Mister Niceguy
A/N: So, at the time I started writing this, I had a little message that said "Wow, long time since last update, eh?" etc. etc. and chronicled what had occupied my time at the time. Well, watching the Gundam Wing boxset I got for $80 is no longer current, so now I'm going to blame depression, school, depression brought on from school (I'm going to fail Calculus! seppuku), Stargate and Stargate, and the various anime DVDs I've gotten for a lot cheaper than MSRP (namely all of the Slayers TV series). That and the fact that I've just been in one big artistic and...writertistic slump for some time, which is probably due in no small part to the aforementioned depression...But anyway, I'm gonna try to finish this chapter off and hopefully not go so long inbetween chapters (especially when what you get isn't worth the wait...) And hopefully the Kenshin Kyoto arc DVDs I just got from Half Price Books won't keep me too distracted in the future...coughcough
Disclaimer: I do not own Inuyasha or my pants. Wah.
Chapter 8: (Oooh, 8's my lucky number, y'know?)
Having been through so many battles with youkai during their journey, Kagome and the others had gotten almost accustomed to demon attacks. The surprise and fear they felt at the appearance of the deadly creatures had become minimal since the beginning of their journey, replaced with a down to business attitude of facing the situation head on.
But this time it was different. Where they would have usually grabbed their weapons and scrambled to the scene of battle, Kagome and Sango stood frozen in the confines of Kaede's hut.
"Kagome-chan…you sense a youkai right outside the hut?" Sango asked softly and tentatively. Her eyes betrayed a sense of worry, a gaze that was mimicked by the girl she addressed.
Kagome didn't respond. She merely stood there, frozen with the same worried look in her eyes. The girl was almost shivering, having come to the same unspoken realization that she knew Sango had reached as well.
Shippo however, was a little more dense than the two lovely ladies, and was becoming impatient at the lack of action. Not that he wanted to go fight the youkai, but it would be easier to hide if the girls would hurry up and take it on…
The little fox demon shook his head a little bit, the slightest shred of guilt and embarrassment at his thoughts coming over him. Shaking it aside, he looked up at Kagome and asked, "Hey Kagome, why do you look so worried about a youkai? We fight off demons all the time, why are you so upset now?"
Kagome snapped out of her trance and looked down at Shippo, worry still etched on her face. The worry was accompanied by a mild look of bewilderment. Did Shippo really not understand the situation?
"I know we've fought off tons of youkai before now…but what has changed since the last youkai attack?"
Shippo's eyes widened in understanding, and he slapped himself on the forehead. 'How could I have been so stupid! Inuyasha isn't himself anymore…Will he still be able to fight like he used to?'
Kagome returned to worrying about the situation when Kaede stepped into the "conversation."
"Well what are ye waiting for, girls! Inuyasha is out there left to fight the demon alone! We must hurry and help him!" The old woman yelled, gripping her bow tightly and strapping on her quiver of arrows. She quickly started making her way to the door when she tripped, having stepped awkwardly on her injured leg.
Sango quickly made her way over to catch the elderly miko, showing concern for their invigorated host. "Are you alright, Lady Kaede?"
Kaede brushed off Sango's assistance and vainly tried to return to her feet. "I'm alright, child. We must hurry!"
Kagome stepped in. "You're in no condition to fight like that, Kaede. You should stay here."
"Bah! I'm a tough old woman. A little sprained ankle isn't going to keep me from fighting off a youkai!" Kaede exclaimed, exhibiting a fervor for battle the girls had rarely seen.
But Kagome was much too stubborn to concede to the woman's demands. After all, she had contended with Inuyasha on a daily basis, and that task required her to be more stubborn than a mule. Kagome firmly addressed her elder in a manner reminiscent of the one she used when chastising Inuyasha, "No Kaede, you're too injured to fight. We can take care of the youkai ourselves."
A loud crash came from outside, and was followed by a yell that obviously belonged to Inuyasha. Everyone in the small hut flinched at the sounds.
Kaede was the first to recover, and still cranky, barked out a command to the two girls. "You two might be able to take care of things yourselves, but methinks that might not be true of Inuyasha at the moment. Hurry and go help him!"
The two girls jumped at the command, and Sango nodded and began to quickly change into her battle garb. In the short time she waited for her companion to complete the task, Kagome was left to mentally reprimand herself.
'Of course…I'm here worrying whether Inuyasha will be okay when I should be out there helping him. And here I am, still waiting…That's it, I'm going now!'
As soon as she broke out of her reverie to dash off alone to the battlefield, Sango was at her side, already changed and ready to go.
"Kirara, let's go!" Sango shouted and the two-tailed cat youkai transformed into her monstrous form without delay and joined the two girls on their way out the door.
Shippo stood up behind them, fearfully and slowly starting to follow when Kagome shouted out to him, "Shippo, you stay behind and take care of Kaede!" With that, the kitsune plopped back down, mentally exhaling a sigh of relief, completely forgetting his earlier guilt at brought about by his cowardice.
The girls made their way to the battleground to find Inuyasha crouching on the limb of a tree in a ready stance, prepared to bounce off and lunge toward the demon at it's next strike. Following the hanyou's gaze, they turned to discover what youkai had attacked.
A large ogre was struggling to get up. From the looks of it, Kagome thought that it had charged at Inuyasha, whose nimble evasion caused the ogre to crash into a tree. The young miko almost laughed at the thought of Inuyasha pulling such a cartoonish trick on a deadly foe.
Her amusement at the situation left her feeling relieved. Even though he was behaving differently, it seemed Inuyasha never lost his battle prowess.
Sango took notice of the slight change in Kagome's posture as the young miko relaxed a bit and lost some of the tenseness in her muscles. A bit confused at the change, but trusting in Kagome's judgement, the battle hardened demon slayer followed suit and allowed herself to relax as well.
They sat back and watched as the ogre finally made it's way up and turned to face Inuyasha. Anger was clearly etched on the creature's hideous face and hatred emanated from his gnarled features. Inuyasha remained completely unaffected, calmly and efficiently sitting in his battle stance poised to meet the ogre's next attack head on.
As the ogre stood there seething, a battle aura began flaring up from its gruesome figure. A few seconds later the beast's loathing scowl morphed into a dangerous smirk. With that the ogre began to charge towards Inuyasha.
Kagome tensed up a little as she saw the ogre once again take the offensive. Then her gaze returned to Inuyasha, and the impossible sight of Inuyasha cautiously, patiently and non-recklessly tending to battle relieved her once again, so she sat and waited to see how Inuyasha would finish a fight without resorting to his once favorite strategy of brute force.
The ogre drew nearer and Kagome kept waiting, expecting to see some clever and effortless movement from Inuyasha that would completely topple the ogre's blind fury. She detected the slightest movements from the hanyou just as the ogre drew within striking distance, and then finally Inuyasha swiftly drew his sword and performed a magnificent strike to the ogre that expressed a level of skill and mastery of swordsmanship that neither Kagome or her youkai hunter companion believed their half demon friend possessed.
But their awe soon turned to anguish as they saw the rest of the scene unfold before them. While Inuyasha's counterattack was beautifully executed and most certainly an uncontested finishing blow, the strike of Testusaiga tasted nothing but air instead of the ogre's flesh it was expecting to cleave.
Inuyasha lost his calm and composure, and then let out another yell as he felt a bone-crunching force strike him from behind. Struggling to maintain his balance in the tree, Inuyasha quickly turned around to see the ogre fade from his view as if it had vanished into thin air. His eyes widened in terror-filled realization just after another blow hit him from behind, dazing him and knocking him out of the tree.
The girl's watched in horror as they saw the ogre's teleportation trick in action. Seeing Inuyasha falling form brought forth an angonizing scream from Kagome, whose worry and concern for her friend instantly turned to hatred and anger for their enemy.
"Sango, let's go NOW!" Kagome ordered in a terrifying growl the likes of which the demon hunter had never heard escape from the kind-hearted girl's mouth. Seeing the look of hateful determination in Kagome's eyes brought a swift end to Sango's surprised staring, and she briefly nodded and ran into action with Kirara close behind.
'Let's take this ogre out, Kagome-chan! We'll make him pay!' she thought to herself. With that she loosed her Hiraikotsu, shouting its name as a battlecry.
The ogre finally noticed the new arrivals to the battle, and continued to smile arrogantly as he saw the approaching attack. He quickly teleported out of the path of the weapon and then back into the same spot once it passed, taunting the beautiful demonslayer by showing her how pointless her attack had been.
While the ogre was overconfidently directing his attention toward Sango, Kagome was all business. She let loose arrow after arrow, giving the distracted ogre no time to sense their approach and teleport out of their way.
The ogre winced in pain and nearly fell off of the tree branch he now resided on as one of the purifying arrows pierced his shoulder. He yanked the arrow out and the pain quickly subsided, and he began to laugh.
"Nice try little girl, but that was barely even a scratch! You have no chance against a Grand Ogre such as myself!" the beast gloated and laughed on. But what he hadn't noticed was that the second the arrow hit him, his battle aura had blinked out.
The ogre's battle senses picked up again, and he turned to the Hiraikotsu barreling through the trees on it's return course, heading straight for him. Arrogantly shirking off the "danger," the ogre stood up straight to meet the giant boomerang head on. As it drew closer, he closed his eyes and then triggered his teleportation trick...
...and nothing happened.
The ogre's eyes shot open just in time to see Hiraikotsu tear into his torso, cutting him in two. Then his eyes glazed over and he saw nothing as his life was brought to an end.
Sango caught her weapon and turned to congratulate Kagome on their victory, to find that the girl had already abandoned her position and sprinted over to Inuyasha.
Kagome approached Inuyasha, fearing the worst. 'Please, not again...Don't tell me something horrible has happened to him again...' Kagome was fighting back tears at the thought of Inuyasha being seriously injured again as she approached the spot where he had fallen.
Inuyasha was groggily coming to, rubbing his head after the shock of the blows he received and the fall he taken. He looked up to find Kagome standing next to him, and smiled a bit.
"Hey Kagome. What's up?"
Kagome was still and silent, not reacting to Inuyasha's calm and oblivious comment. Without a word she grasped Inuyasha in a tight embrace and smiled brightly.
"I'm so glad you're okay!" she said.
At that, Inuyasha remembered what had happened, and tensed up. "The ogre! C'mon Kagome, it's dangerous here!" he said, standing up and helping Kagome to her feet. As he started leading Kagome to safety so he could go back and finish his fight, Kagome stopped him.
"It's okay, Inuyasha. We took care of it. The ogre's dead."
Inuyasha turned to the girl, surprised. "You killed it yourself?"
Kagome frowned a little. "Well, me and Sango. But yeah, I couldn't just let it get away with hurting you, Inuyasha. I was so worried..." She trailed off as tears began to take over and the fear started belatedly sinking in. She had been so focused and consumed with anger towards the monster that she hadn't even had time to be scared.
Inuyasha saw the distress on Kagome, and gave her arm an enouraging squeeze. "Thanks, Kagome." With that he flashed her one of his newly charming smiles, and Kagome looked up and returned it.
Where before, Inuyasha's pride would've made him grumpy and irritated at the thought of being rescued by someone else, now he was actually thanking Kagome for coming to his aid.
'I wonder if I'll ever get used to this Inuyasha...' Kagome thought as the two started making their way back to find Sango and Kirara.
They found the two poking around in the two halves of the ogre's corpse. Realizing that the couple had returned, Sango addressed them.
"Ah, there you two are! Are you alright, Inuyasha?" He nodded and smiled, and Sango mentally blushed a little. Quickly regaining her composure, she turned to Kagome and asked, "Now that you're here, Kagome, can you tell where the jewel shard is? I can't seem to find it just by looking."
Kagome nodded and began focusing on the ogre's corpse. While she could sense the presence of jewel shards with little effort, Kagome had to focus carefully to actually locate where they were.
Kagome stared at the corpse for a couple of minutes before she finally looked up with a confused expression furrowing her brows.
"What's wrong, Kagome?" Inuyasha asked.
Kagome turned to face him for a second, then turned completely away from the ogre's corpse.
"Kagome-chan? What is it?"
"I didn't see any jewel shards in the ogre, but I think I sense them in this direction..."
"What? You mean ogre didn't have a jewel shard? Then how did he do that teleportation thing?"
Before the conversation could continue any further, the group heard a commotion nearby, and a cloud of dust and leaves and the like started moving closer. From that direction a voice shouted out...
"Don't worry, Kagome, I'm here to save the day!"
A/N: And that's all for now! Whee! Who is that mysterious voice? It probably won't be too hard to figure out, but oh well. I just wrote the opening A/N a little while ago, but now that I've actually worked on writing the story some more, I think I feel a bit more psyched to work on it some more now that I'm back in the groove or whatever. So hopefully it won't take so long to get another chapter out. Thanks to anyone whose still reading or taking the time to read my sorry little story for the first time. I appreciate it! And y'know what else I appreciate? Comments/Reviews/Whatever we call them around here! (it's been so long I forgot OO) So yeah, please review if you're so inclined. Thanks!