhere next to his bed, under a pile of clothes.. He reached for it in the darkness, covers still tangled around him.
"H'lo?" he mumbled groggily with his eyes still shut. "...Kagome? What's so important that you had to call at-"
Kagome's hysterical voice cut him off suddenly. "Sango's in the emergency room!"
"What?!?" he demanded, instantly jolting upright and pulling his twisted covers away from his waist. A fear, unlike anything he had ever felt before, filled him and he found his heart leaping into his throat. He ran a hand through his messy hair, trying to control his breathing. "What happened?"
"She's lost too much blood," was the reply, barely understandable through Kagome's sobbing. "They say it will take a miracle."
Beep... Beep... Beep...
"Her condition is critical."
Miroku hardly glanced over at the elderly doctor, all the emotion completely drained from his face as he stood, arms crossed tightly. His jaws were clenched together tightly and it seemed that every single muscle in his body had tensed. In hardly a few hours, he felt like he had aged years.
"I'll keep you posted," the doctor finished, glancing at each of the three teenagers before disappearing down the hall.
InuYasha watched the doctor walk off as Kagome clung to his hand tightly, fingers intertwined. She bit her lip and rubbed her puffy eyes with her other hand. She could feel the blood pounding in her ears from the adrenalin rushing through her. This can't be happening.
Beep... Beep... Beep...
"What?" InuYasha asked sharply, being probably the only one of the three that could speak.
"She's comatose," the doctor repeated. "Her brain might be functioning properly, but her body is unable to respond."
"What the hell is that supposed to mean?" he snapped in retort. His golden eye flashed in annoyance. Yeah, he was upset that Sango was hurt - she was one of his few friends - but just having to be near Kagome while she almost had an anxiety attack and Miroku while he just stood there had destroyed all of his patience.
"She's in a coma, but it's possible that she'll come out of it."
Kagome swallowed heavily, voice cracking as she spoke. "C-can we see her?"
The doctor nodded and opened the door behind her. She stepped to the side and watched as, one after the other, three stone-faced teenagers filed into the room and closed the door behind them.
Beep... Beep... Beep...
"Miroku? I'm going to go now. It's getting late and I promised my mom I'd be home for dinner."
He nodded absentmindedly, hardly taking his eyes off the hospital bed.
"Don't stay too long."
"I won't, Kagome," he replied in monotone.
She bit her lip, digging her teeth into the flesh until it almost began bleeding. "Stop torturing yourself like this."
Miroku looked over at her, his expression completely deadpan. That's how it had been since that night. Sesshoumaru probably showed more emotion than he did of late.
"Miroku, it's been almost two months," Kagome continued voice breaking. Tears flooding to her eyes and her heart positively wrenching in her chest as she brought her gaze to her best friend and the IVs constantly pumping fluids into her body. "You'll kill yourself if you keep acting like this-"
"I want to be here when she wakes up."
She covered her mouth with a hand as tears fell from her eyes, staining her cheeks. A sudden sob racked her body and she quickly walked out of the room before she could completely lose control. She closed the door behind her, looking at Miroku's back and the machines surrounding Sango's bed through the small window. Helplessness flooded through her veins, the sort of helplessness that she had been fighting against ever since she first heard about the attack on Sango's house.
For a while after Kagome left the room, Miroku only continued to stare at the side of the bed - the sheets folded in so perfectly against her still body and her arms laying perfectly parallel with her side. Finally he began muttering something, hardly loud enough for anyone else to be able to hear.
"I know you'd hate for me to see you like this, but I think it'd be even worse for you to be in here alone all the time," he murmured, looking intently at his hands, folded on his lap. "I don't think you have any idea how much we all need you to pull through this for us. Everything's going to pieces, Sango. InuYasha and Kagome... Everyone, really. We're all losing our grip on everything."
He then looked up at her and leaned forward to brush her bangs away from her eyes. His hand moved to the side of her face, cupping it gently as he rubbed his thumb along her cheekbone. "I've never waited for another girl before, Sango. And you're the one that I - that everyone - really needs back."
Sighing, Miroku pushed his chair back and stood. He glanced at the end table and picked up the black sketchbook she drew in nearly every day of their senior year. It fell open instantly on the picture she had been drawing on the last day of school.
Even now, he couldn't help but feel curious about where she got inspiration for the sketch. She was in it, dressed in the outfit of a demon slayer from the Feudal Era and throwing a weapon identical to her Hiraikotsu at something in front of her. What probably intrigued him the most though was the second person in the picture - a man in a monk's outfit, extending his cursed right hand before him. His face, however, was unfinished.
Miroku set the notebook down again, leaving it open to that page as he looked back at Sango. "I hope you wake up soon; I want to see who the monk is."
He turned, shoving his hands deep into his pockets and walked out of the room. A strange confidence filled him, almost as if he somehow knew that things would start looking up. Or maybe it was despair. After all, he had been trying to convince himself unsuccessfully for months that she could wake up any day. Maybe he had finally been able to. After all, how long can a human last before embracing the smallest shred of hope as if his life depended on it?
The door shut silently behind him. Nothing but the steady beeping of the hospital machines could be heard in the entire room.
With each beep, there was life.
And that in itself meant that nothing that had happened since that fateful night had gone according to plan.
Sango didn't leap out of bed or anything around those lines. The last thing she could remember was being in a battle to the death with several dangerous youkai. For all she knew, she had gotten knocked out and they were still hovering over her, watching to see if she was dead or not.
How she finally managed to win the battle and pull out of her coma would always remain a phenomenon - even to her. All the girl knew was that all of a sudden, she was conscious of her surroundings. The only thing she couldn't figure out was the infernal beeping that continued to echo all around her, taunting and tormenting her. God, the second she found out what it was, she would destroy it. It was enough to drive her insane.
Where the hell could she be where something continuously beeped around her?
Her mouth suddenly went dry and her throat closed. Oh, God, she was still back in the house. The demons had left some sort of bomb behind them to destroy any evidence they may have left and it was going to kill her. Oh God, oh God, oh God.
Her magenta eyes instantly flew open. It didn't matter if the youkai were still around. She was going to die any way, wasn't she?
Everything around her was blurry. Sango had to blink countless times before anything even came close to coming into focus. But one thing was clear.
Sango, you're not in your house anymore.
A hospital? How did she end up in a hospital? She slowly turned her head from side to side on her pillow, trying to figure out exactly where she was.
Her eyebrows knit together tightly as she continued looking around, going through the possibilities of what had happened in her mind.
There were sirens.
Yes, that must have been it! The police had come - some neighbors must have called them - and she had still been alive so they rushed her to the hospital. She must have gone through surgery or something and had blood hastily rushed into her. Yes, that was it. She had just woken up from surgery.
... If that was true, how could all of her injuries have healed so quickly?
She closed her eyes and flopped her head to the side, passing her dry tongue over her lips. When she opened her eyes again, they focused in on the red button that would call the nurse on duty if she pressed it. Yeah, she knew about that. She had been in the hospital when she was twelve to have the kidney she had ruptured while sparring in her dojo repaired.
Without much hesitation she pressed it and waited for the nurse's voice on the other end of the connection. When no one responded, she almost pressed it again. However, just as her finger hovered over the button, her door flew open and one of the nurses stood there in complete shock.
"You're awake??"
She squinted, the bright light from the hallway giving her eyes much more trouble than the dim sunlight from the setting sun that filled her small room.
"Where-" That was strange. She could hardly talk. Clearing her throat a bit weakly, she tried again. "Where am I?"
"You're in the comatose ward of the Midoriko Hospital."
Comatose? How could she be in the -
Sango's face paled and, for a moment, the intern nurse thought she was going to faint. "Nurse... What day is it?"
"August fifth, 2004."
Then, she really did faint. Between having used more muscles than she had in almost two months and almost going into cardiac arrest from fright when she first woke up, Sango had succeeded in tiring her body out completely.
The nurse swiftly entered the room and checked her patient's vitals. When everything appeared to be in order, she went and picked out her patient's file. Now she had to contact the next of kin and let them know that Sango had awoken.
][
"Kagome, how was your day, dear?"
The Higurashi girl looked up from her meal, smiling at her mother. "Fine. The food's great, mom."
Mrs. Higurashi smiled in return and leaned forward to pile more noodles onto her daughter's nearly empty plate.
"You're a growing girl and need to have plenty to eat," she said, scooping out a mound of food and then settling back in her chair, expecting her daughter to eat everything.
Kagome looked down at her plate, an awkward feeling causing her to shift in her chair and mutter, "Mom, I stopped growing when I was fifteen. And I'm not that hungry."
Her mother sighed and balanced her elbows against the table, eyeing her daughter in concern. "You went to see Sango again, didn't you?"
Her daughter's silence was enough of an answer.
"You're always depressed when you come back from seeing her."
Silence fell over the table and Souta glanced from his mom to his sister and even to his grandfather who was eating as if nothing happened.
He opened his mouth to speak and the phone rang in the kitchen. Kagome stood, almost mechanically.
"I'm done. I'll get it."
Souta watched as she left the room and then turned to his mom, clearing his throat to try and start a better conversation. "Guess what, mom."
"What, Souta?"
"I think I might make the team this year."
"That's wonderful, have you been practicing?"
"Yeah, a lot. Me, Souten and even Shippou are really getting good."
"That's just what growing boys need. Sports," his grandfather said suddenly. "It's good for them."
Mrs. Higurashi smiled at him, nodding automatically before looking back at her son. "Souten? Isn't she that adorable little girl with the buns?"
"Yeah, Shippou doesn't like having her around though. She's better than we are and shows off all the time. It really bugs him," he grumbled before added in a brighter tone, "But we're better at computers and video games."
"Sounds to me like she's got a crush," his mother replied knowingly. Souta's eyes widened and he stared at her in disbelief.
"Are you kidding? She is the most tomboyish girl in the entire school. She and Shippou are always fighting about something or another."
"I'm just saying..."
"Mom, girls flirt with guys. They don't beat them in every sport out there and fight with them."
She only smiled and shook her head in a way that would make most children cringe. It was the "I've been there and done that" look parents got whenever they were convinced that they knew more about a topic than their children did. The mere fact that they usually did when they got that look was irrelevant and most kids completely ignored it.
"What? WHAT?? When?!?"
The entire family instantly threw their attention to the kitchen where Kagome's shrill screams could be heard.
"... If InuYasha got in a fight with Kouga again..." Souta began, trailing off. There really was no need for him to continue his train of thought.
"Alright... Yeah... Oh my God, you can't believe how incredible this is."
The grandfather raised an eyebrow in surprise. "How could InuYasha and Kouga's fighting be incredible?"
Just as the words left his mouth, Kagome rushed back into the room, tears collecting in the corners of her eyes. Hardly able to contain herself, she hastily wiped her eyes dry as she said through an enormous grin, "Sango's awake!"
][
Sango opened her eyes and looked towards the door as it flew open. She was hardly able to focus in on the girl that ran in before she threw her arms around her neck and began sobbing into her shoulder.
"Sango, I was so worried about you! I didn't think you'd wake up and I couldn't believe that-" Kagome cut off herself off abruptly, pulling away. "I'm sorry. You're probably really tired and here I am throwing myself on you and-"
"No, it's ok," Sango replied, smiling at her best friend and settling herself back against the pillows. "Were you really that worried?"
Kagome stared at her in disbelief. How could she even ask that? She should have known that they all would have been worried sick. They all were pretty good friends, after all.
"Are you kidding? InuYasha's probably sick of all the times I started crying and Miroku was here almost every day for hours!"
Magenta eyes wide, Sango instantly turned towards Miroku. Her cheeks flushed and she fought to keep from having her entire face turn bright red in embarrassment. "Miroku..."
He crossed over to his usual chair, sinking into it. Taking her hand in his, he smiled at her and Sango felt her cheeks going even redder.
"I couldn't bear seeing you in such a state," he said in the strangely sincere way that he spoke when usually alone with her. "And I couldn't even begin to imagine how horrible it would have been for you to be alone the whole time."
She looked down, unable to hold his gaze for long. "Miroku, I-"
That hand!
"Pervert!!"
Miroku sat back, a hand rubbing the welt on the side of his face as he chuckled uneasily. "Just making up for lost time, Sango. I hadn't done that in two months. I couldn't wait any longer."
She only twitched, huffing and glaring at him.
InuYasha stepped forward, hitting Miroku upside the head as he reached him. "Idiot."
"InuYasha, I was merely exercising my right-"
"To her thigh? Can it, lecher," he snorted, crossing his arms in annoyance. When he looked over at Kagome and Sango, however, his expression softened the smallest bit. "We're all glad you're awake, Sango."
She smiled and ran a hand through her hair. Her expression turned serious and her eyes fell first from one person to another as she searched each of them for answers.
"Where's Kohaku?"
The other three looked at each other uneasily. For a moment, no one spoke. None of them knew exactly how to break the news to her.
Fear slowly filled her eyes as she continued to look at each of them. She struggled to keep her voice steady as she repeated the question.
"Where's Kohaku?"
Finally Kagome cleared her throat and squeezed Sango's hand tightly. "They never found him. The police said there was a lot of blood from an unknown source, probably his, but they never found a body."
She tried to swallow, but a lump in her throat made it nearly impossible. The corners of her eyes itched with the threat of tears and she closed them tightly, refusing to start crying.
"My house? The Shikon no Tama?" she breathed, hardly daring to even ask those questions.
This time it was Miroku that replied. He took a deep breath, deciding to not try and beat around the bush about anything. She deserved the truth and would hear it with or without cushioning. It was better for her to just know exactly what had happened.
"Your house is still marked off as a crime scene. The police are trying to use new high-tech forensics to track the youkai's presences, but they are having a lot of trouble with it," he told her, dark blue eyes meeting hers. "No one knows what happened to the Sacred Jewel."
Sango bowed her head, vision blurring with tears as she stared down at her sheets and tried to force her eyes to clear. But blink after blink, she found herself unable to shove the tears away. They clung to her thick lashes and dropped onto her lap as she shook her head.
"My family was killed by demons for a stone," she said, voice shaking, but with an underlying edge to it. "They should have finished me off while they had the chance."
"Sango... No one knows who did it. The headlines were all screaming about how "Naraku's crime ring" struck again and how destroying the FBI headquarters had been part of his plan and how no one was safe. Everyone was on alert for anything and every single demon in this country was question," InuYasha seethed, clenching his fists until his sharp claws began biting through his palms. His amber eyes flashed with an intensity of rage that no one in the room had ever seen before - or thought that they would ever see. "And still, the police have nothing."
Kagome stood, leaving Sango's side for a moment as she wrapped an arm around InuYasha's shoulders and tried to get him to calm down.
Kagura... She was there...
Sango opened her mouth, about to tell them all that she knew for a fact that the red-eyed youkai had been there and taken the Shikon no Tama from her. But as soon as she looked over at InuYasha and saw the fire in his eyes, she snapped it shut again. Now was not the time to mention it. After all, Kagura wasn't that unique of a name, was it? Maybe it had been a different demon that had attacked her, not the one that used to have a relationship with InuYasha's half-brother.
Deep down, she knew that that wasn't the case. The demon that took the Sacred Jewel had flinched when Sango managed to gasp out her name and Sesshoumaru's. She had seen the brief terror flickering in the youkai's eyes and yet... she had demanded that they all flee and leave her alive.
Why? Why did Kagura want her alive if she would only be able to point the finger of accusation at her when she recovered?
"Sango? Sango, are you ok?" Kagome asked, worry flying back to her features instantly.
She shook her head a bit, forcing herself out of her thoughts. She hadn't even realized that she had zoned out, or that it might have caused her friends to worry considerably about her.
"I'm fine, Kagome, just tired I guess," she lied, giving her best friend's hand a squeeze to reassure her. "When did the doctors say I can leave?"
"Not for a few more days. They need to run some tests and make sure that your immune system's working and that you're fit to leave," Miroku said, eyes falling to her closed sketchbook. So she had noticed that it had been opened. But would she finish the sketch?
"Sango, you know, you don't really have a place to stay, do you?" Kagome stated suddenly. As soon as she spoke, everyone looked at each other quickly. Where was Sango going to stay?
"As much as I know you'd like to stay with me," Miroku began, winking broadly at her. "I'm afraid that it wouldn't work out. I'm sort of... between homes at the moment and staying with InuYasha at his half-brother's."
"Where are your parents?" Sango inquired, lifting an eyebrow at the hanyou.
"In Japan for God knows how long," he snarled, a glare glittering in his eyes.
"It's an extended anniversary gift," Miroku explained with a knowing nod. "And they didn't want InuYasha home alone for a few months, so they decided that family should stick together."
"And I'm going to kill that bastard if I have to see him one more time! I can't stand him!"
Kagome chuckled nervously, taking her arm off of InuYasha's shoulders incase he decided to lash out unexpectedly. "Uh... I could ask my mom if you'd be able to stay with us, Sango."
"Thanks," she replied, nestling herself back against her pillows. Now she really was beginning to feel tired. Her energy was bound to return, but that didn't stop her from feeling tired now. Who knew that talking to her friends for a short time could drain her so much physically and emotionally?
Miroku stood, sensing her fatigue and begun herding the others towards the door. "We'll come back tomorrow."
Sango smiled at them as they left the room, closing the door quietly behind themselves. She was just about to try and figure out what she should do about Kagura when a wave of sleep took over her and she closed her eyes, drifting off into the peaceful realm of sleep.