Down the Rabbit Hole
Disclaimer: Takahashi owns it… Which would make sense, since this is fanfiction and all…
The cold fingers which wrapped around her arms and sank into the soft flesh of her arms were like daggers, slitting the throat of all of Kagome's hopes. A weaker girl might have snapped then, shattered like glass crystal. But she wouldn't do it. She wouldn't do it.
Lifting her pale grey eyes to meet the dull red ones hovering over her, she felt a shiver roll down her spine. The barest smile touched his lips. Bile began to roil in her stomach.
Averting her gaze, she tried to look at anything but him. Anything but him. Her focus fell on the entrance, and her illness came screaming up her throat all over again. He had let her get so close. So close. She had been there. She had almost escaped. He had let her believe….
No!
No, she could survive this. She could survive this. She was Kagome Higurashi. She could handle anything.
When she finally risked another look at her captor, all of her delusions crumbled.
She wasn't going to make it.
ooOoo
He had never felt so impatient before. Never fucking once. He knew and Sango knew and Miroku fucking knew that they had to get fucking moving. There was no other option. He could not, he would not let things last any longer.
He had to save Kagome.
But some things were easier said than done. Wasn't that fucking right?
Sango put on a brave front. He respected her tremendously for it. She was out there, with him, every day, searching, seeking, hunting. There was something new in Sango's demeanor, a quality which he didn't particularly care to examine. It could wait.
But at night, when they met another day of failure, of hitting a brick wall, she collapsed. She wept every night, even if she did try to hide it, and every day she grew more withdrawn. This wasn't the Sango he was used to. But she would do. She was still useful, and so long as she was useful, he would stay with her.
He grew tired of waiting for them at night, Sango and Miroku. There were times where he would have relished snapping Miroku's neck for his pessimism. But without Miroku, Sango wouldn't get up in the morning, and without the goddamned monk he would lose a valuable ally.
He couldn't let that happen. If putting up with Sango and Miroku meant finding Kagome one second faster, he would do it. He would fucking do it. But still….
If it were up to him, they wouldn't stop at all.
ooOoo
She wondered dully what he was going to do to her. Everything seemed very far away and very distant. A very, very small and quiet part of herself wondered if she was in denial. But she didn't wonder for long. There was too much else to occupy her fuzzy thoughts with.
He had let her get so far… Only to fail… She had been so close, so close… She wondered if she would ever see the light again.
With his arms wrapped around her, pulling her back into his dark, dark fortress, she knew the answer. This was where she'd spend forever. Forever.
She was shaking, now, harder, more intensely. Was she cold?
She couldn't tell.
He tossed her down on the mat, in a cold, wet, dark room. She couldn't even distinguish if it was her own. She looked up at him, at the red haze that filmed over his eyes.
Cold, moist fear settled over her brow. Her stomach flipped, and feeling suddenly, nauseatingly, returned to her body.
Her heart lurched in her chest as her addled brain cast furtive glances around the room, trying, miserably, desperately, to understand where she was. When she looked up at him again, when she saw the naked lust in his eyes and the cruel curve of his lips, she vomited.
ooOoo
They had heard rumors in a nearby village. Crops wilting, people mysteriously growing sick and dying, wasting away and withering until they were just sagging sacks of flesh and hollow skeletons… Naraku was nearby.
Naraku was nearby.
He licked his lips, and he could almost taste the bastard's blood in his mouth. When he flexed his hands and his knuckles gave that sickening pop, he could feel the dirty blood on his claws.
Each day they pressed a little farther forward, and each day the days grew darker, the villages dwindled to fewer and farther between, and his dark fantasies few more vivid.
"Inuyasha…"
He turned to consider the monk standing behind him. It was late, but they kept moving, kept moving because there was no other option. He would not have it; he must find Kagome at any price, and the closer he came the more his resolve to keep moving strengthened. But it was still very, very late.
Behind him, Miroku was half-carrying, half-dragging a bedraggled looking Sango. The smell of salt told him she was crying, if only silently. It was late now, and, as per always, Sango's hard exterior had cracked to reveal a barely-functioning core. So much for his "ally." She grew more and more like an invalid every day.
He glanced over to where Shippou was perched on Miroku's shoulder. The kitsune never spoke anymore, never chirped or giggled or anything. He had become an unnatural child, pale and withdrawn. He thought the red of his hair and the green of his eyes had become duller, recently, but he didn't pay any attention. He didn't really care.
He quirked an eyebrow to show Miroku he was listening.
"We're getting very close now… I can feel it." The monk lifted his cursed hand and flexed it, as if the hand itself ached from being so near its curser.
He snorted. "And?"
"I think we should stop. Plan."
"No. Fucking. Way."
The monk just sighed. "Inuyasha, think clearly for a moment. It would be unwise, possibly even deadly, to go in unprepared. Last time… Last time we barely made it out alive. I'm not going to sacrifice my life for a meaningless gesture."
He saw red. He saw hot, coursing blood before his eyes, and it took every ounce of grim determination and every particle of concentration to subdue the urge to rip the monk's throat out.
Growling low in his throat, he turned to fully face Miroku as the monk continued. He could smell the faintest traces of fear on him, and Shippou, too. There was nothing from Sango.
"Inuyasha, listen to me. If we go in headlong and we fuck this up, if we fail, then Kagome's life will be forfeit. She'll pay for your stubborn foolishness. Don't make her pay for your idiocy."
Inuyasha had no answer for that.
ooOoo
His laughter, dark and rich and full, filled her ears.
"Do I sicken you that much, Kagome?"
The use of her name only made her heave harder.
Her spasming body only made his laughter grow more jeering.
She wasn't sure if she passed out then, but she didn't care, either.
What she did know was that one moment she was emptying her body of everything she could, emptying her mind of schemes, her soul of self-pity, and her heart of hope, and the next she was on the futon, all over again.
It was dark, dark and cold.
Days and days passed. Days and days and years and years, and still no change. Except for one. Now, inside her head, laughter.
He'll never come for you, he told her.
He would have been here by now.
He doesn't care.
She woke up to his voice ringing in her ears and went to sleep with it buzzing, whispering, just beyond the reaches of audibility. When she dreamt, she dreamt he was there, touching her, feeling her, cold, dry hands on her body, stroking her, violating her.
She felt weak, exhausted. She no longer ate, and when, very rarely, she was hungry, her disturbed imagination made her throw it right back up again.
She was a ghost.
He'll never come for you.
He would have been here by now.
He doesn't care. Not about you.
He'll never come for you.
He probably hasn't even noticed that you're gone.
You were just his shard-detector. But he never really needed you.
He has Kikyo.
You were just superfluous.
A copy.
Insignificant.
At first she would cover her ears and scream, scream until the voice was pitched down to a mere whisper in the back of her mind. But it never went away again. Not fully. She was never alone, and she was never able to think clearly again.
ooOoo
"What exactly are you fucking saying, monk?"
"I don't think we're ready for this."
"What the fuck does that mean?! There is no 'ready.' There's only 'I'm here to fucking tear Naraku's throat out and save Kagome.' That's it."
Miroku just sighed.
Fuck him.
"Inuyasha, I beg you to think clearly. For once, act like a rational adult and not a toddler."
His ears flattened against his head.
Kagome.
He listened, for her sake.
"Last time we fought, we were defeated. Why? Because we weren't ready for what happened. We weren't ready. This time, we must be ready."
"And how do you think we'll get ready?"
"Easy. What have we got that Naraku doesn't?"
For some reason, it seemed like the answer was staring him in the face.
He looked over at Shippou, with his ashy complexion and too thin frame.
His gaze slipped over to Sango, curled tightly in a ball, eyes staring out at nothing.
After a long, empty silence, Miroku answered for him.
"Revenge."
Sango's attention snapped over to their conversation. A glitter formed in her eyes, and when she sat up and spoke for the first time in days, there was an undertone of rejuvenation in her voice.
"Yes," she breathed.
Miroku's mouth curved in a thin, hard line, more a grimace than a smile.
Nodding, Inuyasha felt it thrum through him. Revenge. The motivation to fight. This time they would be careful. They would be meticulous. They wouldn't just barge in and make a mad attempt for Kagome. Or maybe they would. Who knew?
He felt dizzy from all the circles they had just walked in. For some reason, it seemed like he had walked this path before, like every question was asked because of the answer and every answer answered by the question. It was a perfect loop: his search for Kagome, Sango's spiraling emotional state, and even Miroku's logic. It was all big, gigantic, fucking loop, and he loved it.
For the first time in a long time, he felt like laughing.
A/N: So, this chapter took a while to start writing… "Real Life" issues and all… But, I think chapter 5 will actually be up this weekend as well, so it'll make up for the chapter being a bit short…Thanks to my beta, hushisushi, for reading and loving the good, and for trashing and flaming the bad. Sometimes. Thanks to everyone who's reviewed; it really means a lot to me and keeps me writing.
Peace out.