Wow, it's been a while since I've published a chapter, seven months to be exact, I managed to finish one sixth of my army service during that time, only two more years to go.
I hate the army.
But for the chapter itself, apparently I can't live without writing, so here's a bit of story, enjoy it, as you won't see more coming out anytime soon.
Chapter 06: Together, perhaps?
"What are you doing here?" he asked silently, letting his hands feel her back, he remembered that in the past he did so many times, but it felt different this time.
"I've come looking for you" she answered, she told herself to move away from him, but her body didn't listen, she kept on hugging him, "Kikyo came to Japan and…" she started, but he quickly interfered.
"I'm sorry, Kagome, it's my fault she came after you".
She pulled away, hearing him saying that name was too much for her. "Sesshomaru and Shippo are waiting for us, where should I tell them to meet us" She took out the cellular phone, trying to focus her vision on the machine rather on the person.
"We don't meet them, let them search for a while, we need as many attention grabbers as we can get" he replied, thinking over the situation, he decided that he shouldn't have expected anything more, of course she would be angry, he thought. He pulled her away from the pink colored life she probably lead somewhere into his world of shadows. Inuyasha was quiet sure that some explaining were in order now.
"Listen, Kagome, it will probably come as a surprise to you, but me and Sesshomaru are running a secret agency in Japan.." Inuyasha started, Kagome almost shirked from surprise, but she was able to stop herself this time. Didn't he know about her being part of the NH? Shippo and Sesshomaru seemed to know, did Inuyasha simply not care all these years? And if so, why the sudden change?
"Obviously" she answered her own question, "nothing changed with him, I have something he wants, so he'll be next to me until he could snatch it away…".
Inuyasha kept on talking, 'reveling' to her the truth about the Sekigahara battle, without noticing she wasn't paying much attention to him.
"Where are you taking me?" She asked.
"Back to the club, I've left something important there, and we should clear up some issues with Bremen, the last thing we need is that they'll declare you kidnapped by the mystery driver." He smiled, "when we get there, give the phone to Iwaseki, he'll know what to do with it, also, ask him to take you into the bright moon room downstairs, there's something there you should pick up".
"What will you be doing at that time?" she glared at him.
"Naturally, I'll lie to Bremen, I'll make up a story about falling for you, and tell them that I've taken you to the embassy to get taken care of, Iwaseki will confirm my story, and that will be it"
"Naturally indeed" she hissed, "why not make up a different story? Actually, why not have me come in there and explain the situation?"
"They're rockers, they need the 'larger than life' stories to live on, it gives them something to dream about" he answered and stopped the vehicle, it was a back alley with a single door. "The back entrance to the club, only a few of us know about it, so go and talk to Iwaseki." Inuyasha said.
Kagome took the key he offered her and opened the door, the design was similar to that of the NH HQ building, many side rooms, some security cameras, "uhmm, Iwaseki?" she called, and the immediately regretted it.
A gun clicked behind her.
"How did you get here?" A man asked in English.
"Inuyasha gave me the key" she said, it wasn't the first time she was threatened by someone with a gun, but this person had a much more intimidating aura, she could tell it wasn't the first time he held a gun.
"If that's the case, shouldn't you be saying something right about now?" the man switched to Japanese.
"A password? Inuyasha never mentioned a password" Kagome thought to herself, all he did was rumble about the night hounds, and she hardly paid attention to that. Which meant that the password was probably related, a few sentences that wouldn't seem too weird if uttered in public. But would only make sense to those who expect to hear them.
"For the kids of tomorrow, one year from now and 500 years from today",
The man behind her lowered the gun, "I'm sorry about that, miss, can't be too careful. Can I assume you're the Kagome Inuyasha was waiting for and Ryo was talking about?"
"He mentioned me?"
"Ryo? He was screaming that we should call the cops right away, I barly managed to get sit him down…"
"I meant Inuyasha" she explained.
"oh, yes. He did mention your name a few times, but he has never explained the relationship you share" Iwaseki said, "Now, turn to the monitor on your right, it seems that he's about to begin his act".
"His act? What do you mean?" She turned to the monitor, it was a camera aimed at the club entrance, where the bands were gathered after a knock on the door.
"You'll see"
--------------0------------
Kagome stared at the screen while Inuyasha walked through the door, the moment he showed his face Ryo attacked him with a hammer kick of the 40cm heels. Inuyasha put his hands into a blocking position, but when the kick connected he was apparently overwhelmed by it's force and fell to the floor.
"hum, serves him right for underestimation them" Kagome thought to herself, had it been her, she decided, dodging such a blow would be easy.
However, a moment later, a fist went through the place where Inuyasha's face was before, and then some small projectile passed the spot which his eye was located at earlier.
"this is what I meant" Iwaseki said with a smile.
Kagome understood now, Inuyasha obviously saw all three attacks, and chose a method to avoid them with the least suspicion. Dodging the assault would make it seem like he was an expert, and taking all three of them would arise their suspicion as for why he would receive no visible damage on his body.
"Please, everybody, calm down." He asked of them, "Let me explain"
"It better be good" both Romio and Reiji both stepped closer to him, fists raised and ready to go for the kill.
"please hear me out" Kagome watched the screen as Inuyasha began his speech, "When that girl, Kagome, walked out of the van, something took over me, I don't know what it was, but I just had to be with her alone"
The men stopped moving, the two who were watching the play noted to themselves that Inuyasha's plan worked.
"Then, after a few seconds, I realized what I was doing, but I couldn't turn back at that point, so I kept driving around. Honestly, it never happened to me before, falling in love like that…"
"he's quite the actor, isn't he? Be careful not be fooled yourself" Iwaseki said to her while sneaking in a smile. Kagome didn't respond to him, but the thoughts in her mind were clear 'Don't worry; I won't be, not again'.
"but it's ok, she hit me a few times and planted some reason into me, so I took her to the Japanese embassy, it's really near, so you could go visit her tomorrow, if you want" Inuyasha continued.
"I guess it's my cue to step in now, with a recent call from you, who has found a hotel close by and wants to thank Ryo for her hospitality?" Iwaseki asked Kagome, she nodded, quietly confirming that Iwaseki also couldn't be trusted, he was too well-aware of Inuysaha's ploys.
He pulled out a cell phone from his pocket and started dialing, "why has he brought you here instead of the front entrance?" he asked her, the club's phone started ringing.
'Uhm, he wanted me to bring him something from a room called "bright moon", could you direct me to it?" Kagome said.
He turned her eyes at her direction, she could tell he was surprised, "he let you into his study room?" he asked in disbelief.
The disbelief was also shared by Kagome, her vision of Inuyasha didn't include a study room, defiantly not something that could force a reaction such as this from one of his close friends. "Yes, do you know what it is that he needs?" she asked.
"I don't have a clue, he never allowed me into that place…" Iwaseki said, he then began walking, leading Kagome to a small door, "it's here, I assume Inuyasha will be waiting for you outside when you're done".
"Thank you" She said.
"It's part of the job" Iwaseki answered, he then opened a different door and walked through it, the door led to a hallway with a different type of furniture, Kagome decided that it was the less secret part of the club.
"Now, what would that bastard want out of this pile of junk" she asked herself while opening the door to the bright moon room.
(88888888)(!)
Inuyasha sat in the van and opened the radio; it played an old evolution crisis song, a band who's vocals died a few years ago. It was already an hour since he left the club, Iwaseki 'explosive burst of rage' and threats to fire him made the play complete, the gangs both turned to Iwaseki and begged of him not to fire Inuyasha, saying that his actions were only because of love, and proclaiming that since he did bring Kagome to safety, there was no harm done..
Even though Iwaseki still 'fired' him, it meant that for all the band members knew it was a closed deal, and their recent sympathy they have shown towards him insured that they won't try to investigate about who he was or what really happened.
Humans were usually easy to predict, Inuyasha came to that conclusion a few decades ago. Despite what they claimed, their logic wasn't least objective, the 'reason' they took so much pride in was fragile to a point where anything could overcome it. Only a few humans really did manage to surprise him, among the were both historical figures and simpletons, people who ruled over armies of thousands and people who struggled to raise two kids while fighting poverty.
And today he met one of them, last time he met her he was still too young, he now knew, among them all, she was the gem who shined the brightest. With her at his side, nothing was impossible, at least nothing should be, and there was but one way to confirm it.
He felt the scar on his back burning, he considered it a good sign. Not many things could cause such a reaction in his body.
&&&8&&&8&&&
The study room wasn't what Kagome expected, that of course, after spending one minute of thinking what it should look like when she learned that he had a study room. Instead of being filled with ancient scrolls of Japanese Wiseman sayings and thesis, it was simply a dusty room with a large number of books and journals in it.
She walked up to one of the shelves and started reading the titles.
"Darwin and co. the evolution of the human specie" was the first book, Kagome found it quite surprising, but not nearly as much as the book next to it.
"Darwin and co. Borrowed evolution of the demonic races"
"just when I though it couldn't get any weirder.." Kagome thought to herself, even without wondering what was written inside the book, the title still raised the question of Darwin's involvement in the research process, was he himself a youkai? Kagome knew that youkais were still alive, but she has recently became painfully aware that they played a much more significant role in human society than she previously suspected, she couldn't help but wonder how many of human's achievement were actually done by demons, or how many world leaders were only pretending to be humans.
She opened the book and started reading, it was written in English:
"Following the recent discussions of the mountain hermits and the Vatican's disclosure of the sealed thesis of the soul wars, I've decided that it was appropriate to combine my theory with the old demon mythology, in order to create a document from which future debates and theories could start. C. Darwin"
Kagome closed the book, figuring that further reading would only raise more questions that she couldn't answer, just that small paragraph noted four important points: A. Darwin was a human, after all. B. The Christian Vatican archive held scrolls with demonic origins, meaning that the people she thought of as old coots probably knew more than she thought. C. there was a group of people or youkais called mountain hermits, probably not the mountain sennins she remembered meeting. D. Somewhere in the distant past, a war broke out, and the youkai referred to it as the soul wars.
She decided to move on to the next shelves, the first book was a much more conventional one, and so were the ones after it.
"Explorers of the rain forest 1950-1990"
"Aztec tribes' collection"
"The wilderness of brazil"
"Argentina in seventy days"
"South America history"
On their own, that list of books didn't surprise her, she recalled seeing some of them in the airports book store, so they weren't any surprise.
However, the lack of any demon authored book was noticed by her, and the fact that almost half of the books in room were about South America was also noted.
"so, next stop it South America?" Kagome asked herself, the amount of books spread around made it seem very likely. She then remembered something that Benkei once told her, legends that passed through both sides of his family, about places that Youkais wouldn't dare venture into, not because of holy protection, but actually quite the opposite. Bigger, Ancient Youkais. A complete continent that was ruled by a stronger race of youkais, and all the others wouldn't dare stepping a foot onto it.
Then, if Inuyasha had to resort to use human authored books, did it mean that south America was normally inaccessible by youkais? Indeed, that probably was a great plan if he wanted to disappear, but if that was the case, someone else should have thought about it earlier. Even he himself could have stayed there instead of traveling around the world so long.
"Unless, the needed conditions couldn't be fulfilled at that time" Kagome thought to herself, and whatever those needed conditions were, it probably had something to do with her.
She then heard a knock on the door.
(888888)
Most of the times, Inuyasha considered the feeling of his scar to be a sign that something interesting was about to happen, as to whether it was good or bad, that didn't matter much to him.
The scars he received from the battle with Naraku took twenty years to heal completely, this one was already nearing its seventy birthday, and still no sign of recovery. The enemy that time was truly remarkable, stronger than anything he met before, and still, only a prologue to what may happen if all the youkais in that continent awaken.
This time, however, the scar was burning for too long, the pain waves washed his entire body, making it impossible for him to move, or even call for help, not that anyone could help, of course. The scar was contaminated with great amount of youki and jyaki, in other words, Miasma. It was incurable, before the battle began, all the demons who participated in it agreed that if they survive, they would use the best of their abilities to help the wounded, and still, not one of the demon lords could cure it. The agreement itself, obviously, was unheard of, during history, demons, especially those of high class and power; tended to use any opportunity they had to, for lack of a better word, screw each other over.
Needless to say, it didn't happen in that battle, every single one of them knew the consequences of losing, the vampire, the werewolf, the dragon, he and Sesshomaru, and the rest of the demons, it was clear as daylight (or, as the vampire said, "as clear as watered down blood", Inuyasha never understood that east European lingo) that if one ancient youkai is allowed to wake up, he could easily awaken the rest of his race.
Inuyasha tried to keep on remembering the past, but the pain was too hard to ignore now, and more than that, he knew exactly what was about to happen. The miasma will outflow the scar into his blood circulation, causing his body to activate its self defense mechanism, which will result in a loss of over one third of his blood, and a temporary inability to move a muscle.
"it's here" he told himself, trying to hold his scream as his veins started to erupt, hanyou blood gushing all on his clothes, "hold it in" he kept on telling himself, had Shippo been around, it could have been an easier process, still painful, but at least tolerable. Though, if he thought about it clearly, Inuyasha would have probably come to the conclusion that moving around without the seal on his hanyou abilities could be as painful as the scar's eruption.
All that Inuyasha had left to him now was just to wait, silently as possible, until the pain would pass, "I hope Kagome has a driver license" he thought to himself.
----!----
"Inuyasha?" Kagome shouted.
"If I was him, I would have gone inside already, wouldn't I?" the voice shouted back from behind the door.
"Iwaseki then?" She asked.
"Yes, can I come in?" he said.
"Sure!" She shouted, she still had no idea what Inuyasha wanted her to bring, so she assumed that Iwaseki may know.
He slowly opened the door, "oh, so this is how this room looks like" he said, "I was expecting something more special".
"You mean this is the first time you've visited it?'" Kagome asked.
Iwaseki simply nodded, "Inuyasha was very clear about it, he said that he would rip me to shards if I even touch the door while he's gone".
In some twisted manner, it pleased Kagome to hear that, at least it meant that Inuyasha hasn't completely changed.
"And now that you're in here, what do you think he wanted me to bring?" she asked. Kagome came to the conclusion that it couldn't be just the books, if their next desteniation was really south America, then the youkai authored books would be useless to carry around, and the other could be purchased at any bookstore.
"Probably the package he brought two days ago, though I don't see it anywhere" Iwaseki answered in a somewhat displeased voice.
"What's wrong?" She asked.
"Nothing, I just wish I haven't opened the door, the room was much more interesting before, now it's just the normal Night Hounds office, I've seen a couple of these, they all have the same design" He murmured and left the room.
That remark was enough for Kagome, if it truly was modeled the same as her own office, then it should hold the same features. She tried picturing back to her office, or rather, the time when she received it from her superior.
"This looks like the normal type of office, Sir. I don't think I need any help understanding what to do with a desk and a bookshelf, and I perfectly aware of the sofa's functions" Kagome said, it was still at the time when she was part of Cell 15, her assignments were limited to data processing and co-working with the Japanese police.
"I know you are, so just shut up and listen, the desk has a special drawer on the inner right side, and that's where you'll store your personal gun, if you ever receive one" her superior said, she always thought of him as a bitter man, the rumors said that he was kicked out of one of the special units because he lacked social skills and was far too cruel to others.
"and moving on, behind the bookshelf you'll find a self destruct button, once you push it, you'll have twenty seconds before the door collapses and the smoke alarms turns into a napalm bomb" he continued the explanation, the more time Kagome spent under his command, the more it became clear to her that the rumors were probably true, he did lack social skills.
"now, there are two safes in the room, for now, you'll use only one, it's under the sofa, you'll store there money jewelry and pictures. Nothing work related. I'm conducting surprise inspections, so if I ever find something else there, you'll be sent to finances faster than a bullet between the eyes".
"So, what's the point of having a personal safe if I'm not allowed to put there anything important?" She asked, secretly wondering where he got that metaphor, though it did reinforce the conclusion she reached earlier, he seriously lacked personal charisma.
"Shut up, I was getting to it. The safe under the sofa is a fake, if we're ever under attack and we're forced to self destruct, the enemy will find it and stop looking for more. The real safe is in the back wall, if you're ever forced into a situation where you have an important item and are chased by the enemy, you're supposed to lock it inside the real safe."
"What's with all the security? Are we expecting an attack on the head quarters? Who can oppose us? we're working with both the police and the military" She tried to ask, he simply brushed her off.
"a rookie like you should shut up and stay silent until someone speaks to you, don't ask pointless questions"
That was the time when she realized why the sofas were so uncomfortable to sleep on.
(8888)(8888)
Kagome turned to desk, it did have the inner drawer on the right, but it was dusty and empty, "figures, Inuyasha doesn't need a weapon to defend himself from most enemies, and the Tetsusaige wouldn't fit into that drawer.
Moving on, Kagome pushed all the books off the sofa and laid down on it, it was surprisingly rough and rather painful, it confirmed her suspicions that there was a safe under it. She pulled out the sofa and looked at the safe, it was the regular low quality safe that she also had in her office, it was designed so the enemy would quickly break it and be deceived not to look elsewhere.
"If it's the same, then it should fall apart with three turns to the right…" She thought to herself, her boss, who she now knew as Bossuke, said that his superiors, which she now knew were Sesshomaru and Inuyasha, instructed them to keep the safe at that condition.
The safe's door fell off, as she expected, she looked at the content of the vault, it had just more books, she read the first title.
Ireland mythology: Loki and Ragnarok
She didn't bother reading the rest, as she suspected, it was all meant for distraction, all the books were authored by humans.
Kagome pulled back the safe's door and connected it, she turned the lock five times to the left, until she heard the click sound, she then turned around and walked up to the wall. "The lever should now be unlocked" She told herself, somewhere in the room, there was a way to open the second safe.
---------
The immediate pain left inuyasha's body, all that was left now were the stains of blood on his clothes and the inability to move a muscle, even his eyes were heavy to move, though his mind was working at full capacity. And because of that, he knew what he missed earlier, he didn't tell Kagome what to bring, and even if she looked around all day, she'll never find any of the safes.
"maybe she'll ask Iwaseki to help" he hoped silently, though even Iwaseki's chances of finding the package were slim at best.
Just then, someone opened the van's doors.
"I think I've found it" Kagome said, she handed him a brown bag, "I've never thought I'll get to see that coat ever again in my entire life, same with the sword".
He turned his eyes to her, as he knew already, she was still able to make that sort of face. Inuyasha wanted to respond to her, to ask her how she found it, but his mouth didn't move.
"oh, aren't you grumpy?" she looked at him, she threw the bag to the back sit, "are you mad that you had to wait?" she asked.
Then, a phone rang inside the car, Kagome pulled out the Shippo's cellular phone, the letter S flashed on the screen, 'Sesshomaru' she guessed to herself, "it's your brother, do you want to speak with him?" she turned to Inuyasha.
"What's wrong with you? You can at least answer me…"
"It's a final warning; don't ignore me like this… "
"SIT!"
When Inuyasha's body slammed to the car sits, Kagome noticed that he didn't take any measures to reduce the damage from the crash, she also noticed that something splashed on her, blood.
Kagome turned on the car's inner light, when she looked at him at clear light she also noticed that she hasn't seen any signs of aura from him.
"can you reflect that attack?" the older brother asked, though the flying bits of earth made a noticeable amount of sound, the younger brother still managed to hear the question and respond.
"not a chance, even if my sword was a hundred times stronger, the rate of actual youki inside the bullet is far too low for a Bakuryuha to have any effect, the only thing we have going for us is the cool down time between each shot"
"some advantage, it just means that instead of blowing us apart from long range he needs to hack us to pieces from a close range, or do you two puppies think you can dodge his tentacles?" this time it was a werewolf to speak, he was a few centuries older than the elder brother, and even though he has ruled over his region with an iron grip for the past 1200 years, he too felt powerless.
A bat appeared next to them, it was red and black, they recognized it as a message from a different team member, the lord of vampires, as he called himself. "greetings, fellow warriors of pride, I have news which will merit us in the battle, for I believe that the vile ancient still has weaknesses for us to exploit"
The bat began broadcasting pictures into their minds, it was a faster way to share strategies rather than simply discussing it.
The strategy wasn't perfect, to say the least, it based itself purely on the enemy's suspected flaws, the old scrolls from the Vatican said that the greatest demons, Amon and Siren, only fought once every few years, especially at the later days of their 'career', the obvious question was for what reason did they wait.
The answer, as Darwin suggested, was connected to the fusing attributes of the demons, at first, they would take on almost completely the form of the victim, and only later they would have found the correct balance between his old powers and his new one.
And since their enemy hasn't been awake for a long time, it meant that his was still in his first stage of fusing, and hopefully, he took some of the flaws that the gun had.
"after he shoots, we do whatever we can to dust, rust and bend his blowhole, if we are lucky, he would misfire, which would leave him with semi working melee abilities"
In a great turn of luck, the plan worked, the ancient youkai was killed in the end, with him, three other youkais died, one by the creatures tentacales, one by a radiation ray and the third died when he and Inuyasha were stung by the scorpion-like tail.
---0-0----
He woke up, the scar didn't as much now, but the dream gave him a new look on his plan, and not a refreshing one, he wasn't even strong enough to fight the weakend demon alone, so what would happen to him if he came across a demon that can utilize 100 of his powers?
No, this time it will have to be different, he would have to make it different, create a windscar that is not only enough to blow Naraku into dust, but one strong enough to kill an awakened demon, a wave strong enough to overcome barriers of will.
And if she was by his side, then it was possible.
He opened his eyes and looked to his left, he saw kagome sleeping next to him, her hands were placed over one of the freshly opened wounds.
Yes, it was possible.
Chapter six - over.
Yes, that was the chapter, with a seven months gap between it. Read and review please, old and new readers, there's nothing like getting some reviews to a story (though, to check for reviews, I need to be home which a prize not like any other is.