Hi everyone! Hope you had a great holiday! Anyway, this chapter is kinda short and slightly dull... but I thought you might like a break from the excitement in the last couple chapters. Look guys! 181 reveiws! WOOT! Thanks so much everybody for reveiwing! I love you guys so much for caring enough to tell me what you think of my story! It's really encouraging! Enjoy!
This chappie is dedicated to animebaby08060 for being my first reveiwer, and my good friend Hanyou Vixen for guessing the answer to my question!
13 - New Surroundings and Explanations
The group approached the house quickly, not feeling safe out in the open. Under the shade of the massive porch, they slowed, an uncomfortable feeling rushing over them. Like they were being watched. Suddenly, Kagome started realizing how much sharper her senses were. She could hear when someone shifted their weight or took a step on the old wooden porch; she could smell everything around her, including her various friends. One stood out from the rest, though. It was a musty smell, like a forest or a mountain. It relaxed her body, calming some of her frantic senses. She sniffed the air again, trying to identify the new scent. Of coarse, her nose led her to none other than Inuyasha. She stepped closer to him, inhailing the aroma that exuded from him.
He noticed this, and made a small step toward her as well. Due to the demon blood in her veins, her scent had also changed. It still held it's vanilla and sugar aroma, yet mixed in with it was a scent that seemed... wild. Like an animal. It excited him, and it took all he had not to lean over and kiss her right then.
The door creaked open, revealing an old, hunched over woman with a eye patch across one eye. "Come in, ye might be seen." she beckoned with a wave of her wrinkled hand. They all entered the partially destroyed home, only to find the compleate opposite of the outside on the inside. It was beautiful, with many colored rugs sprawled out over most of the hard wood floors. The walls were partially covered with large paintings, and the wall near the large staircase down the hall was filled to the brim with old black and white photographs.
"Follow me," the old woman said as she stepped into a large doorway to her left. They followed, taking in their new surroundings. "Sit," she commanded. The teens sat on the large fluffy couches that lined the family room. Quiet rested uneasily over the room, making everyone, except for the old woman, uncomfortable. It remained like this, until a loud thump came from one of the couches. There layed Miroku, on the ground with a considerable sized lump on top of his head.
"Lecher..." Sango muttered as she pretended to dust off her hands. Kagome laughed, then noticed that Miroku had slid easily over to her and started rubbing her legs.
Unknown to Kagome, Miroku was only trying to stand up, his head clouded from the previous knock to his nogin. She blushed profusely, not knowing how to react as Miroku climbed up her legs. Inuyasha sensed her nervousness and opened his previously closed eyes, only to see his best friend all over Kagome. His Kagome. A growl escaped his throat as he dived for Miroku. Sango, just noticing Miroku's 'position', also dived for him. Suddenly, Miroku's eye's re-foucused and within seconds he realized three things. One, he was trying to climb up a blushing Kagome's legs. Two, both Sango and Inuyasha were diving at him, for fairly obvious reasons. And three, he was in for some pain. On instinct, he grabbed the backs of Kagome's knees and tried to sheild himself. This caused Kagome to lose her balance on the couch, falling on the ground, on top of Miroku.
In the end, all four teenagers ended up in a dog pile on the floor. Inuyasha grumbled as he got up. He turned back around to help the others up, only to find both girls tangled together, laying on top of a very happy Miroku. Inuyasha freaked out and pulled them apart and away from Miroku, silenting a protest from Miroku with his fist.
"Why do I always get beaten up?" he questioned as he picked himself up and rubbed his new bruises.
"Because you're a pervert!" Inuyasha told him angrily, his arms wrapped around Kagome's small body.
"You didn't realize that?" Sango said as she walked over to him and looked up into his bright blue eyes. He matched her gaze with a goofy lop-sided grin, thanks to the hit to his jaw during the pile up.
'Why can't I stay mad at the pervert?' Sango thought, angry at herself for the fluttering in her stomach. He moved in a gave her a quick and innocent kiss. 'Oh, I remember now...' she thought with a grin.
"I'm sorry," he said with big puppy dog eyes. "I know I'm not perfect, but I do love you."
She gave him a large smile. "I love you, too."
Kagome was looking on with teary eyes. Then she turned to Inuyasha. "Why aren't you romantic anymore?"
He looked at her in shock. "We've only been being chased by people who want to kill us! Sorry I'm not paying enough attention to you, when I'm trying to save all our lives!"
"Inuyasha, I'm only kidding!" she said as she gave him a hug.
The old woman on the couch had been watching the entire incident, holding in her laughter at the children who had to grow up so quickly. Finally, she couldn't hold it in any longer and started laughing loudly. All four teens stared at her in awe, as if they had never seen anyone laugh before.
"Something funny, old hag?" Inuyasha asked her.
"Inuyasha!" Kagome scolded. "That wasn't nice!"
"Calm ye young head, child," the elderly woman told her with a smile. "I don't expect any better of him."
Kagome turned her attention to the woman. Somehow she failed to notice that she was wearing clothes from the futal ages of Japan until now. Her gray hair was pulled into a low ponytail, and her back slightly hunched as she stood up from sitting in an over-stuffed arm chair.
"I am Kaede," she told the teens, "And ye four will stay here in my home for a time."
"Hello, I'm Kagome!" she said with a bright smile. Kaede gave her a strange look, making Kagome nervous. "What?" Kagome blurted out before she could stop herself.
"Are ye part demon?" she asked.
This shocked Kagome. "Huh...?"
"It's a long story for another time," Inuyasha answered simply.
"I see..." Kaede responded.
'What's she talking about?' Kagome thought. Then Inuyasha shot her a look, telling her that he would explain everything later.
After the rest of the introductions, she approached the stairs and motioned for them to follow. After accending the stairs, they were faced with two doors. Turning to them, she said, "These are the only two bedrooms left in my home. I don't care how ye divide among them. There," she said as she pointed to a door across the hall, "is the bathroom. If any of ye need anything, never hesitate to ask." With that she left, returning to the living room.
"Well, this is simple," Sango said with a satified grin. "Kagome and I call one and you boys can have the other."
"No way!" Inuyasha belowed, shaking the frames on the wall.
"Keep ye voice down, Inuyasha!" Kaede called from downstairs.
"Feh!"
"Why won't you share a room with Miroku?" Kagome questioned. 'I thought they were best friends?'
"He thinks I'll accidentally grope him in the night," Miroku responded in a down cast voice.
"Oh, come on Inu! He wouldn't do that!" Kagome said as she cutely tugged on his sleeve.
Inuyasha looked at Miroku in horror.
"Oh, no... You're thinking of that one time when we were fourteen, aren't you?" Sango asked him with a laugh.
"Don't remind me..." Inuyasha said as he shuddered.
"Hey, I'm fairly new, remember? What happened?"
Sango laughed, Miroku blushed, and Inuyasha crossed his arms and replied with, "Feh!"
"Let me explain..." Sango said with a mischevious tone in her voice.
flash back -
Three young teens sat in the living room of a large house, watching a movie and eating popcorn.
"This movie sucks!" Inuyasha claimed as he threw popcorn at the screen. "I'm going to sleep!" He went to his sleeping bag and got inside.
"Oh come on, you big baby!" Sango called from her position on the couch with another bowl of popcorn on her lap as she rolled her eyes.
"He's right, it's not that good," Miroku said from the ground near Inuyasha's sleeping bag. "I think I'll catch some shut eye, too. Goodnight Sango, my love!" He immediately passed out on his sleeping bag.
'Will he call me that forever!' she thought. 'When will it get through his thick skull that I won't ever go out with him!'
She watched the movie quietly for another hour. Suddenly, she heard one of the boys shifting in theor sleeping bags. It was Miroku, turning over with a strange grin on his face. 'That's the look he gets when he tries to touch my butt...' she thought. 'Ewww! He's not dreaming about that, is he?!'
Then she saw something she wouldn't forget for the rest of her life. Miroku's hand escaped for the confines of his sleeping bag and wandered to Inuyasha's. Sango, not really understanding what was going on, just watched, interested in what he would do. His hand started rubbing on the inu-hanyou's sleping bag, apparently finding something solid underneath. Then he squeezed. Bad idea.
Inuyasha shot out of that sleeping bag like it was on fire. He turned and saw a very groggy Miroku turning in his sleep, and Sango on the couch, face as red as a cherry.
"MIROKU!!!!" he yelled loud enough for people in China to hear.
Said boy shot up and looked around. "Hey, where did Sango go?" he said.
"Sango was never near you, you... you... LECHER!" Inuyasha called and ran to his room upstairs.
"Why did you do that?" Sango asked, holding in her laughter.
"Do what?" he said as he scratched his head.
"... You don't even know what you did?" she asked skeptically.
"No. What? Was it something bad?"
A smirk crossed her face. "Well, you only felt Inuyasha up!"
Miroku's eyes widened and he passed out from shock as Sango's laughter erupted throughout the house.
- end flash back
"From that day on, whenever Miroku slept over at our house, he slept on the living room florr by himself," Sango finished her story as a giggle escaped her lips.
"I was sleeping!" Miroku claimed in his defense. "I didn't know it was Inuyasha! I thought I was groping Sango!"
Inuyasha stood in the corner, still furiously flushed fromt her re-telling of the story.
"I will not sleep in a room with Miroku!"
"Fine, you big baby. Now what do we do?" Sango asked.
"Well, you and I could stay in the same room, my love..." Miroku said as he slipped to her side and wrapped his arm around her shoulder.
'Oh, great. Here it comes. He's gonna grope me now...' she thought, preparing herself to slap him silly. But, the hand with a mind of it's own never came. Instead, he kissed her on the cheek. 'How can I say no after that?'
"Okay, as long as you promise no funny buisness," she said with an audible sigh.
"Yay!" he said as he punched into the air.
"Remember, lech," Inuaysha said as he stepped forward. "We're right next to you, so you better believe if I hear anything that I shouldn't, I have no problems with breaking it up..."
Sango smirked at the dissapointed look on Miroku's face. The teens departed into their designated rooms, Sango and Miroku to the left and Inuyasha and Kagome to the right.
Inuyasha entered the room and tossed his jacket on the floor as he plopped onto the bed. "Man, am I exhausted!"
Kagome entered and closed the door behind her. "I'm tired, too." She looked around. The room wasn't tiny, but it was fairly small. It fit a queen size bed and two small night tables, plus a small oak desk, compleate with wooden stool. Suddenly, her legs buckled underneath her, sending her to the floor.
Inuyasha sprung up, and helped pick her up and put her on the bed. She shook her head, as if to clear her mind. "I still feel funny. When we got here, I could hear and smell things that I couldn't before. And I feel like I have an excess amount of energy one minute, and then I have none at all."
This earned a worried look in Inuyasha's eyes. 'Is her human blood having a hard time adjusting to the demon blood?' he wondered as she continued.
"I've been feeling a little off ever since we left the hospital." Inuaysha sat down behind her, pulling her back to rest against his chest.
"Well, I might know what that's about..." Inuyasha said with a scared tone.
This confused Kagome and made her slightly uneasy. 'Since when has Inuaysha had a problem telling me something? And what is he talking about?...' she thought as she turned her head to face him. "Like what?"
He was quiet for a moment, thinking of how to tell her. "Okay, so we were in the hospital..."
"Yes, I know that."
"Be quiet and let me finish!" he told her sternly. She crossed her arms and Inuyasha recieved a scowl, but she didn't say a word. "Apparently, we had been asleep for almost a week. I woke up and talked to Miroku and Sango, and they told me that you hadn't woke up yet. Well, of coarse I was worried. But then Sesshomaru comes in and tells us that the syndicate somehow found out where we were hiding. He tells us we gotta leave. But we of coarse can't leave without you. So Sesshomaru tells me that he has an idea to help you heal quicker."
"Well, what was it?" she said after his slight pause.
"I told you to shut up, wench!" Inuyasha said as his grip around her stomach tightened. She gulped and nodded, knowing he was serious. "Okay, well he told me the only way to get you to heal faster was to give you some of my blood. So he helped me put my demon blood into your blood stream so you could heal quicker." All was quiet. 'Here it comes. She'll get pissed, slap me, and dump me on my ass...'
"So, does that mean that I'm a hanyou?" she asked after a moment.
"Wait, you're not mad?" he questioned.
"No. Why would I be? You only did it to save me."
"I don't know... I just thought you might be mad, that's all..." he muttered.
"Well, I'm not. So, am I a hanyou?"
Inuyasha sniffed her carefully, inhailing her new exotic scent. "No..." he said after a moment. "From your smell, I'd say you're probably one-fourth demon. Or somewhere around that."
"Wow... That's really cool!" she said excitedly as she turned and gave him a hug. "I can't believe you were scared to tell me that!"
"Hehehe... I guess I was kinda silly, huh?" he chuckled.
Kagome and Inuyasha laughed for a long time. They didn't know why they laughed, but it helped release the stress built up inside of them. Eventually, they fell asleep in eachother's arms.
Sango had her ear to the wall, trying to figure out why Inuyasha and Kagome were laughing their heads off in the next room over. 'What in the hell could be that funny?' she wondered.
"Ahhh... love," Miroku said from his position on the bed. He sat indian style, his back against the head board.
"What did you say?" Sango said as she returned to sitting on an end of the bed, facing him and sitting indian style, mimicking him.
"Nothing!" he replied quickly, knowing that if he said what he thought was going on in the next room, he would be sleeping on the floor.
Sango gave him an odd look, but she remained quiet. It was silent for a time. Eventually, the laughter died down from Kagome and Inuaysha's room.
"You know, you have a good shot, Sango. I never knew that you could shoot a gun."
Sango blushed lightly. "Yeah, well. It comes from playing that duck shooting game."
"From the old Nintendo?" he questioned.
"Yep. It was the only game I always beat Inuyasha at when we were little. To this day he still says that I cheat," she laughed. "He just couldn't admit that I'd beat him."
"That's how he is." They were quiet for a moment, just looking into eachother's eyes.
"Miroku?"
"Yes, my love?"
She smiled. 'I love it when he says that' she thought. "Do you think we'll get out of this alive?"
"Inuyasha is too stubborn to let any of us die. Besides," he said as he slipped off the bed and walked to the window. He sat on the sill and continued. "I wouldn't let anything happen to you. You're everything to me... I won't lose someone else that I love."
"That's one of the things the four of us have in common," Sango said as she went to the window sill and sat next to him. "We've all lost people we love. But," she paused and looked out the window. The sky was blanketed with brilliant shades of pink, orange and red, all eminating from the setting sun. "I think what doesn't kill us, makes us stronger. Besides, it brought us closer together as friends. We're all we have left now."
The couple sat gazing at the array of colors on the sky until the golden sun fell compleately beyond the horizon, revealing an ocean of stars that flooded the darkness of night with dim specks of white light. Miroku wrapped Sango in a hug and kissed her cheek lightly.
'Okay, she's in a good mood... Don't ruin it by groping her!' was the thought that kept continuously running through his mind. She yawned loudly, causing her cheeks to hurt from the effort. "Let's get some rest, love."
"Yeah..." she replied and allowed herself to be drapped to the bed. There they slept until morning. And Miroku even kept his hands to himself, for once.
To My Friends and Reveiwers -
animebaby08060 - Hehe! .
Inuyasha-454 - Now, I couldn't go and kill them, could I? Thanks!
Suaru - Hehe... sorry... Sometimes I like to be evil! It's sorta fun! Mwahhahahaa... (rubs hands together like a maniac)
Kagomegirl56 - You asked for it, and here you are! You're story is really good and should have more reveiws that it does! TTYL! :P
InuFreAK247 - I wanted to thank you for reveiwing for some of the earlier chappies! Now, go and reveiw for this one! YAY!
Hanyou Vixen - Good guess, and you're right! YAY! (hands her a package of Ramen) YAY! Nope, no more cliffies for a little while... maybe sooner... hehe... ;D TTYL! Love and Hugs!
Strawberrie Bunny - Thank you so much! I love fluff, too! I will continue to update, so don't worry! I wouldn't leave you hanging!
Kold - Hehe... That's your opinion! Thanks, though! It means a lot! I always update soon enough! (unlike you... :P)
Sarcasm Girl8 - Thank you!
JadeElemental - Well, I can't tell you if they're gonna be okay, cause then that would kinda ruin the story, don't you think? Anyway, yes, they are perfect for eachother, aren't they!?! Thanks for reveiwing for all the chappies! You rock out loud!
kells - Well, I really can't rememeber where I got my inspiration for this story... And maybe it is a bit much... But it's what comes out of my head! Can't help that, now can I? Hehe...
knifebladenails - It's okay! I have a life outside of this, too! Hmmm... creative and unique... I guess that could describe me! That's cool that I'm like that, huh!? (j/k) Anyway, TTYL! Love ya!
Lost-in-Dark - Yeah, Sango kicked some major... tire? Hehe! Thanks! I would love to have eyes like that! )
Okay, hope you all liked it! Okay, now REVEIW! (pulls out trusty sledge hammer and swings it around) Or else! Muwahhahahaha! (sees reveiwers running away) WAIT! Come back! (throws sledge hammer behind Christmas tree) That's better... (sees them coming back) Okay, now PLEASE reveiw! (gives reveiwers puppy dog eyes and sticks out bottom lip) Thanks! Adios, my amigos and amigas!
p.s. - Go read 'Summer of a Lifetime'! Please!
Ash