"Kurama! Are you gay?" Kagome asked as she hurried after the man. She grabbed onto his arm making him stop again.
Kurama frowned and carefully freed his arm from her grasp, "I resent you asking me that question, focus." He snapped his fingers above her line of vision before turning and continuing towards the well house.
"What's gay?" Inuyasha asked Kurama cautiously.
"It's describing the sexual preference of a male to only enjoy other males. Lesbian means for a female to sexually prefer females, and bi is for either sex to enjoy either sex. Straight is probably what you're used to, a male enjoying only females, or a female enjoying only males." Kurama explained to the dog before pulling open the shed. "You're bi right?" he questioned the dog.
Inuyasha scoffed and rolled his eyes, "I'm celibate."
"You're also going down first, then I'll follow with Kagome on my tail. What's on the other side?"
"The well, again, but younger."
Kurama frowned. "Go ahead and show me how it's done," Kurama offered gesturing towards the steps down.
Inuyasha huffed and headed down the well. He jumped into the hole and Kurama stepped forward to watch him fall, but didn't see him. "He's gone," Kurama questioned cautiously. "Seriously? How do you land?"
"On your feet, but it's a soft landing."
Kurama shook his head and chuckled, "That must be nice. Here it goes." Kurama slipped over the edge and hopped down tucking his arms in close.
Kagome heard the well crackle a bit as an echo almost sounded through the wood.
Kuwabara grabbed Kagome and backed her out of the well house onto solid ground as the place snapped with energy. "His energy's going erratic! We need to stay back!" Kuwabara cautioned. "I think he just hit the bottom,"
"He has a shard though, he should go through. He didn't sound like he hit the bottom, it just sounded like something smacked the walls," Kagome countered. She let out a shriek as an energy spike cracked out of the door. Kuwabara pulled her out of the way of the shock and the area seemed to still.
Kagome and Kuwabara cautiously entered the well house after that, carefully creaking up the stairs, "Is he through?"
"I don't know," Kagome pulled herself from Kuwabara's grasp and hurried to the well. When she saw no one in the bottom, she jumped over herself.
"Kagome!" Kuwabara exclaimed in fear, but the girl was gone.
Going through the mists of time Kagome looked around for signs of Kurama. The energy she'd seen crackling in the well house now crackled through the time spread and she ended up having to avoid a few of them by tucking herself up. When she landed on solid ground, she landed on a body. With a yelp and stumbling, Kagome got off of the arm, but it wasn't Kurama lay in the bottom of the well.
The long silver hair that graced the creature could almost be described as more delicate than Sesshomaru's, but the creature had ears and a tail like Inuyasha. "Inuyasha! Is this Kurama?" She called up in question.
"I don't know. Can you wake him up?" Inuyasha asked from the top of the well. "If I jump down I'll have to hang on to the wall so I don't go back through time."
"I'll try."
Kagome knelt by the silver haired creature and gently pulled him up so he lay against the wall. She checked his temperature, and checked for injuries overall before tapping his cheek, "Kurama, Kurama wake up, Kurama!" Kagome called getting louder.
An ear twitched to life as the face scrunched together and slowly pealed itself open to greet the day. He jumped a little when he noticed Kagome so close, but his head banged against the hard stone wall and he ended up grabbing that instead. After lots of deep frowns and cautiously looking around, the creature began to recognize what was going on, "So I'm here, but I have to be in my…" His eyes shut as he got his first good breath of air. "Mmm, it's like heaven." Kagome could almost hear the rumbling of his throat as he relaxed against the wall.
"We need to get out of the well," Kagome told the demon.
Kurama glanced around and nodded reaching out with his hand. Several of the vibrant vines around the edges of the walls grew thicker and more plentiful as he graced them with his energy. "Come on then, get on," He offered her his back.
Kagome crawled onto his back and the strong fox quickly scaled the deep well. Once out, he let Kagome down before just sitting on the edge of the well and taking several long deep breaths.
"Ah, it smells like god's smiling," Kurama nearly purred.
"So will you do it?"
"What?" Kurama frowned and looked up at Kagome confused.
"Be with us back in time," Kagome reminded.
"Oh, come here and help you find Midoriko, sure." Kurama's eyes shut again as he continued to just take deep breaths of fresh air. After a particularly long breath, he shivered in delight and began to take in his surroundings. "I forgot how good it was."
"Well stop day dreaming, we have to get back to my time to study. I do have a test soon and I need to get to work," Kagome remarked as she got on the edge of the well to hop back down again. Kurama wrapped an arm around her waist stopping her from going just yet. "What?"
"I'm not sure what's going to happen when I return, I died between the two times so I may or may not die again while going back through time. When you go, please get out of the well quickly, and out of the well house. I'll follow after five minutes. Inuyasha, judging by the condition I was in when I came here, would you mind following after about ten minutes from when I jumped in to make sure I get out of the well okay?"
Inuyasha just nodded and Kurama let Kagome go.
The girl slipped off of the well and into the split in time Kurama just went back to enjoying the moments he had in the fresh air while Inuyasha approached and sat by the side of the well with the new friend. They remained silent until Kurama turned around and dangled his feet into the well. "Stand back please. When I came, my energy went sporadic."
Inuyasha just nodded and left the well letting Kurama drop on his own.
Kagome watched from the tree as she waited for Inuyasha and Kurama to appear from the well house. She told Kuwabara what happened and he had agreed that standing back would only be the wise thing to do. As the five minutes were up, Kagome got tense.
Kagome eyed the well cautiously as she heard the crackling of Kurama's energy return, but it wasn't the same as before. Now it seemed to merely surge instead of making an attack on its own. Only a few minutes later, Inuyasha left the building with a badly beaten fox in his arms. The creature arched and grabbed at the fox as the long silver hair pooled out of Inuyasha's arms. He rushed the creature to Kagome watching her nervously as she directed him to lay Kurama on the bench.
"What happened?"
"He screamed when he struck the bottom so I followed sooner and this is what I found," Inuyasha explained.
"Kurama! Kurama buddy!" Kuwabara called as he went to Kurama's other side. His eyes widened as he noticed the wound below his shoulder close to his heart. "Oh man, that's what killed him! That shot!" Kuwabara exclaimed as he pushed his hands on the front of the wound trying to stop the bleeding. "He's going to die!"
Kurama's energy whipped around them like a wind and he began to struggle, opening his eyes and pushing off Kuwabara. The larger man fell back on his ass and stared at Kurama with wide eyes as his hair bled red. He yelped and rolled off the bench grabbed his ears as they began to flicker and vanish. Another scream escaped him as his back arched pushing his forehead into the ground.
"He's changing back!" Kuwabara exclaimed. He hurried forward again trying to help somehow, but Kurama bated him away again. His legs tucked in and his arms pushed into his stomach. After a few more minutes he relaxed into a panting mess falling to the side with shaky arms and shutting his eyes.
"Kurama?" Kuwabara asked as he finally was allowed to draw near.
Kagome and Inuyasha stared at the fox in shock from their side of the bench, staying put. As Kuwabara pulled the fox into his arms, Kagome went to check on him. She checked for a fever first, and found herself relieved. "He's panting, but he doesn't have a fever, so it didn't make him ill."
"Move him by the tree," Inuyasha suggested. "I mean, it is his tree, right?"
Kuwabara nodded and brought the fox over to the large tree leaning him up against it. He smiled as Kurama sighed in relief. "Good call."
"If he has to go through that all the times he goes back and forth, he might as well just stay here."
"What happened on the leaving trip?" Kuwabara questioned.
"He changed back into his fox form, but he was unconscious at first. I'm not sure if it was just sleep or unconscious, but it was definitely not awake," Inuyasha explained. "On the trip here, he basically had to relive everything I think."
The group stayed quiet as they watched the fox, waiting for him to rouse himself and tell them something that would help.
"You seem fonder of him now," Kuwabara eventually remarked.
"He's not bad, just weird," Inuyasha replied.