Disclaimer: No I do not own Inuyasha so there:P

:Ozzzzz...I'm sleepy...

Chapter 14: Shikon no Tama

Inuyasha held her hand tightly, securley, and it was the only thing keeping her from turning and running back to the forest where the strange and nasty echoes of the past would stop following her.

Sango jumped again and stared into the distance.

"Sango will you stop that!" Inuyasha said. "Every time you jump, Kagome jumps too!"

"Sorry." she said her voice preoccupied. "But I would swear I keep seeing something."

"Like what?" Rikos asked with Shippo on his shoulder. Shippo was the only surpassed by Kagome in fear of the place. Maybe it was because he was a child and still innocent.

"I dont know." she admited still looking around. "Just...something."

"Okay, can we stop the creepy talk? Your scaring Kagome." Inuyasha said.

And indeed Kagome's eyes were darting around looking for what Sango saw.

"Aw Inuyasha are you worried about her?" Miroku asked a particular gleam in his eye.

Sango reached over and punched him upside the head.

"Hey what did I do?"

Sango rolled her eyes and Shippo said, "Idiot."

"Come on. This place is giving me the creeps." Rikos said moving their party forward again.

"Sango will you quite jumping!" Inuyasha demanded when she did it again a little while later.

"Look!" She pointed ahead of them.

"Sango there is nothing out here but us!"

"No look! There's something green over there!"

"What?" Inuyasha looked ahead and saw a tiny dot of green.

Kagome looked too and gasped. "Meca coneo!" she said in surprise before she let go of his hand and ran forward.

"Woh, what?" they took off after her but she was already kneeling next to the tiny green thing when they caught up.

"Look! Look! It's a flower!" she said happily stroking it's petals.

"Congratulations." Inuyasha said crossing his arms and looking at it.

"It's so pretty." Sango said bending down and looking at it.

It was pretty. It couldn't have stood more than a foot off the ground and it was just a single flower, with two leaves on a tiny stem sticking out of the tiniest patch of clean earth. The flower hadn't bloomed yet but it was large and the colors of the outside petals were hot magenta.

"What's meca coneo, mean?" Rikos asked.

"It's the ancient equivalent of 'oh my gosh'." Kagome said not taking her eyes away from the flower.

"What's it doing here?" Sango asked.

"It's a messenger." Kagome said here eyes starting to glow as they did when she Sang.

"A messenger of what?" Miroku asked.

"Shikon." she whispered.

"Good?" Inuyasha asked.

Kagome leaned forward and kissed the flower and suddenly, it bloomed. There had to have been hundreds of tiny many shaded petals on it. From light airy pink in the middle to the hot magenta on the outside. The tiny center was a healthy brown and the fragrence it let off was so sweet and light.

Kagome whispered to it in the ancient language, a simple greeting.

"Woh!" Sango said as the ground started to shake.

"What the..." Inuyasha cried out as the ground in front of him exploded. A huge skeleton crawled out of the dirt.

Shippo and Rikos screamed as they saw it. It's armor still clung to it's bones and there was still some meat and sinew there. It grinned at them evily and lifted a large old battle ax from it's belt. It howled to the sky for it's head was that of a giant wolf and he had to be half a man height taller than Inuyasha.

Kagome had not taken her eyes off the flower but she said in a strangley distant voice. "They, too, are messengers."

"They?!" Sango asked worried.

"They are messengers of Tama." She didn't look scared or worried. In fact she looked oddly peaceful.

The earth exploded again and again as more skeletons rose from their ancient grave. Some were humans, many more were demons, all were ferocious and nasty to look at.

"What the hell!" Inuyasha screamed slicing the one in front of him in half.

"They are his worriers from ages past." Kagome said.

"What do you mean, his worriers?" Miroku asked throwing a sacred sutra at one. It immediatly burst into bright blue flames.

"He has kept their souls here, waiting for us." she seemed posatively nonpulsed by that fact.

"Damn it!" Inuyasha yelled out continuing to slice them into pieces.

He jumped back and stared at them. "Hah, their not so hard to..." But before he could finish the skeltons started putting themselves back together, and even more rose out of the ground.

"Kagome, let's get out of here!" Sango grabbed her arm and tried to pull her away but she wouldn't budge. "Kagome, come on!"

But she was still staring at the flower as if was telling her something of vital importance.

"Kaogme!" Rikos yelled trying to fight with his trydent.

Inuyasha took them all down one by one saying, "There....has...GOT....to be....a way....to...kill....these....things!"

"There's a whole army." Sango said worried. "We can't beat them all." And they were indeed surrounded by the dead puppets.

"Kagome!" Inuyasha yelled at her. "Can we go now!?"

"They've been here so long." She said finally looking away from the flower. "I think it's time they were set free."

"What..." Then lightning clashed across the sky and a single rain drop landed on her cheek, like a tear.

"Set them free." She said in the language.

Then the rain started pouring down and where it hit the skeleton army they had bursts of white leave their bodies.

"Hey those are..." Rikos said recognizing them from when Kagome had set the families souls free.

One of the skeletons let out a moan that sounded of dispair before it's corpse collapsed and the bones melted into dust. Slowly it's brothers followed it each one letting out a mournful cry before dropping and melting away.

"Their souls are free." Kagome smiled. "The evil is gone, can't you feel it?"

And indeed the feeling of evil had vanished, or rather, was shrinking as the skeletons melted. The earth below them changed to a healthy black and the clouds started to thin and disperse.

Finally the army was gone, their bodies returned to the earth, and the sky shined clear and blue there for the first time in centuries.

"Shikon no Tama," Kagome said picking the flower, "the battle of good and evil. And here, good has won." the stem and flower withered and they too returned to the earth.

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