As Inuyasha panted lightly and leaned his head against the cool glass window, the train continued jostling its occupants in a steady rhythm. How he hadn't already passed out was anyone's guess, but Inuyasha hedged his bets on divine intervention. As it was, every so often Inuyasha could feel his heart fluttering in his chest from the havoc this stupid leech of a girl was unleashing on his system. Static was filtering out the world spinning all around him. A high-pitched ringing blocked out all sound. Every muscle in his body was screaming in protest…

The time for using words had come and gone. Every muscle of his body was largely locked into place and it was all he could do to keep taking in air.. Even if he could move, Inuyasha was fairly certain the second he pried open his jaw he'd projectile vomit all over himself, the girl and the carpet.

Not that the carpet would be worse off. The train's sickly green walls and brownish gold carpet already looked like somebody barfed all over it. Ugly crushed velvet seats that had once been amber and had definitely seen better days wouldn't even notice a new stain.

Freaking outdated piece of shit...

The train lurched randomly. Inuyasha gagged as his body was jolted into an impossibly worse position. Honestly it was a miracle he wasn't suffocating against the glass his face was now pressed into. Actual breakable, old school glass that let him feel the freezing temperatures outside. Which was nice. So nice.

The train jostled again and Inuyasha let out another soft groan. It was weird as hell that they still used trains or anything even remotely similar to what they had been taught about life being like five hundred years ago. You'd think, even with all the nuclear warfare, that technology would've advanced by now or, at a minimum, caught up to things like airplanes or trains that used magnets to glide instead of coal but oh no, people could fly so why build machines for the assholes that didn't? Why bother springing for better transportation when only a handful of people crossed regional borders each year? It made no damn sense. There were technopaths of every variety under the sun mass producing what few technological advancements humanity had made. Surely, surely there should have been some massive changes by now. The only investments the government made were in surveillance, energy and weaponry. Every other advancement or discovery came from the private sector.

But, in the governments defense, outdated modes of transportation got the job done, wasn't broke why fix it, and, right now, it worked to his advantage. By some stroke of luck, the powers that be hadn't felt the need to turn the heat on during a snowstorm. It was freezing in here which was probably the one thing keeping him from passing out.

Inuyasha let out a miserable little groan as his heart faltered in his chest and the ringing in his ears grew louder. Nausea crept from his abdomen to his head. His heart dropped to the bottom of his shoes. The world began fading to black and for the briefest of seconds, Inuyasha could hear everything clearly. Finally heard the somewhat frantic questions being yelled at him by the boy while the girl extracted Kagome from his arms.

"Move, move, move," a male voice that sounded a thousand miles away barked urgently as someone or something mercifully pried the little leech out of his arms and replaced her body with a metal bucket of some kind.

"I thought he could let go!" a female voice hissed as Inuyasha fought desperately to keep his mind clear, "How were we supposed to know..."

Inuyasha gagged. Once. Twice.

And then he prayed to the bucket god as his sensitive dog-like ears rang.

"Miroku, couldn't you have summoned something bigger? Its going to spill!"

"Well forgive me if I did not want to warp the train in search of something larger. If it fills, I will empty it."

"Ew."

"You are more than welcome to dispose of it in a more convention...oh no. No, no, no."

"What's wrong?"

Retching a few more times and emptying what little remained of his stomach, Inuyasha found himself lacking the ability to form words. Usually, Mother pulled away before it got this far. She knew how to time it. But he just...he should've just freaking said something. Used words. Said yes when that jackass said he was an empath. Their deaths were going to be his fault and this time no one could say he didn't...

Only that he couldn't...

Something cold suddenly wormed beneath his shirt followed shortly by something sending shockwaves through his system in steady yet agonizing rhythm. As his body jerked and the air grew thin, Inuyasha found himself losing the battle to stay lucid much less upright.

"Call the medic. Call. The..."

And the world went black.

Shivering slightly in the ice box they called a train, Miroku and Sango sat in the middle of their small compartment in shell-shocked silence while their two comatose companions lay sprawled out on the cushioned benches. Whatever the hell that whole thing had been hadn't just been a 'normal reaction' to someone being in prolonged contact with an out-of-control empath. Even if it was, it was weird that the on-board medic had seemed genuinely concerned until he accessed Inuyasha's register. Then, magically, his whole attitude changed. A quick vital sign reading and suddenly it went from a potential cardiac emergency they needed to stop the train over to 'he'll just need to sleep it off.'

Honestly this abrupt change in tone and behavior had caused some whiplash. Even after Sango tried to advocate for Inuyasha's condition, those concerns were just brushed off in a hurried, nervous manner. The only reasonable explanation Miroku and Sango could come up with was that the medic got spooked by Inuyasha's criminal past. After all, a few rather intimidating looking men had stopped by not long after and asked some odd questions. Not about Kagome who was arguably the bigger concern from a safety perspective but about her victim. How they knew Inuyasha. How long they had known Inuyasha. Had they seen him interact with any other abilities. Had Inuyasha been violent.

Had Inuyasha said anything about abilities that were not listed on his public register.

Unfortunately for the men in black, Sango and Miroku had grown up with far too much experience with government men looking for reasons to lock someone away. When in doubt, deny, deny, deny.

Once the men in black seemed satisfied they'd wandered off and after Sango did a sweep to make sure no bugs were planted, she and Miroku began to address the elephant in the room.

"Kagome and I both read his register. The whole thing. Even what I could mine about the criminal history," Sango suddenly murmured as she chewed the inside of her cheek, "Nothing in there about him having any empathic abilities but we all saw him block her in the cafeteria. And that? I don't even know what that was."

"A shield maybe," Miroku opined quietly as he glanced at the poor boy who really should've been taken to a hospital, "Or a conductor. He did something to calm her when he first picked her up."

"Maybe."

Setting his jaw a few times, Miroku took note of the various concerning aspects of Inuyasha's person. His lips still held a bluish tinge that was accentuated by the purplish bruise like marks on his cheeks. His breathing continuing to hitch in between near hyperventilating pants. Every once in a while the hurting boy groaned and his head would loll from side to side. It was a terrifying thought but if Inuyasha had kept cradling Kagome in his arms, it probably would have killed him…

It should have killed him. There was a reason empathic abilities were regulated.

"Do you remember anything in his register concerning regen…"

"How did you realize he couldn't let go?"

Pulled away from his own thoughts, Miroku hummed in confusion as he turned his attention back to his visibly shaken friend.

"Hm, what do you mean?"

"You know what I mean," Sango sighed heavily as she plucked at the plush gold carpet, "What gave it away?"

Miroku let out a shuddering sigh before adjusting his navy jacket to sit higher on his shoulders and clearing his throat.

"Well, he was looking rather ill," came the mumbled evasive replied, "And I realized if he was hurting that badly, the natural instinct would have been to put her down. I assumed…"

"You didn't assume. You knew," Sango accused as she narrowed her eyes, "How did you know?"

Miroku blushed, averted his eyes and shrugged. Sango had her answer.

"You felt something shift, didn't you?" the woman huffed exasperatedly as she leaned forward and glared, "He's unstable."

"Yes and no," Miroku cleared his throat, "His system was stable until it was not. A perfectly normal reaction to exhaustion and having your heart give out under stress. It's a bit unfair to…"

"That's literally what unstable means," Sango interrupted with a roll of her eyes, "Both you and Kagome are so…"

"Everyone's center shifts when they're ill. Especially when they're near death," Miroku corrected defensively - shifting his own weight and massaging his covered hand, "And each person's field is like a snowflake. Each one is different. Yes, his fluctuated for a moment but that does not mean he's consistently unstable which is what I presume you meant. The circumstances were highly-"

"Being unstable sometimes is still dangerous. Even..." Sango pressed before pausing when Miroku set his jaw and glared at her with no lack of hurt. Taking a steadying breath, Sango cleared her throat and amended, "I wasn't talking about you. What I was going to say was that even I felt something hit me right before you started forcing his heart to keep beating. By all accounts, Inuyasha was likely dying - which is terrible don't get me wrong - but dying did something to him. Maybe even made him stronger. That's not normal."

For a long moment, the pair was quiet before Miroku sighed wearily and pulled out a pack of playing cards from his pocket. Absently sliding the slippery cards from their cardboard sheath, the boy began shuffling them and wrinkled his nose.

"The situation might become clearer if we were privy to certain information. Like say…" Miroku hummed a little too casually as he began separating the cards into two separate piles, "What mother's abilities were?"

"What?"

Glancing up at the confused girl, Miroku sighed as he continued his task.

"I don't remember you mentioning his mother's abilities," he clarified calmly, "Given what just occurred, I think reviewing his mother's gifts might give us some insight. Abilities are genetic after all."

Frowning, Sango knew where Miroku's mind went. After all, his mother was a electromagnetic and his father was space naturopath. A seemingly innocent combination that, unfortunately, created a naturopathic son whose primary element was gravity with some additional electromagnetism thrown in for flair. As a toddler, he'd managed to take out the electrical grid more than once while throwing a tantrum and was to blame for at least one building's partial collapse. By the time he reached six, Miroku could cause an earthquake at will and form a black hole in the palm of his hand. Ordinarily having such a strong ability would have recruiters scrambling over themselves but, unfortunately, the medical staff labeled his ability a terminal one. Thirty years - if he was lucky - but no further. Without treatment but treatment required money which the boy sorely lacked. As such, Miroku understood far too well how a seemingly innocent combination could create a nightmare. Thus why Miroku was so very determined to earn a champion's title. The Capital wasn't about to let one of their brightest stars die from something treatable. It'd be bad for business.

"Register didn't say anything about her other than her relation and date of death," Sango sighed wearily as she watched the two piles grow, "Slap jack?"

A pair of violet eyes flicked upwards and Miroku paused in his shuffling.

"We can play something else."

"No that's fine," Sango replied before shrugging out of her black jacket and unwinding the pink scarf from around her neck, "What do you think she was?"

"An empath. Obviously," Miroku sighed as his eyes flicked towards Kagome, "But then the question becomes what type. I have a feeling that's why her name isn't listed. Probably comes from an influential line with the power to cover up things like that."

"Like a son killing their father," Sango hummed, "With an ability that could be tied to them."

"Precisely," Miroku affirmed before wrinkling his nose and continuing, "It's also possible Inuyasha might be allergic to his particular gift. It wouldn't be unheard of and I've heard of abilities not being listed publicly for that reason. To discourage use, you know?"

Sango shrugged. Conductors especially were notorious for having adverse reactions to the powers they diverted through them but the science behind why that would was limited as the answer seemed rather obvious.

Inuyasha could very well be a lower range…

Except that didn't quite make sense. It was almost like he was absorbing her energy but that wasn't possible. No one could do that. The fact that it looked like that though…

"He's a moderator," Sango breathed as her eyes grew wide, "Miroku, he must be a moderator."

Miroku blinked once.

"I'm sorry?"

"He didn't conduct her energy. He slowed it down," Sango breathed incredulously as she turned her wide eyes towards the clearing suffering boy twitching on the cushion, "I think I remember reading something about regeneration too so if he does have a regenerative ability..."

"His body tries to repair itself," Miroku finished with genuine sympathy, "So his body isn't focusing on distribution like it should. That's…"

"A nuclear disaster waiting to happen," Sango finished wearily before shaking herself and looking at her cards, "Do you want to go first or should I?"

"You go," Miroku mumbled absently as the game began, "Strange an empathic ability wouldn't be on his register though. Especially one that might impact third parties. It could just be that his other abilities allow him to handle that big a drain. Maybe he's not an empath at all."

"He blocked Kagome," Sango repeated as the speed of the game began increasing, "Without breaking a sweat. He's definitely part empath."

A jack appeared in Miroku's favor and following a disappointed feminine groan, the game continued.

"If he is a moderator, I'm guessing he never trained with that ability for... obvious reasons," Miroku sighed as he focused on the game, "I'll need to make sure an empath doesn't get close enough to touch him until he learns how to control it."

"This is all just speculation. Could be he killed his father because he wanted to," Sango pointed out bluntly as another jack appeared again in Miroku's favor, "Next time I'm shuffling the cards. You cheated."

Immobilized by excruciating pain, Inuyasha half-listened to the conversation while the rest of his brain power fought desperately to stay awake. These idiots weren't going to train him on jack shit and he was pissed that he'd let himself get into this situation in the first place. If he used his empathic abilities too long, everyone wound up having a bad time. Stop it in time and only he suffered which was much better. None of it made any sense and that wasn't to say Mother didn't try to explain the finer details…

But no one ever said his mother was perfect.

'It's like this,' Mother had hummed once as she'd given her eight year old a library book about a place called Chernobyl. Having your compared to a nuclear disaster that occurred five hundred years ago had been traumatizing. Out of potentially thousands of ways to explain what had happened when he was three, being indirectly told 'you might explode and kill a ton of people' was not the best way to explain the situation. It also seemed unlikely. In fact, Inuyasha would have laughed at this explanation if it weren't for the fact that his Father had indeed died. That and he was freaking eight so he was more terrified by this news than anything. As he got older, the bigger question became why the government hadn't immediately locked him up for being a danger to society. It wasn't like Mother had connections or money. Then again, someone had to have manipulated his register. There was no record of Mother's abilities that Inuyasha knew of and his own empathic traits were never written down despite the very clear evidence they existed.

Reality was he'd probably never know more than he already did.

"How are you feeling?"

Some other words followed but honestly it was all Inuyasha could do to stay awake much less catch every word. If only his body would cooperate so he could get off at the next stop. This whole idea was one of the biggest mistakes he has ever made. Even bigger than that time he'd...

And then something touched him. An act that pierced the personal space bubble making Inuyasha shudder both in disgust and panic.

"Are you awake?" came the voice of the crazy exploding girl who started all this bullshit, "Wait, just relax. It's just me. Just relax."

A hand began massaging his upper arm in what this bitch clearly believed was a soothing manner but instead of making things better, the touch ushered in a new wave of pain that had Inuyasha nearly puking right then and there. She needed to stop but even though his body was thinking of cooperating, his mouth wasn't forming words.

"The medic said to let him rest Kagome," Sango's voice absently chimed in, "Just let him sleep."

Almost as soon as the pain arrived it began to ebb and an almost pleasurable sensation began agitating his screaming nerve endings. This, however, made his already fast heart rate hit painful heights and stole the remaining oxygen from his lungs.

"Breathe. Just breathe. In. Out. In…"

Someone needed to stop her. Someone needed to stop her. What were those idiots even doing? They knew better than to let her touch them. She needed to stop. Why weren't they making her stop?!

"I'm...I'm not doing anything. " Kagome replied worriedly and she absently rubbed his upper arm, "I just want to make sure you're okay."

"S-stop," Inuyasha snapped as the unwanted mixture of pain and pleasure magically subsided, and he weakly tried to push her arm away. A decision that wound up making an already awkward situation unimaginably worse. His hand was now stuck securely against her chest and some unfamiliar ability began flowing into him at a much faster rate until his entire body was close to convulsing.

This was different than before. Why was this different? What was she doing?

Someone needed to help…

"What are you doing?" Miroku's voice hissed as he grabbed Inuyasha's wrist and broke Kagome's hold in one quick movement. Panting heavily, Inuyasha fell back against his seat and half-listened to the anger banter.

"We told you he can't let go," Miroku snapped irritably, "He literally had a heart attack not three hours ago and you touched him anyway?"

"Exactly. He had a heart attack that no one treated. I was trying to heal him. That's not an empathic ability," Kagome hissed, "I thought I was helping since the medic didn't do squat."

"Do. Not. Touch. Him," Miroku instructed slowly like he would to a five year old making the girl in front of him give him a withering glare, "Are we clear?"

Officially done with this bullshit, Inuyasha pushed himself forward and made to stand up. Why the hell would he stay around a crazy bitch who couldn't listen to instructions and two idiots who couldn't keep her in check?

"What the hell is wrong with you people? You let her touch me even after everything?!" Inuyasha muttered heatedly as he tried to keep from dry heaving, "Just because I couldn't move doesn't mean I couldn't hear you. You knew that was a stupid idea!"

Miroku sighed while Sango cringed.

"Neither of us realized she'd made contact. I personally would have prevented this had I realized. This was an innocent mistake. That being said..." Miroku attempted to do damage control as he turned and gave the sickly looking boy an apologetic look, "Perhaps you can enlighten us about your ability for future reference? After all, this..."

"I'm not explaining anything until someone tells me what the fuck did she just did," Inuyasha interrupted hoarsely as he turned his attention on the girl who'd caused this mess.

"I don't understand the question," Kagome tried awkwardly with a faint blush, "Do you mean...mean when I passed out or..."

"Are you an idiot? Now. Just now. What did you do?" Inuyasha snapped as he righted himself and folded his sore arms across his chest.

"I was just...well, like I said I was trying to heal you? You were hurting so...so I was hoping that maybe I could help," Kagome explained miserably as she maintained unwavering eye contact and the poor boy looked endlessly more confused. Still livid but confused.

"Bullshit. You weren't trying to heal me. What was that?"

"Okay, well I was trying to heal you so what do you think I was doing?" Kagome sighed heavily as she glanced at her friends for backup. As the idiot girl continued rambling nonsensical apologies, Inuyasha's heated yet insecure glare glanced around the other occupants before he unsteadily got to his feet and grabbed his suitcase.

"That ticket is two ways right?" he snapped hatefully as he held out his hand, "Give it to me. I'm getting off."

"Don't do that. Look, I think we've gotten off on the wrong foot," Kagome pleaded earning a strangely withering glare from Miroku, "How about this? Let's just start over. Pretend this never happened."

"A little late for that," Inuyasha snapped angrily, "What do any of you understand about my life, huh? You go through my register and suddenly you act like you know me. Well, guess what? You don't know a damn..."

A small identification tablet was suddenly thrust in front of him by the boy who'd first approached and who appeared in front of him with unnatural speed.

"...thing."

"Go ahead. Read mine," Miroku sighed wearily as he gave the very frazzled Inuyasha a patient look, "It's only fair."

Huffing, Inuyasha set down his suitcase and yanked the tablet out of the boy's hands.

And read.

Slowly, the lines of anger faded away into something akin to genuine sympathy.

"As you can see, you will find no judgment from me. No preconceived notions. I would very much like you to stay and I will personally make sure nothing like this happens again," Miroku offered calmly as he waited for Inuyasha to finish reading, "If you still want to get off the train, that is your choice. One I completely understand and support. However…"

The ebony haired boy sniffed once and cleared his throat.

"Kagome's mother is a fabulous cook and the shrine is quite beautiful."

The silence that followed the world's lamest sales pitch was deafening. Three pairs of eyes watching as the boy (who very clearly wanted to leave) stayed and scrolled through Miroku's register. Strangely, most people who read the small print typically looked more uncomfortable the farther down they scrolled. Inuyasha, on the other hand, seemed to relax. So it was that Inuyasha finally awkwardly handing the tablet back and shifted his weight a few times before rolling his eyes and plopping down.

"You two got anything to add?" Inuyasha asked wryly as he glanced at the two women who looked nervous as all get out.

"I'm really, really sorry?" Kagome offered miserably with a faint blush before glancing at the defensive looking Sango, "I know that...that probably doesn't mean very much but I really hope that you decide to stay."

Inuyasha huffed and looked at the boy who was shoving his tablet back into his back pocket.

"What does her mom make that's edible?"