Welcome all!
WARNING
This fic will contain a lot of heavy sexual references, racism, mental health issues and some drug mention. It starts in a very dark place and deals with some very heavy issues. Like many of my fics before this, it won't always be a pretty, cheery, romantic work of fiction. There will be a lot of dark themes and a lot of issues broached that may upset some people.
If you are easily upset or uncomfortable about any of these potential triggers, please reconsider reading this story. I don't want to discourage anyone from doing or reading what they like, but I do want to make sure everyone is safe and happy above all else. I don't want to upset anyone with what I write. If you do want to read this story, please proceed at your own caution.
Thank you for reading this warning
WARNING
I know I've said I didn't think I had a great idea for making an InuYasha fic before, but a few things have happened lately to make me reevaluate that decision. I've gotten way back into InuYasha hardcore lately, rewatching the show from the beginning, and working on an art project where I draw an illustration for each episode of the anime. Rewatching it has given me many ideas for stories. I also got my hands on a translated version of the InuYasha light novel, which I've been chewing through pretty steadily. If you get the chance to read the light novel, go for it. It's short, but I really enjoyed it.
I've been playing around with a lot of ideas before I came up with this one. I think y'all should buckle down with this one. It's going to be a long ride and a real trip. I'm pretty excited to write this story now that I have an idea down for it. InuYasha is in my top three characters from the series.
I always find writing my favourite characters difficult, but since I've also written fics for my other two in the top three (Naraku in my fic Miasma and Bankotsu in my fic Perfidious) I thought I should give writing an InuYasha fic a go. I'm hoping I can do this character the justice he deserves. Of all the characters I've been worrying about messing up in writing my fics, InuYasha is probably the one I worry about most. He has so much development, and so much distinct characterisation, that I could so easily mess up and make him out of character or unrecogniable. It's really daunting, honestly.
But, I need to stop pussyfooting around and try my best, right?
So here we go!
Catch The Rain
Some people feel the rain. Others just get wet
- Roger Miller
So messed up I want you here
And in my room I want you here
And now we're gonna be face to face
And I'll lay right down in my favorite place
Yeah you know what that is
This was where I felt at home.
While on-stage, this moment was all that mattered. The bright lights in my face, the leers and cheers from the men watching, the cool metal of the pole against my back. The club was hot and sticky and stunk of booze and smoke. The music was too loud to think about what I was doing, the lights too bright to see the mistakes that had lead to this moment.
Here, on this stage, I could forget who I was. I could forget who I was going to become. Most importantly, I could forget what I could never be.
Nothing mattered but the powerful music and the way my body moved. I could forget the outside world and my place in it. There were no classes here to worry about, no game of who's better and social expectations to try to live up to. I didn't have to worry about having a nice car, a nice house, a nice husband, a nice job. Neither did the people watching me. We could live in our fantasies here.
I could relax and enjoy myself.
I knew I had none of those things that everyone wanted, and flat out battled for on the streets every day of their miserable lives. I lived alone in a shitty apartment, with only a few spiders that I couldn't bring myself to shoo away from their webs as company. I had no husband, no boyfriend, and I certainly didn't have a nice job.
I would never be someone to be envied.
My fingers gripped at the zipper of the cropped leather jacket draped around my shoulders that I had donned between sets. The zip dragged downwards slowly, teasingly. I couldn't hear the sound of the metal dragging against itself as the jacket unzipped, but I could feel the heat of the room against my sweaty skin. There was no breeze in this packed room, and the heat just had my skin glistening with sweat. In the harsh lights above the stage, that was a blessing. The beads of sweat glimmered as I moved, drawing greedy eyes and generous hands.
The roars of the drunken men sat around the low stage almost eclipsed the sound of the English rock song as my fingerless-gloved hands stroked down over my bare breasts and stomach; my long black stiletto nails scratched gently over my skin. My thumbs hooked under the waistband of the tiny PVC shorts I wore, dragging the front of them downwards too, pausing just before I revealed all to the men watching.
Now I want to be your dog
Now I want to be your dog
Now I want to be your dog
C'mon I want to be your dog you know it
No matter what people said about it, this was the life. I didn't have the nice car, nice husband, nice job everyone wanted, but truly what more could I ask for? I had all that I needed in life. The thrill. The attention.
I dropped to my knees at the edge of the stage, rolling my hips and ruffling my choppy bleached shag as paper money was waved towards me.
The money.
A smirk came to my painted red lips when fingers slid over my stomach and thighs, hands tucked money into my shorts, voices called out promises and propositions. Yet no one dared to touch what they really wanted to. Not with security hovering just close enough to keep the man wary of acting out. The security here wasn't shy about keeping the women here safe. More than once the security had even come to my aid when I'd needed it. I owed them a lot.
These men didn't dare touch, so I touched for them, slipping a hand between my parted thighs and stroking upwards, over the PVC, the paper, the sweaty skin, between my heaving breasts.
What life could possibly be better than this? Here I could be whatever I wanted, do whatever I liked, fuck whoever I wanted.
Well come on
I'll be your dog
With an exaggerated moan, that only the lucky few closest to me could hear, I threw my arms out and jumped to my feet, landing with practiced nimbleness on the tall stilettos strapped to my feet just as the song finished.
And with that, I turned and strutted down the stage's catwalk, just as a new song began to play, quieter and slower now the night was coming to an end. This place always wanted to wrap things up with a slower number to try and tamp down rising emotions and hormones amongst employees and patrons alike before everyone had to make their way back to their real lives
Boring.
Whatever. I was out of here. I had underwear full of cash and adrenaline pumping through my veins. What else could I possibly need from this shithole tonight?
Maybe a warm body to share the high with. There was nothing better than a nice rough fuck when feelings were running this high.
"-Thinking of a June wedding, y'know? When everything's pretty and alive, but not like in-your-face sakura-everywhere pink."
If someone didn't shut this bitch up right now, I was going to do it myself, and it wasn't going to be a pretty sight. The shitty coffee in a paper travel cup and the painkillers I'd inhaled on the way out of my apartment this morning was not cutting it for trying to stave off the murderous rage induced by the shrill voice cutting its way through my hungover brain.
"I don't give a shit whether everything's alive, dead or on the fucking moon, Laura. Stop fucking talking. Jesus!" The rise in my voice and temper had a pulse of pain cutting through my head just as bad as my companion's voice. I chugged another lukewarm mouthful of coffee and grimaced. I didn't know what those shitty coffee stands were doing with their beans, but it wasn't making a good coffee out of them, I could tell you that.
An old couple strolling by us tittered to each other, clearly understanding the English profanity I often slipped into when talking to my sister and disapproving heavily. As the woman of that little duo turned a glare at me over her shoulder, I threw up the bird and a very fake forced smile. That had her gasping in melodramatic horror and clinging to her man, who sent his own glare at me in defense of his wife.
Mistress? Wife? Yeah, probably, wife. Men that crusty and old tended to affair with much younger chicks. The woman on his arm definitely wasn't a younger chick, bitch that she was. Unless she was the rich one, but if that was the case I imagined seeing her on the arm of a much younger man would be more realistic.
My sister, less surprised and horrified than the nosy couple, but equally judging, snatched my hand from the air before my finger could insult any other poor sensitive soul here. "Camille! Can you be a decent person for like ten seconds?"
Not in this lifetime. "Why the fuck are we even here, Laura? You know I hate these places."
The shrine we were at was, for all intents and purposes, beautiful. It wasn't particularly big, but the flora that surrounded the place, even in the middle of the city, was a breathtaking sight. It cast a green and pink hue onto everything in a way that I'd never get tired of seeing.
I just hated the feeling I got from it, and every other shrine and temple I had ever visited. It made me feel nauseous, and not all of that nausea could be blamed on my wicked hangover this time. This place just felt creepy and wrong to me. I could never understand why shrines like this were such a big tourist attraction. I did everything I could to avoid these places. My sister clearly didn't avoid them as much as I tried to.
I still didn't even know why we were here. She had called me this morning, waking me from my crappy sleep, without so much as a hi, demanded that I come meet her across the damned city in a tiny shrine I'd barely heard of. I'd barely gotten a curse out when my phone screamed its protest.
Drunken Cami apparently didn't care about sober Cami's need for a phone today. I'd forgotten to charge it. Damn.
"Doesn't it just feel so relaxing when you step through a torii?" My sister sighed blissfully into her coffee at the apparent pleasant thought.
I pulled a face at her. "Uh, no?" What the hell was this woman on?
She rolled her eyes at me. "No, of course it doesn't, 'cause you're Camille Ono, the baddest bitch in town," she mocked. "Don't you burn on sacred ground or something?"
"Fuck off," I shot back tiredly, taking another sip from my half-empty coffee. I didn't want to deal with an argument right now. I felt shitty enough. Couldn't she have just let me suffer in peace back at home instead of demanding I come join her at a shitty shrine on the other side of the goddamn city for a totally unnecessary tête-à-tête? I was done with the day already and it wasn't even noon yet. "Why are we here?"
Laura smiled at my irritation. Bitch. "I wanted to come check it out. This is where we're thinking of having the ceremony."
"The ceremony? As in the actual I do, swap the rings shit ceremony? You're having a Japanese wedding? But he's American."
My sister's fiance was as American as you could get. The man ate fucking apple pie for breakfast. He was nice enough, I guessed, if a little (very) obnoxious in just about everything he did, but he was very much not Japanese. He'd only moved to the damn country a couple of years ago. Why the hell were they planning a Japanese wedding?
"Being half-Japanese may not mean much to you, Cami, but it does to me. I don't want to lose my heritage, and Kenny understands that." Her brows drew together in that familiar frustration that meant she was a beat off crying. Fuck sake.
"Lose your heritage? Babe, you live in Yokohama. The only way you could be more encased in your heritage is if you moved out to the country and became a fucking shrine maiden, and from the way Kenny brags when he's had a few too many to drink, there ain't any maiden days left in you."
That was apparently the wrong thing to say, if the handbag hitting my arm had anything to say about the situation. I grunted, then hissed as my coffee spilled over my hand and the lacy red top I was wearing.
"Shit!" I cursed, dropping the cup and trying to shake off the hot liquid. My shirt was a gonner already and the burn against my chest was a bitch. "What the fuck is wrong with you, huh?"
A little self-righteous huff sounded from the woman as she stuck her nose in the air.
It was not alright to punch your sister. It was not alright to punch your sister. It was not alright to punch your sister.
"Serves you right for being such a bitch. Why can't you just be happy for us? We're getting married next year, and all you can do is bitch and moan like you always do."
Oh I really wanted to bite back. I wanted to put that bitch in her place. I knew things about her future husband that she would never believe, and would never accept if I did tell her. That man wasn't the perfect man she thought she was. But I held my tongue. I didn't want to fight her right now. The ringing in my ears and pounding in my head were torture enough. Having a public slanging match was not my idea of fun right now.
If I wasn't so hungover, I'd be on it quicker than a fly on shit.
"It's difficult not to bitch and moan when you have hot coffee poured over you," I grunted to myself, stalking away from my sister, kicking my abandoned coffee cup on the way past.
"What was that?" she called after me.
"I said you're a bitch," I replied without hesitation, flipping her the bird this time. I didn't get an answer.
Haha, I got the last word.
The shrine maiden currently trying to sweep the step of the main shrine house was quick to show me where the toilets were when she got a good look at me, drowned in my own sustenance.
There was absolutely no way I could save that top. The beautiful red lace was already stained a gross rusty red-brown.
I turned away from my reflection, trying to push back the memories of nights that got too rough and the burning pain of a broken nose. It had my stomach rolling.
The shirt had to go.
Thank fuck I wore a pretty decorative bra today. I didn't want to think about the ungodly sight I would have given everyone if I'd worn an old stained piece of crap today. The black lace of today's bra was just nice enough to look alright under the loose hoodie black I wore. It wasn't going to be winning any fashion awards, but it would do just fine for milling around until I could retreat back to my apartment.
I grimaced as I zipped my hoodie up over my stomach, leaving it open just enough to not boil myself alive. It was a hot spring day today. I didn't want to be melting on top of everything else I was feeling today, but leaving the hoodie open would just earn a shit tonne of nagging from my sister. I was already one hundred percent done with that shit today.
I rifled through my bag, tossing a used nipple pasty without its backing, and covered with loose tobacco and crumbs of something, onto the bathroom floor beside the discarded top, before coming up with what I wanted. The click of my lighter sent a familiar wash of calmness through me, that was only heightened as nicotine flooded my system soon after. That was what I needed.
The tired woman that stared back at me in the reflection of the toilet mirror looked like hell, even as her tense shoulders began to relax a little.
"Bitch, you look like shit." I gestured with my lit cigarette to her burnt chest, limp blonde hair and heavy dark bags under her hazel eyes. "What are you doing with yourself, huh? Partying all night then getting up and trying to fit in with all this shit? You don't belong here."
I didn't belong in any shrine, or at any fucking wedding. Who the hell did I think I was?
I needed to make a quick exit.
Laura would be pissed, I was sure, but I wasn't about to stay here when she was angry at me, already hungover and uneasy from the feeling in the air. If she really wanted to talk to me, she could come to me next time.
I heaved my bag up off the counter and pulled open the toilet door. The walk through the building, back out to the rest of the shrine was quick and quiet. The breeze brushing past the sensitive pink skin on my chest had me flinching and pulling my hoodie a little tighter around me to block it out. Dammit, that was going to be sensitive for a while.
It was a light enough burn that not many would notice it at work, if I kept a bit of a distance from people. Tips would go down the shitter, but a couple quiet days shouldn't hurt me too much. I'd just made rent last night, so that wasn't much of an issue for now. I could handle a week or two of eating ramen. It wouldn't be the first time.
Thank fuck for crappy, barely hot coffee.
"Excuse me?" came a broken English mutter from beside me. I blinked back into existence, looking up at a tall shrine maiden coming towards me, holding a broom in one hand, and pointing at my cigarette-laden hand in the other. "You no smoke here."
"Save your breath," I responded in our native Japanese, side-stepping her and hoisting my bag further up on my shoulder. "I'm leaving anyway."
"Please, put it out," she continued, following after me as I headed past the ema station, towards the large torii that marked my way to freedom.
"Camille?" my sister called out when she spotted me. Fuck sake. "Cami, where are you going?"
"Please, miss, your cigarette."
"Cami?"
"Put it out."
"Camille!"
I could feel my last nerve snapping alongside my already paper-thin patience. I stopped in my stride, heels digging into the ground hard as I tried to ground myself just a little bit. "Would you just shut up?!"
Grounding didn't work.
Around us, shrine visitors fell quiet. The whole place went deadly silent as my anger simmered.
"Here." I reached out and stubbed my cigarette out on the nearest blank plaque hung up on display. The acrid smell of burnt wood hit my nose about the same time my stubbed-out cigarette hit the ground. "Out. Gone. Happy? It's half-burnt for you. You know what my wish is? To not feel so fucking shit." I whirled on my sister now, throwing my hand in her direction. "Which is exactly the reason I am going home, so email me whatever you need to tell me or just fuck off, okay? Goodbye."
No one tried to stop me as I stormed off towards the torii, leading down onto the street.
Angry energy burned through me as my heels clicked against the stone ground towards the ridiculous staircase I knew I had to tackle. It burned through my veins, filling me with more nervous energy than I knew what to do with.
I needed to blow off some steam big time.
"I'm so sorry for her," Laura's voice muttered behind me. "Here, let me pay for what she..."
Good old Laura, always smoothing over the shit I left behind. It's a wonder she didn't get bored of it, the amount she followed behind me trying to fix my mistakes. If I was here, I'd get tired of hearing my own voice apologise so much. Some day she was going to realise it was stupid and unnecessary anyway. Yeah, that'd be the day.
The day she realised that would be the day she left me behind for good.
My eyes squeezed shut against the splitting headache forming as I reached the torii. I grunted, reaching out to steady myself against the gate when my heel slipped, grinding against the floor in a bout of clumsiness I wasn't used to from myself in heels. I'd spent the majority of my adult life walking around in them. I could sprint in them if I gave myself the chance to. Tripping wasn't common for me.
It was, though, apparently, when I misjudged the distance the thing I was trying to brace myself on was. I went down hard when I missed the torii, grunting as my ankle twisted on the way down. "Fuck," I hissed, eyes clenching tighter shut as I curled up around my throbbing ankle. "Fuck fuck fuck fuck!"
A little burn on my chest was one thing to try and hide from work. A twisted ankle would keep me off my feet for way too long.
Forget noodles, I was going to be living on dust for the rest of the month. At least there was plenty of that already in my apartment. No need to spend out on that.
"I'm fine," I insisted sarcastically when my sister didn't rush to my side to see if I was alright. "It's probably only a broken ankle. Nothing to worry- what?"
Expecting to see the smug face of my sister, nothingness wasn't an option, yet that was what greeted me when I did look up.
Nothingness probably wasn't the right word. I saw trees and grass and the beach in the distance. That was all something, but it wasn't the shrine I had just been standing in. Where was the shrine? The irritating shrine maiden? My sister?
It was all gone, and in its place a totally undisturbed view of nature. I couldn't see a single thing but trees and fields and sea around me.
I saw no buildings, no people. No anything.
"What..." I repeated, still trying to figure out just what I was seeing.
What... had happened?
Was I hallucinating? Had I died?
Was this some sort of celestial plane? Was my body crumpled at the bottom of those shrine steps, broken and gone? Was this where my soul had come to pass on to the other side? Or was this where I passed on to?
Where the fuck even was this?
"Come on!" I yelled out, throwing my handbag across the field I was stood in. "Couldn't I have gotten a better place than this? Where's the club? The women? The men? I haven't fucked up that bad!"
I'd sinned. I'd fucked around and cheated and lied. Maybe more than I should, maybe not, but I didn't deserve this sort of cold, abysmal Hell. Isolation in a place I didn't know. I don't care what I'd done, I didn't deserve this.
"What's the point of dying if I can't enjoy myself, huh?" I ground out. scrubbing my hands over my face, hissing when the gem of a ring that had twisted around at some point during the day scratched up my cheek.
The dead didn't hurt... did they?
I stared down at my hands, brows furrowing as I tried to make sense of what the hell was going on. I felt pain, even if it was just the pain from a scratch, so I couldn't be dead. So what was going on? Where was I? How did I get here? I was mostly convinced this wasn't the afterlife now, so what was it? Magic? Hallucinations? I'd never had a hallucination like this before.
I rubbed at my throbbing head and pitched forwards to crawl after the bag I had tossed aside in my frustration.
My pack of cigarettes was still right at the top of it when I unzipped my bag. It only took a few seconds to fill my lungs with blessed nicotine again.
I was too hungover for this shit.
"So what are you going to do?" I asked myself out loud, flicking some ash onto the ground.
Weren't you supposed to stay where you were if you got lost? I didn't think that would do me any good. Laura clearly knew I was gone, dead, whatever, but how the Hell was she supposed to find me here? I was in the middle of Yokohama five minutes ago. I had no idea where I was here. If I had no idea, I doubted Laura would, either.
So staying still wasn't an option.
Next?
I could follow the waterline. I'd seen a beach in the distance while looking around. If I kept following the water, I'd hit a port at some point, right? Well... if I wasn't alone in this Hell, I'd hit a port. What if this was just a barren land with only me in it? My literal idea of Hell. What then?
Maybe not the beach, then.
There were woods in the distance opposite the beach. I could try my luck in there. I was more confident in my ability to stay alive in the woods than on the shore. At least in the woods, I could forage successfully. With fuck all in my handbag to help me fish, I didn't want to take my chances out in the sea. There was only so much seaweed I could identify to eat, and I didn't fancy living on a diet of seaweed if I ended up not finding port or people. At least I knew there was more diversity in the woods.
Not that I liked the idea of either option, honestly.
"Fuck my life," I swore aloud, pushing myself to my feet, and wincing when my ankle throbbed.
Well, shit. That wasn't good news.
Unstrapping my heels was a good start, and with a sad little whimper, I left them where they were. "Sorry babies, but mama's got shit to do and you're not gonna help," was my devestated goodbye to them. At least they weren't the Jimmy Choos - a very generous gift from a creepy old man with deep pockets I'd sucked up to a couple years ago when he started sniffing around the club. He ended up going off with some other skank, but not before I'd rinsed him well. Those things would have come with me if I had to get rid of everything else in my bag to keep them. The ones that had been on my feet today were cheap and a lot more expendable.
I didn't have anything in my bag to wrap my ankle, and the one thing I could have used - that damned coffee-stained top - was still likely slumped in a corner of the shrine toilets, sodden and useless to me, even if I did have it in hand.
With a deep sigh, I limped forwards, not even close to ready to take on this aimless wandering to find something beyond trees and fields.
"Whoever said the fucking woods was a good idea needs to be shot," I growled to myself the next morning as I slapped away a low-hanging branch threatening to get in my face.
I'd managed to live through the night with thanks to my lighter creating a small fire and some foraging for something edible to chow down on. Thank you, mom, for forcing me to go to all those Scouts meetings over the years. I wasn't likely to ever thank her in person. I'd thought they were a waste of time and money after the first month, but she'd kept paying and pushing me to go until I'd moved out and left it all behind.
I doubt I would have survived half as well without Scouts training, though. If I ever saw her again, I'd maybe think about giving her a hug for her hard-ass nature.
Maybe.
Not likely.
The night hadn't been a glamorous one, and I was aching like a bitch after sleeping on the ground all night. Well, sleeping was a strong word for the abysmal 'rest' I'd gotten. It was spring, but the nights were still cold, and I was in a bra, a hoodie and a denim skirt that barely covered my ass. Not ideal forest-exploring gear. I'd been freezing, hungry, and still rough from my hangover from Hell.
This morning I'd woke up with a desert for a mouth and a new appreciation for Kenny, that he would absolutely never hear about, whether I saw him again or not. My sister's fiancé was an asshole at times, but his annoying insistence for drinking two litres a day 'for my health' had led me to own too many gifted water bottles and developing a habit of throwing one in my bag when I left the house, even if I rarely drank from it. I'd been nursing the one I threw into my handbag to meet up with Laura through my long trek through the night, and this morning, sipping when I felt thirsty and not a moment before then.
I didn't know when I'd next see any running water, and I wasn't about to die of dehydration any time soon. That was not the way I was going out.
It almost felt like it was, though, when by the end of the second day walking through the woods with no hint of another person in sight, my throbbing ankle felt like it was going to give out on me, my water bottle was down to its last few swigs, and the first sign of rain started filtering through the canopy.
I needed to find a river, or a village, or hell just a hermit living out in a cabin in the woods would do me right now.
Another branch smacked me in the face, and I slapped at it with a frustrated shout, hissing as rain splashed over my cheeks, too.
"Oh." The anger dissipated as I stared up at the sight in front of me. "What...?"
Definitely not the type of human contact I had expected to see, but the sight of an old man pinned to a large tree was living proof that I wasn't alone here, wherever here was. The roots of that tree had grown around him, though. How had that happened? To grow like that, he must have been there for a long time, but that was impossible.
I stepped forward and made a noise when I got closer and details got clearer.
"Poor bastard."
Living proof had been too quick of a judgement of what I saw. Sticking out of the man's chest, piercing the deep red cloth of his kimono, was an arrow. It didn't take long to notice other things about the man, either. He wasn't old like I thought he was from a distance. His hair was a brilliant silver that cascaded down around him, slowly starting to cling to his cheeks as the rain began to saturate him, but his face wasn't wrinkled or gnarled like I expected from someone with hair that white. He looked young, definitely younger than my twenty-six. I'd maybe even put him as a teenager, if I really had to make a guess.
His clothes, too... They were old. I'd seen similar clothing before in old museums as a kid. Never on an actual living person, though. Even in period dramas and during festivals, I couldn't recall clothing that looked that old.
There I went with the living thing again. Oops.
"Poor bastard," I repeated, climbing up the roots wrapped around him, so I could get closer. "Sorry for this, but a girl gotta live, and you...don't..."
His clothes weren't covered in blood. With a wound like an arrow through his chest, you'd think that the poor guy would have bled out, but I couldn't see a drop of blood on his clothing at all, even as I pulled the torn fabric aside, trying to see the entrance wound. His tanned skin looked like it had healed around the arrow or something. I touched the tanned skin and pulled back when I felt heat, looking up at his face. His body was still warm, even as my own skin chilled from the cool rain. He couldn't be dead.
I couldn't feel a heartbeat, though, as I pressed my hand to his chest, the arrow settled in the crook of my index and middle fingers.
How could he be warm but have no heartbeat? He wasn't breathing either. Just when had this man died?
He was warm, like his corpse was fresh, but his clothes were ancient, and the arrow piercing his not-wounded chest was battered by age itself. The white feathers making up the fletching were tattered and totally worn away in some places, looking even more haggard as the rain clumped the barbs together. The wood, too, looked weak and battered. It was like the arrow had been sat out to brave the forces of nature for years.
My fingers stroked the shaft, and a little noise escaped my throat when a splinter of the weak wood broke off. It really was as old and delicate as it looked.
The wood began to glow from that splintered piece and radiated outwards from that spot, lighting up with an odd pinkish glow. It gave me the same nauseous feeling as shrines and temples did. What the hell was that?
I jerked my hand back away from the arrow, looking back up to his face again as the glowing faded.
"Look, guy, whatever's going on with you is freaky, and I want nothing to do with it," I told the unresponsive body. "Forgive me for this, if you're even still alive, but I'm desperate."
His obi had no bag tied to it. Damn. Couldn't make it easy for me, could he? Carefully avoiding the freaky arrow to stop it from glowing again, I plunged my hand into the collar of his suikan, which felt unusually heavy and warm, like thick wool. I rifled around inside his robe until I felt the bag I was looking for, hoisting it out and tossing it in the air.
"Thanks a million, dude." I snatched it out of the air triumphantly when it began to fall again.
I wasn't totally sure that there would be anything of worth in the bag, but if he had anything of worth at all on him, it'd be there. That archaically dressed, I didn't think it was worth trying to find a wallet or a phone or anything else useful like that on him. I'd have probably even settled for a pager, but that felt like a big ask from a guy like this. He didn't even look like he was from a period reenactment. He just looked weird.
So, thick red bag matching his old clothing in hand, I climbed down off the roots, wincing at the screaming protests my ankle made. The sooner I found somewhere to put my foot up, the better.
Swinging the bag around by its thick black strings, I turned away from him, humming a little victory tune.
It barely counted as pick-pocketing from a corpse, but it had been a while since I'd had that particular thrill, and I reveled in it as I walked away from him. Was it considered looting rather than pick-pocketing if he was dead?
Was he dead?
I still had no idea.
Oh well. That wasn't my problem anymore. I could leave him and his freaky not-dead-deadness behind me.
My only problem to solve now was trying to find a good water source so I could fill up my water bottle and keep going on my aimless wandering journey. Then hopefully I could try and find some less dead company. I'd proved that there were actually people around now, so I just needed to find some that were a bit more talkative than that guy.
Maybe I should have gone along the coast, after all. It was easier finding a port town than wandering aimlessly in hopes of hitting a town.
Hindsight!
I tutted to myself, ducking under a low branch and around a tree, groaning when more water filtered down from the leaves above, soaking my already dripping hair.
If I got a cold from this on top of everything else, I'd be so pissed.
"Hi fellas," I spoke, a casual air in my tone, slowing to a stop. "How's it going?"
There were the people I was hoping to find. Three of them, looking weirdly old and plain. They, like the man just behind me, were all wearing simple plain coloured kimonos and hakama. In such a bright city as Yokohama, I saw a lot of kimono-wearers, particularly during holidays. Pretty much every kimono I saw on the streets of the city was brightly coloured and patterned. My own kimonos at home, all folded up in a cupboard, were usually considered plain compared to most others I had seen, but even they were highly decorated compared to the plain undecorated fabric these men wore.
These men weren't quite so friendly looking as I'd hoped, pointing weapons at me like they were. Old weapons, too. In the rougher parts of Yokohama, I was no stranger to seeing knives aplenty, and the odd pellet gun around, too. I'd never seen an actual gun, but weapons were a normal sight. I even kept a multitool with a small knife in my handbag, for moments I felt particularly unsafe.
The weapons these men were holding were not weapons that I was familiar with.
Or rather, weapons I wasn't familiar with seeing anywhere but at festivals or on TV. One of the three had a bow in his hands, training an arrow at me. The other two were holding yari out, business ends pointed at me.
My penknife didn't stand a chance against those.
At least they were people. That was what I'd hoped to find, even if they were hostile.
"A foreigner," one of them pen spoke from the corner of his mouth, trying to talk to the other men without alerting me. Years of working in loud clubs had given me a really good ability to lipread. It was something I most often used to get in on the gossip around the area. There was plenty of gossip that passed through strip clubs, and you wouldn't believe how handy it was to know some things about people. I liked the odd gossip session myself. Who didn't?
"I'm not a foreigner," I corrected for the millionth time in my life. It seemed like it was the same conversation with every new person I met. Didn't people get tired of pointing it out? "I'm half-Japanese."
"Shut up, girl," one of the men snapped at me, thrusting his yari forward. I skittered back a step to avoid it. "What are you doing in InuYasha's forest?"
InuYasha's forest? What sort of name was that?
"How am I supposed to shut up and answer questions, huh?" I bit right back at him, crossing my arms over my chest. "Look I, like, tripped and ended up in a really weird place not too-" Far. Not true. I'd been walking for hours over the last two days. "Close to here. Are you doing some weird reenactment shit? Do any of you have a phone I can use? I'll be out of your hair when I can get a ride home."
The men shared a look between themselves, like none of them could understand what I was saying and were trying to gauge whether the others understood me.
"Let's take her to the village," the one with the bow whispered to the others.
"Is that a smart idea? What if she's dangerous?"
"If we take her to Lady Kaede, she can take care of her."
"Good thinking, Rikichi."
I could feel my frustration mounting and a twitch developing in my brows.
It was like I wasn't even here. I hated rude, ignorant people like that. I knew what it was like to be treated less than others. I'd been treated like that for the entirety of my damned life. Talking about me like I wasn't there was the quickest way to really piss me off. The only reason I wasn't screaming down these rude bastards was because I wanted what they were talking about.
If I could get to a village, I could get to a phone, or a postbox, or a fucking carrier pigeon and be able to get my way out of this mess.
"I won't fight if you take me to your village." Not that I even could. My ankle still killed, and walking barefoot through a forest wasn't easy on the feet, even ones as hardy as mine, that had developed a million callouses from constant high heel usage. My callouses were no joke, but the forest floor was just that little bit tougher. I didn't even want to think about the number of little cuts I'd gotten since yesterday. Cleaning my feet was my second point of call after getting hold of a phone.
The men eyed me warily again before one - Rikichi - lowered his yari. "Hold your hands out."
Weird demand, but I complied, as he pulled a length of rough braided straw rope out of his sleeve. Be prepared for everything, or what? What sort of person kept rope in the sleeve of their kimono?
My brows shot up. "Kinky."
Walking in the rain fucking sucked.
But you know what sucked more than walking in the rain?
Walking for twenty-five fucking minutes in the rain.
It had taken us five minutes to break through the forest and out into open land again after I'd been tied up. Rikichi, the apparent leader of the group, had taken control of my itchy rope leash, and he periodically tugged on it if he thought I was walking a little too slow. At almost a foot shorter than the bastard without my heels on, I was almost jogging to keep up with him anyway.
The sight that greeted us when we did finally leave the forest was beautiful, and no doubt about it. Even in the rain. It was like the distant countryside, with rolling fields and rice paddies surrounding a tiny village. I meant tiny. As we walked, I counted the old-style wooden huts. I could barely count a dozen buildings, and no place - village, town or city - used all their buildings for housing. How few people lived in that place?
Or was it permanent residence? I'd heard of places where people had bought land and built up whole villages for their weird LARP fantasies. Was this one of those places?
Damn. If it was, I might be totally screwed. If this was a place for weird-ass people doing their weird-ass roleplaying bit for just a few days at a time, then the likelihood of having electricity around here was minimal. Would someone still have a working phone around here? Or a pager. Anything. But what would the signal be like here? I couldn't see a cell tower at all.
If I couldn't get to a phone, how the Hell was I supposed to get home?
Rikichi yanking at my bound wrists again dragged me out of my fretting, and right into rage.
I yanked back, unbalancing enough to bring him down on his ass. "Yank on me like that again and I'll shove these fucking ropes so far up your ass that you'll be picking straw out of your teeth for days! I'm not a fucking dog!"
I managed to deliver a swift kick to the guy's ribs before I was dragged back, struggling, by the other two. One of them managed to get a good hard slap across my face that left me winded and dazed for a moment.
Had... Had he really just hit me? I wasn't standing that bullshit. Not a snowball's chance in Hell was I standing someone slapping me.
My feet kicked out at the two men as I struggled, getting good hard kicks in, and elbowing them when I could. Rikichi jumped into the fray again at some point during my struggle.
It wasn't long after that I felt a sharp pain against the back of my head.
Information Time
I Wanna Be Your Dog - This song is a brilliant song by The Stooges. It's had many versions and covers over the year, but the one I imagined being used in this chapter is the Joan Jett and the Blackhearts version, covered in 1988, which puts it just nine years before 1997 that I think InuYasha is set in, and a perfect song for Cami to strip to
Torii - a traditional gate, used in shrines to mark the border between the mundane outside world and the sacred world of a shrine, often painted bright red when they're not left as natural stone or wood
Tête-à-tête - literally a 'head to head' is a meeting between two people, usually to discuss something
Ema plaque - an ema plaque is a small wooden board, often with a picture of an animal or shinto imagery painted on them. People sometimes write wishes on them and leave them at shrines to be burned in ritual events. They're most often an elongated pentagon shape and can be very beautifully painted
Iseyama Kotai Shrine - I don't think I ever actually named the shrine Cami was at in the chapter, but it was meant to be the Iseyama Kotai shrine in Yokohama. The Shrine was erected in the 1800's, so slipping back in time to Feudal Japan, which I've said before in my Naraku fic, I think is around 1555, would mean that the shrine doesn't currently exist, or didn't exist then? Trying to speak linearly is a nightmare when time travel is involved. Either way, back in ye olde demony times of InuYasha, Iseyama Kotai didn't exist
Scouts - The Girl Scouts of Japan is a faction of the World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts. I spent a good few years of my life as a Brownie and Guide myself here in England. You learn so many things. I learned camping, cooking, a few survival skills. There was so much more I could have learned if I'd stuck with it
InuYasha's Clothes - Now, I know I didn't go into too much detail on describing his clothes, but I want to drop a note in here about them, anyway. It's never really discussed in the series, or even in many fanfics I read, interestingly, but InuYasha's clothing is actually just as out of time as Kagome's is, by almost the same amount actually. The kimono shirt he wears is called a suikan, which was a really popular type of outdoor clothing for men in ancient Japan. But like... really ancient Japan. The suikan was worn predominantly in the Heian period, which ended in 1185, which puts at least 370 years between the popularity of that type of clothing, and the timeline the bulk of InuYasha is set in. InuYasha's clothing is archaic, even for the Muromachi period the show is set in. Kagome's uniform was first used in the late 1800s, but was introduced officially as a school uniform in 1920, which puts it around 365 years between the show's setting and the popularity of that type of clothing
Yari - a type of Japanese spear with a sharp blade at the end. Yari were popular weapons during the Muromachi period
LARP - Live Action Role Play. Basically dressing up and acting out the life of a character you create. There are some big events here in the UK and even bigger events in other countries. I've not done much in the way of LARPing myself, but I know people that are really into it
Thank you for sticking with this chapter, if you made it to the end. I know it was a lot, and quite different from my usual style of character. I tend to enjoy writing slightly rougher characters with big redeeming qualities - Dan from ITJOTW having a pretty strong moral compass and being very accepting of others and protective of her family, Nori from Miasma being a doctor honour-bound to help anyone she can, Reo from Perfidious taking in traveling riffraff and feeding them - so I wanted to try and challenge myself with writing someone who you don't immediately see any redeeming qualities for, and honestly I don't think you'll see too many in Camille for a while. Girl has a lot of issues to face.
If you're a repeat offender here at the milkshake bar, you know that this chapter is quite a bit longer than my usual chapter lengths. I usually aim for between two and four thousand words per chapter on other stories. I'm trying to make this one a bit meatier. I don't want to fall into the hole of just regurgitating what happens in the anime with this story, since I'm going for a story with such a major character this time around, so I'm trying to write longer chapters keeps me from relying too heavily on the source material to bulk chapters out. That's great in theory, but it does also mean that chapters take a little longer to write. Please be patient with updates on this. I will try and get them out as frequently as I can, but I won't promise a regular, rigid update schedule and disappoint you guys.
I hope you enjoy the next chapter, coming along shortly.
