Author's Note: I started this chapter right away because I was more excited to write it than Kikyou's chapter. :D Hope you guys enjoy.
From now on I'll be listing songs I write these chapters to. Cause why not? This chapter was written to Breathturn by Hammock
Disclaimer: I wrote my first Inuyasha fanfiction thirteen years ago. And still, I own none of the Inuyasha series or its characters. So sad.
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Chapter 15: Sifting
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Inuyasha
"Hold it," Inuyasha growled. He narrowed his eyes at the doppelganger, letting her know full well that he could track what she was doing, even if he hadn't been looking at her. "If you fucking touch that idiotic contraption, I'll come for you next."
She froze, arm stretched out for the weapon. He watched as she slowly moved away from it, glaring at him.
Good.
He inhaled deeply, forcing the pulsing tide of his demonic aura down inside of him, willing himself away from transformation. Once fully transformed it was hard to stop, especially without his sword.
He kept his gaze pinned to the doppelganger as he felt the redness recede from his vision. The kid who'd tried to gouge his eyes out earlier was unconscious on the bed, although he was breathing, and the infuriating girl who had shot him was currently under the control of his grip, held tight against the wall. The only one he wasn't fully in control of was the infuriating Kikyou-double who called herself Kagome.
"Now," he said, "Everybody calm the fuck down, and listen to what I have to say. …If you want to live that is." And he let both girls know how serious he was by putting as much menace behind his grin as he could. He watched Kagome's face drain of color.
He had her full attention now, which was imperative at this point. Once he lost that, she might do something rash, like shoot him again, and he'd slip back out of control, and he really, seriously did not want to kill anyone. Once he morphed to full youkai, he would have no way of protecting them from himself. Kagome's actions in the next few seconds could alter everything.
He tried not to show it on his face, keeping his expression mean and intimidating.
"I am not here to eat you, as you all seem to think I am. I am not here to kill you, although," he added quickly as Kagome opened her mouth to argue, "I am not beyond tearing apart the next person to fucking shoot me. Understood?"
She nodded, eyes wide, darting from him to her friend and back to him again.
"I'm past you two playing hero. I'm done with this game. You. Doppelganger." He pointed a clawed finger at Kagome, growling his next words. "Pick up the weapon. Slowly. If you shoot me with it, I will break your friend's neck." He watched as she sucked in a deep breath and moved slowly, just as he'd instructed, picking up the weapon with her thumb and index finger and bringing it to him.
"N-no!" Her friend bit out.
Inuyasha tightened his grip around her neck. "Shut up."
She coughed.
"Please don't hurt her, she was just trying to protect me," Kagome said, holding the weapon out for him. Inuyasha reached out and swiped the newfangled torture device from her, crushing it into a deformed metal ball in his hand. Then he let it drop to the floor.
He was expecting her to let out a shriek of fear or something, but she looked relieved instead. Which was strange, because as far as she had to be concerned, there was a crazy, bloodthirsty youkai in the room who had her friend shoved up against the wall.
"I won't hurt her, as long as you promise to fucking stay put for more than three seconds." He promised.
She locked her jaw and crossed her arms. "You won't hurt Kohaku either? Or me?" She added as an afterthought.
"You won't go running off?"
At her firm nod of agreement, Inuyasha turned back to her friend. Sango. "Listen up," he said, eyes locked onto hers, "if you try to so much as push me, it's not you I'll go after, it's your brother."
The absolute fear followed by absolute hate that flashed through her eyes convinced him she understood. Slowly, he released his grip around her neck, letting her fall to the floor in a crumpled heap, where she coughed violently.
"Sango!" Kagome started towards her, but Inuyasha held his hand up to stop her.
"Stay where you are."
"But she's hurt."
"She's fucking fine, she just needs to breathe a little."
"You slammed her head into the wall!"
Keh, that was such a human thing to do, blaming others for their own actions. What he had done was out of self-defense, that bitch had attacked him first. "She fucking shot me." He seethed.
She opened her mouth to argue, then closed it again, eyes darting to her friend. Then she turned her eyes onto him and locked them there.
Inuyasha had to school himself not to react to her. His mind immediately skipped to the first time she'd kissed him. Then the second. Then the third. He grit his teeth against the memories, against mentally replaying the way her lips felt on him, the way she had shivered under him, how wet she'd been for him.
No. No. He couldn't let himself get carried away anymore, no matter how much his body seemed to crave her. She was a racist bitch, and even though it didn't make any damn sense that she had flipped the switch, somehow, in between the time they'd last kissed and he had seen her again, she had become disgusted with herself for being so attracted to him.
He had been so angry with her. So fucking pissed off while she refused to look at him. It made him sick to his stomach. Had he thought this Kagome girl would be the one to fix all his fucked up relationship problems? No. It was going to take more that a stupid, pretty, human female and probably another three hundred years before he was even in the range of being ready for anything more than lust. But he had thought she was different.
"Inuyasha, you cannot claim me as you are. You cannot claim me until you are human."
Kikyou's words replayed on a sickening loop over and over inside his head. Keh. Women, both human and youkai, were all the same. He wasn't good enough for any of them. He was damned being half human, and damned being half youkai. But both parts were what made up him, dammit, and that's why he had to shove it back, every shot to his ego, every hit to his pride. Shove it far back so he just wouldn't give a damn anymore.
Keeping his back to the window he'd climbed through to get in the house, his eyes pinned both girls, in case they were stupid enough to try anything else. He crossed his arms over his chest and sank into the desk chair, trying to get as comfortable as possible while maintaining track of everyone situated in the room.
"Now that we've all calmed down a bit, we can talk." He said.
Kagome's eyes hadn't left his, not for a second. And for the first time he saw something besides the lust and the fear that usually mixed there. Determination. He sensed that something had shifted in her. She leaned up against the wall, folding her arms in a mimic of him, her jaw set.
"So? Talk."
He smirked. "Here's what I need from you. I need the jewel. I'm pretty sure you're the only one that can track it down."
"What makes you think that?" She asked, frowning.
"Because you're Kikyou's doppelganger. The jewel was inside of you, which means you were born with it, which means it's a part of you. You should be able to sense the shards."
She huffed impatiently. "That's like saying if my finger were chopped off and hidden from me I'd be able to 'sense' it and track it down."
"That would be stupid, unless your finger is a powerful jewel," he made a show of looking at her hand, "it's not."
She ignored his taunting. "So all I have to do is… is feel around for these shard pieces?"
"That's all." He insisted.
"And then you'll leave me and my friends alone?"
Inuyasha nodded, holding his hands up to signify he had nothing to hide. "You'll have seen the last of me, I promise."
Her eyes narrowed, and he saw the skepticism there. "Where do I begin looking?"
He shrugged. "I've got a few leads, a few people to check out. If I know Kikyou, and I know her well, she didn't just scatter them randomly, she'll have sent them to people she either trusts or who owe her something."
Kagome tensed up then, pushing herself away from the wall. "Wait a second. How long is this going to take?"
He clamped his teeth together. He could feel himself growing increasingly impatient. She was asking too many damn questions. "Does it matter? Do you think I'm going to take no for an answer? This isn't going to be a fucking day-trip, doppelganger, you don't-"
"My name is Kagome, not doppelganger. Stop calling me that."
Inuyasha grinned. He liked that he was able to jab at her with his words. That it got to her. "That's what you are though, Ka-go-me, just a doppelganger, a fucking copy of an original. Who, when she discovers that you've helped me escape, by the way, will want you fucking dead. Do you get what I'm saying?" He had stood up at some point during his tirade, trying to intimidate her with his size.
Her chin jutted straight in the air, her eyes glairing daggers up at him. She was afraid, he could smell the faint odor coming from her, but he was damned if she refused to show it. Her arms stayed crossed and her feet stayed grounded in place. She wasn't giving him an inch.
For some reason Inuyasha was excited by the thought that she could, at least on the outside, hold her ground. Under normal circumstances, he would have been all for taking his time, figuring out what made her tick. But he didn't have any fucking time. He needed that jewel whole and powerful and in his hands. Now.
"Keh," he said, moving slowly back to the chair and sitting down, smiling at her visible relief, just like when he'd crushed the weapon earlier. "My point is, it doesn't matter how long it takes, you're still going to help me."
"Kagome… Don't." Sango rasped from her still-crumpled spot on the floor.
"By all means, listen to your friend. But I won't stop following you around until you agree. I will make your life a living hell."
Her eyes widened.
He had her now, he knew it, and he couldn't help the smirk that spread across his face.
But then, suddenly, she was smirking too, and it caught him off guard. Only for a second did his face slip, before again becoming perfectly controlled.
"Do you think I'm stupid?" She asked, body visibly relaxing in front of him. "From what I can tell, you have about…" she glanced down at her wrist watch, "six hours until sunrise. Until you're sucked back into your little prison. And I can assure you, Inuyasha, that I won't be letting you out again." Her smirk had turned into a grin.
Fuck. He had been counting on the fact that she wouldn't remember that little detail, that his fast talking would be enough to get her to agree to at least start looking for the jewel. She was smarter than he had given her credit for, and she knew it. She took two steps towards him, confident now.
He glared back at her with contempt.
He had to play his cards right.
"Six hours," he growled. "Six hours is a hell of a lot of time to cause havoc. Six hours is more than enough time to-" he stopped his threat mid sentence, shocked. He felt the sift in the space around them, felt the traces of power seconds before he appeared.
Inuyasha's eyes flashed to Kagome, and he could tell: she sensed it too.
He appeared right behind her, Kikyou's lackey, purple robes swirling along with the sifting wind, deep eyes gazing out underneath dark bangs. Kagome went ridged, eyes wide. Scared. Before she could turn her head to look, his arm was around her neck in a chokehold.
Her hands immediately went up to claw at his arm, grabbing fistfuls of cloth. She could still breathe though, he could see it as she started to panic.
"Miroku," Inuyasha hissed.
"Inuyasha," Miroku replied, his voice the same, calm timbre. His eyes scanned the room, falling on the unconscious whelp on the bed and the girl on the floor now struggling to sit up. "I hope you're not planning on killing any humans," he continued. "Otherwise Kikyou will be upset."
"Kikyou can fucking shove it."
His eyebrow quirked up, but he didn't take the bait. "Excuse us."
"No!" Inuyasha shouted, launching himself from his seat, reaching his hand out. But it was too late, Miroku sifted again, and Inuyasha's claws closed around thin air, right where the doppelganger had been standing.
"Wh-what the hell!" Sango shouted, finally standing on shaky legs. "Kagome! What the hell, where did they go?" Her eyes locked onto Inuyasha. "What did he do to Kagome?"
Inuyasha stood stock-still. It was too quick. Kikyou had found them too quick. But this couldn't be the end, not when he finally had a slim chance of freeing himself for good. No way was he going to give up now. No way was he handing over the doppelganger.
Not without a fucking fight.
Inuyasha turned and gave Sango a curt nod. "I'll bring her back," he said. He had only seconds to track and follow Miroku, and then it would be too late. He closed his eyes, concentrated, and caught the barest wisp of a trail.
He sifted.
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So my computer died just as I was writing the ending to this chapter. I had a heart attack. Thank god for auto-save!
Also, I'm curious if anyone caught on to my earlier mention of Miroku back in chapter four? Anyone? Or was I too obscure? Lol.
Please remember to review, I'm serious about my writing and my stories, and if you have anything to comment about or anything to mention or anything to say, I would love to hear it.
~SugarRos
