Disclaimer: Don't own Inuyasha.

Okay, I know this was a quick update but it just flowed out. WARNING: This scene is pretty intense and has gore. Right now Kagome's past isn't too clear but I promise it will be cleared up soon. This is a insight into her turmoil and change. Just as FYI for part of the chapter, I know that Christianity isn't the dominant religion in Japan, but Kagome has been living in the US for 80 years, which explains her exposure. Let me know if I went too far. Thanks to all the readers and reviewers.

Chapter 3: Beast and Broken

Kagome woke in the middle of the night. She had required less and less sleep over the last few decades that she often woke after only two or three hours. She gazed around Kaede's hut and realized how surreal everything seemed to her now. She felt stuck between two realities. One where she was a 98 year old vampire and another where she was again an 18 year old girl spending a few days with her best friends. She felt out of touch and detached. She hadn't had much time to consider the consequences of the well's misfire but now as she sat on her futon her mind was going into overload. What was she doing here? Would the well send her back to the future she lived in now, or would it send her back to the future 500 years from now? Would she go back? If she went back to the future 80 years ago to her, what would she tell her mother? What about Naraku? Inuyasha? Kikyou?

Kagome didn't notice immediately that her brown eyes had begun to glow an ethereal red. Kikyou. She felt a growl growing in her and a very feral hatred rise at the thought of her. Kagome stood abruptly, she could now see that her world was awash in red but didn't care. Her whole body was rigid with suppressed anger and hate. 'I'm not submitting to that bitch's shit anymore. I'm not the weak human girl I was last time she saw me. No more!' Kagome's mind raged. Her blood was boiling and her skin burned. Her last thought replayed as a mantra in her mind as she began to shake with a primal anticipation. Kagome left the confinement of the hut in exchange for the cold night air. Something about the last day had awaken something in her that she had been fighting down for years, it awoke something in her that Cyrus had spent 80 years trying to draw forth.

Her hate. It was washing over her like burning oil. And it woke the beast. Kagome keened lowly as her jaws snapped open and closed repeatedly with desire. Her breath came in pants as she felt her claws flex and her fangs elongate. Her muscles contracted and corded up waiting for release.

Kagome's humanity was panicking; she was losing control and fast. Her sanity was slipping through her fingers. She could feel the remainder of the demon gaining ground. The demon was part of her, part that she would now die without. But she couldn't let it win. No. Not with her friends so close. Not ever. She pooled her pure energy desperately and her head snapped back and forth, testament to her internal battle. Then she let the energy explode within her.

An agonized scream ripped itself from Kagome's throat as she purified herself. She could feel old wounds pull open and new blood run down her arms, face, torso and legs. The excruciating pain took another scream from her as she fell to her knees. She felt the demon crying out in pain as desperate as her own. But the demon fled. And Kagome could feel her humanity and sanity within reach again.

"Kagome!" 'Inuyasha.' Kagome thought as she turned her blood streaked face to look upon her hanyou.

Inuyasha froze at the sight before him. Kagome had her back towards him but she was radiating the scent of terror, pain and so much blood. She was on her knees, her clothes soaked in blood and surrounded by it. She looked over her shoulder when her had screamed out her name and he froze at her damaged face. Chunks of skin were missing and her eyes were swollen. Many places her skin was ragged and claw marks were clearly visible beneath the red of her blood. Her left arm hung loosely out of the socket and a long gash was visible from her shoulder to her left ring finger. The fingers on her right hand were disfigured and broken and bruises were now making themselves known on her already torn body.

"Oh Kami." He whispered in utter horror.

"Inu..." Kagome whimpered. She wished she could pass out, have reprieve from the pain that was throbbing through her body. But it was her punishment for trying to kill apart of herself and she was fully alert. "I'm sorry." She whimpered again. She had never felt more vulnerable. She wanted to tell him that she would be fine. But she couldn't get the words out. She knew hethought she was going to die. What would hehave said if they knew this had happened before. That these wounds were all old wounds. That Cyrus had tortured her into beastial insanity. Her mind swam. Blinding Pain.

She heard a loud gasp and turned slightly to see Miroku, Sango and Kaede watching her with horror filled expressions and churning stomachs. Minutes passed as Kagome was frozen in agony and her friends frozen in disbelief. Inuyasha was the first to recover.

"Shit." He dashed forward to kneel at her side. She was now shaking with the strain of blood loss and pain, yet she still wasn't able to pass out. The hanyou was at a loss for what to do.

"Our Father which art in heaven..." Kagome began whispering her eyes now closed.

Inuyasha's eyes widened a fraction and then he shrugged off his haori and put it around her.

"Hallowed be Thy Name..." Her voice was barely audible and deathly haunting.

"Kaede." Inuyasha demanded from Kagome's side. "Help her dammit."

"Thy Kingdom come..."

Kaede and the others shook off their horror and rushed forward to aid their whispering friend.

"Thy Will be done in earth, as it is in heaven..."

Together they lifted her delicately off the blood soaked earth.

"Give Us this day our daily bread..."

Slowly they headed toward the hut which still held a sleeping Shippou and Kirara.

"Forgive Us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us..."

After setting Kagome down on her futon, Kaede rushed to retrieve herbs and bandages.

"And Lead Us not into temptation..."

"Hold her." Kaede commanded, when Miroku and Inuyasha obeyed, she began cleaning the wounds of a now convulsing Kagome.

"but Deliver Us from evil..."