Disclaimer: I don't own Inuyasha.

A/N: No prompts were used…mostly because no one prompted me. ::eyes you all and huffs::

Kagome craned her neck and peeked into the bedroom to see a man inside.

Slim, tall body. Dark, curly hair snipped short to conform to the new era. Sharply angled face with glib, inhuman beauty. Traitorous eyed glinting hints of red in the dim light.

Unrepentant in stance, language and perception.

Ergo, Kagome noted dizzily with a faint sense of déjà vu and oh-please-for-the-love-of-all-that's-holy-not-this-shtick-AGAIN, unless the devil grew a spare twin while still in the womb, that's Naraku. In my house. In my bedroom. Doing God only knows what.

And then she paled. Oh my days…what if this version's a panty-sniffer? Ew, ew, ew, ew, ew, ew, ew, ew! Ugh, I'm going lingerie shopping tomorrow. Getting a whole new underwear wardrobe.

And then she looked at the grocery bill, still crumpled in her hand. Damn, that's going to cost some good money. Which I don't really have. Because really, in the practical scheme of things, if she were to ask the universe, "New roof for the wellhouse or new panties for me?" the universe would screech back, "Panties, panties, panties, stupid human!"

And she would naturally obey the orders of the cosmos.

And the wellhouse roof would rapidly collapse, destroying the charms keeping the portal sealed and unleashing hell on her somewhat-stabilising life.

And then she would rail at the universe, "Why meeeeeeee?"

And the universe would point a galaxy-sized middle finger at her and sing-song back, "Ha! Ha! Got! Ya!"

Because in Higurashi Kagome's world, that was how universes operated. She knew the manual backwards.

Naraku called again, curious. "Priestess, I am waiting for you to come kill me…"

"Ugh." Kagome hauled herself off the tiles and trudged to the bedroom, grabbing a meat cleaver just in case she had to use it again. Strangely enough, she didn't want to butcher him anymore. She just wanted answers.

Re-murder could always wait till she managed to figure out a way to keep him dead. Human, my foot. He must be cloaking his aura somehow.

"How did you survive the purification?" she asked bluntly as soon as she saw him.

He appeared genuinely confused by the question. "I didn't."

"Cowdung. You never died, back then. You aren't dead now, though you were."

He looked away. "Yes, you made sure of that, didn't you?"

Kagome nodded, casting a surreptitious glance to her closet. It seemed intact, no stray underwear peeking out anywhere. "I did. So. Why are you here?"

"To talk?"

She wagged the cleaver at him, allowing reiki to spark through it. "No games, monster."

He sighed in exasperation. "I'm human. Not as human as you are, true. But still. Human."

Eyeing the open suspicion on her face, he added, "I have a human mother. She's dead, but there are records and a grave. I can get the file, show you her tomb, dig up her remains if you like, find the doctor who delivered me…what else do you need?"

Whuh…? This is crossing all levels of weird! Kagome jiggled the cleaver again. "One. This is strange. Strange as strange could be. Two, I'd take you up on the offer if I wasn't so sure your mother's grave happens to be some oozing, pulsing ball of slime in hell somewhere. And three-"

"Do. Not." His eyes were flashing crimson, naked fury on his face. Kagome stepped back in involuntary fear, reminded too much of the hanyou she had destroyed in the feudal era. "Not a word against my mother, priestess. Whoever she was, whatever she was…not a word. I may be human and mostly law-abiding, but I am not, I have never been against killing and you know it. And that pretty little knife of yours won't help you much without your reiki crippling me."

Kagome stared at him, overcome by the alien sensation of everything being familiar and wrong at the same time. Deciding to deal with the threat later, she focused on the emotional holes in his story. "What do you mean by 'whatever she was?' Why are you defending whoever it was that spawned you? WHO the hell are you, if you aren't the creature I demolished?"

They glared at each other for long minutes, each refusing to back down from their ancient nemesis. Finally, he dropped his eyes to the floor and slumped on the bed. A hefty sigh escaped him as he indicated that she have a seat. Adjusting her grip on the cleaver, Kagome took the stool near the dressing table and eyed him with baleful anticipation.

"My name…my real name, is Furusawa Kichirou. It was the name I was given at birth…they were being optimistic, I suppose."

"Kichirou…," Kagome rolled the name on her tongue, testing the flavour of it. "Hah. Who the hell thought to name you 'lucky son?'"

He lifted a tired shoulder. "You're a lot more foul-mouthed than you were. Remnant from that puppy-eared bastard?"

Kagome narrowed her eyes in response. It was true, but he didn't need to know for certain.

"The nurses at the maternity hospital. They wanted to help. Gave me a name that would hopefully negate the circumstances of my birth."

Now that got her attention. Sensing a story there, deeper than she could imagine, Kagome leaned forward, concentrating on every nuance of him.

"The pregnancy…I'm human, priestess…but I am not…correct. The spawning – that was the right word to use, by the way – of my previous self in the Feudal Era was something unnatural and unholy and against all the laws of existence. Life was created where only death and decay thrive. And to create me, that Naraku that was me, too many lives were taken, conjoined and eaten…you get my drift?"

She nodded. "Ugly as it gets."

"Yes…something of that has…remained. My…creations. Kagura died. Kanna did not. She must have had children at some point, there's no other explanation for why my genes propagated. My mother was impregnated by Kanna's descendant. He had to be that; no one else could carry the hell I am."

"Oh, good lord…"

"Indeed. The woman went insane. The pregnancy and nightmares that came with my growing awareness of who and what I was, even as an embryo; she just went mad. The birth killed her. She killed my…uh…father, heavens, that's convoluted genealogy – in a fit of something; I don't know what. Then the birth killed her. Unfortunately, as we've seen, I can't be killed quite that easily. She must have already had a streak of demon blood in her that pronounced my father's genes and recreated me. I'm human. I age. I die. Then I relive. I don't think anything can kill me…old age probably has a shot and that's about it."

She had to believe him; everything about the way he spoke screamed that he was telling her the truth. And yet, that made it all the more awful, to know that such a creature had been reborn into a peaceful world. Bile rose in her throat and Kagome couldn't keep the revulsion at bay. "Monster! You really are one! Always were, always will be!"

He met her eyes squarely. Unflinchingly. "I changed my name to Naraku as soon as I legally could."

"Couldn't resist being yourself, eh?" she mocked to wash the taste of disgust away.

"Is there anyone else I deserve to be?"

"What?" she squeaked, unable to process what she was hearing. No way. No. Freaking. Way.

Naraku, the Naraku-that-was-is-and-always-will-be, looked into her eyes. He looked with the eyes of a man who knew everything about himself, who did not regret his past, who accepted even his darkest hours with uncompromising clarity.

A man who had killed, tortured, destroyed, manipulated, tantalised and brutalised and almost created a Holocaust long before the word attained its present notoriety.

A man who had nevertheless come searching for his greatest enemy, his final foe and successful dispatcher.

Kagome looked into the eyes of the man who willingly called himself Naraku and found that he had come to her for absolution.

And now you all know. T_T the deep, dark secret is out. Well…one of them anyway. I'll just invent a few more as we go…trololololololol!

Press that reevoo button and ree-voo the naq, pweese?