Age of the White Down
Chapter 18: Pretty Quick Sand There
Kagome shared a look with Sango before they both simultaneously sighed in irritation. After the regulars of the Snow Pine Inn had chased them out of Udala and into the outskirts of the Kentachi, Miroku had revealed his "time efficient" path. Instead of taking the round about route around the swamp, they were taking the shorter route through she Kentachi Swamp. Needless to say, Inu Yasha was pissed.
Massaging her temples, Kagome grit her teeth and resumed the mantra she had been mentally chanting for the pass hour, 'I will not sit him, I will not sit him, I will not sit him…'
The other female of the newly formed quartet wasn't faring any better than her companion. Not only was her dress ripped, her hair oily and her arm covered in scratches (courtesy of the thistle bush she had tripped into earlier) but the sullen silence that enveloped the group was seriously grating on her nerves. The only noise for miles was the occasional squelching of a mud puddle clinging to the bottom of a shoe and that in itself was a nerve-wracking sound. Even more nerve-wracking and downright gloomy was Inu Yasha's scowling face and the unusual lack of complaints/words in general. Yeah, Miroku's path was a tad—she glanced at the twelfth mangled animal carcass they'd passed that hour—okay, Miroku's path was very dangerous, but not speaking for three whole hours wasn't helping.
She absently tucked a strand of hair behind her ear and sighed. If only Kagome would lose patience with him and his childish silent treatment and sit him; they would start arguing and the thick silence hovering over them would finally be broken! She looked hopefully between Inu Yasha's stubborn pout and Kagome's determinedly pursed lips and heaved yet another loud sigh. Nope. Kagome losing her patience was as likely to happen as soon as her marrying Miroku.
"My Lady Sango," aforementioned lecher purred, sideling up to her side, "what's ailing you?"
"Er, nothing really," Her eyes narrowed suspiciously and her cheeks reddened as he slung a "comforting" arm across her shoulders.
"Two sighs in one minute is not 'nothing.'" He looked down at her out of the corner of his eye, exposing the teasing laughter that always seemed to be dancing just below the surface of the solemn curiosity usually in his eyes. Most people, women in particular, found this trait intriguing, cute, mystifying, sexy or endearing. She, unlike the general population, found it annoying as hell.
"Whatever perverted plan you're plotting or thought you're thinking, stop."
"Oh my! Such poisonous and cynical thoughts from such a pure and delicious looking lady."
"…if you don't get your hands of my chest, this lady will turn you into pure and delicious looking meat for the ugly and hungry looking dogs."
"And if both of you don't shut the fuck up I'll rip out your squishy and tiny looking brains and shove them up your small and tight asses," Inu Yasha tossed over his shoulder.
"Inu Yasha! You shouldn't talk to Sango and Miroku like that!" Kagome scolded.
"Why shouldn't I? They were annoying you too, don't deny it!"
"Well okay, maybe a little—"
"Hey!"
"We're annoying?!"
"—but you could've been a little nicer."
"Feh. They're too dense to take a subtle hint."
"See! See!" Kagome pointed an accusing finger at him, having his back to emphasize every word, "You just did it again!"
"Did what again? You're not making sense wench!"
"Oh, and about that thing. My name's Kagme. Say it with my now, Ka-go-me!"
"Now you bring that up, wench?!" He turned to glare at her, but she had already swept passed him, hands clapped over her ears,
"I'm not listening to you."
"Wait, wench—"
"Not listening!"
"Wench! Wench! Wench!"
"Not listening, listening, listening!"
Miroku watched as Kagome swiftly disappeared behind a tall bush of thistles, hands still clamped over her ears, and then looked over to the fuming hanyou hollering after her.
He blinked.
"They act rather childish, don't they?" He calmly observed.
Sango rolled her eyes, "You have no idea."
"Stop being such a bitch…wench!"
"I told you, I'm NOT listening to you."
"Wench!"
"Not listening, not listening, not liiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiisten—"
"Wench, wench, wench, WENCH! …wench?"
Inu Yasha ears twitched in confusion at the silence that met his taunts. Something wasn't right; Kagome should've been having kittens by now, or at least shrieking the word sit until she was hoarse. Slowly tilting his head upwards, he delicately sniffed at the air before he froze—something terribly foreboding was writhing violently in his gut—and shot off pass the thistle bush Kagome had disappeared behind just seconds before,
"Kagome!"
"Oh, now he says her name," Sango muttered, hurrying after the hanyou, Miroku trailing close behind.
Following the curve of the path the pair simultaneously stopped in their tracks, mouths hanging slack in surprise are their eyes traveled up the rest of the path to, what appeared to be, a rapidly undressing Inu Yasha.
His eyes had flicked towards them for a second in acknowledgement, but had quickly fell downwards to the patch of ground he was hunched over. The white undershirt of his haori had been shrugged off by then, and he was swiftly tying the sleeves of the two articles of clothing together clad only in his red pants.
"What a great idea, Inu Yasha! How about we all get naked," Miroku suggested slyly when he re-gathered his wits. He turned pointedly to Sango, but she, still looking at Inu Yasha in confusion, just pushed him roughly to the ground, a foot away from Inu Yasha.
"It was just a suggestion," he muttered, picking at the dried grass by his feet, accidentally uprooting it in the process.
"Shut the fuck up, houshi, and take this," Inu Yasha growled, waving an untied haori sleeve impatiently in his face. Hearing the startling note of urgency in Inu Yasha's usually gruff voice, he obediently took the offered sleeve before asking,
"And why am I doing this? I already told you I'm straight. I don't know about y—"
"Shut up for a moment houshi," Sango sharply ordered, holding up a hand to silence him. He opened his mouth to object, but, noticing she wasn't looking at him, he followed her gaze to the uprooted chunk of grass that still dangled from his hands; more specifically to the clumps of sand the delicate roots clung to.
"Eh…Sango?"
"Quicksand."
"What?"
"Kagome fell in to quicksand!"
"She did? How do you know? What do we erk—" Poor Miroku, once again unable to continue his sentence, was suddenly jerked forward, the hand that had instinctively fell forward to break his fall sinking beneath a shallow puddle of sand. Before he could recover, he was once again jerked forward, but fortunately, Sango had the presence of mind to grab his flailing, sand-covered hand, but not before everything below his torso became submersed.
Gritting her teeth, Sango firmly planted her feet into the last edge of solid ground before packed dirt gave way to loose sand; she'd be damned before she let them fall.
Her situation had rapidly swung from exasperatingly boring to grimly dangerous. Houshi was waist deep in quick sand, one sand-encrusted hand clasping hers while the other one tightly gripped the end of Inu Yasha's haori sleeve which disappeared beneath the suffocating substance where Inu Yasha and was, hopefully with Kagome. The delicate situation depended wholly on her capability to hold the weight of Miroku, Inu Yasha and eventually Kagome combined and, judging by the way her arms were beginning to treamble with the effort of just Miroku and Inu Yasha, she wasn't sure she could.
Seconds that felt like hours passed in a crackling silence in which two pairs of eyes were intently trained on the haori sleeve
…that had suddenly gone slack.
A/N: …I'm aware it's not very long. But you know why? It's because I had to chop one BIG chapter into two. That's right. The next chapter should be up soon, and I mean real soon. I just need to type it up in fact. Yay! And sooo sorry for the lack of updates, I've just been busy with tests this week. I wrote this chapter in between/during classes so the tone might change a bit. ^_^* Sorry for the OOC-ness. Review review review!