Disclaimer: I don't own InuYasha
Haa Jinsoku made a show of caressing Kagome's arm with the hand he was holding her with. The other hand he had snaked around her waist in a protective manner. He smiled down at her and leaned the side of his head onto hers, smiling charmingly at the shocked mix of humans and demons before him.
"Love, have you been giving these people a hard time?" he asked, his hand wandering up her arm and then down again slowly, almost in an absentminded way. The mischievous look in his eyes however made Sesshomaru doubt that.
The girl giggled and raised her hand to touch the reptile demon's long pale green hair. "Maybe a little?"
Haa Jinsoku smiled and nuzzled his nose into her hair, his eyes only slits as he watched the others intently. "Good girl," he murmured, earning another giggle out of Kagome.
"What the hell?" InuYasha finally blurted, exclaiming the other's thoughts in one sentence.
Sesshomaru glanced at his half-brother, eyebrow partly raised at his brother's language, before staring intently at the – as he assumed – couple before him. Kagome tsked and shook her finger at the hanyou.
"Language, InuYasha. There are children here." Then she giggled again, covering her mouth as she did.
Seeing that the hanyou was sputtering for words, Sesshomaru opened his mouth, turned to the snake demon. "Explain," he demanded coolly.
"Is there any need for explaining something when you can see with your own eyes?" Haa Jinsoku tilted his head on top of Kagome's, hugging her to him lightly. "Is it such a surprise to find love even as enemies?"
"That's just it!" The tajiya suddenly uttered. Her voice was trembling with barely contained anger, but she still managed to get her words out without hurling herself at the green haired demon. "She has been weird ever since she got back! Frightening the children, attacking us. And," she continued, a pointed look traveling over her male companions, "seducing them, which our Kagome would never do!"
The snake smiled sadly. "Figured it out then, did you?"
The young woman snorted. "Well, you obviously did something with her, though I don't know what."
Sesshomaru frowned. The way the miko behaved had indeed been disturbing, and quite so for him since he preferred the image the miko had had before this… incident. The most irritating concern though was that something was ticking in the back of the taiyoukai's mind, something that told him that he recognized this particular change in personality. But what was it? Something so simple, so utterly normal in demon terms…
The miko made a sound at the demon slayer; something between a hiss and a laugh. "Maybe they did, maybe they didn't. For all I know, I feel great!" She laughed, turning quickly to face the snake demon at her side. Then she astonished everyone once more by peeking him on his lips.
The older of the dog brothers was so deep in thought that he hadn't noticed the wolf demon move forward. "You- Kagome, what are you doing?"
Sesshomaru vaguely calculated that soon someone would either get his heart ripped out, in the literature sense, or someone would really get his or her heart ripped out of his – or hers – ribcage. Seeing the wolf's tightly clenched fists he opted for the latter.
The girl only smiled back at the poor wolf, shoving an awful lot of teeth; it twisted her face into something not quite ningen.
Then it came to him, fast and just as startling like a bucket of cold water. The taiyoukai almost got the impulse to facepalm himself of the obvious answer. The electricity that had startled him, the girl's behavior, the bracelets…
Looking at the girl, he asked the question which would prove him right. "As the Lord of the Western Lands I command Thee to reveal your true name." He stared into her shocked eyes sternly, not breaking eyecontact.
Of course, his brother interfered. "The heck are you blubbering about? That's Ka-go-me; anyone can see that! What 'true name'? Have you finally lost it?" The hanyou snorted loudly, but when receiving no answer from the taiyoukai he grumbled loudly before opening his mouth for a new flood of insults.
"My name…" the girl known as Kagome began, swaying slightly in Haa Jinsoku's embrace as the snake demon tried to steady and break her eyecontact with the demon lord. Sesshomaru smiled, knowing that such a task was impossible once the contact had been made. He felt the same electricity in his belly start to build up, but ignored it.
"My name…" she said once more, slowly as if trying to remember. "My name… is Tsukie."
A collective gasp sounded from his temporarily companions, InuYasha's the most audible as he sputtered and cursed under his breath. Sesshomaru smirked, but never broke his eyecontact with Ka- no, Tsukie.
"What are you, Tsukie?" he asked gently, imagining that he was peeling the skin off of an orange.
"I- I-" Tsukie gasped, wide blue eyes staring into his golden ones. If he didn't imagine things, he was sure that the strange movement from the corner of his eye was her hands flexing and twitching over and over, almost like the aftermaths of an addiction. Probably fighting his hold.
"What are you, Tsukie?" he asked again, more firmly this time. The orange had a strong skin, but even the most stubborn of fruits could be eaten.
"I- I am- you and them. I'm what you hear and see, yet something you cannot touch or taste." Tsukie rambled, her eyes growing impossibly larger as she let go of the fight. Her shoulders dropped and her head straightened so she could look straightly at him.
Haa Jinsoku stood by her, not knowing what to do, only that he had to see this through. Sesshomaru could read the expression, even as the demon lord was holding his eyecontact with Tsukie.
"I can only live if someone dies, but cannot live if someone else is alive. The moon which are my sun, and the branches which are my connection to this world must stand together when creating the bond between me and my host." Kagome – or rather, Tsukie – spoke tonelessly. The lord could see her fighting for control again, and to his own rage could feel his grip over her slip.
"What is your bond to this host?" he asked hurriedly, narrowing his eyes in hopes that it would somehow be stronger.
"That- That- That-"she stammered. Then the girl blinked rapidly and a frown appeared on her forehead, before a vicious smiled spread over her face. Sesshomaru gritted his teeth – he had lost his hold.
Tsukie turned the miko's clear blue eyes to him and pouted, wagging a finger at him. "Tsk, little Perfection. You naughty boy – you can't make a woman tell you all of her secrets, you know? Not even my sweet little Jin-Jin knows everything about me." She reached behind her and, finding the reptile demon there, slid her hand up to his chin where she gently patted him.
Haa Jinsoku looked, for all that had occurred the past minutes, lightly shaken but nonetheless smiled playfully down at her as he snaked an arm of his own around her waist. "I do like surprises," he murmured. Tsukie giggled.
Sesshomaru cringed slightly. Had it been any other creature – or even this miko, had she not been possessed – the sound would have been pleasant. Now though it made him want to cough loudly. And Sesshomaru never coughed in public, which held a lot of meaning to the situation.
"Ew!" a child voice screeched, voicing the gang's thoughts exactly. The fox kit ran forward and jumped up onto Inuyasha's shoulder, pointing a little clawed finger at the couple before them. "Why did you take my mama's body for? She hasn't done anything to you!"
Jinsoku and Tsukie stared at the little kit before they both erupted into laughter. "Little kitsune, this was not really my plan, per se. I have been dead for more than twenty years," Tsukie in Kagome's body tittered. "But then this handsome little reptile found a way to give me life again."
The reptile demon snickered as he buried his nose in Kagome's hair. "What wouldn't I do for my family?" His voice came out muffled.
"Wait just a goddamn minute," InuYasha growled form Sesshomaru's side. Glancing at his brother he noticed anger in the boy's face that clearly resembled that of the wolf's. "Family?"
Kagome/Tsukie glanced at the hanyou before giggling again and stroke Jinsoku's cheek. "Jin-Jin, you didn't tell? Now that's a naughty boy, not introducing me properly." She bereted him in a giddy tone. Sesshomaru suspected that the soul wasn't very mad at that though – if anything, the annoying creature seemed more gleeful and crazed than what she had appeared when she stood before him and the Wolf Prince. Thankfully, he wasn't the one being goala-hugged this time.
"My apologies," Jinsoku murmured, finally lifting his face out of Kagome's raven mess, causing both InuYasha and Kouga to relax their stances. "Nee-san, this is my lord's attacker and his accomplices. Rumor has it that they are searching for the Shikon no Tama."
"Nee-san?" The stoic western lord questioned, ignoring the looks of shock on the pack InuYasha traveled with.
"Onee-sama, for you," The woman remarked. "Still, it was my mate you tried to kill~"
"You are that pest's mate? But you are clearly dead since a long time ago," Sesshomaru murmured, raising a delicate brow. "How is it that you still consider yourself his mate, and why is it that you let your brother swarm around you in such a manner?"
"Now, aren't you becoming the talkative one?" Tsukie snaked out of Jinsoku's embrace, and took several steps towards the dog demon. Stopping a few feet from him she smiled toothily. "I should have revealed myself sooner!"
He stared back at her with a blank look. "Explain."
Tsukie got a pondering expression on her face as she brought up a hand to tap at her cheek. "Hm? Nah, I don't really feel like it. Memories are bad, you know? Making you live in the past and reveal old sorrows and heartbreaks. Though I do like a good breaking of a heart, don't you dear brother?" She glanced over her shoulder at Jinsoku who smiled sweetly back at her.
"Of course, nee-san. There's no such thing more enjoyable than ripping a still beating heart out of someone's chest – though if I do recall correctly you w-"
"Will you shut up!" Sesshomaru cringed at his brother's loud voice. Really, who had he inherited that from? "Leave Kagome alone or I swear to God I will kill you both!"
"… dear boy. Little stupid InuYasha – if you kill my brother I will come after you, and since I'm in this body you can't kill me, right?" For once the possessed miko didn't have a laugh imprinted on her features. Instead she sported dead-seriousness that could have equaled Sesshomaru's own. Only that, no one was equal to Sesshomaru. However it was, InuYasha's screeching ceased and settled for huffing instead. Sesshomaru felt slightly grateful for the ghost's quick success in silencing the fool.
"Please," a new voice spoke up. Not caring to turn to see the demon slayer take a careful step forward, Sesshomaru fingered the hilt of Tokijin. "Please, if you are in Kagome's body – are you also with Kagome?"
That made the lord cast a look at the brunette, watched her large worry-filled eyes and her fidgeting hands, before he once more faced the demon and possessed miko.
"The hell, Sango?" his half-brother cussed.
The woman ignored him and her tentative steps brought her closer to the front, until she stood by Sesshomaru's other side. "Please, if she's still there – can you let her talk to us, so we can know she's okay?"
Tsukie gazed at the slayer thoughtfully, with the same expression a cat could get when watching an interesting insect. "Brother," she then chirped," I believe this is going in our favor after all." Glancing at the slayer she smiled again – not her own smile this time, but a much kinder one that held warmth in it. "Just one moment – this is going to feel slightly ticklish to me."
The group watched the girl close her eyes, take one, two, three deep breaths – and then she fell into a heap on the ground, flailing and flapping like a fish on dry land.
-ooo-
It wasn't really the coziest thing Kagome had ever experienced before. The feeling of being dragged through a swamp and then through sharp rocks wasn't something she or anyone she knew referred to as 'cozy'. Then again, being stuck in a body that was being controlled by an icky spirit that loved male company, who used Kagome's body to seduce and irk those around her… yuck.
So she was grateful when she opened her eyes – her own eyes! – and saw the blue sky overhead. Not really the most impressive thing to see, but being forced to see such things that Tsukie made her see…
Coughing roughly she slowly sat up, wincing slightly as a headache made itself known. She was however grateful for that to – the simple possibility of feeling something again! And the air – it had never smelt fresher than that moment. Not even her first journey to the Feudal Era could compare! Then she winced and began rubbing at her pulsing temples. A short joy, this headache.
"Oh, man," she muttered and felt a slight joy at being able to use her own real voice again. Opening her eyes the young woman glanced around her at the other occupants, which were staring down at her; shock and confusion – and a flat look from Sesshomaru – met her blue orbs. She smiled carefully, fully expecting her face to crack like dry mud.
"Hi, guys," she spoke. Then all hell broke loose.
Shippo and Kirara were the first ones to throw themselves at her, crying and mewling after another. Then Sango fell to her knees by Kagome's side and hugged the girl close to herself, both crying as they hugged each other.
Kouga went next, practically breaking her hands as he held them close. "Woman, do you know how worried we was?" he growled. Then he embraced her himself, and took the opportunity to smell her. The clean scent of strawberries and forest twirled into his nose, which caused him to sigh in content. It's really her.
Suddenly the wolf was yanked away from the silently crying girl. InuYasha threw the wolf over his shoulder in an unceremoniously heap, without looking at the protesting demon. He only had eyes for the girl before him, who equally only had eyes for him. Sitting down in front of her he twitched his nose, took a deep breath and closed his eyes. Kagome found herself thinking of her dad, how he would look when tasting a wine he just had bought.
The hanyou opened his eyes, gold glittering strangely. "Hey," he muttered. As if that was her cue, she hurled herself at him, crying and sobbing loudly, not caring in the slightest that she was staining his hitoe or that she was being a baby. She didn't care that his half-brother was staring flatly, that she had Haa Jinsoku at her back or that she must seem utterly pathetic. Finally she could touch something again, she could finally feel warmth and the grass tickling her legs, smell InuYasha's puppy-scent and Shippo's sweet carrot aroma. And now she could also feel the strain her fingers were taking from gripping InuYasha's back too tightly. Regretfully she loosened her grip and leaned back, taking deep breaths in weak attempts of ceasing her sobbing, while at the same time wiping her cheeks, painfully aware of her hanyou gazing at her intently.
"W-what have I missed?" she joked weakly, trying and failing miserably at smiling.
"Oh, Kagome," Sango cried, brushed InuYasha aside and hugged the girl again.
"Kagome-sama, you had us quite worried there," Miroku said, flinching at the dirty look Sango shot him. "But I'm nonetheless glad that you are back with us and that you are unharmed."
The girl sniffled and hugged Sango more fiercely, almost desperate. "But I'm not unharmed." She looked up at the males, minus Sesshomaru's, questioning gazes. "She shares my soul; knows everything I've ever done, my emotions – everything! How can I not be hurt?" She buried her face in Sango's shoulder.
Miroku blanched as heated glares bore themselves into him. "I didn't mean any harm!" he defended himself, hands outstretched in surrender.
Ack! Hated this chapter, but hated chapters are chapters too o.o
And sorry for such a late update .
Are focusing solely on Stray Dog at the moment, and coming up with new fanfictions o.o
I will update this one too, and be done with it!
... just don't know when or how often.