The Sickness, Chapter 3.
Naraku stood up, and immediately fell to his knees. He tried to stand, and was assisted by Kagura, as she hooked her arm under his, supporting him. He turned to find Kanna standing silently behind him, and he grunted, startled by her unannounced appearance. He looked into her magical mirror, and growled in disgust as he witnessed the last few minutes of his near demise at the hands of InuYasha. He was about to turn away when something caught his eye. He watched as InuYasha unleashed the Wind Scar, immediately followed by the Backlash wave. Right before the amassed energy slammed into him, he saw a dark figure jump in front of the energy wave, sacrificing itself for Naraku. As he watched that, and watched the figures mouth move as he spoke, even while being disintegrated, something in Naraku clicked, and he unlocked that which was better left forgotten.
"Die, InuYasha! Your friends are already dead, and your next!" Naraku said, feeling confident as to his victory. Suddenly his energy attack was vaporized, as the Wind Scar tore through it, and ripped toward his body. The few fragments of energy that hadn't been torn asunder were doubled and thrown back at him as the Backlash Wave came out of the dizzying haze of energy, and followed the Wind Scar toward him like a dog trailing a scent. For the first time since being confronted with that wenches Purifying Arrow, he felt real fear. All too soon the waves were upon him, threatening to envelope and destroy him. Suddenly, out of no where, Naraku glimpsed a flicker of shadow as it dashed in front of him, seeming to try to sacrifice it's life to spare Naraku's. Naraku gasped as he glimpsed the figure that looked startlingly likke him, and was even more amazed when this figure seemed to cast no shadow, despite all the bright lights being cast around by the impending energy. As the waves tore into the sacrifices body, Naraku felt his body and mind being gripped by total and mortal fear as he recognised himself, seemingly from the future. The figure, in the midst of being torn asunder, turned and looked directly into Naraku's eyes, and spoke.
"Listen closely, Naraku. I am your future self. You have gained enough strength, and power, that you had unknowingly summoned me as your final trick to ace InuYasha, but this is a double edged sword, like all great tricks. As I am dead, you now have very limited time to kill InuYasha and fix the timeline before you catch up to my present time, where you will be removed from the timeline, and cease to exist...Forever." Naraku watched with paralyzed eyes as his future self was split down the centre, even whilst still talking. In that brief instant of watching his future self die, Naraku's whole life was replayed before him, and in a single instant, he watched how every single fight he had went horribly wrong, and was forced to endure the endless pain of being burned to death by that demon slayers two-tailed cat, then impaled by InuYasha's sword and left to become food for countless vultures, and even saw himself being dissolved by his own poison vapors, screaming as his skin burned and itched as if he were being devoured by it. Suddenly it was over, and a long silence ensued, in which he saw that time was frozen, with little pieces of his future self scattered across the breeze, and InuYasha's two attacks frozen like giant energy waves, hovering in the sky. In the last instant of glitched time, Naraku glanced between the Scars of Wind, to see the victorious face of his enemy, InuYasha. Then a tiny scream started up, slowly growing in volume until it threatened to split Naraku's eardrums, then an enormous explosion followed by the restart of Time itself, and the remainder of InuYasha's attack hit Naraku, knocking him out, and tearing him up, yet he was still alive, for his future self had dissipated most of the attack. Before Naraku passed out, he glimpsed the look of relief upon InuYasha's face as he fainted from blood loss, his friends running up behind him to catch him and congratulate him on the slaying of Naraku. 'But I'm not dead, and you will all pay the price...' Naraku thought, before crumpling to the ground.
'Bang!'
Naraku opened his eyes, and gasped, sweat pouring down his face as he recounted his fate.
"What happened, Naraku?" Kagura asked, sitting down beside him. Naraku was silent for a minute, before looking at her, startling her with the look of intensity in his eyes.
"Kagura..." He said soflty, "I just bore witness to something no mortal man could bear to see without going crazy from fear, being driven insane wondering how and when he would die. And I must kill InuYasha, or suffer a death more painful than your wildest nightmares, and endless, at that." He shuddered at the thought of failing, and being subjected to an endless eternal fate of being tortured and burned in a place that could only be accurately described as pure Hell. He raised his head, and shook it off, trying not to think of it. He tried to gauge how much time he had left before he was erased from the Timeline, but found it impossible to concentrate. His only thought was how to finally kill InuYasha for good, and do so in a manner that ensured his continued Existence in the Timeline. Just that single thought of being deleted from the Timeline brought forth more horrible and unbearable images of what would happen to him if he failed, accompanied by an endless screaming, the inhuman sounding scream of a tortured and petrified animal.
InuYasha sat down, and once again grinned as he had often done when he thought of his slaying of Naraku. Just that thought made him feel more happiness than he had felt in a while, and on impulse he grabbed Kagome's hand as she walked by, and pulled her down beside him, putting his arms around her and hugging her tightly, making her blush. He let her go, and tried to advoid looking her in the eyes, hence not noticing her lean down to place a kiss on his cheek, making him jump. He looked at her, blushing, and she smiled at him.
"You did it, InuYasha, you killed him, and avenged us all. Miroku's a half-atestament to that...seeing as his wind tunnel shrunk considerably, but didn't disappear..."
"No Kagome, we all did it. I wouldn't have even gotten half as close to him if it wasn't for the great work of Sango and Miroku, and you too. Besides your purifying arrows, you...you were in my heart, and just the thought of you kept me going, and made me try twice as hard as I knew I possibly could. You pushed me past my limit, and drove me to succeed. Thank you, Kagome. Really." He said the last part quietly, his face heating up again, and he looked away from her, toward the setting sun as it threw colour all over the sky, painting it a fiery red, yellow, and orange. Kagome looked at his profile, and decided to let it all out now that Naraku was gone, and couldn't interfere and tear them away from each other. If he would let me, she corrected herself. 'Naraku might've torn apart InuYasha and Kikyo, but now that he's dead, I'll be the one to heal his heart, and stay beside him, now that it's over.'
Kagome leaned toward him, and placed a gentle hand on the side of his face, making him look toward her. She kissed him softly on the lips, and his eyes opened wide in surprise, before sliding closed as he gave himself up to her, deepening the kiss and letting her tongue venture into his mouth hesitantly. He groaned, and put his hand on the back of her neck, tilting his head as Kagome leaned into the kiss. She pulled away slowly, and a blush slowly deepened over her face, making InuYasha grin.
"Um, InuYasha, I...I want you to know that I lov-"
"Uh, did we inturrupt something? 'Cause we can walk right back out and act like we never seen nothing, ya know." Miroku said, leaning against the wall near the door, with his arm around Sango's shoulders, his hand brushing dangerously close to her breast. Sango was blushing furiously, but had decided to put up with it, thinking that maybe he wouldn't be a perv, if just for tonight.
"So what did you guys want? Besides to come bug us, I mean." Kagome said jokingly.
"Aww, nothing in particular," Sango said, stepping over Shippous sleeping body to walk over to InuYasha. "Just coming over to congratulate the hero of the hour, InuYasha." She smiled a genuine, happy smile at InuYasha, and reached down to him to run her fingers through his hair, scratching his ears at the same time. InuYasha closed his eyes, and purred, eliciting a giggle from Sango. She dropped down to her knees, as InuYasha was sitting down on the ground, and brought her face close to InuYasha's.
"Don't read too much into this InuYasha, but..." She leaned forward and supported herself by placing a hand on InuYasha's shoulder, before placing a soft, gentle kiss on his lips. InuYasha gasped as her soft lips touched his, and he blushed deeply, never expecting this from Sango, of all people. Suddenly, Sango overbalanced, and fell forward, landing on top of InuYasha. She broke the lip-lock, and stared at InuYasha. InuYasha grinned, feeling her body against his.
"Ya know, for a demon slayer, you sure got a bad sense of balance." He said, smirking. She blushed and pushed herself off of him, offering her hand to him, helping him up. As he rose, he looked around him and realized that all this time that he thought he had no friends, and no one to trust, there had been trustworthy people all around him, people that had graciously lowered themselves to his pitiful level, just by being near him, and being seen with him, yet did so without a second thought. He thought about it for a second, before being jolted out of his thoughts by Kagome. "Come on, InuYasha, time to celebrate!" She said, handing him a bowl of sakè. he took it, and smiled at her. "Thanks, Kagome." Suddenly he was grabbed by Sango and Miroku as they dragged him outside, into the fresh air, which somehow felt cleaner, less polluted now that Naraku was dead. Miroku led them all to a hill that overlooked the village, and they sat on the cool grass, looking up into the night sky, with its millions of stars, and the bright, yet tiny sliver of moon, signaling the start of the new moon, which would take place tomorrow. InuYasha looked up into the sky and saw the moon, and realized what it meant. He smirked.
"Tomorrow I'm gonna lose my powers, for a whole damn day, so it looks like I had better start making use of them tonight, while I still can." He whispered in Kagomes ear. She looked at him. "Oh, yeah, InuYasha?"
"Oh, yeah." He said, sniffing her neck. She giggled, and pushed him away, only to have him come even closer to her, staring at her with his bright, golden coloured orbs. He crawled on top of her, and pinned her arms down on the ground, kissing her on the mouth. Kagome closed her eyes and kissed him back, trying to put all of her feelings for him into that one kiss, yet knowing that one simple kiss wouldn't even come close to measuring up to her feelings for him. When the kiss ended, she stared up at him, and smiled, happy to see that InuYasha was finally loosening up, and wasn't acting all uptight and angry. InuYasha rolled off her and took a sip from the bowl of sakè that Kagome had given him, and squirmed uncomfortably as the feiry liquid burned its way down his throat. He coughed, covering his mouth with his hand, blushing as Kagome laughed at him, rubbing his back. Miroku heard him coughing, and laughed also, his arm around Sango as they sat on the other side of Kagome, staring at the stars and talking quietly to each other about what would happen now that Naraku was dead, and revealing things to each other that had had to stay hidden before, because who knew what Naraku might've tried.
When InuYasha wasn't looking, Miroku slipped the sakè jug in Kagomes direction, and she slyly filled up his bowl again, hoping he didn't notice. She slipped the jug behind her back to Miroku again, and placed her hand on top of InuYasha's, enjoying his company, wondering where things would go from here. She sighed. The biggest threat and challenge facing them was no more, yet things were far from over. There was Kohaku, Sango ached to see him again, now free from Naraku's grasp, then there was the matter of Kikyo, and Kagome, after kissing InuYasha, wanted him more, and was damned if she was gonna lose to some dead bitch.
'Oops, hehe, think the alcohol is getting to me...I'm getting angry at a dead girl.'
InuYasha put his arm around Kagome's shoulder and pulled her against him, letting her lean on his shoulder. InuYasha was on his third bowl of sakè, and was already red in the face, knowing that he shouldn't have had so much for his first time drinking it. InuYasha yawned, and laid back onto the grass, Kagome laying down with him. She snuggled up against him, and glanced at him as he put his arms behind his head, and stretched his legs out, staring up into the sky. She put her leg over his lower body, half straddling him as she rested her hand on his chest. InuYasha tried not to look at her, but his tell-tale blush betrayed his feelings and she giggled as she slid her hand up toward his neck. She caressed his neck, and leaned forward to kiss his throat, and lick his collar bone. She kissed him on the mouth, sliding her tongue into his mouth and running her fingers through his hair, gently massaging and rubbing his soft furry ears between her fingers, making him elicit a half-groan, half-moan. Kagome smiled slightly as she heard him moan and groan, but didn't break the kiss, slipping her hands down to his haori. She undid the fastenings holding it together, and slid over his body with a leg on either side of him, straddling him. She kissed his smooth toned chest, and ran her fingers over his sexy stomach. As she leaned down to kiss him on the stomach, her long black hair brushed against him, making him shudder as it tickled him. She giggled, and kissed him again, gasping as his hands gently gripped her hips, sliding down as he felt her smooth tight ass through her mini-skirt. She moaned as he slipped a hand around to the front of her, and touched her through her slightly wet panties. InuYasha tried to cover her moan with a kiss, but it escaped, and Miroku finally had enough.
"Okay, that's it, if you two wanna make out, go somewhere else, I'm trying to enjoy the peace and quiet of the night with my dear Sango." He said, turning back around and sliding his arm around her waist. "Now get out of here, I'm getting embarrassed just listening to you."
InuYasha laughed, and Miroku said nothing, knowing that with his reputation he sounded unbelievable. Kagome groaned as InuYasha sat up, and she moved into his lap, letting him wrap his arms around her, keeping her warm from the cool night air. InuYasha kissed the back of her neck, and held her as she leaned back into his chest, his hands caressing her stomach. Kagome wondered how many stars there were in the universe, and knew it was impossible to guess at the number. She looked up at just the right time, and was lucky enough to see a shooting star.
"Ahh! InuYasha! Look! A shooting star!" She said, pointing up into the sky as the fiery comet soared across the sky, heading in the direction behind her. She tilted her head back slowly, following it as she made a silent wish, wishing she could work out the problem of her family 500 years in the future, through the well, and wished that she could stay with InuYasha forever. She tilted her head back until she bumped gently against InuYasha's shoulder, and the comet raced out of sight.
"Kagome..." InuYasha whispered softly.
Kagome looked to her left to see InuYasha staring at her, his golden eyes filled with emotion. Before Kagome knew what had happened, InuYasha had placed his lips upon hers, and kissed her deeply, and passionately, every second of the kiss filled with the love InuYasha felt for Kagome, and it lasted about a minute. When they slowly pulled apart, and Kagome and InuYasha shared a moment that lasted an eternity.