Travel Travails Chapter 10: Corpses and Consequences, an inuyasha fanfic

A/N: I wanted to finish this arc up and so posted this as soon as I could. Defense for the rather mean ending is in the bottom AN.

Hope you all enjoy it.

Corpses and Consequences:

"I can't handle this," Kagome whispered. It was the third night in a row she had woken up in a cold sweat. The nightmares were getting stronger and stealing away her strength; the emotional pressure was enormous.

The hanyou across from the smoldering fire glared. "You wouldn't have bad dreams if you would just stop crying yourself to sleep."

Kagome glared right back. "Don't be ridiculous. Crying doesn't cause nightmares."

"They do if you keep crying and bitching because you won't stop thinking about it!" Inuyasha snarled. "Nothing so terrible happened."

Why do I bother? Sighing, Kagome felt all her pent up nerves and energy fade away into lethargy. Crickets chirped and she inhaled the peace as if it were a physical aid to her wellbeing. Nighttime usually brought a rare sense of calm to the tumultuous region.

But with the nighttime now came memories.

The sights, the smells and the sounds of that forest glade where murder had been committed surged into her and Kagome buried her face in her hands on the remembrance.

The dismembered bodies…congealed blood everywhere…pink and pale guts spilled over green grass...a crow pecking at a man's stomach and peeling away flesh…

Gagging, she stumbled out of the sleeping bag and made it outside the campground just in time.

"Aw shit," Inuyasha grumbled, already rummaging through her yellow briefcase. "Not again."

Kagome sank next to the greenery and coughed. I can't do this…

Heaving a sigh, Inuyasha plunked a water bottle next to her. "Drink," he ordered curtly. "And stop hurling. I told you it makes me sick."

"Sorry," she whispered. "I can't help it." She took a deep drink from the bottle, spit it out and stood up on shaky legs. Sitting down again beside the fire, she stared at her hands and simply tried to empty her mind of the horrific memories plaguing it.

Dead, mangled bodies…a spirit arrow bisecting limbs…an insect climbing over a vacant face…

Whimpering she shut her eyes and sucked in a lungful of air. "Don't think about it," she whispered to herself.

"Oi! You!" snapped Inuyasha.

Warily Kagome's eyes opened to see a gold reflection of herself too close. His breath fanned her cheeks and Kagome jerked back in surprise.

Inuyasha leaned forward. "Stop beating yourself up about it," hesaid impatiently. "It's not your fault."

"If I had detected the shard earlier…"

"Those assholes still would have tried to get it, only they would have fought us instead of other humans," Inuyasha bluntly. "Bastards, all of them, through and through and killing 'em rid this area of a menace."

Kagome looked away sadly. "I can't help being so freaked out. I killed people with my arrows…"

Inuyasha sighed. It was honestly confusing to him the way the girl obsessed over things beyond her control. "It was them or you," he said finally. "In the end, that's all it comes down to."

"I know. I wish it didn't."

If only we had avoided coming back two days later, we wouldn't be having this problem. It was only after seeing the bodies that she started having these nightmares…, Inuyasha thought, angry for not having considered her reaction to the decaying corpses.

"I hate doing this," the girl from the future confessed. "I wasn't supposed to kill people when I agreed to do this. The nightmares and guilt are too much."

"Scary dreams or not, you don't have a choice," Inuyasha said in a hard voice.

She looked away.

"You broke the shards," Inuyasha hissed furiously, enunciating every word. "Do you understand? You fucked up. You have to put things right again. Got it?"

"I know that!" Kagome shouted in his face. "I know! But this is too much!"

"Are you going to run away?" he asked after a minute, the answer to his question not in doubt.

Kagome sighed unhappily. "You know I won't."

Inuyasha nodded at her once in approval.

"I want to run away," she admitted softly.

Inuyasha snorted eloquently. "Keh. Who doesn't? It's always the toughest shit that needs doing. Didn't anyone ever tell you that?"

She shook her head at his bluntness. "Let's just say I've never heard it put quite that way."

"Keh."

"I'm going to sleep. Again," she announced with a yawn.

"You exhausted yourself from all that crying," he snorted.

As the silence between them dragged on, Kagome realized something frightening. He's not going to say anything else. He truly doesn't see my need to be comforted more. How can he not understand that? I killed someone and he doesn't care.

The differences between them gave Kagome sudden pause.

I am going through a life-altering event after killing someone and he just doesn't get that it's a big deal. Human life really doesn't mean anything to him if a person gets in his way.

Feeling a shiver run down her back, Kagome silently moved her sleeping bag across the fire, as far as she could get from the hanyou.

Inuyasha noticed and swallowed. I'm not disappointed, he told himself sternly. I'm not disappointed at all.

Neither slept that night.

A/N: This is not light hearted at all and originally I had them coming to some sort of understanding with each other. Then I realized that- no, the issue of the importance of human life is too big to be solved over one conversation. Inuyasha doesn't get it- caring for others is too foreign for him to comprehend or bother with at this point in his life.

It's just something the two of them would have to come to accept about the other in time and, in the anime and manga, eventually they do (with Inuyasha becoming more compassionate but whatever). Some people aren't going to like this at all, citing Kagome OOC-ness and other things. In my defense all I will say is that two people from such disparate backgrounds, lifestyles and experiences are going to be uncomfortable with each other at some point so why not with this? Seems like the type of point a person should be concerned with.