Disclaimer: Inuyasha wo shoyuu shitenai ze. Ba~~ka. ^_~V
____________________________
Inuki
Chapter Eight :: Full Moon
A invasive ray of morning sunlight broke through Kagome's purple curtains and the former miko rolled over in bed, groaning. Fur nuzzled her nose and she opened one eye, glaring at Buyo. The chunky cat nyaa'ed at her and rolled over himself, and Kagome smiled sleepily, reaching out and cuddling the cat. How many years had she had him now? Ten, to the very day.
"Happy birthday Buyo." she murmured. After a moment she sat up, flopping out of bed and making her way downstairs to the bathroom. On the kitchen wall, a picture of a mini waterfall and tons of lilacs overlooked the calendar that read: May 11th, 1998.
Inuki, surprisingly, was up already and in the living room playing some fighting game with Souta, the two of them were getting nice and rambunctious. Kagome was certain she'd have a headache before her party even started.
In the kitchen, Jiichan was standing on a ladder, arguing with a ribbon of uncooperative crepe paper, and Mama was watching him to be sure the old man didn't fall, as well as her other job as Balance, the duties of which were to say "Up" or "Down" accordingly.
In regards to the placement of the crepe paper and other miscellaneous party decor, that is.
There was a nice scent of baked goods, and Kagome grinned at the scent. Her birthday cake! She walked in with a smile, giving her mother a morning hug. "Happy 16th," Mama greeted her, and Kagome smiled. "Thanks, Mama."
"Are you certain you want to have the confounded party --God curse all crepe paper!-- rather than just go out to eat like Inuki did?" Jiichan demanded, and Kagome winced at the sight of her grandfather, who was now wrapped in enough crepe paper to look like a mummy.
"Yes," she replied to Mummy-Jiichan, "It's my sweet 16th birthday! The most important one! All my friends will be here!" *Except the ones I want to be here the most.*
"Well all right, Kagome dear, if you... unk... insist."
"Jiichan, let me help you out of that," Mama offered.
The phone rang and seeing that Mama was obviously busy, Kagome made a move to answer. "Hello, Higurashi residence.... Good morning, Sorayama-san, I-- Oh." She made a face. "Oh I see. Yes, give me ten minutes."
She hung up and then threw the biggest tantrum she ever had in her life.
For Kagome was quickly deciding there were things in life she would forever despise. Seaweed, humidity and volunteers who were absent on their day to work, forcing her to work for them.
~*~
It was just after 2 pm when Kagome finally made it home. Figures that her one, single, the-only-one-that-would-ever-happen-in-her-lifetime 16th birthday would be the day all the crazies were out. Inuki greeted her at the door. "Welcome home. Have a nice day at work?"
"Bite me," she growled, "Do you have ANY idea what I had to put up with today?"
"Uhm, no?"
Kagome flung off her shoes and threw down her purse. "Sick, snot-nosed kids; old people who couldn't quite hear me on account of they had something called a HEARING AID stuck in their ears; a rude but young, disgustingly cute doctor; and a nurse who not only likes to drive the young, disgustingly cute doctor bonkers so he's even ruder than usual but this woman has an affinity with his butt! I swear she must've groped him fourteen times while I was there."
Kagome kicked at her shoes in frustration. "That.. That PLACE is not a hospital; it's an insane asylum!!"
Inuki smiled. "I had a good day too."
She smiled faintly at his good attitude. She'd sorta missed him today. She stretched and glanced into the living room where Souta was sitting patiently in front of a PAUSE screen. She sighed. "Souta, have you moved at all today?"
Her little brother looked up. "Yeah. I think I was lying on my stomach when you left."
Kagome rolled her eyes and walked into the kitchen. After the day she'd had all she wanted was a nice, steamy bubble bath and then to lounge in her soft, fluffy bed, but she had a party to wait for, so that was sorta out of the question.
She settled for soda and Cheezie Puffs.
An hour or two passed. Slowly, the sounds of Gackt and E.M.U. washed the memory of the horrible day away and she wandered downstairs to prepare for the party; Yuka-chan and the others would be arriving soon. She gathered the empty soda cans and the crumbs of her long-gone Cheezie Puffs and as she headed towards the kitchen to dispose of the garbage she heard the most horrible slime come from someone's mouth.
That someone sounded remarkably like Inuki, and if Kagome had thought she had heard every insult in the book being with Inuyasha --the hanyou did seem to have a way with words-- she was sadly mistaken. Either mistaken or she just hadn't seen his full potential.
If what he'd uttered on his best days was indeed his best, Inuki had him beat.
Sitting Inuki in front of the Gamecube console with Souta as his opponent was sort of like asking the older boy 'Try to come up with the worst, most colorful insult you can using only every single curse word you know of.'
Kagome pulled open the living room door, where Inuki and Souta were --surprise, surprise-- STILL seated in front of the TV, and whether or not Inuki was letting the younger boy win or not hadn't quite been made clear, but what WAS certain was that Souta was kicking his ass, and in a bad way.
"YOU BRAT!" Inuki roared, jumping to his feet, fingers still clacking against the Gamecube controller's buttons in a manic pace. "OKAY, last time!! I'll beat you this time!"
"Eat it, fuzzface, I'm gonna win again!!" Souta yelled confidently, and Inuki growled low in his throat, sending the elfin-eared sword-bearing character spinning at Souta's character, and with one swipe of the huge one-eyed sword the opposite character had, "Nightmare" brought down "Link."
"NO!" Inuki glared at him. "Dammit! What are you!?! Superhuman?!!"
Souta just grinned, and went on playing while Inuki turned towards the table to finish what appeared to be his weekend homework, muttering more obscenities under his breath. He looked up for a moment and met Kagome's gaze, and instinctively knew by the look on her face she had been watching him.
"What?" he demanded, using anger to hide his embarrassment, and Kagome shook her head, openly blushing as she too abruptly realized how long she had been staring at him. "N-Nothing..."
"Keh," was his only response as he reached out for his pencil, and abruptly his long nails knocked it away. Kagome pretended not to notice, as she had mentioned his nails to him before and was viciously put back in her place by him for her concern.
But it was hard not to pay attention when he muttered under his breath, "Dammit, they're this long already...?"
Accent on 'already.'
Curiosity piqued.
He crawled on his knees over to the small table in the corner and pulled out the nail clippers, hunching over them and carefully cutting away the excess fingernail. He looked annoyed as he did so. Kagome was tempted to ask again, but it was rude to do so after he had plainly told her to screw off.
Curiosity killed the cat. *But,* Kagome hmphed, *…satisfaction brought it back!*
"Yashagawa-kun?" He looked up at her, his I'm-going-to-kill-you-if-you-ask-about-my-nails expression darker than usual. "What?"
She gestured to his hands. "How often do you clip your nails? Didn't you just do it last night?"
The black eyes narrowed. "What of it?"
Kagome blinked, trying not to sound rude or nosy and failing on the nosy part. "Your nails grow awfully fast." He turned back to his nails and snapped, "Mind your own business."
She sighed and sat at the table, scanning Newtype boredly. Inuki came back to the table also, all ten fingernails now short and neat, and he glared at Kagome as she examined his hands out of the corner of her eye. "What already?" he demanded again, and she blushed, looking up at his face. "Sorry."
And then she did a double take. The roots of his hair were... silver. Impossible. Inuki's hair was all black. But no, it stood out like a sore thumb. Underneath his bangs and at his temple, strands of silvery-white were starting to spring up. And his eyes seemed a lighter brown than usual.
"Yashagawa-kun..." She began, pointing.
"If it's about my hair, I know already, so stop staring at me!" he yelled abruptly, slamming his pencil down. "I go through this every full moon, so just DROP IT!" And with that he stood, and she sat, transfixed as his footsteps headed down the hall.
*What's going on?*
She let him alone for several minutes so he could cool off, as he was prone to need that occasionally. But when she saw him stomp out of his and Souta's room towards the entryway, his overstuffed backpack over his shoulder, she jumped up. "Hey, where are you going?"
"To Shiina's. I'm gonna stay over the night," Inuki replied, and Kagome gasped, running in front of him and blocking the door. "No!! You can't go, tonight's the party."
Inuki looked down at her. "I already gave you your birthday present, Higurashi, and I'm not too good at parties."
Kagome's face crinkled. "But... it's my birthday. It won't be the same without you here." Her bottom lip started to quiver of its own volition and Inuki gawped. Was she actually crying? About the damned party???
Instantly he gave in. "Fine, fine fine! I'll stay," he dropped his bag at his feet, looking down at her in helpless defeat. "I'll stay, okay? Turn off the waterworks." Kagome sniffled and wiped at her eyes.
"Thanks."
She bounded away to get dressed and Inuki looked outside at the sun. It hung low in the sky, a bright golden orb whose light seeped out and turned the sky around it pinkish orange. Only two hours until sunset.
He clenched a fist. "Dammit, it'll be night soon."
~*~
"Yuka-chan, have you seen Yashagawa-kun?"
Kagome frowned, continuing her path around the house, looking pretty and light in a white party dress, a long thin navy bow in the back. She was wearing her present from Mama and Jiichan, a beautiful silver pendant. Her hair was in light curls, waving in a dark frame around her pretty face.
Throughout the rest of the day, Kagome's contact with Inuki had been scarce at best. He had taken to some hiding spot, where exactly she wasn't sure, but he refused to make himself known at all.
"No," Yuka replied honestly, to which Shiori, Ayumi and Eri also agreed they had not seen him. Houjou looked up at Kagome from the dinner Mama had prepared. "I saw someone outside, Higurashi, but I don't think it was Yashagawa-san. He had white hair."
Kagome frowned. White? Or silver, she wondered? She nodded and looked at her friends. "I'll be back inside in a little bit. Wait for me, okay?"
Kagome made her way outside, towards the front of the shrine. As she stood under the base of the Goshinboku, memories of Inuyasha came sifting back to the front. She pushed them down and looked up into the branches. "Yashagawa-kun, it's dinnertime."
"I'm not hungry," he replied in a low, husky voice, and Kagome sighed. Well, she was right about his choice of hiding places, at least. 500 years of reincarnation and he really hadn't changed at all. "Come on, everyone's already here, the party's started. I wanted you to be here. And you haven't eaten all day. I KNOW you're hungry."
As if to compliment her remark, Inuki's stomach emitted a loud rumbling, loud enough that he was sure Kagome had heard. He brushed a hand through his hair. "I'll eat later, I don't want to come down now. You'll see me."
"Unless you turn yourself invisible I'll see you later too." No reply. She sighed, stamping one high-heeled shoe. "Look, we're living together for who knows how long so why don't you come down and get this over with? You'll still be here next full moon too. And the one after that, and the one after that~ AND the one after that..."
There was a soft growling noise from the tree's branches, something that sounded particularly like Inuyasha's old growl, or just a dog in general. There was a rustling of trees branches and Inuki said, "All right, I'm coming down. But don't you dare stare at me."
Kagome promised, her voice triumphant, and in a moment there was a silver-white blur that dropped to the ground. Inuki stood, his hair shining white in the light of the rising full moon, and Kagome's mouth dropped open.
In the few hours since afternoon, Inuki's hair had bleached itself completely. He'd pulled his hair from its usual braid, and it hung down his back, down to his thighs. His eyes had changed colors, from brown to solid amber-gold. His human ears remained the same, but for his hair and eyes and the claws that had again regrown, you would have thought he was Inuyasha.
Kagome did.
Her eyes filled with tears, hands clenched at her side. She stood unmoving, unable to tear her eyes away from her hanyou, even despite the fact everything in her knew and screamed that he had died.
He couldn't be dead. He was standing right in front of her. Her hands covered her mouth. "Inuyasha..."
His face twisted, but before the boy could even begin to get angry, Kagome swooned, and collapsed against his chest. She hardly heard him call her name before she passed out.
"Higurashi!!"
As she fell into the darkness, she shook her head as much as her body would allow. *No, call me Kagome... you stupid hanyou... Call me Kagome.. like you used to...*
~*~ To be continued ~*~
a/n :: Okay, before anyone goes insane on me ^-^ I promise to explain why Inuki is changing (in a later chapter; God don't you just wanna hit me~ ;p) And it is not because he's turning into Inuyasha. That will NOT happen. Inuki is Inuki and that's that.
Please review and tell me what you think! I really wanna know! Okie, ja~!
~*~ V^-^V ~*~
~Tessen
____________________________
Inuki
Chapter Eight :: Full Moon
A invasive ray of morning sunlight broke through Kagome's purple curtains and the former miko rolled over in bed, groaning. Fur nuzzled her nose and she opened one eye, glaring at Buyo. The chunky cat nyaa'ed at her and rolled over himself, and Kagome smiled sleepily, reaching out and cuddling the cat. How many years had she had him now? Ten, to the very day.
"Happy birthday Buyo." she murmured. After a moment she sat up, flopping out of bed and making her way downstairs to the bathroom. On the kitchen wall, a picture of a mini waterfall and tons of lilacs overlooked the calendar that read: May 11th, 1998.
Inuki, surprisingly, was up already and in the living room playing some fighting game with Souta, the two of them were getting nice and rambunctious. Kagome was certain she'd have a headache before her party even started.
In the kitchen, Jiichan was standing on a ladder, arguing with a ribbon of uncooperative crepe paper, and Mama was watching him to be sure the old man didn't fall, as well as her other job as Balance, the duties of which were to say "Up" or "Down" accordingly.
In regards to the placement of the crepe paper and other miscellaneous party decor, that is.
There was a nice scent of baked goods, and Kagome grinned at the scent. Her birthday cake! She walked in with a smile, giving her mother a morning hug. "Happy 16th," Mama greeted her, and Kagome smiled. "Thanks, Mama."
"Are you certain you want to have the confounded party --God curse all crepe paper!-- rather than just go out to eat like Inuki did?" Jiichan demanded, and Kagome winced at the sight of her grandfather, who was now wrapped in enough crepe paper to look like a mummy.
"Yes," she replied to Mummy-Jiichan, "It's my sweet 16th birthday! The most important one! All my friends will be here!" *Except the ones I want to be here the most.*
"Well all right, Kagome dear, if you... unk... insist."
"Jiichan, let me help you out of that," Mama offered.
The phone rang and seeing that Mama was obviously busy, Kagome made a move to answer. "Hello, Higurashi residence.... Good morning, Sorayama-san, I-- Oh." She made a face. "Oh I see. Yes, give me ten minutes."
She hung up and then threw the biggest tantrum she ever had in her life.
For Kagome was quickly deciding there were things in life she would forever despise. Seaweed, humidity and volunteers who were absent on their day to work, forcing her to work for them.
~*~
It was just after 2 pm when Kagome finally made it home. Figures that her one, single, the-only-one-that-would-ever-happen-in-her-lifetime 16th birthday would be the day all the crazies were out. Inuki greeted her at the door. "Welcome home. Have a nice day at work?"
"Bite me," she growled, "Do you have ANY idea what I had to put up with today?"
"Uhm, no?"
Kagome flung off her shoes and threw down her purse. "Sick, snot-nosed kids; old people who couldn't quite hear me on account of they had something called a HEARING AID stuck in their ears; a rude but young, disgustingly cute doctor; and a nurse who not only likes to drive the young, disgustingly cute doctor bonkers so he's even ruder than usual but this woman has an affinity with his butt! I swear she must've groped him fourteen times while I was there."
Kagome kicked at her shoes in frustration. "That.. That PLACE is not a hospital; it's an insane asylum!!"
Inuki smiled. "I had a good day too."
She smiled faintly at his good attitude. She'd sorta missed him today. She stretched and glanced into the living room where Souta was sitting patiently in front of a PAUSE screen. She sighed. "Souta, have you moved at all today?"
Her little brother looked up. "Yeah. I think I was lying on my stomach when you left."
Kagome rolled her eyes and walked into the kitchen. After the day she'd had all she wanted was a nice, steamy bubble bath and then to lounge in her soft, fluffy bed, but she had a party to wait for, so that was sorta out of the question.
She settled for soda and Cheezie Puffs.
An hour or two passed. Slowly, the sounds of Gackt and E.M.U. washed the memory of the horrible day away and she wandered downstairs to prepare for the party; Yuka-chan and the others would be arriving soon. She gathered the empty soda cans and the crumbs of her long-gone Cheezie Puffs and as she headed towards the kitchen to dispose of the garbage she heard the most horrible slime come from someone's mouth.
That someone sounded remarkably like Inuki, and if Kagome had thought she had heard every insult in the book being with Inuyasha --the hanyou did seem to have a way with words-- she was sadly mistaken. Either mistaken or she just hadn't seen his full potential.
If what he'd uttered on his best days was indeed his best, Inuki had him beat.
Sitting Inuki in front of the Gamecube console with Souta as his opponent was sort of like asking the older boy 'Try to come up with the worst, most colorful insult you can using only every single curse word you know of.'
Kagome pulled open the living room door, where Inuki and Souta were --surprise, surprise-- STILL seated in front of the TV, and whether or not Inuki was letting the younger boy win or not hadn't quite been made clear, but what WAS certain was that Souta was kicking his ass, and in a bad way.
"YOU BRAT!" Inuki roared, jumping to his feet, fingers still clacking against the Gamecube controller's buttons in a manic pace. "OKAY, last time!! I'll beat you this time!"
"Eat it, fuzzface, I'm gonna win again!!" Souta yelled confidently, and Inuki growled low in his throat, sending the elfin-eared sword-bearing character spinning at Souta's character, and with one swipe of the huge one-eyed sword the opposite character had, "Nightmare" brought down "Link."
"NO!" Inuki glared at him. "Dammit! What are you!?! Superhuman?!!"
Souta just grinned, and went on playing while Inuki turned towards the table to finish what appeared to be his weekend homework, muttering more obscenities under his breath. He looked up for a moment and met Kagome's gaze, and instinctively knew by the look on her face she had been watching him.
"What?" he demanded, using anger to hide his embarrassment, and Kagome shook her head, openly blushing as she too abruptly realized how long she had been staring at him. "N-Nothing..."
"Keh," was his only response as he reached out for his pencil, and abruptly his long nails knocked it away. Kagome pretended not to notice, as she had mentioned his nails to him before and was viciously put back in her place by him for her concern.
But it was hard not to pay attention when he muttered under his breath, "Dammit, they're this long already...?"
Accent on 'already.'
Curiosity piqued.
He crawled on his knees over to the small table in the corner and pulled out the nail clippers, hunching over them and carefully cutting away the excess fingernail. He looked annoyed as he did so. Kagome was tempted to ask again, but it was rude to do so after he had plainly told her to screw off.
Curiosity killed the cat. *But,* Kagome hmphed, *…satisfaction brought it back!*
"Yashagawa-kun?" He looked up at her, his I'm-going-to-kill-you-if-you-ask-about-my-nails expression darker than usual. "What?"
She gestured to his hands. "How often do you clip your nails? Didn't you just do it last night?"
The black eyes narrowed. "What of it?"
Kagome blinked, trying not to sound rude or nosy and failing on the nosy part. "Your nails grow awfully fast." He turned back to his nails and snapped, "Mind your own business."
She sighed and sat at the table, scanning Newtype boredly. Inuki came back to the table also, all ten fingernails now short and neat, and he glared at Kagome as she examined his hands out of the corner of her eye. "What already?" he demanded again, and she blushed, looking up at his face. "Sorry."
And then she did a double take. The roots of his hair were... silver. Impossible. Inuki's hair was all black. But no, it stood out like a sore thumb. Underneath his bangs and at his temple, strands of silvery-white were starting to spring up. And his eyes seemed a lighter brown than usual.
"Yashagawa-kun..." She began, pointing.
"If it's about my hair, I know already, so stop staring at me!" he yelled abruptly, slamming his pencil down. "I go through this every full moon, so just DROP IT!" And with that he stood, and she sat, transfixed as his footsteps headed down the hall.
*What's going on?*
She let him alone for several minutes so he could cool off, as he was prone to need that occasionally. But when she saw him stomp out of his and Souta's room towards the entryway, his overstuffed backpack over his shoulder, she jumped up. "Hey, where are you going?"
"To Shiina's. I'm gonna stay over the night," Inuki replied, and Kagome gasped, running in front of him and blocking the door. "No!! You can't go, tonight's the party."
Inuki looked down at her. "I already gave you your birthday present, Higurashi, and I'm not too good at parties."
Kagome's face crinkled. "But... it's my birthday. It won't be the same without you here." Her bottom lip started to quiver of its own volition and Inuki gawped. Was she actually crying? About the damned party???
Instantly he gave in. "Fine, fine fine! I'll stay," he dropped his bag at his feet, looking down at her in helpless defeat. "I'll stay, okay? Turn off the waterworks." Kagome sniffled and wiped at her eyes.
"Thanks."
She bounded away to get dressed and Inuki looked outside at the sun. It hung low in the sky, a bright golden orb whose light seeped out and turned the sky around it pinkish orange. Only two hours until sunset.
He clenched a fist. "Dammit, it'll be night soon."
~*~
"Yuka-chan, have you seen Yashagawa-kun?"
Kagome frowned, continuing her path around the house, looking pretty and light in a white party dress, a long thin navy bow in the back. She was wearing her present from Mama and Jiichan, a beautiful silver pendant. Her hair was in light curls, waving in a dark frame around her pretty face.
Throughout the rest of the day, Kagome's contact with Inuki had been scarce at best. He had taken to some hiding spot, where exactly she wasn't sure, but he refused to make himself known at all.
"No," Yuka replied honestly, to which Shiori, Ayumi and Eri also agreed they had not seen him. Houjou looked up at Kagome from the dinner Mama had prepared. "I saw someone outside, Higurashi, but I don't think it was Yashagawa-san. He had white hair."
Kagome frowned. White? Or silver, she wondered? She nodded and looked at her friends. "I'll be back inside in a little bit. Wait for me, okay?"
Kagome made her way outside, towards the front of the shrine. As she stood under the base of the Goshinboku, memories of Inuyasha came sifting back to the front. She pushed them down and looked up into the branches. "Yashagawa-kun, it's dinnertime."
"I'm not hungry," he replied in a low, husky voice, and Kagome sighed. Well, she was right about his choice of hiding places, at least. 500 years of reincarnation and he really hadn't changed at all. "Come on, everyone's already here, the party's started. I wanted you to be here. And you haven't eaten all day. I KNOW you're hungry."
As if to compliment her remark, Inuki's stomach emitted a loud rumbling, loud enough that he was sure Kagome had heard. He brushed a hand through his hair. "I'll eat later, I don't want to come down now. You'll see me."
"Unless you turn yourself invisible I'll see you later too." No reply. She sighed, stamping one high-heeled shoe. "Look, we're living together for who knows how long so why don't you come down and get this over with? You'll still be here next full moon too. And the one after that, and the one after that~ AND the one after that..."
There was a soft growling noise from the tree's branches, something that sounded particularly like Inuyasha's old growl, or just a dog in general. There was a rustling of trees branches and Inuki said, "All right, I'm coming down. But don't you dare stare at me."
Kagome promised, her voice triumphant, and in a moment there was a silver-white blur that dropped to the ground. Inuki stood, his hair shining white in the light of the rising full moon, and Kagome's mouth dropped open.
In the few hours since afternoon, Inuki's hair had bleached itself completely. He'd pulled his hair from its usual braid, and it hung down his back, down to his thighs. His eyes had changed colors, from brown to solid amber-gold. His human ears remained the same, but for his hair and eyes and the claws that had again regrown, you would have thought he was Inuyasha.
Kagome did.
Her eyes filled with tears, hands clenched at her side. She stood unmoving, unable to tear her eyes away from her hanyou, even despite the fact everything in her knew and screamed that he had died.
He couldn't be dead. He was standing right in front of her. Her hands covered her mouth. "Inuyasha..."
His face twisted, but before the boy could even begin to get angry, Kagome swooned, and collapsed against his chest. She hardly heard him call her name before she passed out.
"Higurashi!!"
As she fell into the darkness, she shook her head as much as her body would allow. *No, call me Kagome... you stupid hanyou... Call me Kagome.. like you used to...*
~*~ To be continued ~*~
a/n :: Okay, before anyone goes insane on me ^-^ I promise to explain why Inuki is changing (in a later chapter; God don't you just wanna hit me~ ;p) And it is not because he's turning into Inuyasha. That will NOT happen. Inuki is Inuki and that's that.
Please review and tell me what you think! I really wanna know! Okie, ja~!
~*~ V^-^V ~*~
~Tessen