http: passed uneventfully, then faded into winter, which thawed into spring. Then winter pulled a fast one on summer and fall for three weeks in June it was 30 degrees. Summer figured out what happened and kicked winter's ass, and returned the seasons to their rightful place.
During this brief period of seasonal civil war, life for InuYasha continued along the same course it had been since he decided to drop out, and the Harley creeped even closer to being functional.
One night, as he finished his beer, he took it to the trash can he kept for beer bottles. He noticed it was full. He grinned. 'Finally. I'll talk to Roy in the mornin' on my way to meet Kikyo and- Shit. I'm gonna be with Kikyo all day, and she can't come along... shiit. Ah well. Do it at night, I need to practice at night anywho.'
The next morn' he rambled out the front door an hour early, and instead of heading for the over pass where they normally met, he headed off toward town.
He entered a small store on the side of the highway, a sign out front read 'R&R Sporting Guns.' Inside, a man sat behind a glass counter full of hand guns, packing his own cigarettes. He looked up at the sound of the door opening.
Roy nodded at InuYasha and finished packing the last tube. Sesshomaru had intoduced InuYasha to Roy when he was young, before that bastard left. Roy was an old friend of his dad's who apparently owed him one.
"Usual?" Roy asked. "Yeah." Roy reached under the counter and pulled out a box of 50 .41 AE rounds. "Yer lucky I do this for ya, ya know how hard it is to find .41 AE slugs now-a-days?" "Yeah yeah, yer too good to me Roy." "Damn right I am! I outta charge you for em!" "Hate to rob you of the five bucks ya lose on 'em." "Try 50" "Eh." "Get outta here before I show ya the new Springfield .45 I got in, ya little punk." "Yeah yeah, want the brass back?" "Of course."
That night when he said goodbye to Kikyo, InuYasha returned home, and, never taking off his jacket, walked into the garage and set the box of rounds on the work bench. He reached up to the shelf and pulled down the box with the Jericho in it. He pulled the pistol out of the box and set in on the table, before reaching up and pulling down a second box.
This one had four magazines in it. He dumped them on the table and slid out the cardboard carton inside of the box. He sat down on a stool and lit up a smoke.
InuYasha reached over the neat rows of bullets, brass casings shining in the work light, the words "STARLIGHT 41 AE" stamped around the primers. The room was silent as he picked up the first round between his fingers and pressed it into a magazine with his thumb. The spring pushing the round upwards produced a solid chink.
'Why did he leave me this gun?' Chink. 'What does he think I'm gonna use it for?' Chink. 'Not mine.' Chink. His brother's words echoed in his head. 'Not mine, yours.' Chink. 'Ask mother about father.' Chink. 'What did the old man do?' Clink. 'What does he expect me to do with this?' Chink. 'Damned fool crusades' Chink. 'Crusades. So they both went off on some kinda quest.' Chink. 'But what?' Chink. 'And why?' Chink.
He set the now loaded magazine down and picked up the second one. 'Sesshomaru made it sound like I was going to follow them.' Chink. 'Both he and dad left, and he seems sure I'm goin'..' Chink. 'Maybe what ever it is, it's a family thing.' Chink. 'Hell, Roy helps me 'cuz of my family..' Chink. 'So, saying I did have to leave home..' Chink. 'Could I tell anyone?' Chink. 'Tell Kikyo?' Chink. 'I don't wanna abandon her jus' to go off on some adventure.' Chink. 'Hell, she did fine at Costco, why couldn't she come along?' Chink. 'But, what would she think of me?' Chink. 'I have to let her know it's for some higher purpose.' Chink. 'That I'm not some common criminal..'
He set down the mag and finished loading the other two in a daze. He slipped a magazine into the pistol and rammed it home with his palm. He stuck the Jericho in his jacket and the magazines in his belt. He picked up the trash bag with the bottles in them and walked out the door.
He walked into the woods for half an hour, far away from any one who could hear. He came to his normal spot, a clearing with a shot-up desk in it. The ground was littered with busted bottles.
InuYasha set down the trash bag and started lining up the bottles on the desk. He walked back 15 paces and calmly reached in his pocket and drew his sidearm. He racked the slide and chambered a round.
Kikyo sat with her back against a fallen tree, cigarette between her lips. The world was pitch dark, but she knew no one could sneak up on her. The air was warm and muggy, and she could feel herself drifting off. She considered sleeping under the bridge where she and InuYasha always sat again, but she didn't like sleeping in the same place twice in a row.
'Listen to yourself. Was it always this bad? Have I always been this used to it? So far away from normal life? Is it really worth all this shit? Hell, look at yourself. No home, no family, sleeping in the woods, not to mention my 'job'. Hell, I can only relate to other outsiders, like InuYasha. Hey, that's not fair, you're making that sound like a bad thing. Hell, you can't even relax without InuYasha nearby anymore..'
A gunshot rang through the silence of the night. Kikyo's hand instinctively went to the small of her back as she looked toward the sound. 'Large cal, somewhere in the forties, pistol.' She thought with a twinge of remorse, the thought an exclmation point on her previous introspection.
InuYasha shot down six bottles in rapid succession. His brother had told him to learn how to use it, and he would. Not for that bastard, but for himself. He held out the Jericho with one hand and lined up the sights on the bottom of a bottle.
Kikyo slowed down as she got near the gunfire. She figured out it was coming from a small clearing, and she knew there was good cover there. She crouched behind a tree and blended in with the darkness.
'It's just someone uses bottles for target practice. No danger to me.' She thought watching several bottles shatter in a matter of seconds. 'Whoever it is, they're good...' She shifted to see the shooter.
She sat down in shock. 'Well, you wondered if he could handle himself in a fight.' Her mind mocked. 'No.. this is InuYasha. He's the only person I know untainted by this shit, I want him to remain like that.'