Chapter 5

Written by LongHairedMan

*One Day Before*

"Kagome, you better hurry up! You're already 30 minutes late!" Kagome's mother shouted from the other side of the kitchen.

Without a word Kagome grabbed her backpack off the chair and tossed it on her back.

"I'M SO LATE!" Kagome thought, jumping over to the doorway.

Kagome went to reach for the door handle when the door slid open on it's own. In the doorway stood Kagome grandfather with a number of dining plates in his hands.

"Ah Kagome. Have you-" Gramps was about to finish before Kagome launched by him, causing him to almost fall over.

"Kagome!" gramps yelled.

"Sorry gramps! I have to get to school!" Kagome shouted, running through the courtyard of her families shrine, towards the shrine stairs.

Kagome reached the shrine stairs and climbed down them as fast as possible.

"I can't believe I'm this late. Traveling in the feudal era for most of the night caused me to over sleep. I just hope Mr. Matsuo doesn't give me an after school detention. If he does, InuYasha will come for me and cause even more problems." Kagome thought, remembering what InuYasha said to her last night.

"Don't take all damn day or I'll drag you back here myself!"

Kagome reached the bottom of the stairs and scowled.

"What does he think he is? My dad? What gives him the right to decide how I long I get to stay in MY time?" Kagome unintentionally shouted, not realizing she had done so.

An older women who just so happened to be walking by looked over to Kagome.

"Boy friend problems?" the old lady asked nicely.

"INUYASHA IS NOT MY BOY FRIE..." Kagome didn't finish, realizing what she was sounding like.

"Ah young love. It's always so emotional." the old women stated, walking past Kagome.

"What is wrong with me... The lack of sleep is getting to me. Maybe I should just stay home." Kagome thought, looking up the shrine stairs.

Kagome's eyes widened in shock.

*Present Time*

Hideko turned around to find a Japanese man standing at 5'5'' who looked to be in his 40's. His right eye was brown with bags that hung underneath. His other eye was covered with a black eye patch. The man had a short black pony tall held together with a piece of cloth. Much like the bandits, this guy was sporting samurai armor but it was in much better shape. The eye patch man spun his finger in a circle and Hideko watched as the fine almost invisible wire from before wrapped around it with a shinny metal needle at the end.

"Let me see your arm boy." the man ordered.

"Why?" Hideko asked, more then a little hesitant of the man.

The man rolled his eyes before he leaned over and grabbed Hideko's right arm forcefully. Before the Hideko could pull it away the eye patch man pulled up his sleeve, revealing a scar that went across Hideko wrist.

Most people would instantly assume Hideko had done it to himself but the truth was, he gained it from an accident when he was just a small child.

Hideko instantly ripped his arm back and put up his fist, ready to fight the man if need be.

"Calm down boy, I was only making sure you weren't one of these bandits." The eye patch man explained.

The man walked over to the dead body of the leader bandit and stopped. He then bent down and lifted his arm up, revealing the Japanese symbol on his wrist that stood for bandit.

"Understand now?" the eye patch man asked, looking over to Hideko.

After a moment Hideko lowered his fist.

"Who are you? Some kind of bounty hunter?" Hideko asked.

"My name is Resutoa. No I am not a bounty hunter although on occasion I do hunt weaker demons and bandits like these for currency." Resutoa answered.

"Demons? I must be in some kind of backwater area of Japan. Like the stories I heard about the Amish. Only instead of giving a warm welcome the people here seem to be in favor of the more cold and metallic kind." Hideko thought, staring at one of the dead bandit's bodies.

Resutoa looked like he was about to say something when villager from before rushed over to him with his daughter in his arms.

"Thank you young Samurai." the villager said.

"Yea well I didn't do it for you. These men all have a bounty on there heads and I am here just to clam that bounty. As for Samurai, I haven't been one for a long time. Now quit wasting my time and get out of my face." Resutoa barked.

The villager looked taken back but after a moment he bowed. The villager then walked over to the children and after speaking a few words, they followed him into the village. Hideko watched the villager until Resutoa spoke.

"What's you're name boy?" Resutoa asked.

"Oh uh, Hideko." Hideko answered.

The man immediately dropped the dead bandits arm and turned his head around to Hideko.

"Hideko huh? I should have guessed from the clothes." the man said before turning his head back to the bandits body.

"Guessed what? That I'm from the city?" Hideko asked, hoping this man knew the way back to Tokyo.

The man didn't answer. Instead he pulled his sword out of it's sheath and lifted the mans arm into the air. Hideko knowing what was coming, looked away only to hear the sound of a blade cutting threw meat.

"Ugh, do you know where the closest city is? I think I'll just walk from here." Hideko asked, disgusted.

Again the man didn't answer.

Hideko irritated, looked back over to see the man right in his face with the dismembered arm of the bandit in his left hand. His sword in the other.

"I have no idea what you're going on about boy, but I'm taking you back to you're father's castle. I'm betting on top of these bandit's I should get a nice reward for bringing you in." Resutoa explained.

Hideko just gained an extremely confused look.

"My father?" Hideko asked, completely lost.

"Don't play stupid with me. You're the son of Lord Ikeda. Out looking for 'adventure' right? Trust me kid, enjoy the life you have. Not everyone gets to live without a care in the world." Resutoa said, putting the bandit's arm into a bag attached to his belt.

Hideko had no idea what the hell what the man was talking about. Castle, son of a Lord, 'adventure'? All he knew was that the man wanted to take Hideko to some 'Lord' and that no wasn't an answer.

"So uh. When do we go?" Hideko stated with a fake smile.

"When I collect the other bandit's arms." Resutoa answered.

"Got it. Well I'll just be right here if you need me." Hideko said, not very convincingly.

The man's one eye narrowed on Hideko.

"For you're sake I hope so boy." Resutoa warned.

The man just turned around and walked over to one of the other bandit's bodies.

Hideko who really didn't want to watch Resutoa cut off the dead bandit's arms, pulled out his phone from his pocket. Hideko clicked the on button and the phone came to life with the lock screen.

Hideko noticed again there was no cell phone reception.

"Still no signal. Fantastic." Hideko thought.

Hideko closed the lock screen and noticed the date. One day ahead of the last time he was at school. Before he could think about the time he lost he noticed another thing, a text message from his mother, sent a day ago.

The memory of hitting Mr. Matsuo popped into Hideko's head and his grunted to himself before opening the text message.

"I heard what happened at school. You're lucky I convinced you're stepfather not to press charges. As for where you're going to be living, you will find everything you own on the lawn. Get it and leave. I don't even want to talk to you."

Hideko's grip tightened on his phone.

"And now I'm homeless...Can this fucking day get any worse?!" Hideko thought while lowering his phone. Only to see Resutoa who had finished collecting the bandit's arms, walking towards him.

"Let's go." Resutoa ordered.

"Yea..." Hideko replied, letting out a sigh.

As always, I hope you enjoyed reading. See you again in chapter 7. As for chapter 6, my partner in crime seems really really busy at the moment...hopefully it will be out soon :D