Chapter 2: Dreams Take Us Back

Staring absently out the coffee shop's window, Kagome watched as the snow covered the streets of Tokyo in a cloud of white, blanketing everything from the crosswalk to the railings, to her car that was parked a few feet away. Her hand lightly holding onto her coffee mug, the concealed demoness sighed before addressing her companion across from her who was keeping busy buttering a selection of scones for a midday snack. "Hey, Sango?"

Pulling back the quick bread that was halfway to her mouth, the brown haired woman eyed her best friend who had been unusually quiet for the past few days since returning to Japan. Maybe she was finally going to tell her what was up. "Yes? What is it Kagome?"

Switching her gaze over the human, she smiled gently at the girl only to throw her off by randomly asking, "What do you think about dreams?"

"Dreams?" she repeated confused, "Uh...well according to the dictionary they're just a series of thoughts, images, and sensations that occur while…"

"I don't mean the literary term," she suddenly amended, "I mean, do you think they have a stronger purpose than just giving us entertainment in our sleep?"

"Well…." lost in thought, Sango honestly considered what her friend had asked her. "I'm not sure..." she finally admitted, a light blush staining her face, "Dreams are just...dreams to me."

Sighing Kagome chuckled at her bluntness, it was one the things she liked about her. "Never mind then Sango, just enjoy your food."

"Where is this coming from?"

"I…" hesitating, the demoness considered telling Sango about the recurring dream she had been having for the past few weeks now, every detail consistent every time it appeared. In the two hundred years, she had been living in this world, Sango was the only person she had ever revealed her true self to. The woman knew nearly everything there was to know about her, including the fact that she was an Inu Youkai who was hiding out in the modern era. Of all the things she had confided to the girl, the fact that she didn't remember anything since waking up in the early nineteen hundreds centuries ago was probably the most peculiar of all. "I've..been having a really weird one lately, and I think there's more to it than just images, sensations and.. stuff."

"Really?" lowering her voice she whispered to the concealed demoness, "Do you think it has something to do with your past?"

"I honestly don't know," Kagome confessed, slightly uncomfortable to be discussing such an intimate secret in public like this. "But everything seems so...real. Well, everything but the flea…"

"Flea?"

"Yea...there's a flea who bites me named Myoga and no matter how many times I squash him he keeps coming back for more."

"You...named an insect?"

"Flea." Kagome corrected, "or to be more specific a flea demon. I...its ridiculous right?"

"It certainly isn't rational," Sango admitted. Taking another sip of her own hot chocolate, she added a quick bite of her food and silently offered some to Kagome who absently refused. "but, it probably isn't something to stress over, you haven't gotten your memory back in all these years, it's doubtful you would do so now and, after all, you have a company to run, and with your success the future is bright."

"Your right…." she finally relented, sipping her tea, the demoness tried to appear normal though her mind was still thinking about her missing past.

"So," her friend began, wanting to change the subject, "what's the project you were working on in Morocco?"

"I already told you," Kagome exasperated, "I was helping restore the Hassan II Mosque in Casablanca. If done right, they should be done by June of next year."

Scrunching up her nose at the answer she teasingly asked another question, "Oh and your people are helping out with it?"

Not paying attention Kagome responded seriously, "No we're in charge of it, and I'm the boss, I had to make sure they were doing everything right."

"Oh," she was a goner. Sango stuffed the last of her scone in her mouth and checked her phone only to let out a squeak when she realized she was late to get back to work. Rushing out the door, the woman threw a chaste goodbye over her shoulder as she left, Kagome sighing as she watched the girl slide through the snow while racing to get back to her job on time. Sango was always in such a high gear. Even the demoness had trouble keeping up sometimes.

Arriving back at her penthouse apartment, Kagome casually threw her trench coat on the rack and removed her boots so that she could cross the entryway. With stocking covered feet she entered the privacy of her home, heading over to the couch and collapsing into it gratefully. She had been so tired since coming back to Japan and she had only been gone a few weeks. Burying her face in her hands, she let out an audible whine, what was wrong with her lately?

'You're lonely'

"Hardly," she muttered out though even she could feel the weakness behind the denial. She was an Inu Youkai by nature, a being that craved companionship. "And for two hundred years I've been alone…"

Ever since she had awoken next to that well two centuries ago, she had spent every day afterward with feelings of emptiness and loss that she couldn't explain. For two hundred years she had done nothing more than going through the motions one did to survive in the world, forever trying and failing to fill the void in her soul she could never fully place. If it wasn't for her career, in this day and age the demoness would literally have nothing. She held no attraction for men or women and that naturally meant pups weren't around. Her memories only began next to that well she had found herself two hundred years ago and continued up til now. Her past was a mystery to her she couldn't solve. Could that have something to do with the dream she had been having?

Sighing she removed the spell from her body, and once freed of her human appearance ran her clawed fingers through her now waist-length blue-black hair. No pointed ears or paper white skin, her allure came from the natural way her body was shaped and her assets expressed. The only markings she contained were the odd light blue tribal symbols which ran under left eye and matching ones on her shoulder and right outer leg. Her body wasn't extremely decorated up with crescent moons and claw-like scratches like other demons she had seen depicted in the few paintings of the feudal beasts she had found while trying to discover herself. She took the appearance of a much more original Inu she had figured after a while, the ones that first appeared with the creation of the world. Leaning back further against the couch, Kagome slightly opened and closed her hand that was once again beginning to hurt, specifically right where the scar on her palm was located. Glancing at it she didn't even bother to growl when she saw how red and swollen it had gotten again. It wasn't worth the effort anymore. After two centuries this was the only scar on her body that had refused to heal, always returning at the most random of times.

Her life wasn't all bad, though, she reminded herself. Looking around her penthouse living room, she smiled half-heartedly as her eyes locked on her drafting table where she had been working on a little side project for the past few days. All on her own, she had established and ran a successful architect company which focused primarily on restoring ancient structures and other important buildings to their original form. And even though she had no idea who she truly was well managed this same business for the last one hundred and fifty years, which she continued to lead under many different aliases. Her current identity as Abigail Tokuoka, the fabulous woman whom her former persona had 'found' while on a business trip in London ruled with as much kindness and favor as did the moniker's before her. There was no family inheritance at her company, only 'prodiges' which were kept out of the public eye until the handing down ceremony where they would eventually take over for the previous 'deceased' owner. A pretty decent cover up if she did say so herself.

Hearing her phone go off, she grabbed it from her purse on the coffee table and after checking to see who it was, sighed when she saw that it was her calendar informing her it was time to write her monthly check to the Higurashi shrine. She had been supporting that place since it had been built near what was now called the bone eaters well for almost a hundred years ago now. Just another thing she couldn't explain, but something had kept her going to that old water hole for years until the humans decided it was the perfect place to build such a holy structure around.

Over the years, she had managed to keep giving financial aid to the place with little suspicion by claiming her ancestors had helped create it and she was willing to do anything to keep it running. In this day and age, she had only been visiting it once a month under the guise of dropping off her charity when in reality she had used the time to question once again how she had ended up there. Something in her gut told her it was more than coincidence she had woken up in that spot with severe amnesia, but what it meant even after all these years she still was no closer to figuring out.

While Kagome's mind remained in turmoil, a pair of eyes watched her impassively as she left the comfort of her couch and headed for the kitchen where he lost sight of her when she passed the wall. Exhaling in irritation, the man remained in place on the roof of the building he was occupying, counting down the minutes until he could make his move. She wasn't going back to the living room for a while. Briefly, he saw her shadow once she waltzed in her bedroom and began to remove her clothes in preparation for a bath. Once even her shadow left his line of sight, the man rubbed at his palm irritably, which upon turning it over, one could clearly see the angry red scar that ran down the entire length of his hand.

A/N: What will happen next? Please review -Theores