When I first posted this chapter, there was something horribly wrong with the formatting. I'm sorry to anyone who was inconvienenced by this! I'm not sure what sort of effect it's going to have...
A special thank you to…
demander-of-logic…Clouds of the Sky…Ayjah…readingwriting wench…TrueBelle…bdrake07…Avelyn Lauren…ffgirlmoonie… IYgal44354…silverkonekotsukari…Watching Eternity… iamthefish…mangafreak16…jesse10132…TouchofPixieDust…MeiunTenshi…WynnFire…chiclet180…Amaya Mishugosha… Eye's of the Rose…I Laugh at ur Pain…
Disclaimer:
Mr. X: You monster! You get off that hippo right now!
Pwale (Who is gallivanting around with the hippo): Never! Yoo-hoo!
Shippo: I know I'm going to regret asking this, BUT HOW DOES THIS HIPPO LEAD TO A DISCLAIMER?!?!
Pwale: Read this side!
(Written on the side of the hippo in big white letters is "Pwale Doesn't Own The Inuyasha Characters…Legally, Anyway.")
Shippo: …Yep. I knew I would regret it. But I just had to ask, didn't I? Sigh…
Oh my Gods, I am so sorry! I really thought that I was going to update sooner then this! Two weeks till school ends and the teachers get together and say "Wow this year was short! Hey! I've got a great idea! Let's pile the work on now!"
So, to make up for it, this chapter is LONG and EXCITING!
…
The Stamp Of Gold
Stand Up In The Middle
By Pwalefriend
…
When Kagome opened her eyes the first thing she saw (and breathed) was dust. Once she was done hacking, she ventured from the doorway where she had taken refuge and she looked around. What met her eyes can aptly be described in one short sentence.
A horrendous mess.
Kagome barely had time to consider the strewn cement, the broken glass, the torn street and the still-crumbling city around her that was slowly starting to burn when the situation started to set in. There had been an earthquake. And judging from the way things kept falling, she was probably going to die. Normal people would've started to panic then. Normal people did. But Kagome wasn't a normal person. So instead of panicking she ran off to help the normal people who were panicking, because that was the exact moment the normal people started screamed.
…
Inuyasha didn't bother looking for the remains of the Magic Mirror in a desperate attempt to find Kagome. Instead his thought process went something like this-
There had been an earthquake.
She hadn't been protected.
She might be dead.
Damn, the room is a mess.
It was his entire fault.
He had to get there.
He had to get to Kagome now.
Tetsusaiga wouldn't get him there fast enough.
"Clingy!" Inuyasha shouted. "Clingy!"
"Yes, lord?" Clingy bounced in front of him.
Well, this is by far the stupidest thing he's ever done. Inuyasha's left foot said.
We're all going to die. Said the right foot.
What the- Said the brain. Hold up you idiot! I'm saying DON'T make a World Mare! Don't! Not Do!
We're definitely dead. Agreed the kidney.
Kagome! Bemoaned the heart.
SHUT UP!!! They all screamed at it.
Yes, dear reader, Inuyasha was going to change Clingy into the World Mare, a means of transportation faster then any we have yet developed, unfortunately the process (though quick and short) normally kills the person trying to make a World Mare (which is why it's usually quick and short). To this day not even I have any idea what possessed Inuyasha to turn Clingy into one, since the only part of him not saying DON'T DO IT!!! DON'T DO IT!!! was his heart and that's only because his heart was too busy whining Kagome's name to say anything that was relevant to the situation.
However, I think the brain can take a well-earned round of applause for the success of the venture. It worked incredibly hard to achieve something incredibly difficult under incredibly stressful circumstances. Let's give it a round of applause, everybody!
See, Inuyasha's Brain? We appreciate you. Keep on trucking there, buddy! We're all rooting for you!
Anyway, back to the story.
…
Kagome ran past burning and fire and pain and death and tragedy, which were usually happening all at the same time like a Three Ring Circus. Finally she arrived at where she was running.
It was a boarding home, one for Single Young Ladies of the Working Class, which basically meant We'll Let You Live Here, You Dirt Poor Wretches, If You Bend Over Backwards And Do Three Flips Like A Dog.
Kagome had lived in one of these houses. Not this particular one, but another one in the big city that was all to similar. In fact the only difference was that here they made you pay through the nose. Back at the one Kagome had lived at they made you pay from a slightly more southern region. It had been after her father's death, when they had first been kicked out of their homes. Kagome's colleagues, professors, mentors and her father's old friends had all abandoned them. Kagome had been unable to continue her education, let alone afford decent living standards. She had pawned off all their belongings, even the ones of no value, and had managed to buy her mother a tiny one-room apartment. Her mother and grandfather were of failing health and her brother was too young to work a respectable job and too troublesome to work a none-respectable job. Kagome had started working at the boarding house where she lived to pay off their debts and to pay her living fines and her mother's rent fees. It hadn't worked very well. She was on the brink of giving up with her father's oldest friend had come to her with a letter from Sango.
A letter that had saved the lives of her and her family. And here she was, running for her life from the person who'd saved their lives because he'd saved her life by taking another's life.
I think I may have mentioned it before, but ain't life ironic?
Kagome shoved her skirts out of the way and fell to her knees and began scrabbling at the rubble, she was in the process of pulling a rather heavy rock off of what looked dreadfully and horribly like a dismembered arm, when a polite cough came from behind her. Kagome turned and found she was staring at a scary looking old guy.
She blinked.
Oh, no. She corrected herself. He's not old; he just looks as if he should be. I guess it's the tie. It looks like one my professors all used to wear.
"Kagome Higurashi." Said the man, smiling coolly at her with an undeniable charm. "May I help you up?"
Kagome blinked again. She swore in her mind. He's Naraku. She thought. And she was right. He was Naraku. There was something completely and utterly Naraku-esque about him. Whether it was the slimy yet self confident way he carried himself or the evil aura that practically seeped out of his pores in a way that made most people subconsciously very glad they couldn't see auras, and made people who could see auras very consciously wish that they couldn't. Kagome was a mixture of the two. She was very consciously glad that she couldn't see auras, because she knew without a glimmer of a doubt that his would be simply revolting.
As subtly as she could manage Kagome palmed half a brick and wished that her hands were bigger, so that then she'd have been ableto subtly palm half a brick.
"Naraku." She said. "Why don't you help with these people?"
Naraku surveyed the damage. Kagome thought that his expression had not changed until he looked down at her and she saw, to her surprise, honest confusion.
"Why?" He asked.
Now, some of you may think that Naraku was saying this to be mean and cruel and evil so that after a little lead up he could use his patented evil laugh, the famous Ku ku ku ku. But this is not so! No, dear readers, Naraku quite honestly hadn't the faintest idea whatsoever about why he should help the pained and dying people buried underneath the rubble. Naraku wasn't an evil guy by choice; he was just naturally drawn that way. He was like a cynic, only without the funny part, and a lot more intense.
Kagome gaped at him, shocked.
"What do you mean, 'Why?'" Kagome demanded angrily. "They're hurt, that's why!"
"But I don't know them, and I don't care to." Naraku explained patiently, as if explaining to a child who had just asked why the sky was blue and then after a long talk about pigments and particles and reflections had asked "So there are lots of shiny rocks in the sky, right?"
"But…But they're hurt!" Kagome said. "When people are hurt you should try to help! That's just how the world works!" Naraku raised an eyebrow and Kagome dejectedly amended herself. "That's how the world ought to work." Kagome mumbled.
"Maybe." Naraku shrugged. "That's your opinion. Normally I wouldn't argue, but I certainly don't want any employees of mine rooting around in the dirt. Get up this instant."
"I'm not your employee!" Kagome snapped, glaring. "I already have a job, thank you very much! And it pays well too!"
"Oh?" Naraku looked amused at something. "You refuse my offer because you prefer a murderer to working for me?"
"Inuyasha is not a murderer!" Kagome glared at Naraku, not really even noticing that she was rising to the hanyou's defense. "He killed Koga in defense of me! Which legally counts as self-defense! So there!"
"Oh, I wasn't referring to Inuyasha." Naraku said, taking a step closer. "Did it sound like I was referring to Inuyasha? I'm sorry. Allow me to change a few words of my statement." Naraku took another step closer and Kagome's grip on her half brick tightened and she stared up at Naraku a little feebly. He was a rather imposing figure. "I meant to say," Naraku continued. "That rather then work for me, you chose to face a murderer."
Kagome wasted no time then. She leapt to her feet, swung the half brick at Naraku's head (unfortunately the brick sailed right past Naraku, though it did graze his ear a little bit) and took off like a hare from the hounds, all in one swift and fluid motion that looked a little bit silly to the casual observer.
Naraku chuckled to himself.
"Ku ku ku ku ku." He laughed. "Ku ku ku. Run, run, run, as fast as you can." And then Naraku began to follow at a leisurely pace. "Wait up, my dear!" He called happily. "You run ever so fast!" Naraku was one creepy bloke.
…
Meanwhile, in another part of the world, Kagura looked around the hotel room one last time.
"Well," she said to Mrs. Higurashi and Sesshomaru. "That's everything. Are we going to pay a surprise visit to Sango and Miroku, thus interrupting their honeymoon and probably getting a good laugh out of it, or go home, thus interrupting Inuyasha and Kagome and probably getting a good laugh out of it."
"Oh." Mrs. Higurashi said. "Let's go interrupt Sango and Miroku. The children are certainly looking forward to it, and I think Kohaku misses his sister more then any of us miss home."
"Right." Kagura nodded. "To-…Wait, where did they go again?"
There was a moment of silence.
"Didn't they elope unexpectedly?" Sesshomaru asked. The two women nodded. "Isn't the point of eloping so that no one will be able to find you?"
There was a second moment of silence.
"Well, that's so rude!" Mrs. Higurashi eventually snapped. She made a fist and thrust it into the air. "I vow that I will not go home until I have found Sango and Miroku and interrupted their honeymoon!"
"Yeah!" Kagura shouted vehemently.
Sesshomaru shrugged.
"Me too." He said.
And so they stepped out of their hotel room, into the hot and steamy (and buggy, and disease-ridden) Amazon rainforest to tell their family and companions their new resolution.
It comes to my attention here that Kagome and Inuyasha both suffered from something known as the Relative Syndrome. Basically the Relative Syndrome works like this:
Where is your family when you need them most?
On the other side of the good ol' planet and wouldn't you know it, they forgot to leave an emergency contact number.
…
When last we saw our heroine she was running away from the scary bad guy, who was chasing her at not only a slower pace, but also one that was a lot more graceful then hers.
Just adding insult to injury, he was! Salt in the wounds!
As we are now rejoining our heroine, only a few short moments have passed, but that same villain (by name, Naraku, a name that sounds as evil as he is) has cornered our heroine (Lovingly referred to as Kagome, the dear) in a dark alleyway.
Whatever will she do next?
…
Well, there you have it!
Sorry about the cliffie. I wrote it, and then I simply couldn't resist. I'll give you a teaser, if that makes it any better:
Kagome closed her eyes and tried again. This time she felt all of them, rising up and pounding on her boundaries, they wanted out, and she was going to give it to them. Kagome's left foot wondered what Naraku could have possibly done to make them so angry.
Well well well…What could that be?
The Review Lion demands Reviews!
ROOOOOAAAAR!!!!!
Yay! Oh nooo! There goes To-Ky-Yo! Go, Go Review Lion!
(Forgive me my geekiness, I'm not really that geeky. For example, I've never seen Godzilla. I just like the theme song. And only bits and pieces at that)
…
Oh, yes, Review Lion was planning to go eat Fishie, who's been very lax about reviewing. Unfortunately the cleaning ninja's got in the way, and now an epic battle is waging.
To learn about this epic battle, which will begin in the disclaimers of my next story, I demand an answer!
Would people rather see an AU, or a Non-AU? I'm torn, I'd like to answer a demand. Fill a spot, as it were. If there's a shortage of one type, I'd like to do my part.
Till next time!
TTFN
Ta Ta For Now!
Sincerely
Pwalefriend