A.N. I do not own Inuyasha or Naruto.
Sweat broke out on the dark haired beauty's forehead as pink reiki flowed through her hands and into the prone shinobi on the table. It was taking a great deal of effort to purify the poison from his system. When it was finally done, she sighed in relief. "He will be alright. Just needs rest and rehabilitation."
Temari frowned at the strained look of her student. "Are you alright?" She had seen her perform many healings that were far more complicated than simple poisoning. Yet she seemed so tired, as if she had used too much of her strange chakra.
"I'm fine. Poisons are difficult to purify without purifying the subject." Eying the male's Konoha hitae-ate, she knew it would be quite unwelcome of her to take such an action.
"Hyuuga is human." The blond female blinked, not understanding.
"He is," Kagome readily agreed as they walked away, somewhere others would not hear. "His eyes though... They are not." When the foreign nin had been brought in for an emergency poison extraction, she'd known it would be difficult. His eyes... They were part of him, yet not.
Frowning, the kunoichi shook her head. "Have you ever come across something like that before?" The miko had been a bit standoffish even with her about her past, but she hoped that if the information was pertinent, she would share.
"Not like that... I've seen the reverse, once, but it wasn't natural. A taiyoukai I knew, he used a human arm in order to use a blade that would have rejected him otherwise. The eyes aren't really his though-I could remove them and they would work for someone else, with training they would have full use. But they're born with it..." She shook her head, trying to clear her mind of thoughts of the white haired male from her past. "Chances are, somewhere far back in his bloodline, someone made a deal with a youkai for that specific trait. Getting a youkai's abilities without mingling and becoming hanyou does sound like something many would go for." She was mainly thinking aloud now.
Dark green eyes remained glued to the miko, a tad worried. What she was saying could get her in a lot of trouble. "Be careful who you say that to. Clans can be very guarded about such things." Though it was an intriguing thought.
Realizing she may have said too much, she quickly smiled and nodded. "I'll keep that in mind."
x~x~x
"Gaara..." The blond male poked the Kazekage. They were having an afternoon away from the miko as she went about her duties. She said they should be together right now, their strong auras keeping each other in check. But he was bored. Really bored. And he was still very bothered by something.
"What is it, Naruto?" the redhead intoned, a tinge of annoyance coloring his typically emotionless voice. He didn't mind the Konoha-nin and in fact considered him to be one of the few he could classify as a friend. Sometimes, he could be quite childish though, and that caused him great irritation.
Grinning widely, he scratched the back of his head. "Well..." He knew that the other male was already irritated, so he decided to just get on with it. "I really like Kag-chan."
The ridge, where his eyebrow would be if he had them, twitched. "And?" There was a slight edge to his voice. He was well aware of the other newly blossoming youkai's interest in the miko. His still unreconciled other personality was snarling with possessiveness, but he managed to curv the desire to stick a kunai through him. That would upset Kagome and Naruto was his friend.
"She keeps telling me I don't really like her, that Kyuubi and I becoming one is why I'm interested." He gave him a sheepish look, the kitsune nature having the opposite effect on him. Yes, there was a want to possess, to claim, but there was also a much looser interpretation on what being in a relationship meant. His very human side was appalled at the ideas that the non-human entity he was merging with came up with. But... He would be perfectly comfortable sharing her with his friend, and though he once found it disturbing, enjoying Gaara as well. "So, I was thinking we could team up to make her like us."
That threw the quieter shinobi through a loop. Was the fair haired man honestly proposing what he thought? "Make her like 'us'?"
"Well, yeah. She's not the kind of girl who likes guys fighting over her. And we both like her and I'm not going to back down, and I know you won't." He shrugged as if he wasn't discussing the possibility of sharing a lover with the other male.
"So, if we were to be successful at making her like us, we would what, share her? How would that work, Naruto? I am Kazekage and you have goals to be Hokage." What he was suggesting seemed impossible if they both were to go about their lives and try and complete their goals.
"Yeah, you're Kazekage and I have a long way to go before I'm Hokage." The blond man grinned and stretched out. "Right now, we're in the same village, and we both need her, so there's no problem there. Plus from what she said, we're going to love a long time to live. Even if we can't all be together all the time, we'll both have to stop being Kages at some point just to keep up appearances and then we can run away together!"
Blinking, the redhead was surprised that Naruto had thought this out so thoroughly. "What about her? Kagome is human."
"Which is why we have to make her like us so we can mate with her and tie her life to ours," the kitsune told him without missing a beat. He gave his trademark grin. "And there's no one I'd rather share her with more than you."
x~x~x
"You want me to give you what?" the puppeteer asked, incredulity shining through his dramatically painted face. He had heard some odd requests in his days as personal assistant to the Kazekage, but this one was absolutely ridiculous.
"I want to look at the records you have on Shinobi with kekkai genkai and summoner's contracts." The miko wanted to look at them all, as far back as possible and see if there was a correlation as well as figure out how the lives of shinobi with demonic traits compared to those of human ones. She could also ask Naruto and Gaara a bit, but their cases were unique and not isolated to specific traits the way these different types of bloodline limits seemed to be.
"And why on Earth would I ever give you access to such private records?" Frowning, he wondered vaguely if her relationship with his brother was making her think she was Kazekage herself. "Not even the most loyal citizens of Suna have access to that much intelligence. Underlying meaning? Why would I give an outsider that much information?
Blue eyes narrowed in slight irritation. "I'm not going to go selling secrets, okay? I just thought it might give me better insight into the workings of this world and make me a better fighter." She didn't say nin because they both knew Gaara would never want her to do anything so dangerous given her value to his recovery.
Disbelief shined in his eyes. "You are a piece of work..." Shaking his head, he fished out a key. Fact was, Gaara would allow it even though he felt it was a dumb idea. "Archives are back there. I'm not helping and you're not allowed to bring anyone else in there." That would reduce how much she could read given that there were many scrolls sealed with chakra that he doubted she had picked up the expertise to break.
"Thank you, Kankuro-san." She bowed and took the key before going to hunt through the many records.
x~x~x
"Breathe deeply. In through your nose and out through your mouth." Sitting to the side, she was walking the two males through the finer points of controlling youki. Or demonic chakra as they preferred to call it. They had basic control down but because it had never been treated as truly part of them, the finer nuances of manipulation alluded them.
Gaara found the control more easily, having lived with the idea of the Shukaku longer and having less power to control as there was still slow recovering to be done from the Akatsuki incident. The miko had healed him mostly, but left him with some work to do so that the merge could be more subtle.
Naruto, however, had sweat beading on his forehead. To coax the red chakra to do as he wanted was more difficult. Kagome said he couldn't let the remains of the Kyuubi persona control it, but use his own chakra channels and will to bend it.
Watching the two carefully, the miko stood and walked towards them. Flaring her aura and wrapping it around them, she smiled when the kitsune youki became more manageable to him, an automatic response given the threat.
Both males were not thinking along those lines though. The pure feeling chakra was enticing, drawing their instincts to the surface. A want to take, to claim, to mate her...
"You've both done well. Now take a break." She smiled a little at them and pulled back her pure reiki. "I've got dinner plans with Temari-chan." With that, she gave a wave and left them to their own devices.
Calming as she left, the Kazekage frowned. "Naruto..." His seafoam eyes actually held a tinge of discomfort. "What if she's right?"
"Right? About what?" Rolling his shoulders as the instincts settled, the Konoha-nin looked confused by his words. She'd just told them to take a break.
"We both reacted to her chakra. Drawn to it by our instincts. It could be possible what she spoke of was true." Unsettled by the revelation, the desert dweller found himself longing for this process to end so that he would be in control again.
"If you feel that way, I'll keep her for myself," he sniffed, face scrunched. "Our instincts are part of us, so yeah, Kag-chan being powerful makes us react. But I like her for more than those reactions. She's sweet and helpful, not just with us, but with other people. She spends time at the hospital, learning and healing. She's also really smart-not like Sakura-chan, more like Shizune-neechan... And I like her. My instincts feeling the same is just a bonus."
x~x~x
"You shine with YOUTH and I thank you for your assistance in helping my teammate!" The green clad male bowed formally to her as the brunette tugged him back.
"Sorry about him-We arrived to get Neji and he heard and had to track you down," the pretty Konoha kunoichi apologized as she looked at the civilian in surprise. She glanced at the blond woman in silent question.
Temari simply slung an arm around her protege. "Kagome-chan is awesome like that. But we have dinner plans, so we'll catch up later." She was feeling protective of the miko, not sure if she would ask questions she shouldn't.
"Thank you, er, Lee-san." The blue eyed beauty allowed herself to be towed away. "Are all Konoha-nin that exuberant?" she asked, thinking on Naruto as well as the thick-eyebrowed male she just met.
Snickering, she ushered her into the little cafe she'd chosen for them. "Just the forward ones." When they were seated, she looked across the table at her, curious. "Kagome, can I ask you something?"
Surprised at the sudden change, she met her gaze. "Sure, Temari-chan."
"The guy you were talking about, the 'taiyoukai'... You seemed pretty sad when you talked about him." Sipping her drink, she watched her, sensing the same sort of change.
Sapphire orbs stared at her own tea thoughtfully. She was still so uncertain about this world, but... "I was in love with two men. One was this very brash, out of control guy; really more a boy. He only really wanted me around for his goals though. The taiyoukai was his brother, and when he died, he took the position of leader for my group. We became very close and I thought we were going to be together. In fact, he seemed adamant that I was to stay with him. Turned out he was only attracted to me for the potential young I could produce." When the waitress came, she quickly pasted on a smile.