Chapter 3
Author's Notes: So looks like I did find time today to write another chapter! Yay! But I'm sure you just want me to get straight into it so here it is!
Chapter 3
It was him again. I froze, my mind unable to process how to react. I was alone on a dark street with him. My instincts were urging me to fight immediately but I fought them back still unable to move.
"Cold night isn't it?" his voice called. It was just as I imagined, deep and coarse. I cleared my head knowing I couldn't just stand there forever. I made my feet move and kept walking forward towards my home without looking back. I could play it off like I didn't hear him right? No need to engage in conversation at all! Wrong. I forgot that I had suddenly went from not walking, to frozen, to walking again. Of course he knew I had heard him! Well better follow through with my choice anyways. Maybe I could get home or run into other people. I was only three blocks away from my house.
"Well aren't you being rude my little darling?" His voice was right next to my ear. I whirled around to face him while jumping back to make distance between us. He must have used his youkai abilities, there's no way he could have caught up to me so quickly. A deep chuckle resonated in the air. I finally looked up to his face, only to confirm what my powers had already told me. It was the same red eyed man.
"I'm trying to go home. It is late and dark, so please leave me be." I put my best effort into making it sound forceful. Like I could back up my words. My powers came to the surface and brushed against me as a reminder that they were still there.
"I just wanted to get to know you. My name is Naraku, now tell me yours." His tone had an edge of seduction in it. Did he really think that would work on me? For heaven's sake I'm a miko! He should know perfectly well that my instincts are telling me 'FIGHT OR FLIGHT'! Like a little change in tone would have any impact on how I was feeling!
I steadied my voice and repeated myself, "I'm trying to go home. It is late and dark, so please leave me be." This time it came out with more force. I would not let some dark person like him scare me. I was powerful too and wasn't going to let my fears control me anymore.
"Tell me your name girl. This is the last time I will ask you politely." His voice told he was getting angered with me. I needed to get out of here and fast. I drew my powers forward and let them pulse out over the immediate area. It was a warning. As I saw him flinch from the pulse of my power I turned on my heel and continued walking. I would not let him think he could control me.
That's when the first strike hit me. A tentacle had hit my legs knocking me to the floor. I rolled quickly and formed a bow and arrow pointing straight at his heart. Tentacles had sprouted out of his body. His face was now contorted in a menacing grin as he laughed at me.
"You think you're little bow can stop me? You will learn the hard way Kagome that I get what I want. I have been watching you since I first laid my eyes on you. You are quite the fascinating little creature. How easily you find happiness and light in your life. See I think it would be quite the show to take that light away from you, and see what you become. You are powerless girl, nothing compared to me."
I let go of the arrow and sent it flying towards him. Get out now. My powers were wavering. Why? I had better control than this what was going on?
Another tentacle hit me, this time piercing my abdomen on the left side just above my hip. I screamed out in pain. I had never felt such an intense pain before, it hurt so badly. And yet I couldn't focus on the pain. All I could focus on was getting away from him. Another tentacle came towards me and I dodged the brunt of it but still was smacked in the face knocking me to the floor. Before I had time to react I was pinned by another tentacle to the wall. The bleeding was getting intense
My powers, I needed my powers. I called as much as I could get control of forward and tried to form a barrier around myself but his powers were pressing against mine and I was losing the battle quickly. I was helpless against him. I had no control. He was right. I could do nothing. I wasn't strong enough. I felt myself giving up and lost any link I had left before to my powers. I couldn't feel them inside of me anymore. I couldn't feel anything inside of me anymore, it was just empty.
I could hear Naraku's booming laughter as he looked at my pathetic display. He knew he had won.
"Remember this feeling little one. Remember exactly where you stand on the earth now. All that matters is that you are below me."
As I started to lose consciousness I heard yells in the background. Was someone there? It didn't matter, my world went black and I passed out.
I woke up to white everything. White walls, white ceiling, white sheets…
I was in the hospital. I looked around my empty room and saw a nurse outside notice I was awake. She ran off and came back shortly with a doctor.
"Good morning sweetie! How are you feeling? Be careful not to move too much and rip you're stitches. Try and just stay still for a while." Stiches? What? Ow! Oh right… those stiches, from the tentacle that pierced my stomach. I winced in pain as the doctor came over to check that the stitches were still intact.
She laughed, "They never believe you until they find out for themselves… Well you're lucky you didn't rip them. They've had a couple days to set so you should be almost healed in just over a week. You seem to be very lucky little one." She said to me with a kind smile on her face. "Had it been much longer you might not have made it due to blood loss, but you are ok now. Thank goodness that girl found you and called the police. You have some bruises that will be tender for a few days and the stiches but no damage to any organs. You will need to stay in bed for a few more days and have you're bandages cleaned twice a day. You put up quite the fight…" She ended sadly.
After a moment of silence the nurse came over to my bed and stood next to my doctor.
"Hi my name is Deborah, I'm going to need to ask you some questions now starting with your name." I nodded my head. I answered all her questions about my personal information but when she starting asking about how I acquired my injuries I couldn't answer her. I just started crying and couldn't speak. The nurse told me she would give me some time to rest and continue with the questions later but I wasn't going to wait for that to happen. I swung my legs over the bed and slowly tried to stand up. I grabbed my clothes at the end of the bed. Gasping in pain I tried to relax my abdomen to continue moving and walk out of the hospital.
Although it took me longer than normal, I made it home and fell into my own bed. Sleep. I just wanted to sleep and not think about what happened. First I tried to make a connection to my powers. At first I couldn't feel it, but then I grasped at a small piece of it, satisfied that I had at least found some no matter how small. Yes, that would be enough for today.
I woke up with a scream and panting heavily. A dream… Naraku wasn't here. But my stiches quickly reminded me that it wasn't all a bad dream as I winced once again in pain. I checked my phone to see that it was 8:27am. I only wanted to see the time but I also got to see a bunch of missed calls from my friends and the date. I had hung out with them on Sunday, the night I was attacked. It was now Wednesday and I had 12 missed calls from Sango, 3 from Shippo, 3 from Miroku, 1 from Inuyasha and 1 from and unknown number along with voicemails and text messages. I felt guilt for not telling them where I had been last night when I had the chance. They were all so worried. But I didn't want to tell them what had happened to me either. I wasn't ready to yet. As stupid as it sounded, telling them would make it real, and I didn't want it to be real. You would think the injuries would be enough of a reality check and yet it wasn't. No, I wouldn't tell them. That just left me with the challenge of explaining where I had been. After thinking it over I started writing my first text to Sango.
'Hey Sango, I'm sorry I made you worry so much, I just got a really bad case of the flu so I took the train over to my aunt's and am staying with her for a few more days. I'll be back in school on Monday though! Again, sorry I made you worry.'
I sent similar texts to Shippo, Miroku and Inuyasha and then saw that I had a text from an unknown number. I opened it and read it.
'Kagome, message me when you see this. –Sesshomaru'
Sesshomaru messaged me? I saved his number in my phone and quickly typed up my response.
'Hi Sesshomaru, sorry I wasn't responding, I took a train to go see my aunt because I got a bad case of the flu.'
Well I guess he was worried too, which is sweet. It almost made me smile. But with everything that had happened I wasn't sure I was ready to smile yet.
After watching Netflix for a little while I heard a stern knock on my door and so paused my show. Who could possibly be at my door? I told all my friends I was away… No. I stayed in my spot on the couch and tried to make as little noise as possible.
"Kagome let me in, I can smell that you're in there." The voice made me melt. I was wrong, it wasn't Naraku. Quite the opposite actually, it was Sesshomaru. How did he know I was home never mind where I lived? Would he be mad at me for lying? I got up and went to answer the door. Well I guess either way I had to face him. Here goes nothing. I peeked through the hole to double check it was him, I really didn't want to take any chances, and upon seeing Sesshomaru I opened the door.
"You are not at your aunt's. Why did you lie to me?" He was angry. I cowered away from him with an involuntary look of fear on my face. The last time someone was angry with me didn't work out too well for me to say the least. I was still fearful of people, especially powerful youka, which Sesshomaru happens to be. His expression turned to one of shock upon seeing my reaction. Due to his confusion he turned to his nose to figure out why I was reacting that way.
"Blood. You're injured, let me see." I flinched away from him again. This caused Sesshomaru to pause. He wasn't exactly skilled at being gentle with people. He lightened his expression to one of concern in an attempt to communicate that he wasn't going to harm me. He reached out to me to put a hand on my shoulder while saying "I won't harm you Ka-" as his hand touched me I threw my body away from him. I ended up throwing myself straight into the wall behind me and winced in pain from my injuries being jostled. I knew Sesshomaru wasn't trying to harm me but I wasn't acting rationally. I was still scared from being attacked. I felt powerless, I didn't want to be near anyone. This was exactly why I told them I wasn't home!
I felt bad for my reactions. Sesshomaru didn't deserve the treatment I was giving him. I looked up at him with a pained expression. I wanted to explain, I really did, but I couldn't.
"I'm sorry Sesshomaru…" was all that I could make out in a mumbled voice.
He took a few steps back not wanting to risk another freak out from me. "Kagome. Listen to me. I will not harm you. I will never harm you, you have become pack."
"Pack?" What did that mean? We weren't family… we were friends at best but I didn't even know if he considered me that. At least his words brought me out of my irrational behaviour.
"Yes, pack. You are like a sister to Inuyasha and to the rest of the group. I am alpha and as such I would never harm you. Now please tell me what happened." His voice was firm. He wasn't exactly willing to negotiate but I could be stubborn too.
"I fell." was my response. I heard a low growl in response. I looked up at him shocked and he kept his expression blank. Fine, be that way.
"I was… impaled… but it's just some stiches, the doctors said I would be fine in a week." I tried to limit the amount of information I gave him.
"Stop speaking in half-truths Kagome. I grow tired of this game."
"Well I don't want to talk about it." Another growl.
"Someone did this to you."
"No." A louder growl was heard.
"Who." It wasn't a request, it was a demand. He was forcing me to talk about something I didn't want to. After silence from my end he sighed in a frustrated manner and walked up to me. As he got closer I become more and more scared until he bent down and put his face an inch away from my neck and sniffed. My heart was racing and my vision became dizzy as I began freaking out. I didn't want anyone so close to me.
"I know his scent." He pulled away. "Naraku." Upon hearing him speak his name and finally being a fair distance from him, my legs gave out. I braced for impact expecting to collapse on my knees only to be caught by Sesshomaru, picked up, and remarkably delicately placed on my couch. This all happened in the blink of an eye. He sat himself next to me keeping a couch between us.
"He will not hurt you again." He stated it like it was a fact. He wasn't there. I was defenseless! I might as well have not had any powers at all!
"He's too strong…" I mumbled hopelessly. Anyone else wouldn't have been able to hear what I had said but I knew he could.
"Look at me Kagome." This time it was a request. His voice was gentle so I complied and looked into his eyes. I had never seen anything like them before, they were amazing. The way he was looking at me made me feel connected to him, like he was showing me his true self behind his mask. Suddenly I became aware of his aura. He had been concealing it before but slowly started letting it expand to its full form. He was incredible. I would normally be in pain from this much overwhelming youkai energy around me but it did not hurt. No his powers brushed against me in reassurance yet displaying his full capabilities. I had never witnessed anything so amazing. My eyes were wide in astonishment.
"He is not stronger than me, and I will not let harm come to you again. You are pack, I have failed you once and it will not happen again." He was so confident in his words I couldn't help believe him. I felt safe. If Sesshomaru was there with me, no one could harm me.
"Thank you Sesshomaru." I cried with relief. I lunged across the couch and hugged him, wrapping may arms around his big chest. He was stiff at first but then responded by wrapping one arm around my shoulders and the other holding my head closer to him. I breathed in his scent as it comforted me. I felt myself relaxing and releasing a bunch of pent of fear from within me. I felt so light and started to fall asleep without even realising it. No nightmare tonight. No, for now, with him here, I was safe.