Little Miroku and the Wandering Child

Chapter 3

"Turned into a child, was he?" Kaede pondered this news for a moment, sitting in the middle of the group who circled her. Inuyasha stood by a wall watching the scene casually, as Kagome and Shippo sat across from him. Sango sat by the door, halfway in-between both, her arms crossed and not looking very happy.

"Yeah," Inuyasha replied. "And he's kinda been actin' like one too, I guess."

Kaede furrowed her brows and absently stirred the hot soup bowl next to her. "Very odd indeed. Maybe if he could retell me everything that happened . . . Where is Houshi-dono, anyway?"

Kagome and Shippo both looked over at Sango and Inuyasha glanced over to her out of the corner of his eye. Sango's eyes narrowed and she shut them quickly trying to kick the thought out of her mind.

"Outside," she mumbled in a halfway between a huff and teeth-clenching way.

"You are the cutest little boy I have ever seen!"

Miroku grinned from ear to ear as he sat amongst four young women, each cooing over him and praising him in all sorts of ways.

"Now, now ladies, there's plenty of me to go around," he assured setting his hand on the hand of the girl closest to his right.

The girls giggled, but he did not recognize it as the giggling he was used to. The shy, flirtatious giggling he knew many girls, especially those in Kaede's village, to have. This was more of an entertaining giggle, as if something was funny to them. Then he realized, he was nothing more of than a cute little boy to them, and would definitely not be able to get anywhere. When this dawned on him he heaved a great sigh.

"Ah, Houshi-dono. It is true of your height, it's always good to be taller than others," Kaede joked at seeing Miroku. The group had come with her, and Miroku quickly stood up.

"Kaede-sama, how pleasant to see you," although it can be said that the second part of that sentence was said because he was looking over at Sango, who really was just as beautiful when she was angry. The village girls were always a little fun to tease and such, especially when the thought that he needed an heir before his death plagued the back of his mind. Nevertheless, his ways around those girls were practically frivolous in relation to his feelings for her. He never lied when he told Sango his heart belonged to only her, so it always made him wonder why she got so angry still.

"Now, Houshi-dono," Kaede's words snapped him out of his thoughts. "Relay to me everything that happened before you found yourself in this predicament."

"And then I woke up, and I was like this."

Kaede nodded at him. They had returned to Kaede's hut where they all sat listening to the story they, also, had just heard completely. Sango's wave of jealousy over the adjectives Miroku had used to describe the girl was now replaced with curiosity as they all silently waited for Kaede's response.

"I'm afraid cases like this are not well-known," Kaede began.

Inuyasha snorted. "We didn't come all the way to see you for no reason."

"That's right," Kaede nodded. "You didn't. All I know, is there is a mountain south of here where it is said many children go wandering to and when they emerge, they have aged into adulthood."

"Really?" Miroku asked with a newly sparked interest.

"Indeed," Kaede responded. "However, the only reason these children have aged is due to the fact that years go by, you see."

"Ah," Miroku replied lamely.

Inuyasha approached the two in the center of the room. "But there's a reason why all the kids go to the mountain, ain't there?"

Kaede shook her head. "None that I know of, it is a mystery, but in these times no one bothers troubling themselves with looking to see when they have their own lives to take care of."

Kagome caught Inuyasha's eye. "What do you think, Inuyasha?"

"I think I know what mountain she's talkin' about," Inuyasha replied crossing his arms again. "It might be worth a look, but if it ends up just being a refuge for runaways then we wasted a whole day . . . "

It was understood. Like Inuyasha said, if they departed for the mountain in the morning only to find nothing of use, then they would have wasted that day and Inuyasha would turn human that evening, then they may need to find shelter. It was all rather difficult.

Shippo popped up next to Miroku. "Maybe the children are actually sprites who play pranks on humans by turning them into children. It's possible."

"Perhaps," Miroku replied, trying to consider what would be the best thing to do and be fair to everyone and not be the handicap amongst them.

"I don't see what point there is in thinking too deeply into it," Sango finally spoke up and all eyes were on her. "I mean, we have a lead . . . we should follow it. That's how you exterminate demons, follow leads until it gets you somewhere."

Even though her analogy was seen as a good idea by everyone else, Kagome could not help but send her a knowing smile. She knew Sango wanted Miroku back to his rightful age again, not just for him either.

Inuyasha shrugged. "I don't care, but that means you all need to get to sleep. We're leaving early tomorrow."

Miroku rolled from him back to his side, then from his side back to his back. He continued doing this as he dreamed. "Father," he whispered in a scared voice. He writhed on the floor again and gave a soft cry, then abruptly sat up and opened his eyes. He was breathing hard, and for some reason he could not figure out why. Was he talking in his sleep again? Was he rolling all over the place? He had not done this stuff in years, what was happening to him?

His eyes trailed over to see Shippo and Kagome cuddling together under one of her blankets. He frowned and felt a little lonely. Then his eyes traveled across the room to see Sango lying with one of Kagome's blankets, too. Kirara not with her like usual, she must have been out hunting for food. For a moment, he looked down at his makeshift bed, considering trying to go back to sleep, but the nightmare worried him too much. Then, without really knowing what he was doing and as if he had no control of his body, he stood up trudged over to Sango's sleeping form. He could not say he was not surprised; Sango usually jolted awake at any sounds of a person coming close to her. Then Miroku remembered her sore leg, and how she kept up walking on it all day. She must have been exhausted.

Sitting on his haunches, Miroku lifted up the edge of Sango's blanket and scooted underneath it. When he was sure she still was not awake, he threw the blanket overtop of him and laid down beside her. Generally, he would have touched her somewhere or had a big, lecherous grin on his face. Oddly enough, however, he was merely content with his situation and fell asleep quickly. Sango opened one of her eyes and looked down at him. Generally, she would have smacked him for committing such an act, but he was not doing any harm. Besides, she could not exactly place it, but something had been different about Miroku ever since he did turn into a child. He had been acting peculiar, sometimes like his normal self, but sometimes as if he were a seven-year-old child. Nevertheless, she did not worry about his presence at that moment. With his back pressed against her shoulder, she could feel him lightly breathing, and this rhythmic feeling soon made her fall asleep, also.

Inuyasha was not completely surprised to see Miroku and Sango the next morning. Those two had been so strange the past couple of months he gave up being surprised and just shrugged everything they did nowadays right off. Using Miroku's staff, he poked at the top of Miroku's head.

"Wake up, ya wanna grow up or what?"

Miroku woke up and rolled over onto his stomach, looking up at Inuyasha who was glaring down.

"I'm grown up, thank you, Inuyasha. My physical appearance just does not wish to agree with that."

"Yeah, yeah." Inuyasha grabbed the front of his robes and lifted him up, setting him back down on his feet. "You can ride with Sango, I'm done chewing your ear out. Do me a favor though, try not to screw up too much more, okay?"

Miroku sighed at him and dusted off his robes. He glanced over at where he had woken up and felt happy suddenly. Hade he really slept the whole night with Sango?

"Sango, Kagome, let's go," Inuyasha attempted ushering them out of the hut. Kagome was still half asleep and asked incoherent questions that no one understood, and thus were incapable of answering.

Kirara turned into her larger form and Sango was about to climb on top of her when she saw Miroku approaching her. Without any words, she bent down and picked him up, and at first he was surprised as she carried him over to Kirara's back. He blinked a couple times and was just about to accept this, until he realized that he had not been acting himself long enough and would not allow Sango to help him like this without him repaying her. Just as Sango sat him down atop of Kirara, he wrapped his arms around her and laid his head on her chest.

"Thank you so much," he replied, and nuzzled against her breasts.

Sango jumped back and held her hand out to smack him. Yet again, though, she just could not find herself to smack him. "Houshi-sama . . . Why can't I hit you?" She accidentally asked aloud, but did her best at not showing embarrassment at her actions.

Miroku gave her a smirk, but before he could respond, Inuyasha walked up behind him and hit him hard on top of his head, like he did to Shippo many times, and Miroku fell off of Kirara and hit the ground.

"Thanks," Sango said to Inuyasha, who sneered down at Miroku as he went to explain to the half-asleep Kagome that she did not need to bring her backpack with her.

Miroku looked up at Sango, who was peering overtop of Kirara to glare at him. His head hurt a lot, and he suddenly felt bad for Shippo who endured such pain all the time.

"You better behave," she warned, this time allowing Miroku to climb onto Kirara himself and, while on top, rub his head in agony.

"Inuyasha," Kagome mumbled, "Miroku-sama . . . that berry he ate must have been a secret potion."

"Is that what the old hag suggested?" Inuyasha asked absent-mindedly.

Normally, Kagome would argue with him over saying such mean things about people, but she was too tired to do so, so she merely nodded her head. Then, remembering Inuyasha could not see her, she murmured a confirmation.

"We'll have Miroku keep a look out for those berries he saw," Inuyasha said aloud, all though he was mostly talking to himself. "That'll lead us somewhere, too."

Generally when Miroku and Sango rode together on Kirara, Miroku would sit behind Sango and hold his staff in front of her horizontally so that he had a place for it. Now with shorter limbs than before, he had to hug pretty closely to her back for his arms to reach each side of the staff, which now had a different center of balance due to his not being able to reach very far out, so every time Kirara turned his staff slid that way and he had to wait until they were straight before he could hold it right again. It did not annoy Sango as much as one would have expected it to, but she had asked countless times if he wanted her to hold it for him. His pride would not let her.

End of Chapter 3

A/N: Well, it appears this story is going to be six chapters long, so I though I would send out the first half of the story for you all to marinate in. Tell me what you think so far. I'm almost done, I'm on chapter 5. You may have noticed that this isn't as humor-centered as most stories with this concept is, that is because I am trying to focus more on the plot and making it seem real. I hope it is not too unappealing, I try to throw in humor as I tend to be pretty popular at using it. Anyways, as I said... here is the first half. Chapter 4 may be out by the middle of the week, I need to tweak it a little. :) As always, thanks for reading!