Souta's Project

Rest was something the whole Inu gang wasn't used to, but what they were enjoying now, in a way. It was the second week Kagome was spending in her time. Sango had broken her leg and the gang was grounded for a couple of weeks. Miroku went to see his master, who was ill and Inuyasha was spending time in his forest or in Kagome's house. In the past he could nap all he wanted, but in the future he could get tasty food. Downsides were that in the past he was mostly bored and in the future he had to do chores. And since he was a man of action, so he was helping Kagome's family more and more while the girl was in school. To Inuyasha's wonder the girl was bringing him ramen every time she was returning home. He was not sure why she was doing that, but he wasn't going to discourage her.

Everyday he was taking a nap before dinnertime, because Kagome's fiends were visiting her every day to work on some project. He didn't mind because he could pester her later and got extra ramen - maybe it was a reward for being out of sight. He'd play with Souta, but for some reason the boy was always busy with some project he was doing for one of his classes. Inuyasha offered to help him, but the boy reclined saying that his grandfather was helping him.

Visitors were not coming today to the shrine and Inuyasha was taking advantage of the front yard. He had a scarf around his head, but he didn't expect anyone to approach him for a while. He was laying on the grass under the Sacred Tree, Buyo sprawled across hi belly like a heavy, purring kitty blanket. But suddenly the cat stopped purring and the hanyou looked up to see Kagome's three friends approaching him, each holding a shopping plastic bag with some ramen cups inside. 'Huh? Where's Kagome, she should come back with them from the school?'

"Inuyasha..." started Yuka softly, her eyes focused on him. The hanyou sat up, feeling uncomfortable and confused.

.

Elsewhere, Kagome was returning home. She had to take a longer way because the store nearest her home was out of ramen for some reason. Kagome wasn't aware of the fact that she was supplying Inuyasha with more ramen than usual. She was concerned about her essays, tests and the fact Souta was looking at her oddly every time she saw him. It was like the boy was waiting for something, wanted her to do something. Upon being asked he just shrugged and didn't give any real reply beside of a 'keh'

Without a doubt someone was a bad influence on the kid.

Anyway, this was the second week of Kagome staying home and the girl was enjoying her time with her future friends. She relearned how bowing school was and felt that she wouldn't miss it that much after returning to the past.

She was just climbing up the shrine steps, looking under her feet mindlessly. At least nowadays it was much easier to climb them. She was thinking about her plans for this afternoon and planning the list of supplies when suddenly she stopped.

The fronts of the stairs had each written a few words. She knew about it, according to her mother her grandfather and brother painted the kanji a couple of weeks ago. There were mostly wishes for good luck and blessings, which were supposed to make the climb up fun and also pit the visitors in a good mood. It was like earning the blessings while walking the steps.

But the words written on the step in front of her were different.

They spelled: "Buy more ramen."

The miko blinked and lifted her gaze to read was on the rest of the steps, now moving slower and paying attention. She climbed up twenty steps before finding another unusual message.

"Kiss Inuyasha."

Both the messages were written in a hand not as steady as her grandfather's and Kagome realized it was probably Souta's doing. The latter looked fresh and when Kagome touched it a little of the paint stayed on her fingertip,

'That dork, what he wanted to do? No one reads those,' she thought as she wiped the paint off her finger and grabbed her shopping bag full of ramen cups. 'Which is fortunate, because the visitors would be wondering what's that supposed to mean... It's not like anyone knows Inuyasha...' she mused. For some reason when she thought about the hanyou the memory of Kaguya's palace came to her mind, the warmth of Inuyasha's lips against hers... 'I'd like to experience it again...''

Kagome found herself blushing and shaking her head to get the memory out of her mind. That is when she heard a desperate cry of a hanyou in distress.

When Kagome ran up the stairs and entered the yard she saw the most unusual thing in her life. There was Inuyasha, laying on the ground, Ayumi and Eri pinning him down while Yuka was sitting on his torso and leaning her face close to the struggling boy's face. Some distance away Souta and his grandfather were standing and just observing the action unfold.

Inuyasha noticed Kagome's approach and called her name while trying to get free from her friends' grasp without harming them.

"Girls!" Kagome dropped her shopping bag and waved her hands to get their attention "What are you doing to Inuyasha?!"

The trio looked up at her and jumped to their feet, letting Inuyasha go and starting apologizing and explaining that they felt a distinct craving to see how it was to kiss the boy.
"But why had it to be my boy?!" Kagome demanded, ignoring the stunned expression on Inuyasha's face.

The trio started to look at the ground under their feet sheepishly.

"Hm that's not what I expected," commented grandfather Higurashi while scratching his chin.

"Well, I told you, that we should've written Kagome's name first. Now it's going to affect everyone who walks up the shrine steps," Souta replied firmly. "Next time we should go with something more personalized."

"But when you see your name won't it catch your attention?" the old man looked at his grandson, deep in thought.

"My teacher says that if you put it smartly somewhere in the project the receiver won't pay much attention to it," Souta replied.

"What are they talking about?" Inuyasha cocked his head to the side.

"The dorks wrote messages on the shrine steps and put some subliminal message."

"What?" Inuyasha still didn't understand. Ayumi, blushing in embarrassment, tried to explain, but Kagome was better at handling how to present the futuristic stuff to the feudal-era-minded hanyou.

"Something like hypnosis. They wrote messages to our unconscious selves to follow simple orders. In this case it was to buy you ramen and kiss you," the miko shook her head and crossed her arms in front of her. "It obviously failed, so they better remove the messages.."

Everyone present looked at the shopping bags hanging from her elbows. A lazy, cat-like smile appeared on Inuyasha's lips when he looked at his favorite miko dropping the bags of ramen. When she looked at him he raised an eyebrow, as if asking for what she was waiting. She licked her lips and realized he was looking at the tip of her tongue as it darted across

"Higurashi?" everyone jumped and turned when they heard a quiet voice. Hojo was standing in the gate of the shrine grounds. He had a shopping bag full of ramen cups in his hand.

Inuyasha fled to the well house.

A/N: This story was sitting in my head for better part of the year. I tried to approach it a few times, but it never came the way it should. So I decided that this will be my final try - hope it's at least a little enjoyable.
And now follow my subliminal message (first letters of first 6 paragraphs), please :D