Military service update: I've gone down to a platoon, I have absaloutly no idea what's it's like, but I'm hoping it'll be nice.
Anyway, a chapter that focuses on Kagome and Inuyasha, if you like endless dialogue that doesn't get to the point, then this will be one of your favorite chapters.
If you don't like… well, you probably didn't even read the earlier chapters, right?
Let the story beg.. Uhm, Continue!
Chapter nine: The Whole World is a Bitch.
When the two stepped down from the plane, it was Kagome to first notice the strange symbol on one of the pictures in the various newspapers.
"it's a wonder how all the tabloids have managed to capture this one fireman from the same angle… his family probably made a wall with all his pictures by now". The headline of the paper was "The Second London Fire", concerning a sudden mass arson that occurred.
"probably there was only one guy low enough to take pictures instead of helping, and he only had one decent photo" Inuyasha said while looking at the business section of the paper, some stocks he owned fell because of the panic in London, but as usual in those cases, the companies that were set in Asia stocks have skyrocketed. "And because he wanted to sell the photo to different newspapers he photoshoped the background each time".
Inuyasha took a look at the girl besides him and started laughing, he threw away the paper.
"What's so funny?" Kagome looked at him, trying to remember if she ever saw him laughing so hard, or for the same matter, looked so intelligent.
"Sorry, Kag. It's simply that I've been keeping this pose so long that I forgot I don't have any need for it now". He said, thinking to himself what good will the changes do today, he couldn't draw any money from a bank now, if his brother or any other of his acquaintances had a power base in south America, they will come after him before he could cross the border.
"That's weird" She said.
"hey, you try traveling over half the world while disguising as a businessman and then we'll talk about losing habits"
"Not that, the fireman's helmet"
"What about it?"
"It seems a bit unnatural, something with the camera's flash and the flames make it seem like there's the…" Kagome stopped her sentence, changing her words so that he won't suspect, "there's a Latin character on it".
"let me see" Inuyasha snatched a newspaper from the stand. "Damn it, the Rangers, I can't believe how fast she is".
It wasn't the first time Kagome heard about the Rangers, it was common knowledge at the night hounds that other countries had similar agencies, most of Europe's organizations were founded during the inquisition, and held a central headquarters in Italy. The rangers was also a European group that handled demons, their home base was in Scotland.
She worked with them once, two years ago, five men came to Japan, her role was to escort them to a building where bear demon hid himself, she was told that the youkai came from Scotland and therefore was under their jurisdiction.
Kagome now remembered that the five used crossbows, axes and swords rather than firearms, at that time she thought that they simply hid the guns into the weapons to conceal them at the airport, but now she understood the there was no deception, simply using traditional tools, just as she could have started using bows if she went back and joined the cleaners.
"who is fast?" Kagome asked.
"Kikyo, The Rangers are a secret organization, the fact that they revealed themselves means that they want to send a message, that the fire wasn't caused by any natural source, it's basically a global warning to all agents to watch out" he answered.
"Why do you think it's Kikyo?" She asked, 'is it because she is always on your mind?'.
"I don't have any solid evidence, just a feeling" he said, a really bad feeling, the miko was quick to catch on to his mind, he was still far too weak to severe the bond they had between them. "for now, we go on with the plan, a friend of mine is waiting for us" he stretched out the word friend, leaving Kagome to wonder who exactly he meant.
A couple of hours later, in a small, dust infected town at the Mexican border, Kagome was about to find the answer.
"there's a youkai in this town, not very strong, but his youki is all over the place" Kagome said, wondering to herself when had she started feeling youkais so clearly.
It's the disruption of harmony, I guess, I know what Inuyasha feels like, so whenever the air around me changes I can feel any other youki trying to interfere.
"yes, that's our guy, my good old friend… he probably knows how to get us across the border" Inuyasha said, yes, the eagle demon was a smuggler, not only from the US but he also seemed to have connections with crime syndicates at south America, and with Kouga gone, there would be no one around to get in their way.
"An attack!" Kagome screamed.
'dammit, who can it be now? A youkai? An Indian fighter? An American commando unit?" Inuyasha thought to himself, were they too slow? Wasn't he always two steps before everyone else?
"Kongosuha!"
Inuyasha swung his sword to the air, releasing shards of diamonds to the enemy's direction.
"curse you, dog demon" the eagle demon hovered slowly to earth, his wings shattered by the attack, Amigo barely escaped being hit by the diamonds.
"Shit, he's fast" Kagome muttered silently, her mind being filled with memories of youkais who were fast enough to escape inuyasha's attacks, the list wasn't very large, but each name held some very bad meanings.
"Don't worry, the bastard isn't that agile, I was too much in a hurry to think straight and I attacked his after image" Inuyasha answered in order to calm down Kagome, though, for him, it meant that something was wrong, attacking prematurely? It couldn't be a good sign.
"So you attacked the fuckin' after image? That's probably one of the most basic youkais techniques these days and you fell for it like some roo…" Kagome silenced herself again, though she was starting to fear that Inuyasha deliriously ignored her speech slips.
"Why are you here again, and what are you thinking, attacking like this!" Amigo transformed back into his semi-human form. Walking slowly toward Inuyasha and Kagome, "that attack was meant to kill, and I don't care who you are, if you harm me or any other of this region's demons, you'll have to answer to the local Skulls, and let me tell you this, they aren't easy on foreigners" he shouted. In a small town like this, nobody was present at the street in those hours.
"the Skulls? Isn't that the Mexican border patrol elite unit?" Kagome asked herself, "a Mexican spiritual fighters unit? Why's that they are doing border patrols?" didn't it mean that their main objective was to watch that no one crosses the border? 'but the Mexicans wouldn't warrant such an elite unite to prevent immigration to the USA… which means that the prevent movement to the south border, they stop people from south America?" Kagome tried thinking it over again, "not to stop people from south America, but to stop people from entering south America.. the legendary forbidden youkai territory".
"I didn't have enough time to finish our conversation last time, but I need your help"
Inuyasha said to the eagle demon, now understanding that he attacked almost instantly, he knew that he attacked the after-image the moment he attacked, but before that, he didn't know that he was about to attack.
"You're right, you were in the middle of explanning me your situation when Kouga came in and got in our way" Amigo responded, now focusing his attention on Kagome, 'very gifted, but unattended to, throws out her feelings like an attack, why is he with someone so unpolished?'
"Kouga!" Kagome interrupted the conversation, Kouga, the wolf demon? What was he doing in central America?
"I've taken care of him. That wimp won't stand in our way for a while" Inuyasha responded quickly. Though, if they ever went back to Japan, they'll have to deal with him, but heck with it, they still needed to get out alive.
"So, mister dog, who is this young girl? And what is such a powerful soul doing with you?" Amigo asked.
"Soul? What does he mean as soul? Did you get me into another one of your reincarnation events?" Kagome hissed at Inuyasha at Japanese, thinking to herself whether the fact she could still live after Kikyo took her soul was because she held a few more of Inuyasha's dead girlfriends souls, 'Kagome, the soul holder woman', what a nice book title it could be.
"Calm down, Kag, he's referring to some Youkai theology and myths, you shouldn't take it as it is" Inuyasha tried to calm her down, "I'll explain it all very shortly, just as soon as we get out of the danger zone".
"don't hush me, Inuyasha. You've been dragging me across half the world without telling me squat about what's going on, I need some answers, and I need them now"
"Should I leave you two alone?" Amigo suggested in Spanish, sure, he hated the dog demon for what he did earlier, but he also remembered Inuyasha telling him about some problems with his wife, this could be what he meant.
"There would be no need to, we have to haste ourselves" Inuyasha turned to Amigo in English, Kagome knew exactly that he was meaning it also at her, as if saying she was wasting precious time.
"Inuyasha, SIT" Kagome yelled, and while he was falling to the ground, she turned to the eagle and asked him to leave them alone for a while. Amigo, after viewing, what he seemed to think as an excellent control over demons from the young Shaman, gave up on any resolution he might have had to argue with her.
"I really need to find a way to dump this collar one day" Inuyasha thought to himself.
"I really need to find a way to replace this collar one day" Kagome smiled to herself.
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AN: Kagome is Italics, Inuyasha is Bold
"So, what's so important to ask that you had to bust my head into the rocks?"
"Lets see, besides knowing what you're planning to do, why are you so afraid of meeting Kikyo, and what did that Eagle mean when he said soul?"
"Don't you want to leave anything to mystery? No? Not a single thing?
Well then, stop me when I start digging to deep… when the universe was created, scientist say it was 13 billion years ago, demon reincraniation go back only 2 billion years, as far as we've found out. There was a single mass of energy in existence, most people would refer to it at the source of all creation, god if you really want…"
"And what does that have to do with anything?"
"I'm getting to it, but I'll try to speed up. We assume that in the moment of creation, which, if you think about it, is the first conflict in existence, the source of power broke into two sorts of energy. One that could exist on it's own, which after many years evolved into what we now call life forms, and the different kind of energy, which despite being the mass of energy in universe, couldn't continue existing without burning itself out and vanish into thin air."
"Again, where is this all leading us?"
"It's either listening or arguing. Which one are you doing?"
"Sorry, go on"
"the second kind, which for personal comfort I'll demonic, we'll get to that point soon, needed to use different demonic energies in order to live on, while the more pure energy started the evolution process. Jump a few billion years forwards, and we have the newly formed earth, crawling with life forms and material, from rocks to dinosaurs to trees. At that time also occurs a mass invasion of demonic soul energy, which by then is very close to being extinct"
"Fast forward, I still can't see what does this have to do with Kikyo"
"It has nothing to do with her, I'm trying to get to a point here, so can you stop interrupting? Anyways, somewhere in the off time of our story the demonic souls discovered that in addition to consuming fellow demon souls, it's also possible to survive by submission, or through the process of merging, if you want to call it like that. So, when the demon souls arrive at earth, we see the first time a demon soul merges with an evolved life form, and for the first time in history, a youkai is created"
"So you're saying that Hanyous are a merge of pure souls and demonic parasite energy? Wasn't that the kind of stereotype you've been fighting against your whole life?"
"God no, Kag. A Hanyou is a biological creation, it has next to nothing to do with what we're talking about, at least not with what I've said so far… the first demos weren't even of living entities, they were closer to being forces of nature rather than intelligent creatures, but they were youkais. After that, we see millions of years of demon energy merging into pure life forms, creating prehistoric races of air youkai and water youkais, still not completely living, but with self awareness to some point"
"you might be a youkai with hundreds of years left to live, but while you're talking, I'm dying from old age…"
"I'm getting to it, if you would stop getting in the way every six lines I might have been able to keep my train of thought running long enough to finish it"
"ok, but just try to speed yourself up"
"It's hard to believe that you were the one who wanted to talk about this now…
For the sake of speeding the explanation, I'll skip some parts of the theory which aren't relevant to the point, remind me to go back to them later… anyway, as I've said earlier, the life on earth were created by souls, which are immortal, and after the process of evolution, the human race has begun it's age. During all the years of earth, the demon souls, who needed to parasite themselves upon others, have been dulled down to a point that they resembled the pure souls more and more.
Because the demon souls were so weak at this point, they actually merged into the purer souls, rather than swallowing them, it led to the creation of biological youkais, trees and plants mostly, not only self aware, but also able to change their condition to some point. After that, we see more animal based youkais, prehistoric races of mammals and insects, even some dino-youkais. At this point there was also the first difference between the youkais who followed the regular evolution process, the ones who's souls have merged into other beings, and between races which followed the borrowed evolution theory.
"I know of that term! I saw a book on it by Darwin in your club… ooh, I'm sorry, I interrupted you again"
"it's fine, I've managed to slide in twice as many lines from before… and yes, Darwin did write a thesis about it, but most of the real work was done about 90 years ago, by a Japanese man named Higurashi Jinrochi, if we ever get back to Japan, you should pick up some of his notes, he fires some study suggestions there that could cause a complete change of modern medicine..'
"Higurashi Jinrochi? That's the name of my grand-grand-grandfather… what did you say he did?"
"the way you describe him makes someone think of a sumo wrester, I've heard that he himself said he was born an old and fragile man.."
"you're avoiding me, do you mean that my grand-grand-grandfath… that Jinrochi worked on the subject? You knew that a relative of mine was involved in theorizing about demons and you didn't think about telling me?"
"Listen, Kag. There are about 50 families called Higurashi in Japan, and Jinrochi wasn't a rare name at those times, we have no proof that you are related to that coot"
"Don't insult my dead family members! It doesn't matter whether they are my family members or not, you should respect the dead!
… though, it could explain why my grandfather always threw such feats whenever he saw you.."
End of Chapter Nine
Yep, I think I dug too deep, and it's not over yet.
Just so we make things clear, I thought about this part about nine months ago, before I was even a soldier, so it does seem a little out of place, but all in all, if you read enough into it, you'll see how it fits in the grand picture.
By the way, the idea was based on the first volume of Devilman, you can see some references to it around the story, I also took notes from other sources, but I'll be dammed if I remember them all.
Anyways, Don't worry, I'll get into the plot in a chapter or two, or maybe later, nothing's sure for now.
Shout outs (!)
Coykoi:
I understand why some people don't like Kikyo, it's the natural reaction to her, being the main romantic rival for the main couple. But in my eyes, Kikyo is a really great character, and most of all deserves pity, as she is destined never to be happy, she only lives to kill Naraku, and after that, she'll return to nothing, while all the other characters will continue living happily. For that reason, I also avoid portraying her as 'the evil zombie witch of the past' like others tend to do, the fact that Kikyo accepts her destiny is one of the things that makes her such a wonderful character.
And for Inuyasha being childish? I agree that I have tried to write him a bit differently than before, it's because of some changes in my way of thinking (blame the army for that) about the co living of one person with society and giving up what you want for what others call 'greater good', so there's a shift in how I write my main characters. And for him getting all that he wants, I agree that it may annoy some to see him betray Kagome, live happily with Kikyo and then go back to Kagome, but I plan to put him through some stuff that would make up for this…
Last, but not least, Kagome did enjoy an active sex-life, I indicated it in the first chapter (which was written years ago..), and she was portrayed as a man-eater, which doesn't quite fit her new image, but the story has so much plot holes that it really doesn't matter, at least that's what I think.
lin-ko:
I'm glad that you like the story, I also think that the incorporation of world history is what makes the story fun, not only to read, but also to write, it's also why I put in references to other anime and cultural symbols. The Night Hounds concept came because I wanted to portray a different Kagome than the 'happy happy joy joy cheer'
Kagome you mostly see in fanfiction, I wanted to create her in a way that gives her an excuse to suspect and try to differ herself from Inuyasha, and because I was writing an Naruto story at that time, it seemed natural to incorporate her into the Naruto fic, who also has a semi-sane woman in an agency called night hounds.
Kagome is really an unstable character, I go by the saying "a man forgets but never forgives, a woman forgives but never forgets" , so, for a good while now, Kagome is renewing her relationship with Inuyasha, at least to a certain point, but she is also suspicious of him and all the seemingly insane plans that he has don't make things any better.
Oh, and if you're wondering, Inuyasha does have reason in his plans, it's just that he's crazy, or has to be crazy if he wants things to succeed.
Well, that's all for now, review, because it'll be a while before the next update, and the best way to remind of the story's existence is by reviewing it!