Disclaimer: I. Do. Not. Own. Him.

Chapter Sixteen: Better Judgement

The voices wouldn't leave her alone.

…To say nothing of her guilt.

Kagome lay in bed; her tresses now tangled and spread out along the bed. Her eyes to any other would look almost lifeless though it was merely the distant gaze she got anytime she went in too deep. And that was exactly what she was doing that night.

She knew she was in the wrong to do it, but she had to. She needed help.

The only person she knew that could help her was, well, her.

The imaginary friend.

Kagome didn't want to do this but she was desperate. She couldn't bear the weight of knowing and holding such information. It was against Kagome's better judgement to not let Inuyasha read the stories and it certainly wasn't because she was afraid of what he'd think of her writing style. Something within her told her to keep it to herself.

And that something was more like a 'someone.'

Kagome felt the icy grip of death as she felt her mind surrender to the darkness, as she felt the chill tingle down her spin as a new reality came before her, as she saw for the first time her imaginary friend.

Kagome took a step forward and tilted her head, taking in the image for the first time. "Who…who are you?"

"Is that really important?" For once, the voice wasn't just a whisper in the breeze or a lost voice in an echo. It was clear, concise, and human. They had finally met.

"I think so," Kagome retorted, trying not to sound indignant. "If you're my imaginary friend then I'd think-"

"At the moment, what you think isn't what should be."

Kagome caught the woman's gaze and felt a shiver pass through her. "I'm guessing you're using that as a double-meaning?"

The woman nodded, a faint shimmer of a smile crossing her lips. Her skin was pale and clear, her eyes a solid colour and her lips fine. "He cannot see them just yet."

Kagome couldn't help but take another step towards her. "Why not? Won't it help us? The investigation? Won't it save lives?"

Shrugging the woman didn't give a definite answer. "That depends on how many you want to save, Kagome."

Sighing, Kagome looked around the emptiness. "Is this were you stay? Is this…all you have?"

The woman laughed, shaking her head.

Kagome looked up at her. "Can you tell me…is there really a Heaven? Or a Hell? Do they exist?"

"I don't know," the woman said slowly. "Do they?"

Kagome growled in frustration. "I was asking you."

"And I'm asking you. Kagome, do what you believe in and do what you feel right. All of it leads to something, nothing can ever end."

"So, I can never be wrong? If I just follow my instincts everything will turn out the way it should?"

"Just think of it this way: you may be closer to wrong, but you're no further from right."

"Cryptic much?" Kagome asked rhetorically. Shaking her head, Kagome looked at the woman. "Why…why can't you tell me who you are?"

"Not yet," she whispered. "Not yet."

Kagome opened her mouth to further question when she felt a burning sensation overtake her body. She felt her knees go weak and her head throbbed. It was like fire was set upon her body and the raging push of reality forced her to the ground.

"He's calling you back," she whispered. "Your friend…he's worried."

Kagome clenched her teeth and squeezed her eyes shut. She was too deep without a lifeline and as Miroku tried to stir her, hot searing pain clouded her. Looking up to her imaginary friend weakly, Kagome watched as the face blurred and suddenly, everything just went black.

Nazuna took the towel off the woman's head, letting wet hair fall to the shoulders as she put the towel in the back. The hairstyling place that she worked at was small but convenient. A long room with two outside rows of chairs and mirrors, it held enough room for roughly half the town and because lighting in the room was dim and not extremely well connected, a large window at the front of it brought in most of the light.

Nazuna combed through the hair of the pale blonde before her and sighed inwardly. Something had been bugging her all day. Well, actually, it had started over a week ago but she hadn't really paid much attention to it before now.

Call it intuition, but Nazuna had the feeling that she was being watched, stalked.

She shook her head and mentally slapped herself. Stalked? What was she thinking? In a small town that barely made it on a map, nothing bad ever occurred in the town. Everyone knew about everyone. And there were certainly no stalkers in Trite.

Of course, before she could've sworn that there were no murderers in Trite either.

Nazuna cursed herself as she grabbed the scissors and gathered a small amount of hair in her hands, putting it in a clip before getting to work.

She wasn't being stalked. Nothing bad was going to happen to her.

But even as she thought those words, she couldn't help but gaze out the window, hoping in some sense, she was right.

Miroku felt Kagome's body: cold, clammy and stiff. All of her muscles were tense and her body barely moved when Miroku picked her up to shake her. Her eyes were wide open and her lips were almost blue.

"Kagome, what are you doing to yourself?" Miroku asked her pleading, knowing full well he wasn't going to get an answer.

"Why won't you show them?" Miroku demanded. "This is a matter of life or death for the people here and even though you have two detailed stories that could give the people enough leads to actually catch the guy, you refuse to show them. What has gotten into you?"

Kagome's body jerked but she still remained stiff, unconscious.

Miroku laid her back down on her bed and took his head in his hands. Why was she doing this? No lifeline… He could tell by the way her body was responding (which was absolutely nothing) that she was way too deep.

Maybe this time, she wouldn't be able to get out.

"You don't understand," Kagome whispered. "I can't."

"And why the hell not?"

Miroku dashed to his cell that lay buried somewhere in his room. He threw clothes everywhere until it was found under some papers on his desk. Unsure of whether to call 911 or not, not knowing what they could do for something like this, Miroku ran back to Kagome's room.

Last night they had a fight, the second one in their entire friendship. She had gone to her room after a brisk goodnight and remained there. It was noon the next day when Miroku had started to get worried. First of all, Kagome never slept in but taking in the fact that it had been a hard two weeks, he let it slide. Then after a long while he stood by her door to see if there was any sound. She could have been just avoiding him.

When he heard no sound, he started to get worried.

Especially when he called her name and no answer came back.

"Because I just can't, got it?" Kagome screamed. "Stop interrogating me and scolding me like I'm a child. I may not know what I'm doing, and I know this goes against any normal human being judgement but in case you haven't noticed, I'm not normal!"

It was just when he walked back into the room and placed his hand on her forehead when her felt her body jerk forwards. She lashed out, her hands clawing and a moan escaping her lips. She sounded like she was in pain, deep, fresh, raw…

"Kagome, are you okay? Kagome, wake up!" Miroku shouted, relief showing in his features.

"M-Mm," the sound died in her throat. Kagome blinked rapidly, water springing to them like bees to honey and soon droplets fell off her pale ghost cheeks.

"Miroku?" she whispered; her voice hoarse. "What are you doing?"

Miroku sighed loudly and smiled. "You're okay? Thank God Kagome!"

Shaking her head slightly, Kagome lay back down in her bed and threw the covers off of her. "It's…so hot."

"It shouldn't be," Miroku said, confused. "The AC is on and I personally find it freezing."

"Coming back," Kagome said, explaining but Miroku understood that as much as he understood Gibberish.

He understood Gibberish as much as he understood women.

Simply put, he didn't understand it at all.

After a while, Kagome relaxed and Miroku left Kagome alone so she could change and get ready to meet Inuyasha and Sango at the station.

It took Kagome a while and she didn't rush to get the job done. She almost dreaded seeing him, knowing that she had valuable information that she wouldn't give.

She couldn't give.

…Something depended on it.

And that was something she had yet to find out.

"Chief, have you decided to call in the FBI?"

"No decisions have been made at this time," Inuyasha said reasonably. "We are taking everything into consideration and looking at every possible angle."

Bullshit.

"But Chief, do you think you're doing enough? Who do you have working on the cases?"

"Everyone is doing what they can to solve these murders. Right now I cannot release any information on either of the victims."

"Do you think they were killed by the same person?"

"I think it's a long stretch to be calling this murderer a 'person.' But as I said before I cannot release such information."

"Do you plan to place any curfews?"

Inuyasha nodded his head, inwardly sighing. He hated these stupid things. "Yes, it is going over with the mayor as we speak and should be announced by tonight."

"Is it strictly women this man is targeting?" one reporter asked and soon after, a rile began. Men in the group shouted and defended themselves.

"How do you know it's male? It could just as well be female!"

"I heard a woman didn't have the physical strength to do it," one male shouted.

Women of the group of reporters started to yell in outburst and words such as 'sexist,' 'pig,' and other words too crude to speak of were shouted. Officers quickly got everyone back in their seats but Inuyasha had had just about enough.

He was extremely thankful when he saw Kagome enter the back, give him a quick smile and head towards the back and out another entrance that headed towards his office. Taking his gaze off her, Inuyasha briefly gave an encouraging statement a promise and then headed out of the building himself, avoiding all other questions that were shouted at him.

When he met up with Kagome and Miroku in his office, he wasn't surprised to see Sango with them.

Slap

Frankly, he wasn't surprised by that either.

"Damn pervert, keep your hands away from me or I will file for sexual harassment."

Miroku grumbled but said no more, his gaze downward as he took a step back. If he couldn't touch, he could certainly see.

Sango sighed as she looked towards Inuyasha. "I have the background check on Korari; you know Nazuna's friend-slash-alibi?"

Inuyasha nodded.

"There was nothing out of the ordinary as far as I could see. Perfectly clean record, above average student during high-school. She was both the teacher's pet and popular, never did anything like drugs," Sango shrugged.

"Is it just me, or does everyone in Trite have a perfectly clean record?" Kagome drawled.

"I was starting to get that feeling too," Inuyasha admitted. "Okay then Sango, can you-"

"Wait," Sango said, holding up her hand. "Don't tell me. You want me to bring Korari in?"

Smirking wouldn't have been the smartest thing to do at that sort of time so Inuyasha just nodded –somewhat sheepishly seeing the dangerous glare in her eyes- and walked out of the room, dragging Kagome along by the arm.

Miroku stood there, gazing downward with a smile of satisfaction on his face. Sango turned and saw him blink, then realized what he had been doing for the past ten minutes.

Slap

The room around her was cold and the blandly coloured white walls didn't help the sudden chill. Tying her blonde hair back into a ponytail, she waited anxiously, chewing her mint gun until all taste was drained out.

She vaguely wondered how long she had been there and also how long she would be waiting.

Right after that thought left her, the door handle jiggled and a tall woman with her hair down walked in, her expression bored if not irritated. She recognized her as Sango Houko, the head of investigation for the recent murders.

"Korari Takeda?" Sango said pleasantly, though strained.

"Yes?" Korari asked using an overly light tone. She still had no clue why she was here. Why she had decided to come was another matter but she didn't get a chance to really think since the officer continued.

"I'm Sango and before you ask, you're not in trouble and not under suspicion. We would just like to ask you a few questions regarding what you had been doing last night."

Korari nodded. "Okay then, ask away."

"Were you out last night with Nazuna?"

"Yeah, we went out to Suki's. We normally go there at least once a month to catch up on stuff because of my busy work hours."

"What time did you see her?"

"I picked her up at her house around seven for dinner. We went out to Suki's and stayed there until closing time around ten-thirty. It was mostly just chatting. Our waitress was named Jay by the way and my boss was also there so he can say I was at the restaurant."

"Naraku Morikawa is the name of your boss right?"

"Yes," Korari answered earnestly. "I don't know why though. I remember…well he asked if I had plans that night and I told him about meeting Nazuna for dinner. It was weird because after that he became quite interested. Maybe I'm just paranoid with everything that's happening."

"Would Naraku have any access to Nazuna's house or car?" Sango asked, wondering why both Nazuna and Korari found him strange.

Korari's eyes widened. "God I hope not. Though he's not exactly bad looking, his way or…nature is pretty deranged."

"Deranged how?" Sango asked.

"The way he words something or the way he acts. I don't really know but now that I think of it, he does seem to have an odd obsession with Nazuna. I mean, she comes over to see me a bit and normally he can hear our conversations when he walks by so it's possible he would know our plans…"

Sango looked at Korari strangely. "What are you trying to get at Ms. Takeda?"

Korari shrugged, looking at Sango with eyes that made her look very vulnerable. Sango wondered if this woman would be the next victim… And that scared her.

"Well, since Nazuna has never taken any interest in him other than wondering why he was so weird…maybe my boss has a thing for her."

"Is that what you think?"

Korari looked at the plain scarred table in the room and traced an indent on it with the tip of her index finger. "No… He's married but that doesn't stop most guys these days anyways." A small humourless laugh escaped her. "Maybe I'm just really paranoid but now that I think of it, like really start to think about it…Naraku has always been where Nazuna and I have been. Like when we go out, he's always there."

"Then I guess," Sango said with a sigh, "that I have one more person to talk to."

Ami Dai looked at the clock with mild irritation and cursed the line of people that was making her job go by longer. She was already supposed to be off the clock but this woman had either a very big family or they all just ate a lot because it would take at least two shopping carts to put all the bagged goods in.

How she managed to shove all the food originally into one cart was more than an undeniable talent, it was a miracle.

She was a bit on the thin side too…

After all the groceries were bagged and put away, and a receipt given, Ami turned to look at a young teenage boy who was to take on the new shift. He had blonde, somewhat long hair and an expression that could be read as either bored or wistful –wistful in the sense that he didn't have to work and it was all a bad dream.

She signed herself out and wrote the teenage boy's name, humming to herself while she fumbled for the keys in her purse and walked to her car in the parking lot. It was getting late out and Ami's stomach loudly reminded her that dinner was needed.

It wasn't until she reached the car that she realized the only food in her cupboards was a couple of cans of some unclassifiable food (surely something some friend brought over) and some bags or boxes of month old expired meals.

Just peachy.

Turning around and walking back into the grocery store, Ami made her way through the too familiar isles and looked around for a decent meal that would give her enough leftovers for a couple days.

Finally finding the food she wanted, she grabbed an extra bar of chocolate to sooth herself and then waited in line.

Which ironically was the exact same line she had been cursing only minutes ago.

There she is, all thoughtful and smug.

She's a bitch who needs to learn her lesson.

She must be getting desperate if she's doing things for herself and not waiting for her friend to do it for her.

Poor, poor Ami, carrying her own groceries like that.

She must feel so little.

So undignified.

She thinks she's all that but I'll show her.

I'll show them all.

Say bye, bye Ami.

Say bye, bye.

Next Chapter: Us and Hell- "It's natural for someone to feel obligated to protect something that could be hurt, shattered. It's natural, it's human instinct. It's how we survive in this world. So when you saw me, all alone, trying to get by this…this problem I had, you fought to protect me."

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