Author's note – Yes, I admit I have been lazy at reposting this, although I find my family's computer is nowhere near as reliable as I would like it to be.
Miss Chang Po – Much like my laptop was supposed to be, ne?
Uhh… I guess… although yours never was that reliable to begin with…
Miss Chang Po – It was, too::squeals when it boots up only to freeze and crash once more: AAarrrghhh! Damn you, you infernal hunk of plastic and microfibers and :blinks as it comes on and then crashes again: CUUUURSESSSSS!
:remains silent, not quite sure how to process this reaction: Uh huh…. Um, yeah, Chapter 3, guys… enjoy…
Miss Chang Po - :turns to her, blinking innocently: What?
Chapter 3
When Kagome awoke, she expected the whole ordeal she had experienced to be a bad dream - a figment of her imagination.
However, it was not to be true; she was still in the Sengoku Jidai, and to top it all off, she was trapped.
The wind demon, Kagura, had knocked her out and whisked her off to some unknown location, locking her in a dark room while she presumably decided what would be done with her.
'Not to mention she totally destroyed my school uniform,' she thought to herself in the darkness of her cell. Feeling the torn cloth in her fingertips, Kagome sighed heavily. It just wasn't fair; no matter how hard she tried to cover all the bases, somehow she'd always ended up messing things up. She'd just have to suck it up, she decided – once she got home, she'd have to ask her mother to order yet another set for her - this one was way beyond repair…
At that, she paused, realization hitting her. She had been captured by a youkai right outside of the village. The village had been completely destroyed. As far as she had seen from the damage she'd surveyed, there had been no survivors. There was no one to help her.
Even if by some fluke she managed to escape, what was she going to do really? Her powers relied on her solely on her arrows as a conduit and she was almost certain those had been left behind in what remained of the village. She had no idea where she was or how to get back to the well. Dropping down to her knees, she buried her face in her shirt as tears began to fall.
'Guys,' she sobbed silently to herself. 'Where are you?'
"Now here is something I would never expect,"
Kagome went still, feeling her blood freeze in her veins. Lifting her head from her uniform, she felt as though the room had suddenly gotten darker and colder.
"The great and powerful spiritual warrior... reduced to tears like a young child."
Her grey eyes went wide, darting back and forth. 'That voice,' she felt herself grow smaller. 'Oh God, please don't let it be...'
Like magic, a dim light flooded the room, casting Kagome in an unearthly glow. She stared down at her clothing in horror. A white gi and a pair of long, red hakama...
...the garb of a priestess.
Feeling eyes upon her, Kagome looked forward to the figure in front of her. Clothed head to toe in white fur, her host donned the mask of a baboon...
Her uniform dropped from her hands. "Naraku,"
The baboon mask was removed, revealing the shaggy black hair and soulless eyes of the once-human thief, Onigumo, now known and revered as Naraku. A few moments passed as he studied, taking in her features with a mask of neutrality. However, seconds later he smirked pleasantly at the young girl before him, sitting down several feet away from her.
"While am pleased to see you, I must admit I am very surprised," he murmured softly, the smirk still present on his cold features. "How many times must I kill you before you remain dead in your grave, dear Kikyo?"
At the mention of her predecessor, Kagome not only regained her voice, but her temper as well. Oh, if only she had had her arrows! She stood up, fixing her captor with an angry glare.
"First off," she exclaimed, gritting her teeth. "I'm not dead, and second of all, I am not... I repeat - not Kikyo. How many times must we go through this before you get it through your evil, sadistic head?"
Naraku regarded her with a look of surprise before quickly replacing it with one of extreme pleasure. He closed his eyes, letting out a low chuckle. "Ah, the reincarnation, Kagome," He opened his eyes, leveling her with a calm gaze. Kagome resisted the urge to shudder. "How could I have been mistaken? I do hope you will forgive my error."
Had he been anyone else, Kagome may have. If only she had taken her quiver with her; she would have given anything for just one arrow!
Her captor, however, was not finished speaking. "We all know of course, that you are the more favorable... as opposed to your archaic other-half."
Kagome frowned. Kikyo, if anything, was not her 'other-half'. She directed her expression of displeasure towards him. "You say I'm the more favorable half, and yet you kidnapped me thinking I was her!"
Naraku chuckled again. What was it he found so amusing about this situation?
"My dear girl, you are mistaken," he replied. "My servant, Kagura, did bring you to me under the pretense that you were Kikyo. That is the only reason you were not killed on sight." He smirked again. "However, I had no intention of capturing Kikyo." His expression turned to one of boredom. "I've no need for a woman who has been dead nearly a century."
Kagome blinked. "Wait a minute..." Evil, maniacal villain though he was, the dark hanyou should have been better at math. Something didn't quite add up. "What do you mean Kikyo's been dead nearly a century?" she asked. "It's only been 50 years since you killed Kikyo!"
Once again, Naraku looked surprised. And she had once thought nothing would faze him - short of being blown in half by an arrow shot by a 15 year-old reincarnation from 500 years in the future, of course...
"Once again, you are mistaken," he replied. He smirked once again. "But then again, I'm not surprised. This explains much." He gave her a once over. "Given the circumstances, you should not even be here - looking the way you are now."
"What are you talking about?" Kagome balked. Deep feeling of dread was worming its way into her gut. The way he had been looking at her certainly wasn't helping either.
"I had always wondered what had happened to you," he murmured, as if ignoring her completely. "To be quite truthful, I had missed you - seeing your reaction when I gained dominion over this land would have been so..." He closed his eyes, as if experiencing some unknown pleasure. "Exquisite."
Kagome felt her knees give way beneath her. Her eyes widened in disbelief as Naraku's next words wormed their way into her heart.
"You see, Kagome, I've won."
It couldn't be; there was no way it could be true. The words fell from her lips, holding none of the venom she had intended. "You're lying."
Naraku smirked again. "Am I?"
"There's no way," Kagome shook her head slowly. "There's no way we could have lost to you so easily!"
He chuckled. "You didn't think your presence - or lack thereof - would make so drastic a difference, did you?"
Her hands clenched tightly in her lap, her knuckles ghostly white as she pulled at the fabric of her pants. "But it's only been three weeks...!"
"Kagome," Naraku gazed at her with false sympathy, though his soulless eyes seemed to be laughing at her. "It's been 40 years."
Forty years? Kagome felt as if she had been dealt a physical blow. All of the air rushed from her lungs, leaving her weak as the thought processed itself in her brain. Forty years… she had been gone for forty years? Her mind could not process this; forty years was nearly half a lifetime! It just couldn't be true!
"You're lying," she whispered softly.
Naraku continued to smirk. "About what?" he asked loftily. "About my gaining dominion over this world, or your having been gone for nearly a century?" Kagome opened her mouth to speak, but no words came forth. "Honestly, dear girl, I gave you more credit than that. Surely you've seen the village."
At the image of the ravaged village came mind, spurring Kagome into action. All rational thought left her mind as she rushed towards Naraku, intent only doling out his deserved punishment. "You evil son of a--!"
Naraku deftly moved out of the way, and being the conniving coward that he is, resumed his seated position several feet out of her reach.
"Now, now, Kagome," he purred. "There's no need to get upset. What's done is done."
Resisting the urge to gag, Kagome struggled to control herself. Her eyes wide with terror, she finally came to realize that this was Naraku she was dealing with. Alone. If he had so wished it, she would have been dead already. As she managed to get her breathing under control, she reminded herself that if she remained patient enough, a position to attack would present itself. She just had to be ready. In the meantime, she would have to be more careful.
Sensing her success at restraining the anger within herself, Naraku nodded his approval. After all, it wouldn't do to have a potentially powerfully - and equally untrained - miko losing her temper and lunging at him in a vengeful rage. If left unchecked, she could be very dangerous to his plans. He would have to find a use for her - a use for her indeed.
That thought finished, the evil demon lord turned to the young girl before him. Despite the latent power he know she possessed, she posed quite a pitiful sight, trembling and quaking on the floor as if the very world had crashed down around her. Naraku smiled pleasantly; if only she knew how vulnerable she was at this moment…
And then suddenly, like magic, her whole demeanor changed. Her posture straightened and she raised her head to face him. Her eyes cleared, her eyes shining with angry determination as her fists clenched tightly in her lap. Regarding him calmly, it was almost as if she had become her predecessor, Kikyo.
"How did you manage to gain control of everything in my absence?" she asked in an even tone.
Naraku did well to hide the fact that he felt slightly threatened and intimidated by her new-found confidence. She was waiting for him to say the wrong thing, thereby giving her the incentive she needed to exact her revenge on him. He frowned slightly at this; how dare this slip of a girl try to bait him into a trap? He felt the dark miasma stirring within his body as he tried to quell his anger; she would be the one to break, not he! Naraku would not be bested so easily!
"The answer to that is quite simple really," he answered calmly. "As you know, a mere hanyou - as your predecessor considered me to be - could never be expected to take control so easily. So, to make sure those I had dominion over would not try to oppose me, I needed to obtain more power."
"You mean the power that the demons who devoured your body all those years ago, gave you wasn't enough?" Kagome asked in disbelief, though managing to keep her expression somewhat neutral.
Naraku only smirked at her. "I, Naraku, would never satisfy myself with the status of a simple half-breed." He replied. "To bend others to my will, I required more power. It is as simple as that."
"And where did you acquire this power?" Kagome asked, though she was sure she already knew.
"As you might already be aware," Naraku continued, as if uninterrupted. "With the growing number of humans dying in their pitiful little wars, more youkai flocked together in one place, feeding off of the souls of the dead and the dying."
Kagome cringed in disgust. A parasite; that's all Naraku was. "So, you absorbed them," she frowned. "Just like the parasite you are!"
"Parasite?" Naraku chuckled. "Interesting… they are no less parasitic than I, feeding off of the souls of the ones you strive to protect - and yet you pity them?" He paused. "Very interesting…"
"No one deserves a death like that!" Kagome exclaimed. "You treat people - human and youkai alike - like tools and then you use them! You're a monster!"
"Oh yes, a monster… who gobbles people up in the dark of night," Naraku drawled. "I suppose that's how all the bedtime stories go." His soulless eyes bored into hers. "What would be a more fitting end then, my lady? The weapon of a youkai exterminator, or perhaps the purifying arrow of a priestess; perhaps that would be more appropriate?"
Kagome flinched and paled. At that, her captor only chuckled once more; a hollow sound that made her feel as though spiders were crawling up her back.
He began to speak again, "Anyway, we've gotten a bit off topic, haven't we? As I was saying, I managed to absorb more and more youkai and then I was able to finally become a full youkai myself."
"Impossible!" Kagome shrieked.
"Is it?" Naraku spared her a cold, sideways glance. "Perhaps I am not a full youkai by true nature, but I have slain all those who were foolish enough to try and prove me otherwise."
Kagome shuddered. It was then that she realized that he was telling her the truth.
End of Chapter 3