It's been a long time…I've been busy, but that's not the reason for the extremely long time between updates…I just couldn't write for a while. Anyways, I've finally managed to get back into the mood to write and worked myself up to update this story.

Chapter Seven: Rabid

Episode One: Seeing Red

Blood. He could see it even before he struck. It seemed to coat the night, an envelope of red over the world. Hiten and his two brutes were standing over Kagome, who was half-naked, herself, and their attention was firmly fixed upon her. He was upon them in an instant, and one of the brutes happened to look up in time to catch five sharp claws in his face.

Inu-Yasha dragged his claws deeply through the brute's face before pulling back to swipe at the other, fingers covered in blood and one eye hanging on the end of his talons. The thing screamed in pain but was quickly joined by the agonized cries of its similar. Inu-Yasha took the rib bone that he had pulled out of the second brute and stabbed it at Hiten, who managed to dodge it at the last second. Instead, Inu-Yasha plunged the bone downwards into the back of the fallen demon and into its heart, rejoining it with its friends.

Hiten leapt away and hurriedly grabbed up his spear, but Inu-Yasha was much too fast for him. His talons lopped away the end of the spear and then clamped painfully around Hiten's fragile neck. Hiten's hand grasped at Inu-Yasha in a futile attempt to do anything. Grimacing, or perhaps grinning, Inu-Yasha tightened his hold, crushing the demon's throat. Blood trickled down out of Hiten's mouth, and he spit in derision at the hanyou. The demon's blood on his face only made Inu-Yasha hungrier to kill, however, to bathe in blood.

By pure chance, Hiten's hand managed to find the sword still imbedded in Inu-Yasha's shoulder. Laughing, or choking, in triumph, he yanked the sword free of the hanyou and plunged it again into his chest. Inu-Yasha growled furiously and stared at the sword as if trying to figure out what it was, then he tightened his grip still more. Hiten wrenched the sword free and stabbed again and would have tried once more, but Inu-Yasha slapped his hand from the hilt in annoyance.

Looking from sword to demon, Inu-Yasha finally came to the conclusion that he didn't want to break Hiten's neck. He wanted more blood. The hanyou dropped Hiten to the earth and drew the sword out of his breast. Hiten sobbed and gasped on all fours before the sword-wielding monster. Inu-Yasha rasied the sword high, hoping to lop off something large but not fatal, when the surviving one-eyed brute crashed into him from behind.

The thing tackled him to the ground, but he kicked at it and rolled away and back onto his feet. The thing lumbered to its feet just in time to have the sword driven through its remaining eye. The sword stuck out from the back of its skull, glistening darkly. Out of weapons, the hanyou turned back to Hiten, flexing his claws.

Hiten managed to bring himself to his feet, but his balance was unsteady and he nearly fell over twice before Inu-Yasha made a move towards him. He didn't even manage a shout. Claws tore at his chest, his arms, his legs, his stomach, his face and eventually his throat. Inu-Yasha quite literally tore the demon apart, enjoying each new fountain of blood, each wet ripping sound as he tore flesh from flesh.

By the end, it was hard to tell exactly what parts of Hiten were what. Most of the bones were whole…a few claw marks, but unbroken, but all of the flesh had been shredded and flung about haphazardly, like bright red confetti. And Inu-Yasha stood in the center of it. A noise caused him to leap from his party mess. He landed, claws raised to find Kagome retching behind a tree.

She drew away from him a little, but seemed too weak to make any real attempt at escape. Her clothes were in better shape than his, which were tattered rags somewhere, stained with blood, but anything would have been better than those. Her shirt had been completely ripped down the front so that her breasts were exposed, and her skirt was shredded at the bottom and torn in half down the middle. She made an effort to close the flapping halves of her skirt, but it didn't work, and there was no way those bits torn cloth were going to cover her bosom.

Suddenly Inu-Yasha grew quite dizzy. The blood, and Kagome's current dress, or lack of it was affecting him in a strange way. His blood began to boil, if possible, even more than it already had been. Somewhere inside of him, there was a rational bit of the hanyou called Inu-Yasha, but it was overwhelmed completely in the demon blood coursing through his naked body.

Once she had realized Inu-Yasha wasn't going to kill her, and after she had realized her clothing was impossible, Kagome had finally noticed Inu-Yasha's own clothing problem. She blushed faintly and her eyes slowly tracked downwards…Kagome's expression suddenly became very surprised, embarrassed, angry, disgusted, and then angry again very quickly. Forgetting that Inu-Yasha was a mad killing machine, she shouted "Sit!"

Inu-Yasha crashed to the earth, sending several sprays of blood as wounds reopened suddenly. His growl was murderous, and his eyes still glowed the colour of blood. He levered himself back up and grabbed a tattered piece of Kagome's shirt, pulling her against him. Her eyes widened and she nearly blushed again, but her anger was not yet gone, and the reminder in her stomach only made her more furious and humiliated.

"Sit! Sit! Sit!" She shouted for all she was worth, which admittedly was not much at this point. Somehow, Inu-Yasha seemed to flash out of sight before she finished the first word, causing her to lose her balance. By the time she had finished the third 'sit', she was on her butt and Inu-Yasha was nowhere to be found.

The sun rose slowly. It had been a long night…a scary, sickening long night. Kagome had felt physically ill at the though of the bodies laying about her, but she had been too frightened to leave the spot. With the red rays of morning now lighting the clearing, she felt the need to vomit some more. So she did. The gore was even worse in this light than she had expected. The red light made the blood and gore shine, and there was a lot of blood and gore.

Inu-Yasha had never reappeared. Kagome wasn't sure what to think of that. She was scared of that murderous thing he transformed into, but she didn't think it was really him. And he'd return to normal, soon…wouldn't he? She crawled over to the lump of rags that was his clothing. They were covered in blood, and even if they hadn't been, they were in even worse condition than her own, so she was still essentially naked.

She held them against her breasts nonetheless, not for decency, but for comfort. An hour passed, possibly two, and Inu-Yasha had not returned. She was stranded in the middle of a demon-infested forest in the feudal era, with no Inu-Yasha and no clue how to get back home. Kagome was already crying when the wolves came.

End of Episode One

I know it was short, and it's only a part of the chapter, but I figure that the end of the previous chapter was a bit of a cliff, so anyone who was reading might be impatient to find out how it turned out. I don't expect to keep updating in short pieces, but this is one of the exceptions. The rest of the chapter will come out soon…I mean it this time…really.