From Bad to Worse
Day One:
Oh how the world seemed bright and cheery as the sun filtered through the mildly dense foliage of the edge of the forest.
The birds sang their usual springtime dawn tune. The lovely notes reached the ears of the ever-fighting group of shard hunters as they prepared the morning meal.
That is until they were suddenly eaten by a shard-bearing youkai.
So said shard-bearing youkai promptly made their giddy way to the shard bearing hunters as they groggily sat down to have a nice warm breakfast.
"Oh shit, not again." Kagome muttered under her breath as she sensed two shards making their way toward her and her group with gaining speed.
Of course this little remark made the superior hearers of the group look up in surprise at her…except for Kirara, she was too busy with her catnip.
Kagome stood up from her now cooled meal and stated, "Two shards coming up fast, and they're corrupted!"
Miroku, Sango, and InuYasha got their weapons ready and faced in the direction that Kagome was pointing: toward the denser part of the forest.
Adjusting her quiver and notching an arrow in position on her bow, Kagome was ready to raise it toward the forest when a powerful wind from behind shook everyone from his or her balance.
"Kagura!" Miroku shouted as he craned his neck around and upward into the sky. Yet her presence was only a distraction to the real situation and threat at hand as the enormous reptilian youkai emerged and attacked from the forest.
Striking out with its lengthy scale-covered tail, the reptilian youkai pelted the taijiya and hanyou so that they flew across the clearing.
"Sango-chan! InuYasha! Are you alright!" Kagome shouted across the clearing as the youkai made it's way toward her with a vicious fang filled grin.
Her shards were what attracted the demon in the first place, as the youkai came closer a golden colored staff rested in front of her, as well as the owner; Miroku.
The monk grimaced as he retrieved sutras from his robes and chanted. The demon did not seem altogether affected by this course of action though.
But rather seemed to feed off of it. Which was unusual in it self, and puzzled the promiscuous houshi to no end. But he knew that this was no time to ponder the unique situation in such a way, so he started his second plan of action.
But was yet again foiled as he proceeded to undo his Kazaana covering because the infamous hell spawned insects from Naraku were released by the wind user Kagura.
Now with Sango and InuYasha back and ready to attack, this was not much of a problem to Miroku.
Sango swung her Hiraikotsu around at the reptile youkai and it sliced off its right arm.
The demon hissed in pain and anger as it watched its arm fly off to the ground and the taijiya catch her boomerang with ease.
What was most startling was Kagome suddenly dashing forward toward the glowing lump of flesh only seen by her and one others' eyes.
Of course not only did this startle the wounded youkai; it enraged it. So as it would happen, as Kagome held the shard in her hand purifying it, she was clawed at by the reptile youkai.
Blood sprayed against the ground as the muscles of the upper back were cut into, contracting in pain, and recoiling; practically pumping the blood out.
Slammed against the ground harshly, the injured taijiya grimaced at the pain, clutching her katana as she struck back.
She heard her friend gasp in shock, as well as the houshi. Yet she was glad that she had saved her 'sister'.
The next moment an arrow and a sutra raced through the air, plastering themselves on and through the youkai, finally defeating it.
Kagome quickly picked up and purified the second shard as Miroku ran to Sango's prone form on the field's floor.
"Sango! Sango, wake up! Please wake up…" Miroku cradled the young slayer as he took off his purple outer robe and tied it around Sango to stem the bleeding.
Kagome raced toward her backpack, diving inside of it, claiming the bandages within it and unfurling them. Lugging her bag with her, Kagome sprinted back to her fallen best friend and the near nervous break down houshi.
"Miroku! Untie the robe, I'll bandage her…InuYasha! Go get water!" She shouted. InuYasha just stood there, dazed.
"NOW! INUYASHA!" Kagome screamed in frustration at the bewildered hanyou.
Sango groaned and InuYasha snapped to attention and sprinted to get the water, muttering curse words along the way.
Shoving the newly fetched water in her hands, InuYasha stomped off to the side, grumbling about how Kikyo would never yell at him like that, and how Kagome would never yell at Kouga like that.
"Well obviously I wouldn't ever try to kill you like her either." Kagome shot at him darkly as she disinfected Sango's back wound.
InuYasha's eyes widened like saucers, "Mangy bitch running around with a mangy wolf, that's all you are." He bounded off into the forest, overflowing with anger, revenge, and most of all: Hurt.
Amazingly enough, Kagome dismissed the thought of going after InuYasha almost immediately. In her opinion, what to do? Go after a temper tantrum-induced hanyou, or tend to her best friend who could very well die in her arms and the arms of her secret love- or not so secret love- Miroku.
Honestly, she didn't see leaving her best friend as a choice. And if InuYasha couldn't see that, then Kagome wasn't going to worry her-self over it anymore. And she believed that her comment was justified, as it was the truth.
She quickly went back to work on her pained friend as Miroku tried to calm her, rocking her gently as Kagome tried to focus her miko energy to heal Sango.
Kaede had been training Kagome to try and focus her energy on healing and other tasks as well as being able to purify and destroy demons. So far she was really improving, though it didn't help it when InuYasha would constantly tell her that she would never be as good as the original, and that she was wasting her time. That she was only good for being a Shard Detector.
Kagome closed her eyes, put her hands over Sango's back and focused her mind on the task of healing Sango's wound. After a few moments a warm feeling sprang to her fingertips, and Kagome opened her eyes to see a soft pink light emitting from her hands and settling in the slash on her friends back.
The light soaked into Sango's flesh and started to piece the bloody skin and muscle tissue back together, as if the girls healing were sped up from weeks to mere seconds.
Miroku and Kagome sighed in relief that Sango would be alright, the healing taijiya was regaining consciousness as they took the warm water and started clearing off the blood from the now healed skin.
Sango blinked her eyes open slowly and looked around blearily, trying to set her mind right. She soon realized that the immense pain in her back faded completely…and that she was wrapped in the arms of a certain sexy monk…
BAM!-
"Ne, Sango-chan, he wasn't doing anything this time…" Kagome commented, suddenly sweat-dropping at her friends' initial reaction.
Sango looked down at her hand, and down at the fallen monk, now that she was standing that is. She suddenly became nervous as well as the now red-marked monk regained his consciousness and balance.
Miroku sat up and rubbed his cheek, "What did I DO?"
"Eh heh, heh…nothing really…it was just instinct…" Sango answered, scratching the back of her head in a nervous want to be off hand manner.
Kagome slowly started to slink away from the couple. When she finally got over to Shippo, she picked him up and started cleaning up the breakfast leftovers and the trash around their camp.
Shippo jumped down from her arms and frowned when he looked toward the far forest: he saw Kikyo's soul catchers and knew like everyone else would that InuYasha would not be far behind. That is if he was not already with the dead miko.
The tiny kitsune quickly averted his attention to elsewhere, such as helping his surrogate mother clean up the camp. He knew that if she saw, she would be sad; and that they still had to wait for InuYasha to come back so that they could continue to hunt shards.
Kagome went her merry way around the campsite, sneaking glances at the shy couple as they talked amongst themselves quietly by a large oak tree.
She felt a pang in her heart to see them so happy. A sad one, yet envious that they could be together when she was alone.
It's not as if she weren't happy for them, no, she knew that they deserved this chance, throughout all of this chaos with Naraku.
She looked up to see Kikyo's soul catchers nearby and out of the corner of her eye she saw Shippo pale, waiting for her reaction.
Yet she really had none. Kagome wasn't sad this time, she wasn't glad; granted. But she wasn't heartbroken anymore, she got over InuYasha; as he had seemingly gotten over her.
All it really made her do was miss that damn cockier than thou wolf demon; Kouga.
She didn't know how she developed feelings for him. They were always friends before, even though he always proclaimed his love for her every time they saw each other.
She honestly wanted to give herself time to think over his offer, but she knew she wanted to say yes. But she wanted to be absolutely sure, because once she said yes, there was no turning back.
Kagome considered the option of going home for the next two days, until Kouga would come to her again. She would like to get her mothers' opinion.
The girl suddenly grinned as she realized that this would be the perfect time to sneak away: with InuYasha gone and occupied.
Kagome did feel a bit guilty about just picking up and going home after all; he had run off sulky and mad at her!
Believing in working things out by talking, Kagome wanted to wait for him to come back. But the urgency to talk over the situation with Kouga to her mother exceeded the talk with InuYasha at the moment.
"Sango-chan! Could I please borrow Kirara? I need to go home for a couple of days." Kagome hated to interrupt Sango and Miroku, but she really needed to get home.
The flourishing couple started out of their almost trance-like behavior and Sango nodded to Kagome, signaling for Kirara to transform and take her friend home.
"Kagome-chan?"
"Hai, Sango-chan?"
"What about InuYasha…?"
"He'll be fine, I'm sure he'll forget about being mad after being with Kikyo." Kagome smiled, and yet, there was no bitterness this time. There was no irritation in the name Kikyo when she spoke it. Kagome grinned inwardly: She was finally growing up and out of her childish fantasies.
Sango blinked a few times at her friend. She had really matured over the past few months, getting over InuYasha, and improving her miko abilities.
She waved good bye to her friend as she climbed onto Kirara's back; saying goodbye to Shippo and that she would be back in a couple of days so he should not worry.
As the giant fire cat flew off towards the bone eaters well in the high noon sun, a pair of amber eyes watched her…
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Sorry to leave a bit of a cliffie everyone! --
But it seemed just like such a good place to stop…
Anyway! Be proud! I'm going to stay consistent with this story! I will always post a chapter within or at the end of the weeks' time. Such as how I posted this last Saturday and am now posting on the following one.
I hope to post the third chapter a little early, and trust me, this is all happening because of your generous reviews. I just love you guys to death!
So I would like to thank all of you reviewers out there for my story or stories !
tori007otaku- Honestly, I believe that it was your review that made me really want to update and not disappoint anyone! I like to be literate in my writing and my conversations. I was practically giddy that you and some other reviewers added me to their favorites' list so quickly. Thank you so much for your review! I hope that you enjoy this chapter!
Botan Jaganshi- Hiei's Girl- Thank you for your review! I'm glad you like the story! I hope to update more often soon!
The Violent Tomboy- I take it that you enjoyed my dry, if not perverted humor, ne? Well, I'm glad that my story made you laugh so much, I was hoping to get a reaction like that. Thank you for your review!
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- Slides just as ominously a bag of Sirius Sprinkles…-
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MadisonMohawksJD – Arigato friend, if I would have known, I wouldn't have asked you to read it. I still hope you liked the story in itself though!
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