Chapter 36: Fear and Courage
Running. He felt like he'd been running for an eternity, and then some. The scenery never changed, remaining the same black inky nothingness, unable to even hear his own footfalls. The only thing that broke the ear-shattering silence was, in a very true sense, his own voice, his blood, whispering in his mind's ear, curling around him like the icy fingers of fate itself. "Give it up. You can never succeed. You will never escape. Just give me control, then sleep. I will protect what's ours."
He closes his eyes and keeps running, 'Don't listen to it. I can do this. I can get out of here. I just have to keep going.'
"You will never get out. It is better this way, no more pain. No more hurt feelings at the stares, the whispers behind your back, you will be safe from them." It whispers in his ear, using persuasion instead of force, a youkai characteristic that, though not often used, can be wielded quite effectively if needed too.
Inuyasha bites his lip slightly, finding it harder and harder to ignore, especially as his past is paraded before him. All the pain, the looks given to him when no one thought his parents were looking, the sharp words he heard thanks to his sensitive hearing. 'No, no, no.' he thinks, whimpering slightly, 'They don't matter. What they say doesn't matter. How they look at me doesn't matter. It doesn't. It doesn't.' he chants in his thoughts, as if he were trying to make himself believe it.
"Oh, but it does. Do you honestly think that if your people find out what you are, that they will willingly be ruled by you? Do you not remember our female's raising grounds?"
"Kagome's village…" the words slip from his mouth as the memories begin to come back.
"Yes, there. Remember the look of fear in the others' eyes? The disgust? Do you honestly think they would be ruled by you without complaint? Without plans of dethroning you? Let me take control, I will crush any thoughts of rebellion. You can stay here, safe, away from all pain. It is best." The demon blood seemed to almost hiss out, knowing that this new strategy was working.
Inuyasha falters in his resolve, 'Maybe it's right. Those ingrates would never look at me with any respect. No matter how high my station, to them I'm just a…a…'
"A dirty mutt." The demon blood supplies. "Unworthy to live, much less to rule. Can you not already hear their future scorn?"
With every passing moment, Inuyasha's rock solid resolve crumbles a bit more, chipped away by childhood doubts and fears that had plagued him all his life. 'Yes. That's what Sesshomaru always said about me to the other head princes. 'Unworthy to live, unfit to rule'. Maybe he was right. I can't even get out of a stupid 'prison' that my own stupid blood put up, how am I supposed to be expected to rule a whole country?'
Finally, he stops running, arms at his sides as his head is down dejectedly. 'Maybe I should just give it control.' He thinks as he can feel it curling around him, stripping away his control little by little as his grip slightly loosens bit by bit. 'Everyone always told me that I was no use to anyone as a worthless hanyou anyways.'
Suddenly, a voice breaks from out of nowhere, decidedly not his, not even male for that matter of fact "Inuyasha!"
His head jerks up to see that, in the all consuming darkness, a single speck of light had appeared in the distance. 'I don't ever remember seeing that before.' He thinks curiously.
"It does not matter. Quickly! Give me control! I can sense an enemy nearby!" the demon blood commands, a slight note of fear in it's voice.
He ignores it as he now becomes fascinated with the point of light that he'd located. Something told him that he just had to get to that light, no matter what. He begins to walk again, ignoring the commands and pleadings of his blood, mind entirely trained on getting to that light, which was growing just a bit bigger with every step he takes.
'Yes Inuyasha, come. Please, come to me. I want to be with you.' This isn't so much heard or thought by the confused hanyou, but more like felt. As if, as he drew nearer to the light, a warmth was being born in the depths of his soul. He decides that he likes it, and continues forward, heedless of the more and more panicked and threatening tone that his blood was taking.
Finally he reaches to where he can tell what the light is and for a moment he stops, breathing out, "Kagome…" For indeed, it was Kagome, cloaked in an ethereal light that seemed to drive all darkness from around it. She was smiling softly at him, arms out as she walked slowly towards him.
"Yes Inuyasha, it's me. I'm not sure how I got here, all I know is that I felt like you needed my help. I'm so glad to see you, I was so worried!" As she says this, she finally reaches him, and he can see tears welling in her eyes. Instantly he has his arms around her, not even thinking about it at this point. He hears Kagome inhale a bit sharply in surprise as he softly says.
"Don't cry Kagome. I'm sorry I worried you, I didn't mean to. You've got to believe me, I was trying to get back to you, I was. Please, just don't cry. I can't stand to see you cry because of me." (A.N. Ok, srry about this, I try not to do this, but I can't help myself. I can so TOTALLY hear this scene with the soundtrack from the series that usually comes on during Inu/Kag romance scenes. Okay, I'm done. Thanks for letting me get that out of my system lol.)
Slowly, he feels Kagome's arms come up around him, and he hears her say "Okay Inuyasha. I'll try not to cry. I was just so worried, and now, I'm so happy to see you again. Why haven't you come back?"
Inuyasha leans back to be able to look at her once again, noting with some pleasure that the tears had dried a little. "Because something was keeping me here. But now that you're here, if you want to, I can get out. Would you Kagome? Would you give me the strength I need to get out of here and back to you? I mean reallyback to you?"
He watches with a hint of amusement as he sees her eyes widen, obviously trying to get his head around the thought of HIM asking HERfor help. He struggles to keep down a chuckle. At this point, he didn't care, no one else could see them, and he'd been put through Hell. Sure, if asked about it later by anyone, he'd deny it to his grave, but at this moment in time, he could do it. And not feel any worse for doing so. Finally he sees her nod, smiling up at him "Of course Inuyasha. I would be glad to help you."
With that, Inuyasha steps back, out of her embrace while he let his furred, clawed hands slip down her bare arms, until they ultimately came to rest on hers, taking them in gently and simply holding them, he looking at her while she gazed back at him. His demon-blood howls around them as it tries everything to break them apart, to throw the lord back into the dark pit that he'd been in, only to have the light that now surrounds the two grow.
"No! I deserve control! I am full demon! You will never be as powerful as I am!" it howls, still weaving around them, unable to enter the blinding light.
The two simply ignore it as Kagome smiles again "Come Inuyasha. Let's go home."
He can't help but smile at the girl and the term used, saying softly back, "Home. Yeah, let's go." And with that the light reaches it's peak of brilliance, the howls muted in the background now of defeat, and finally, they lose sight of each other, having to close their eyes against the light.
- - - - - - - -
When he became aware next, before he even opened his eyes, he could hear voices. His groggy mind went to work slowly, trying to figure out who they were. There were two of them, both familiar. The first one was deep, unemotional… 'Damn it! What's Sesshomaru doing here!' He thinks before his attention is arrested by the other voice. Rough, loud, obnoxious…His eyes fly open. Kouga was in his home? 'The little…' he thinks as he looks around.
The first thing he sees is Kagome, holding his hand in a death grip, though seemingly still unconscious. He almost smiles at that, but then he notes her pale and undernourished appearance. He frowns, 'She better have a good explanation for that.' He thinks as he gets up and tries to careful remove his hand from Kagome's, waking her from her state despite his efforts. Reclaiming his hand, he flexes it a few times before saying "You know, you guys make it really hard for a guy to catch any shut eye with your carrying on like that."
The scene in front of him freezes, one of which he can only guess was the idiot wolf trying to fight his older half-brother. He huffs mentally as the two turn around 'If fighting me is hopeless for the wolf-turd, what made him think that he could take on Sesshomaru.' He wonders as he begrudgingly admits to himself that the elder youkai was more powerful, if only for the fact that he had a tadmore experience with fighting. "Yo, greetings from Hell guys." He says cockily, already gearing up mentally for another fight. He knew that he would be fighting Kouga again, and this time, with Kagome's support giving him strength, he was going to beat the idiot, and he wasn't going to rely on his demon blood to finish the job.
A.N. Alright! Two solid pages! Haven't done that in a while. Well, this chapter was, as you can tell, mainly Inuyasha and Kagome. I'd gotten the idea for this chappie from a review I'd gotten, so I figured, why not? Next chappie, the big fight! Bring the popcorn and beanbag chairs, cause I'm hoping that it'll be the big one! Sorry if Inu seemed kinda OOC, that's just how he came out this chapter. Alright, time for Reviewer Replies! I'd like to thank Lady Dark Angel, marlett, Inu Youkai Gurl, glenlightarrow, harryptaxd204, Lisa, SitDog-Boy, MeMe, and ThatOneNerd for the time and effort that they put into writing reviews, you guys have no clue how much I appreciate every review that I get. You guys are awesome! Now, as for individual replies…
Bloody Rin- As I hope I could show you, he didn't wake up just like that, they only noticed him when he drew attention to himself. Thank you very much for the review and the compliment.
Do a DAMN GOOGLE SEARCH- Lol, sorry to do that to you, but I gotta leave you with something that'll have you coming back for more, don't I? I will do my best to continue updating as quickly as possible, promise.
galaxy guardian- Hey look at that, twice in a row! Lol, I'm not sure how I got my sprite to cooperate, I think she was just in a good mood. As far as Sesshomaru goes, I think a little of it is that he's a bit protective of our Inu-chan, though he'd killed you if you suggested it to his face lol. He'd say most likely that it was his honor code to stop the prosecution of a weakling that was unable to defend itself. Or something to that effect. Thank you for reviewing and the compliments!
Well, that's all for now folks! R&R!