A/N: Ah, before I get flamed for OOC-ness; I'm really not one to curse, at all, and thus Inuyasha won't be bellowing out his usual stuff. If you want, insert the words where they seem appropriate
"Oi monk! Where the hell have you been?" A loud voice boomed out from inside Kaede's hut as Kirara landed a short distance away.
Moments later a rather livid hanyou stepped outside and pinned the houshi with a menacing glare as he jumped off Kirara with Sango. Beneath the glower, Miroku could've sworn he caught sight of a glint of apprehension.
"Out and about Inuyasha." Miroku replied sarcastically with a sigh of exhaustion. The last thing he needed at the moment was to argue with an angry half-youkai. 'Rest, I just want rest. Sleeping will allow me a temporary escape from this vindictive reality...' He walked towards Kaede's hut, avoiding Inuyasha's curses and death glares.
"What the- monk I'm talking to you!" He followed him into the hut. "Do you think you can just disappear for over a day and NOT tell me what the hell happened?" When Miroku didn't answer and simply lay down on a futon and shut his eyes, he began again. "Mirok-"
"Inuyasha, let him rest. He fought Kagura alone yesterday." Sango forced him out of the hut with her despite his muffled curses.
"Come, we need to talk," she added in a whisper as she walked far enough to be out of Miroku's earshot, then stopped and looked at Inuyasha with confusion and anxiety.
"I asked him what had happened yesterday, but something about his story doesn't seem... right." She sighed and continued when Inuyasha nodded impatiently. "He said the she wanted recent information on the Dragon-Scaled Tessaiga, and he had to fight to convince her he didn't know anything new. Apparently that lasted a while because he says he had to spend the night at some nearby temple."
"He's lying." Inuyasha said gruffly, his expression indifferent. "Naraku could get that sort of information without Kagura."
"That's what I told him, but he just shrugged it off. And he was acting, well, strange when I found him. Not his usual lecherous self at all..." She glanced to the side as a light pink dusted her cheeks.
Inuyasha snorted and shrugged dismissively. "Whatever, I'll get the truth out of him when he wakes up. Keep an eye on him, I don't need him walking off again. I was supposed to get Kagome yesterday and his freaking disappearance delayed me." With that said, he turned on his heel and flew towards the well as Sango quietly walked back to the hut.
She sat next to the futon for a while, content with observing him in his sleep. 'Why is he frowning? Maybe he's having a bad dream...' In a feeble attempt to comfort him, she hesitated before gently trying to smooth the wrinkles caused by his frown with her hand. Everything about him appealed to her, though she didn't entirely realize it; the wisps of black hair that dropped around his eyes as he slept, the way his dark eyelashes contrasted his light skin as they rested on his cheeks, how beautiful he looked despite his furrowed brows...
He let out a soft sigh, but his frown didn't diminish. "Sango..." Miroku murmured her name and subconsciously leaned into her hand. She quickly withdrew it and froze. Had she woken him up? No, his breathing was still sluggish and steady. Why did he say her name? Was he dreaming? What was he dreaming? She gasped as her mind slowed to a crawl. He was dreaming about... her?
Sango suddenly heard footsteps rapidly approaching and gasped as Inuyasha barged into the hut with Kagome. She blushed furiously and clumsily got up from Miroku's side. Kagome eyed her curiously. "Kagome! You're back!" She tried to regain her composure and moved to hug her friend.
"Keh! That monk is still sleeping?" Inuyasha paced towards Miroku, intent on awakening him.
Kagome rolled her eyes as she embraced Sango. "Inuyasha! Leave him alone, he'll wake up soon enough." She ran to push herself in front of him.
His attention focused on the girl blocking him and he scowled. "He needs to talk! He's rested enough!"
"I'm up Inuyasha, no need to yell." Miroku stood up from the futon as Inuyasha looked past Kagome to glower at him.
The first person he saw when he awoke was Sango, despite the fact she was the person furthest away from him in the hut. Her cheeks were tinted red and she seemed to be struggling with herself, the color beginning to fade away slowly. He wondered in bemusement why she would be blushing, and his gaze lingered until she turned to face him. She flushed yet again the moment their eyes locked, and his own eyes widened slightly. 'Maybe I wasn't dreaming when I felt her –'
"Miroku!" His attention snapped back to the furious hanyou standing before him. "You need to tell me what the hell happened with Naraku and I want the freaking TRUTH!"
He sighed and stared back at Inuyasha with a rather forced bored expression. "I'm sure Sango already told you. Kagura attacked me for information regarding your sword, we fought for some time, and I was accommodated at a temple for the night. I never saw Naraku at all."
"I'll believe that you didn't see Naraku, but everything else is bull." Inuyasha narrowed his eyes on him suspiciously.
'Well, at least he believes the central element of the façade...' "Believe what you'd like Inuyasha. If anything, you can question Kagura's intentions in asking about the sword, but that is the truth. Why would I make it up?"
"Whatever monk, I find out everything sooner or later. Let's get going, you've delayed us enough already. We've got to pick up Naraku's trail again." He glared at Miroku once more before storming out of the hut to wait for everyone else.
Kagome followed him out with her abnormally large yellow backpack and was about to climb onto his back when a ball of fur suddenly lunged at her. "Shippou!"
"Kagome! I missed you! Why are you late? Did that baka Inuyasha make you mad again?" Shippou narrowed his eyes at the now angry hanyou before turning back to Kagome in a pout.
She laughed at his antics then pinned Inuyasha with a look that he must've memorized by now. 'Don't you dare hit him.' He growled but pulled his arm back nonetheless. "No Shippou, he was late in coming to get me because of Miroku's disappearance. Look, I brought you new crayons!" She rummaged through her backpack before pulling out a box full of colors entirely new to the ecstatic kitsune. He squealed in delight as he took the box and jumped off of her to look for paper to color on.
"Oi brat! Don't get comfortable, we're leaving NOW!" He impatiently picked up Kagome, who was observing the peculiar couple that walked out of Kaede's hut.
Miroku's eyes wouldn't waver from Sango, and she was doing everything in her power to avoid them. When she would happen to glimpse momentarily, he'd avert his gaze. She quickly climbed onto Kirara's back, and he followed behind her. Then she moved forward awkwardly to put some distance between them. He sighed, and his mind seemed to disappear to some remote place. 'What in the world...?'
"Hey Inuyasha, don't you think they're acting a bit... strange?" Kagome whispered, still curiously eyeing the odd pair.
He didn't bother to verify her claim and broke into a sprint now that everyone was prepared to go. "Keh, don't they always?"
Softly blowing Sango's hair back to tickle his face, the wind seemed to taunt Miroku as Kirara flew through the skies at Inuyasha's pace. Either his weak human senses were somehow amplified, or the wind was truly mocking his unsettlement by wrapping him in her unmistakable scent. 'I swear I can smell her... Kami, how am I going to do this?' He struggled to make some sense of his mind as it raced faster than Inuyasha could ever run. 'I told her that we would wait until after we defeated Naraku... but since then I've been fighting all sorts of temptations to keep my own word, and now I'm being forced to give in to them. It's all wrong, so wrong! How can something I've wanted for so long become part of some sick plan that I know nothing of? It has to be deranged if it's coming from Naraku...'
"...and much to your dismay, you'll probably even enjoy it."
'Of course, you bastard.'
Sango involuntarily began to inch backwards on Kirara's back, slowly closing the small distance between them. Bittersweet, conflicting emotions pulled Miroku in a thousand different directions.
Her aroma was comforting to his soul and disconcerting to his mind all at once.
A/N: ((winces)) See, Inuyasha's 'freaking's are really supposed to be the other word. I know it sort of kills what he's saying, I'm sorry! Also, maybe it's just me, but Sango seems a bit OOC, more like Kagome in a way. I read way too many Inu/Kag stories ((sigh)). This was kind of a filler chapter because the next one makes everything come together, so please, stay with me.