Ch. 2

me: ah, life is so much easier without Kikyo here, ne?

Kikyo: ::mumbles::

me: ::pokes box::

Bring! Bring!

The girl in the light blue nightgown cracked one eye open and scowled at the pastel colored alarm clock. The most annoying sound was emitting from the thing, and she couldn't take this noise so early in the morning. Besides, it wasn't as if she had to go to school...She smacked the clock hard to make it shut up, then stuffed it under her bed. The young miko rolled her dark brown eyes and looked up at the adobe colored ceiling, trying to fall back asleep, but to no avail. Realizing that sleep was no longer an option, Kagome laughed slightly and grabbed the red brush on her night stand. Slowly and carefully, she brushed the tangles out of her thick, blue-black hair. She also grabbed a fresh green and white school uniform and stumbled into the bathroom right outside her mom's room. Within ten minutes, she was dressed and ready to visit the feudal era. The only thing left to do was pack her backpack; the bright yellow one she'd taken almost every day to the Sengoku Jidai. Kagome quickly filled it to the brim with ramen and other foods. As a last resort, she threw her Algebra notebook into the backpack, zipping it together with some difficulty.

"Stupid test..." She muttered, slamming her pack onto the floor in an attempt to get the navy blue notebook inside. After four more slams, the book sullenly slid into the pack, and Kagome zipped it up before it could emerge again. Quietly, she tip-toed down the wooden stairs and opened the door. The sun's rays were barely emerging over the hills, and a bluebird was sleeping on her nest in the Old God Tree. Kagome smiled happily and eagerly rushed over to the well. For some reason, she was dying to see InuYasha. She'd had the weirdest dream the night before, and it had unsettled her. As she put her foot onto the well, she recalled the nightmare's events. Everyone was dead; there was blood all over the field, the well was only dirt and splinters...it was horrible.

"No!" Kagome scolded herself, hopping into the dark well. "You've got to stop freaking yourself out!" Closing her eyes, she waited to feel the comforting time shift; once she felt that, she would know that her dream was simply that: a dream.

But it didn't come. The feel of traveling through centuries didn't come. Kagome broke out in a cold sweat and felt the bottom of the well, hoping for something to happen. She felt around for something, anything.

"This can't happen....oh god, please tell me this isn't happening!" She sobbed, continuing to feel all around the well. Her hands contained splinters, and were quite bloody from the constant scraping, but she didn't care. She slumped back against the wall and closed her dark eyes.

I'll just close my eyes...and this all will go away. I'll be in the Sengoku Jidai, and InuYasha will be waiting for me. Dreams aren't real, they are NOT real.

Expectantly, she opened her eyes. Nothing changed. She shut them again, then reopened them. Kagome repeated this process several times, before giving into tears.

"This can't happen!" She screamed. The young miko pressed her hands over her ears and sobbed, the tears dripping onto the dry floor.

"Kagome-chan?" Her mother's quiet voice drifted through the top of the well. Kagome looked up, her eyes still teary.

"...yes?"

"Kagome-chan, what are you screaming about? Is something wrong?"

"Yes!" Kagome screamed again, then collapsed back onto the floor in sobs. Her mom stared at her in alarm, then, with some difficulty, hopped down next to her.

"Honey...what's wrong?"

"InuYasha...I think he's dead! I had this dream, and, I don't know, maybe priestesses can see the future or something, but he died! Him, and Miroku and Sango, too! They're all dead!" She sobbed, pressing her head against her mother's shoulder.

"Kagome, it was just a dream. I don't-"

"You don't understand! I can't get through!! I can't!!!" Kagome felt strange, almost insane. It hurt, to feel like this, but she was so sure...he was dead.

"If you believed every dream you had, then you'd go crazy..." Kagome's mother laughed lightly. "Remember when you were three and you had that dream were that evil monster ate you? That didn't come true, did it?"

"Stop talking to me like I'm a little kid! This is a matter of life and death!!" Kagome felt so angry at her mother.

"Kagome..."

"What?!"

Her mother checked her silver wristwatch. "This is going to sound stupid, Kagome-chan, but why don't you go to school? Grandpa can check the well while your gone, and it'd get your mind off everything."

"There is no way in hell I'm going to school!"

"I'm sorry, but I really think it's a good idea..." Her mom said, almost apologetically. "Think of it this way: your grandfather will check out the well while you're in class, and when you get home, you can go to the Sengoku-Jidai. Sound good to you?"

"No..." Kagome muttered, even though it did. She calmed down, just slightly, her face returning to its normal pale color. "So, you think when I get home, everything will be all right?"

"Of course!" Kagome's mother smiled. She let her daughter give her a warm hug, and watched as she climbed out of the well. Then, the elder Higurashi sighed and slumped against the side. She was almost positive that everything was not going to be all right...

She just didn't want to see her daughter's face when she figured that out.

"Ah! Higurashi!" A handsome young man on a bicycle greeted Kagome when she stepped onto the school's campus. So as not to be rude, she gave him a half-hearted wave.

"Hey Hojo. What's new?"

"Oh, nothing much. Your grandfather said you were out of school because you had really bad menstrual cramps..." He blushed. Kagome's eyes widened, and she made a mental note to kill Grandpa when she got home.

"Um...yeah.....anything else?" She began walking with him toward the school building, feeling her friend's eyes on her.

"Oh, yeah! We've got a new student from America; her name's Alisa Satoshi...she's half Japanese, I think, and she's an albino, too!"

"Albino?"

"She's got this pale, pale hair, and these creepy looking red eyes....I heard some of the upperclassmen making fun of her. She just sat and stared at them, and they eventually backed off. She's weird...."

"Hm, really?" Kagome asked, not really listening to him anymore. They finally reached the main building, and Hojo-kun held the door open for her. She gave him a smile, and they walked into the classroom together.

"See, there she is!" Hojo inclined his head toward the small girl in the corner. She couldn't have been more than twelve, and she wore thick glasses with black frames. Behind the glasses were, as Hojo said, startling ruby colored eyes. Her long white hair cascaded down her back, and it was unnaturally straight.

"She looks so sad..." Kagome murmured quietly. "I should go talk to her."

"It's up to you...." Hojo said, and Kagome got the slightest feeling that he was afraid of Alisa. Ignoring him, she bolding walked up the the little girl, and inclined her head in a bow.

"Hey! Please to meet you, Satoshi-san!" Kagome smiled. The girl stared at her, flashes of light ricocheting off the glasses.

"....konnichiwa, Higurashi-san...." She said, in a voice not much louder than a whisper.

"You're new here, right?"

"....yes...."

"I could show you around a bit, if you'd like!" She offered. The albino girl shook her head.

"....no, thank you. I was shown around by a young man by the name of Hojo Shouma-san. He did...a good job...."

"Oh...well, just thought I'd offer!" Kagome said, brightly. Alisa still did not smile.

"Okay." The white-haired girl went back to staring out the window. Kagome frowned slightly, then went back to her desk to rejoin Hojo.

"You didn't tell me you showed her around yesterday..." Kagome said.

"She freaked me out really bad....kept asking these really weird questions...." Hojo shuddered, as if the memory still disturbed him.

"What kind of questions?"

"She asked if any of my friends had strange habits. I was trying to be friendly, so I told her about Aya-kun's snoring, and about your knack for catching every disease known to man... " He shrugged. "She wanted to know a lot about you, though. Said you sounded interesting."

"Did she?"

"Mm-hm." The bell rang, and Hojo rushed to his seat next to Aya. Kagome slumped into her desk and played with her thick hair, unaware of Arisa Satoshi's ruby eyes on her. The day passed like molasses, and soon it was the last thirty minutes, during which the whole class cleaned. Hojo sidled up to her again, helping her scrub the dirt off the empty desk.

"Yuka-chan wants to know why you're acting so weird...." He said offhandedly. Kagome rolled her eyes.

"Just...still feeling a little sick from the cramps, that's all." She replied, dampening her cloth and scrubbing at a particularly stubborn dirt spot.

"Ah." Hojo nodded knowingly. Slowly, school ended, and Kagome rushed from the building, and began the long trek back toward her house.

Meanwhile, Alisa met up with a tall, dark man outside the school. His long dark hair was tied in a loose ponytail, and he wore a suit. She spoke quietly to him, and pointed a long, pale finger toward the direction Kagome took off in.

"I found another one, Nayamo-sama...." Alisa said, breaking into one of her rare smiles. "The last one..."

me: please review!

Kikyo: ehehehe...you should never have locked me in here.

me: why not?

Kikyo: 'cause now I'm alone with my YAOI!! Ahahahahahah!

me: ::kicks box::