a/n: HEY YALL!!! Im sorry that I haven't updated in like 4ever! I know yall probly hate me but hey, at least I didn't end yall on a cliffy for such a long wait right? Eh..? ....Well anyways this chappy has been a long time coming and it is VERY VERY important to the rest of the story so plz pay attention. So! Who went out and listened to Imperfection by skillet? Cuz if you did you'll probly catch some of the lyrics in here but I was just a little bit sneaky with them(a little so not really). Anyways, I'll shut up now! ON TO THE CHAPPY!!!
"SPEECH"
'THOUGHTS'
DISCLAIMER: I DNT OWN INU/SESSHY/SANGO/ANYBODY ELSE IMPORTANT....i do own this one guy though(but i kill him off(again!) ^-^!)
Chapter 4- The Unexpected Visitor
The sky as far Sesshomaru's sharp eyes could see was a solid wall of dark gray clouds. The storm had blown in just as he carried Sango into her half demolished village and he was just barely able to enter one of the few huts that Sango had rebuilt that was livable before the rain started to fall. Said woman had fallen asleep in his arms with her hands wrapped protectively around her neko and had stayed asleep even as he lay her down on the spare futon she kept for whenever she stayed in her home village.
As the storm raged on outside through the night he'd watched her sleep restlessly. At one point she started to shiver and he was about to stand and get another blanket to put over the thin one he'd placed up to her shoulders when they arrived. However, before he could move to stand he heard a small mew and watched as Kirara wriggled her way from under the small blanket beside Sango's sleeping from and transformed into her larger, fluffier self before settling down behind her and wrapping her warmly in her large tail.
Even the icy demon lord couldn't help the small smile that graced his features at the touching sight. After everything they'd gone through together the two were the closest thing to a loving family that he'd ever seen. It was rare to ever find Sango without Kirara unless the tiny cat was playing with Shippo and the rest of the village children. In battle they always fought as a team and even when he had joined their team the two had been able to easily coordinate their attacks with his.
She was a ferocious fighter and an even better battle partner, ready and willing to give her life for his at a moments notice, but behind those fierce brown eyes lay a deep seeded pain that she tried to hide and was successful with all others but him. His mind wandered back to the horrible pain in her eyes as she stood before him and caught him staring at her legs. He couldn't help that his eyes were drawn to her strong toned legs and before he'd managed to shake his mind out of its stupor she'd caught him staring and from the look in her eyes she'd thought he was staring at her scars. He'd heard that human women were very sensitive about their looks but that had never been the case with Sango except when regarding the scars on her body.
He had decided that moment, at seeing the pain in her eyes, that he could not let this go on any longer and he would talk to her about it as soon as she awoke. He thought that she'd become accustomed to him seeing her scars in training but he'd never seen her in a skirt that short before. He cursed himself mentally for not realizing that in training he'd been so focused on the fight that he'd never looked at her other than in a calculating glare and that she was smart enough to see the change in his gaze. He very much wanted to just go out into the woods and destroy every demon and tree in the surrounding area but he would not leave her alone while unconscious and still not fully recovered.
His golden gaze flashed back to her just in time to see her sit up and stretch her arms over her head and yawn. He would never admit it to anyone and had only just come to be able to admit it to himself recently but he loved to be there when she woke up just to see the look of complete and total innocence in her eyes and face before her mind caught up with her life and her eyes became shadowed once again. Watching as said brown eyes blinked open wearily he waited intently for that flash of innocence and was rewarded for only a second before the innocence slipped away.
"Morning Sesshomaru..."
"Good morning Sango."
Her brown eyes had been staring intently into his molten gold since she'd awoken but they darted away for a moment, first to the flimsy mat that was covering the door and then to the roof that seemed to only barely be holding up against the force of the wind outside. A look of worry and displeasure crossed her face before her eyes fell from the roof to meet his once again.
"How long has this storm been going Sesshomaru?"
"Since I carried you into the village last night just before dusk."
A heavy sigh escaped her lips as she hung her head and allowed her bangs to fall forward and shadow her eyes.
"Look Sesshomaru…"
"It is time we talk about this Sango. It is no longer just an emotional problem, it has started to affect your health as well and that I will not allow."
Her brown hair flew as she snapped her head up and her wide brown eyes showed an expression of complete shock. He may as well have smacked her across the face to have produced such a violent reaction.
"Sesshomaru I-"
"You are worth so much more than what you give yourself credit for. You want to be more like that whiney priestess of my brother's but you are much stronger than that. The weight of your own shame forced you to your knees less than a day ago when you have nothing to be ashamed of."
He paused for a moment to watch the emotions flying through her sparkling brown eyes. Tears had begun to form but she was not sobbing openly and only one lone tear managed to escape her thick lashes and fall smoothly down her face. It hurt him to see her crying but he knew that this was something she had to hear so he plowed on after only a moment's hesitation.
"Your scars show your strength as a warrior. You are a beautiful woman and the only reason that you do not have suitors lining up in droves is that even the pathetic human males know when they are outclassed. It is imperative that you stop letting your failures devour your heart and realize that you are drowning in your imperfections."
At this he stopped and merely observed as she seemed to absorb his words slowly and with a sort of reverence that came from their mutual respect for each other's insight. Her eyes were no longer filled with tears but the stain of the one that had fallen still remained on her cheek as a reminder to him that he had hurt her. An odd feeling clenched his stomach at that thought but he squelched it quickly with a vicious reminder of what could happen if she did not hear what he had to say.
"Sesshomaru."
The simple statement dashed his thoughts in all directions as he was unceremoniously brought back to the present. In her eyes he could see a steely resolve that had not been there moments ago and he knew that in some way he had gotten through to her if not entirely.
"You're right. You are always right. It's just that I have seen the way that men look at Kagome and the other village girls and I have never experienced that. I have always had scars, since I went to my first battle when I was nine years old, and men take one look at them and immediately loose their interest."
She could not meet his eyes while she was talking about her nonexistent love life because she knew he would not understand her need for a greater affection than just friendship could offer. She was sure he would not laugh or mock her for it, that was something the old Sesshomaru might have done, but she was confidant that she hadn't made enough progress towards teaching him human emotions for him to understand.
"It's ok though Sesshomaru. You've set my head back on straight and I realize that I don't need to worry about any of this for the time being. I've still got to help Inuyasha and Kagome find the rest of the Shikon no Tama before I can even think about going on with my life."
As she said this she looked up at the steely demon lord and smiled. The look on his face was measuring and she knew that if she even showed signs of regressing towards depression again that she wasn't going to get a talking to from just Sesshomaru next time.
'Ya, because those two idiots can only ever agree on anything when it's teaming up against me,' she thought exasperatedly.
"Well Sesshy, if you don't mind I'm going over to the weapons hut to work on my slayer suit."
She said this with such a happy tone that a passerby would never have guessed that she wore an eerily evil grin on her face as she said it. The moment of awkwardness between them was gone and their usual playful sparring banter had begun again. Of course, it went unspoken that her little "nickname" for him was never to be uttered to another sole for fear of death but Sango considered it something strictly between them regardless.
A look of sheer annoyance passed across his face and before he could move to stop her she had snatched up the bundle of traveling supplies she carried with her, her broken katana, and bolted out the door into the pouring rain. He watched her running until the rainy darkness swallowed her completely before turning back towards the pair of glowing ruby eyes that were watching him intently.
"Your mistress is a very strange human Kirara."
A mew that sounded very much like an agreement was all that answered him as he sat down beside the door and continued to stare out into the darkening skies that continued to pour out their sorrows to the Earth. He hadn't realized that it had gotten so late in the time that it had taken he and Sango to have their entire conversation; though it had seemed like a solid mass of tense conversation a good majority of the time had been meaningful silence as something greater than words themselves passed between them.
Molten gold scanned and analyzed every shadow that passed through the heavy rain and it was not until quite some time later that any shadow proved more than a small animal or wind blown mass of leaves. He could now see a light in the hut that Sango was indefinitely working in but he felt no desire to build a fire of his own until Sango returned and needed the heat of the fire to warm her rain soaked skin. There was very little dry wood left stacked on the side of the hut opposite him and since he had no need for a fire to stay warm he would conserve the little they had left.
It was now well past dusk and Sesshomaru guessed that there was only an hour left until the twilight was at it's fullest. It was then that he saw a slim yet upright mass slinking through the rainy night towards the light of the hut that Sango was still working diligently in. He could tell by the figure's gait that it was a humanoid demon like himself and not an entirely weak one by the size of its demonic aura. Suddenly the figure whipped around towards the hut that he was in, now in an easily maneuverable crouch, as if it had sensed him somehow but he had masked his demonic aura immediately after seeing the figure and he knew that it wasn't that.
Watching intently, Sesshomaru had one hand resting heavily on Tokijin. A quick sideways glance assured him that Sango had indeed left her weapon in this hut and had only taken the broken katana so that she could try to mend it. The figure looked at the hut for only a second more before turning back towards the light coming from the hut Sango was working in and slowly making its way forward.
It had a strong demonic aura that was poorly masked and he was sure that Sango had sensed him coming but he could still hear the faint hammering of steel that indicated she was still forging her weapon. He did not worry that she hadn't sensed the demon though, he merely worried that she did not have the weapons to defend herself in that hut. So it was with narrowed eyes and a cold scowl that the demon lord slipped out of the shelter of the hut and into the rain following the demon.
He wanted to attack before the demon made it into the hut and into a more narrow space to fight in but he was only half way to it before it opened the flap serving as a door to the hut and slipped inside in the time it took him to blink a raindrop out of his eye. No longer concerned about the demon hearing him approach, Sesshomaru crossed the gap in a matter of seconds and was throwing aside the flap just as a serious of load crashes reached his ears.
It took his keen eyes less than a second to register that Sango was not in nearly as much trouble as he had suspected, wielding two very deadly looking hand held scythes that were connected to each other by a metal chain, but she was not entirely uninjured either. He could see a bloody gash across her cheek where he was sure she'd only just dodged the demon's first attack and she looked exhausted and covered in sweat from working in the forge all day fixing her weapon.
Seeing that she was ok for the most part his blazing golden eyes then flew to the body that was now staggering up from a mass of splintered table that Sango had obviously kicked him into. His expression was sinister and a look of pure rage flashed through his eyes as he threw himself from the pile of broken wood and towards Sango with speeds almost equal to Sesshomaru's own.
Sesshomaru, though, was ready for that and had drawn Tokijin and stepped neatly between the two, blocking the sword that had suddenly appeared in his hands as if by magic. The blade was glowing an eerie green but he could sense no kind of poison coming from the blade. Instead it was like the blade itself was made entirely of the glowing green youki. In all his long years as a demon lord he had never seen such a weapon and the prospect of what it could do worried him.
'I shall have to end this quickly.'
Shifting his stance just slightly Sesshomaru was able to thrust the demon back with sheer strength before thrusting his own body forward to slice at the demon. Of course he didn't expect Sango to just stand around and watch but he was not expecting her to run past his left side and throw both of her handheld weapons at the demon's still reeling form. As both had suspected the demon was not weak and was able to right himself and block both of Sango's projectiles, leaving her unarmed. Sesshomaru threw her and almost reproachful glance before seeing she had already rearmed herself with two of the many unused weapons lying around the room.
Trying to take advantage of the demon lord's momentary distraction, the demon appeared in front of him using his demonic speed and slammed his glowing green sword into Tokijin that had appeared there to block only a millisecond before. Neon green sparks flew from the two swords as they clashed and for a moment Sesshomaru was blinded.
That was all the demon needed to send a vicious kick to his stomach that sent him flying backwards, through a table that had various broken weaponry scattered across it, and into the opposite side of the hut. Sango wasted no time in attacking; she knew it would take a lot more than that to kill Sesshomaru but she wasn't about to let this demon get another shot at him while he was down.
Sango now held two heavy fighting swords, one in each hand, and began a series of attacks and blocks, alternating which sword she attacked with ever so often so that the demon wouldn't sense a pattern in her attacks. Two weapon fighting styles had never been her forte, Hiraikotsu was her primary weapon and the one she was most versed in, but as a slayer she had learned every type of fighting style that her village knew of. She could have smacked herself for leaving Hiraikotsu in the other hut but she hadn't expected an attack of this kind in her old village and she'd been too distracted taunting Sesshomaru.
Suddenly she could feel her attacks slowing as the demon's sword pulsed black and she felt as if all the energy in every cell of her body was being stripped from her against her will. Trying to stop this unknown attack she stepped dangerously close to the demon and slammed the bottom hilt of her sword violently up into his chin before dancing back out of his range. She was surprised to see that her blow seemed to have had no effect other than angering the demon.
The sword pulsed black again and this time it was worse. It felt as if a part of her very soul was being torn out of her body and she couldn't move to stop it. Another pulse and this time she actually felt as part of her spirit was pulled out of her body slightly before it snapped back into her. Her knees hitting the ground, she fell forward onto her hands and gasped for breath that would not seem to come to her.
'Oh Gods I can't take another one of those pulses. I'm going to die and I don't even know how it's happening.'
Just before she knew another pulse would be she heard a guttural snarl and a blur of white and silver whizzed past her blurring peripheral vision, slamming into the demon and knocking the sword out of his hand. She looked up to see Sesshomaru standing at full height, bloody gashes across his back and arms where he'd slammed through a table and into a wall, with his hand around the demon's throat glowing a sickly poison green. She heard him snarl and watched as he tightened his clawed grip around the demon's throat but did not release his poison.
"What did you do to her!?"
The snarled exclamation shocked her; she had never heard Sesshomaru so visibly angry about her battle injuries. Sure he had been angry and killed for her before but this was a kind of primal, instinctual anger that she had only ever seen when Inuyasha was protecting Kagome.
"Hahahaha! There is nothing you can do oh mighty powerful Lord of the West. Even if you kill me my master will have her and the power that she possesses!"
Had she not been so close to the brink of unconsciousness she might have been extremely worried by the fact that apparently some psychotic demon was out to get her and that his flunkies had some kind of soul sucking power, but she could only barely make herself focus on Sesshomaru growling fiercely before sinking his claws into the demon's throat and releasing his poison.
A moment later he was beside her scooping her limp, half-conscious form into his arms. He was supporting her back with one knee as he crouched with the other and one hand gently brushed her now sweat and blood covered bangs out of her face.
"Sango? Sango are you alright? What was that bastard doing to you?"
Feebly trying to keep her eyes open she managed to look up at him weakly and stare into his intense golden orbs that held so much worry and fear that she almost thought she was looking into Inuyasha's eyes for a moment until she realized that Sesshomaru could be himself around her when they were alone and that they no longer had company.
"I-I think… he w-was trying t-to… take my s-soul….."
a/n: hehehe! Ya I know! A CLIFFIE!!! I'm so mean aren't I? Anyways, those of you who think you found the song lyrics in the story leave me a review with a quote of from the story(please try to be specific and not a whole three or four sentences worth) and then a quote from the lyrics. Those of you who get at least 2 quotes right in the reviews will get recognition in the begining of my next chappy! ^-^! ...Well I will definately try to update much much faster this time so please be awesome readers(yall know what to do!)
PLZ READ AND REVIEW!!!