Please Don't Say Those Words

By: Kinomi Shadow

Disclaimer: I don't own Inuyasha.

She had felt the pain of her broken heart long before the pain of her torn flesh. This had happened once before, over fifty years ago, but Kikyo couldn't exactly figure out why she now lay at the feet of the half demon she loved.

"Inuyasha," she said weakly. "Is this what it has come to? Do you love this girl more than I?"

Inuyasha averted his eyes away from the blood covered girl before him and eyed Kagome for a brief moment before focusing his gaze upon the earth. He didn't want to chose now, not after all that he and the others had gone through to seek revenge. He couldn't bear the thought of having to chose, for how could he chose when he wasn't even sure which of these young woman he loved more. Was it Kagome who had came from another time? Who healed his inner afflictions with her courage and sincerity? Or was it Kikyo? The woman he had loved as well as hated for so many years that even now even this deadened shell that held a fragment of her bruised and tattered soul sparked feelings that Inuyasha couldn't quite comprehend.

"I just don't know," Inuyasha said softly. "But you need to rest now, Kikyo. I don't want to lose you again."

Kikyo shook her head and reached out a trembling hand. Inuyasha was quite puzzled by this gesture, but he took her small hand in his because that was all he could do. He felt hot stinging tears well up in his eyes and his companions who stood watching finally decided this was not something that should be watched. Now alone, Kikyo and Inuyasha stayed there, feeling as if their hearts were being ripped from their batttered bodies.

"Life," Kikyo started sadly. "Is a fluke and a blessing. My life is not a life. No one needs to exist twice."

"Don't say that!" Inuyasha pleaded. "You have a life! You need to exist! I can't live without you!"

Kikyo sighed and closed her eyes, feeling a rush of pain as blood continued to ooze from her wound. Flecks of her blood had already made their way in Inuyasha's hair, staining strands of it crimson. It would probably never wash off. Inuyasha held Kikyo's cold, trembling figure in his arms and begun to sob; something he rarely did.

"You lived fifty years without me," she whispered. "You can live without me once more. You... Have others who care for you now... Another to heal your wounds..."

Inuyasha's eyes grew wide with sadness and anger.

"Feh! Don't say those words, dammit!" he screamed out as her body became heavier; colder. "Don't you die... Don't you dare die on me!"

Kikyo's eyes remained opened and glassy, a single tear frozen upon her cheek. She was no longer breathing, Inuyasha noticed, and he broke down into heavy sobs. Inuyasha never liked to cry; he hadn't cried so hard since his mother's death so many years ago. He felt like a child clinging to a broken doll, though the pain was far more intense and heartbreaking. The salt of his tears stung his eyes; blurred and unfocused things. He would kill Naraku for this; there was no mistaking that. But for now, Inuyasha sat in silence, clinging to the body of the woman he loved and staining himself in her crimson blood.

After what seemed like an eternity, Inuyasha rose to he feet, still holding Kikyo's lifeless form in his arms, and found a patch of soft earth by a blooming sakura (japanese cheery tree). He quickly dug his claws through the black earth and when it was deep enough he gently laid Kikyo's body into this grave he had made. Working quickly, but trembling with numbness, he buried her. As he finished, from one of the branches of that tree, he picked a small white and pink blossom and laid it on the earth.

"You were created from dirt and remains," Inuyasha said sadly. "So I returned you to dirt and remains." He paused before going on. "But even though you were born out of these things a flower is what you really are. Pure, simple, sweet, and whole. Goodbye, Kikyo..."

THE END?