A blinking light upon the large screen in front of Sango kept her hopes alive. That little flashing light spoke for all the prayers the young woman had been asking for the past week. There, twenty miles from her current location, her best friend was alive. How alive she did not know, but just knowing her heart still beat helped her sit and watch for hours on end. Kagome was a fighter, and apparently she could survive a week away from the safety of the compound. Others had told her to give up hope, but there was no way she could turn away when she knew that her friend was still alive.
That hope occasionally turned into despair. The pain of knowing that although her friend was alive, no people in their right mind would travel that far to save one person. That was the code, Kagome would understand that. This has happened more than once. It was an unfair rule, but the leaders said it kept more alive.
Sango put her face in her hands and breathed deeply. If she did not calm down now she wouldn't be able to function the rest of the day. These situations brought back bad memories of her family. Her little brother had separated from a group of young students during survival training above ground. His beacon stayed active for three days and Sango's father had been on edge. The boy was not but a mile out but they could not locate him. Her father had been suspicious that her brother had fallen into some sort of hole in the ground. Probably a collapsed underground subway system caused the ground over it to become weak and his weight made it give way.
Against orders, her father and a few close friends left to find him. She had slipped out after them, not wanting to be left out. She was found soon after, but her father did not scold her, instead he smiled and patted her on the back.
"Family is more important that rules, Sango. Never forget that."
They carried the beacon finder to the location and sure enough, a small hole in the ground gave evidence that her brother had indeed fell through. They were so busy trying to pull him out of the hole; they did not notice the lurking figure in the shadows. The first cry of pain from the man closest to the shadows alerted the rest of the Demon Exterminators. Sango grasp her giant boomerang, and prepared to throw. Her father leaped to her side and drew his sword. She remembered distinctly the grim look on his face.
It was a nightmare watching a gigantic spider Demon crawl into the clearing. It simultaneously tore apart two of the five fighting it. Before long, all that remained was her, her father, and her brother who was currently unconscious. The spider was quicker than most Demons she had ever seen. It seemed to know exactly what her father was going to do next. When he finally managed to pull out his finishing gun, the Demon looked concerned. It let loose a spine chilling sound that almost seemed like a laugh.
That was when the sharp pain flooded her senses. Her entire back felt as though it was ripping into. Turning around and seeing the cause of her distress was even worse than the actual pain. From the chain that fell from behind her and trailed across the grass told her that a Demon Exterminator scythe is what caused the damage. The hand holding the end of the chain made her heart stop. Her own little brother, who was moments before dead to the world was all but snarling at her with glazed over eyes.
When he ripped the scythe out of her back, she let loose a scream that alerted her father. In that instant, the spider noticed his averted attention and attacked. The grunt and heavy thud of a body hitting the ground made Sango's world spin. It was wrong, all wrong and she felt like her life was over.
She waited for another attack, but nothing ever came. She fell to her knees and prayed for it to be over. Too much death, to fast to comprehend. Silently screaming against the wind, and feeling her blood trickle down her sides and mingle with the dust below her Sango wanted death.
"Sango… are you alright?"
Almost falling out of her chair, Sango looked back at the door to the control room. There, standing in the doorway was a young man with black hair tied up into a short ponytail in the back. His violet eyes sparkled with amusement from taking her off guard.
"My dear Sango, what seems to be the matter?"
"A perverted man snuck up on me, once again."
"Daydreaming… or setting up watch post?"
Sango just sighed. Miroku knew what she was up to, but in his own way, he was trying to make it not so stressful on her. Every few hours he came back to this room, just to check if she was checking on Kagome's status. Even Miroku was guilty in watching the little blinking light on the screen. Kagome had been someone he thought of as a close friend, and they had gone through survival training together as well as with Sango.
He felt terrible for not being able to stop the Demon from taking the girl, and he still sported the black eye from the abrupt punch to the side of the head.
"I'm about to go get something to eat, and I know you have to be hungry. I thought maybe we could go hunting afterwards to release some frustration… unless you wanted to go to my room and—"
"If you finish that sentence I'll make sure you won't ever think about THAT ever again." She snapped without looking away from the screen.
"And… watch a movie…" He grinned when he noticed the distinct eye roll from his angle of view.
"I am pretty hungry…" She finally admitted.
"Good, let us go then." He offered her his hand.
Sango smiled at him and took his hand as he lifted her from her chair. Almost instantly she felt a firm and roving hand rubbing across her backside. Her face heated and she recoiled and slapped Miroku across the face.
'Damn,' he thought watching her retreating form. 'I'll have another black eye… but it was worth it.' He followed her from the room, taking one moment to look back at the large screen and sighed. He said a small prayer and ran to catch up with the still steaming girl.
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"So let me get this straight. I'm not allowed to go outside, go downstairs, look around to much up stairs, and certainly not allowed to ask you any personal questions after you kidnapped me and brought me to this god forsaken place in the middle of no where that anyone will even attempt a rescue and you won't let me take a SHOWER?"
"Yep."
"You know if I had my sword, or gun, I would castrate you right now." Kagome ground out her frustration on the Demon sitting in the chair on the other side of the room reading the little black book he forbid her to ever read.
It had been a week, and he refused to let her shower. She knew she stunk to high heaven, and from her knowledge of Demon anatomy, she knew Inuyasha smelled her a lot more than she could. It had to be getting to him, or else he liked the disgusting smell…
"Please, just let me shower… I'll do anything."
"I don't trust you. The last time I let you out, I leave for one second and come back and you're on your back with Flea-Bag."
"Why you! For the love of all that is sane and right with this world, I did not ask for you to leave me alone in the woods without any type of weapon!" She wanted to rip those stupid, and admittedly adorable, dog ears off his head sometimes. Ever since the whole Koga incident, he had all out refused to let her out into the open. Confined for a week in this hell hole was driving her insane.
"You do smell pretty bad." That was his only comment. He actually said it more often than not.
"Screw you."
"And I thought only Demons had potty mouths…"
Kagome gave up. She couldn't believe that Demons were stupid. After living with this one for a week, everything she knew and was brought up on was a complete and utter lie. None of her beliefs held fast when she saw him. He was beautiful, something that she had never seen before. He was smart, kind of, in a calculating way. He understood many things that she had been taught that Demons could not comprehend such as life and death, fear and sadness, hate and love. The thing that stuck her most was just how… human like he was. He reminded her of Miroku, well in age, and other boys her that she was raised with.
Even now, the way he was stretched out on the couch, flipping through pages every so often was so naturally human that it felt like she was dreaming. You can't go from believing one thing all your life to waking up and seeing it was all wrong and not feel weird about it. She just wished he could understand. At first, she was cautious around him, but after two days, he seemed more likely to protect her than kill her. For some unknown reason, she felt at ease with him.
Even if he went out of his way to create torment for her.
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"Ms. Higurashi, we are unfortunate to inform you that any chance of rescue of your daughter, one Kagome Higurashi, is negative. As of today, all search parties will be called off, and the beacon will be turned off. We are sorry for you lose."
Miu fell back into her chair. The man in front of her spoke still, in a mechanical uncaring way only repeating something he had said a hundred times before. It had been a week. The grace period was a month. Someone could survive a month on their packs. Kagome was gone a week. The man, she forgets his name, came and placed a hand on her shoulder. His long black hair fell over his shoulder and she closed her eyes.
"She is a three bar. She is immune. She is important. She is special."The tears came.
"Yes. She is special, but our purpose is more special."
"Purpose? What purpose! We are sitting here rotting in the earth with no future! We have not made a single step closer to the idea of returning to the surface."
The man only stood quietly, not showing any emotion to the woman's outburst. Maybe he was used to dealing with mothers who had to be told their children would not be coming home, or maybe he just did not care…
"It has only been a week. You have to give her more time."
The man only handed her the proper papers, the ones needed to pronounce Kagome dead. Miu stared silently as the bearer of bad news walked out of the room.
****************************************************
"Yo, stupid."
"The name is Kagome jerk."
"Your little annoying belt has stopped beeping."
Kagome was relaxing on the couch, reading old newspapers from the time before the Demons. Now, her heart leaped in her chest. Why had he not told her he knew her belt was making noises? Actually, she had not known it was making any sort of noise, but she figured it had to do with the tracking device.
She reached down and unhooked it, and dug into the band until she found the sensor. While it usually flashed red, it down was dead. Panic swarmed in her. Had the battery ran dead? Would the others think she had died and never come for her now? A million thoughts ran across her mind but she realized she may never know the answer.
"They have stopped looking for me I guess." She whispered. It stung. It was like everyone she knew died. She was cut off. A ghost to the human kind. Her name would now be written in the logs of missing persons. Maybe she would be given a medal of honor.
She dropped the paper in her hand and rolled over and faced the back of the couch. She curled into a ball and felt the tears rise. Instantly she heard Inuyasha shuffle around and she heard him creep over behind her. Apparently he did not like crying. At first she thought it was because he was demon and the action was foreign to him. Now she knew that he understood tears meant something happened and she was hurt. He hated crying.
"Hey…" he was tiptoeing around, trying not to cause more of an upset. It was not helping.
He made the mistake of coming into her reach and Kagome knew he would hate it, but she needed someone at the moment.
Inuyasha froze when he felt two arms snake their way around his waist. The black hair covered head buried into his chest gave him a funny feeling. She was shaking and he somehow knew this was his fault, and it made him feel like complete shit. Her family thought she was dead, and it was because he took her.
"Kagome…."
"Please, I need…" she sobbed again.
"Its ok." He stated, and patted her back. She stayed like that for maybe another five minutes and thanked Inuyasha for being there.
"Feh. Whatever."
Kagome watched Inuyasha disappear down the stairwell and she sat on the couch staring at her now useless belt. This was going to be a long night.
