This is a short little chapter! Okay, when we last left off, Gina was sharing Kagome's body after having arrived out of nowhere with two men – one of them being Fitzgibbon. At this point DP and Inu are lying half-dead in a dog pile, and Suzi is about to finish everyone off …Right? Yeah, just checking.

Deadpool…

Wilson's everything hurt. He could hear someone saying words – what where they saying? Wade struggled to focus on the trio confronting "Suzifer" as he'd come to regard their inhuman tormenter, his addled brain on the brink of recognition. Somehow he knew that guy – and that other big guy – and that other girl guy from somewhere, but even before he could accurately determine their identities, more of the loud, painful explosions came to fry what was left of his poor skin.

"Mommy, make the bad ouchie-booms go away," moaned the merc.

The light and noise were almost unbearable and lasted for close to a minute before stopping completely. A low humming sound inside his ear informed Wade of possibly permanent hearing loss, but otherwise he seemed amazingly unharmed.

The buzzing in his ears became a muffled roar; it was (he realized) Suzuki screaming something behind him. Apparently the demon was as surprised as Deadpool that they were still alive – whaitaminute – was Inuyasha still alive? The mercenary craned his neck painfully back to look into the dog-demon's face. Yep, still alive…alive and also biting his wrist, wonderful.

The world began to swim yet again and Wade willingly surrendered to the blackness.

The Demon vs. the Guardian…

"How could you have blocked that?" shrieked Suzuki, "I'm more powerful than you!"

The young girl smiled wanly, she and the demon alone remained standing as the two men who'd brought her here now crouched behind her. "Tsk. Even after all those centuries of brooding inside these stones you still don't fully grasp how they work. I am one with the beads; I can't be killed by my own power, and neither will I allow you to kill anyone else with it."

The dead man glared thoughtfully at her before a commotion from above caught his attention. On the cliff overlooking the beach, police and other alarmed onlookers were busily running for cover from the terrifying light display.

"In that case, it's about time that I tested the extent of your little trinket's abilities," another blast shot out from Suzuki's chest – this time toward the crowd above, "how far does your protective arm reach?"

Faster than human eyes could follow, the fatal discharge was redirected at the last moment – veering straight back and into the young woman's necklace in a blinding flash of light.

"Enough, you insufferable bitch," snarled the monster, witnessing with rage the ease in which the guardian countered his attack, "I'm taking what's left of your feeble powers away from you now!"

Suzuki leapt nimbly through the air aiming straight at Kagome's throat. Without expression, the girl awaited the decisive impact motionlessly. It never came. A large hand shot out, batting the small teenager aside as though she weighed less than a kitten; one fatal swipe later, Carl Fitzgibbon's decapitated body lay in a crumpled heap. Still cowering nearby on the ground, the second of the two men promptly vomited at the sight.

"Oh no," the priestess gasped as she jumped to her feet and hurried over to her slain comrade. Her eyes welled with tears as she looked on Goshi's fallen spiritual leader, berating her own failure to protect her charge. The guardian drew on the comfort that at least he'd died on his own terms. His soul was finally at rest.

Suzuki's vacant eyes suddenly filled with an evil light, "what's wrong, little Gina; can't you even block a simple attack to save your large, smelly friend? I'm surprised at your lack of alertness" he paused thoughtfully, "– or maybe you're just unable to fight back – could that be the problem?" He frowned at the girl with mock concern.

The young woman's silence as she knelt over the large form, told the demon-man everything he needed to know. His returning cackle chilled her to the marrow. "Have I found your weak link: as long as I'm not shooting any sparks you've got no line of defense, do you? Wonderful; and now that there's no one left to throw themselves in front of you," he smiled viciously at the other man currently crouched in a fetal position, "I believe I'll just take your bothersome little bit of potency and have this over with." He crossed casually over to her as he spoke; the gory stump where his hand had once been rose to finish her off physically.

Without warning Suzuki froze in mid-blow – body suddenly rigid, eyes wide with surprise. Protruding like a dead branch through a bag of leaves, a clawed hand burst from the man's recently healed middle decisively snapping his spine in two.

Inuyasha's red eyes gleamed contentedly at his own handiwork; his adversary collapsing paralyzed at the dog demon's feet. Quietly choking, the possessed man cursed into the sand.

Gina/Kagome looked both quizzically and gratefully at the feral youth, only half recognizing him; "I-Inuyasha?" The boy flinched away from her tentative touch – his low growl warning her not to come any closer. "I wish none of you had had to get involved in this," she continued sadly, "If only I had access to Kagome's sacred arrows I might end this much sooner, but none of that can be helped now. Perhaps there's another way though…"

The young demon's face sharply contorted with an instant snarl. She understood why as she watched him sink weakly to his knees; behind him, the indomitable Demon-Suzuki rose once again over his silver-haired foe, bleeding out the remainder of Inuyasha's life. The badly damaged dog demon was slowly dying.

"Stop," ordered the girl, tears trickling from her eyes, "we both know it's me you want – please don't kill him; I surrender!"

The other looked up sharply, gauging her reaction; it seemed her stupid teen host's sentimentality and naïve sense of honor had clouded the guardian's intelligence into thinking he could be reasoned with. Never the less, the little fool did have a point.

"Very well," sneered Suzuki, instead hooking his forearm under the strand of beads and jerking Kagome roughly toward him, "I will help myself to the remainder of my rightful powers before I finish off your darling hanyou." He could feel the energy surge triumphantly into his veins – the monster instantaneously burst into peals of laughter at the ridiculous notion that the mightiest being on earth could ever be defeated by some weaklings and a school girl.

Inuyasha…

Sensations: screaming, the smell of blood, the snap of bone under his claws, and that girl (Kagome's) sad distant stare. Somewhere in the recesses of his demonic mind, he felt a deep sense of loss that he couldn't quite grasp threatening to overtake him. Nothing made any sense but the instinctual urge to attack – and he now found even that difficult to concentrate on.

Behind closed lids, Inuyasha gradually became aware of the smells and sounds surrounding him. One smell in particular quirked his nostrils, causing him to reflexively twitch – the action sending an immediate jolt of pain through his abdomen and a groan through his clenched teeth. The scent grew stronger, nearly overwhelming his emotions, a voice, someone touching his face. The demon reluctantly willed his eyes open.

All desire to kill and maim instantly faded as he beheld the girl he believed gone forever beaming joyfully down at him. Something warm dripped onto his forehead and he reached up until his grasping hand found Kagome's.

"Ka-Kagome, how…?"

"Gina, the Guardian, she saved my life, Inuyasha," the human stroked his blood-caked hair with her trembling free hand, "It's all over, just lay quiet."

The hanyou struggled to sit up, but Kagome's gentle push held him down, "Don't try to move; you're still too injured."

"But what happened?"

"That demon tried to steal what was left of the rosary's magical properties from me, but my soul was already bound with Gina's power so I purified him on contact. He's gone – along with Gina; all that's left now are these empty beads."

Inuyasha's eyes traveled as far as they could go in either direction until he finally spotted a pair of bodies lying nearby. "Suzuki and Swami Fitzgibbon," the girl solemnly explained after following his gaze. He noticed her eyes misting over again.

Abruptly, a man he'd never seen before sidled over to them and, yammering in a foreign tongue, nervously indicated the cliffs.

"We have to get out of here, Inuyasha, the police have arrived with reinforcements," explained Kagome.

"Keh, how's that gonna happen," grunted the boy, "I can't move, and Wade – wait – did he even survive?" He craned his silver head agonizingly to the side in an attempt to locate the deranged gun for hire.

"He's alive, but still unconscious," the teen supplied, "Mr. Weasel can teleport us all back home, though."

"What? 'Mr. Weasel'?"

Hours later at the Higurashi Shrine…

The living room resembled a makeshift hospital in the middle of a battle zone with pallets, gauze and various medicines cluttering the floors and furniture. Kagome reclined on the couch under a blanket with a cup of tea – her mother had applied a damp rag to her forehead. Beside her nestled on the floor lay Inuyasha with his middle amply bandaged; Buyo purred loudly on top of the hanyou's head. Against the wall on another pallet, Deadpool polished off his third cup of Ramen Noodles while sitting with his friend Weasel.

Ms. Higurashi hurried about, tending to each patient in turn. She privately breathed a sigh of relief at having her daughter home again. Deep down she knew everything would turn out okay – but even the most understanding of parents sometimes questioned their children's judgement, the woman reassured herself: especially when Kagome showed up accompanied by a severely wounded Inuyasha and two other strange foreign men (one in equally bad shape as the half-demon).

From the kitchen, Grandfather scowled suspiciously at the new arrivals over his newspaper – considerably less convinced of Kagome's or her mother's or (for that matter) anyone else in the house's sanity.

"I can't stop thinking about what happened to that poor swami," said Kagome after a long silence at which the boy below her looked up with a start, "he really did have enlightenment – he knew to get Weasel, where to find me, what to do; he saved all our lives."

Inuyasha gazed back at her, distracted by other thoughts, "Where did Wade put you when that demon was attacking us? I thought you were dead – and then suddenly I couldn't find you anywhere."

The young woman detected an anguished note in his deceptively casual recollection of the incident, which tightened her heart strings. "I woke up in a nearby shrine," she glanced thoughtfully over at the dangerous-looking, weapon-draped man reclining on a Hello Kitty sleeping bag while contentedly picking a scab off his elbow and smiled, "he must have brought me there for safe-keeping."

"Humph," the hanyou grunted, absently scratching Buyo's head.

Kagome suddenly reached down and grasped his hand, startling him, "I knew you'd be able to find me – thank you, Inuyasha."

"Don't be ridiculous," he grumbled despite his beet red face, "besides, I didn't even do that much." He then added almost resentfully, "you seemed to have the situation under control without my help."

"Oh stop sulking, idiot. None of us had a chance against such a powerful demon without Gina's help. I'm just happy she found peace and that those beads no longer have any power to be used for evil again." She paused briefly, still holding his hand, "Even if not for everything else that happened, I'm also glad that we went on our date." She smirked teasingly, "I think I might be getting kind of fond of you, 'boyfriend'."

Kagome waited, but the only reaction she got was a sudden snore. She looked down only to find him lost in deep sleep. With a sympathetic smile, she carefully covered him with her own blanket, watching his rhythmic, peaceful breathing.

Finally she lay back, closing her own eyes. Her fingers twined around the now benign beads inside her pocket. The stones would serve as a reminder to the girl that, though he'd always arrive in time to save her, sometimes she needed to return the favor to Inuyasha.

It ain't over yet – not quite! Stay tuned for the epilogue coming soon...