Summary: One small thought, an action, and suddenly history has been changed. Consequence: The jewel was never destroyed and Kagome has to get used to her new position. AU. Blend of both manga and anime.
Authors note: Another chapter, and quite timely too if I might add. You readers are definitely flattering me with your reviews. Seriously, you're a small group but that just means I can remember you so much better! So, free hugs for you all!
A bit of warning for gore, (you know, morbid details) but it shouldn't be a big problem considering I rated this T. Please enjoy the chapter!
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Chapter 4
Next morning found Kagome sprinting down the shrine stairs in the vague hope that she wouldn't be late for school. It was maybe insulting how easy it had been for her to push the month away from home to a secluded corner of her mind and instead immerse herself in normality once again. Insulting, perhaps, if it hadn't been for when she walked slowly home from a school filled with assertions that she was alright and that she would meet them later and explain everything… only to come face to face with a ghost.
Kagome, understandably, screamed at the abruptness since she happened to pass through her and had expected an impact that didn't happen.
The ghost, in turn, had gasped in shock at the eye contact and screamed back.
The passersby gave her odd looks and hurried their steps past the screaming girl that stared at nothing.
Kagome noticed this and swallowed her other scream that threatened to burst forward and instead ducked inside a public woman's bathroom. Thankfully, it was empty and she could breathe out. Though, looking in the mirror and meeting a pair of brown eyes of another woman upset her all over again.
"Why are you here?!" Kagome whispered shrilly into the mirror. Her nerves were utterly shot thanks to the encounter, and her memories from the other side of the well were shoved into her face. Surreptitiously pinching her arm didn't reveal any clues either. The scream threatened to bubble forward again, and she visibly took a deep breath to calm herself. In a steadier tone, almost too casual, she said, "Sorry. I meant to ask; what are you?"
The woman standing behind her, a little to the side so she could watch the odd girl in the mirror, only shrugged. The ghost looked real, and Kagome would have passed her in the street without thinking twice. She was a tall slender woman standing more than a head longer with a short leather pink jacket, a daring skirt and pink stilettos. Kagome felt vaguely guilty thinking she looked like a more elegant version of an escort girl.
Flinging her obviously dyed blond hair back, she watched Kagome intensely. "I'm dead, or a ghost if you prefer," she said slowly, "but I rather imagine you already knew that."
She was surprised that her voice was low and slightly musical when she had been imagining something higher and pinched. Inwardly berating herself for assuming stereotypes, she risked a smile to the ghost. "Well, yes, I guess you can say that…" She trailed off, because she couldn't really say anything more about it without telling her the whole story. How could she explain something like a magical well? Even her family had found it hard to believe at first, and they knew about it.
"Yeah," the woman interrupted her thoughts with a loud harrumph, "you better!"
"Huh?"
Kagome blinked at the venom and certainty she heard in the tone. Gone was the musical voice that had impressed her.
The ghost pursed her lips and put her hands on her hips in a highly insulted way. "My death was all over the news the last month! You would have to have lived under a rock for you not to notice! Kids these days," she muttered loud enough for her to hear, shaking her head woefully, "so ungrateful."
By squinting her eyes, Kagome realized that she did, in fact, recognize her. She was one of her best friend's favorite singers, if she recalled correctly. She couldn't remember who, though, but that would explain why Ayumi had been so down when she had greeted her in school.
Kagome began to laugh all of a sudden by the absurdness of it all. Here she was, in a public bathroom, with a dead singer! It was like the beginning of a bad joke; a reincarnated priestess and a dead singer walked into a bar... The ghost in question narrowed her eyes, but was interrupted from actually saying anything when a man popped his head into the bathroom.
She abruptly stopped laughing, cringing in internal thought of how crazy she must have sounded for a man to actually check up on the noise in a woman's bathroom. Either that, or he was a pervert. But though she could classify his appearance as middle-aged, she couldn't really see any hidden motives in the obviously nervous person.
His eyes were watery brown, his hair plain and short, and his nose was upturned and a little red. He looked like the stereotype office man that had been sick a week but still turned up for his hours.
"Excuse me," Kagome said politely. "Can I help you?"
He startled, head snapping towards her from where he had been looking around at the room. "Y-you can see me?" He took a step forward, eyed wide in amazement.
"Sorry?" But even as she said it, she could feel something different from him. Suddenly his face was red and scarred; a chunk of his head missing as she could see bones and brains dribble under the flesh. His legs was turned directions she knew could not be possible to stand on, and one arm was dangling helplessly while blood dripped from his clothes and onto the floor where it disappeared soundlessly.
Kagome felt her stomach heave, and she turned her eyes slowly to the famous woman standing beside her. She, Kigiku Ana if she could remember correctly, was in a similar state as the man. Her once beautiful blond hair was now clumped with blood, her neck twisted unnaturally and her chest open where a shoulder had protruded.
Kigiku frowned in worry, and it did odd things to her burned face that she frankly didn't want to see. "Wha–"
Kagome stumbled back, hitting the sink with her back and shaking her head frantically as she covered her mouth.
Suddenly, as swiftly as it had appeared, the image flickered once, twice, and then they were normal again.
But even if it was gone, Kagome could not forget the sight. She shivered, looking at them in a new light. Ghosts would mean death, and death would also mean a cause of death. Did she just witness it?
The woman scowled. "Oi! This is no time to freak out!"
"It looked like you saw a ghost," the man added with a strange quirk of his lips. Kigiku shot a venomous look at him, and he ducked his head with an eep.
"No matter," she told the younger girl, her eyes lingering at the cowering man with narrowed eyes. "Are you going to help me or what?"
"Sorry?" She repeated. Kagome was feeling a bit out of her depth here. She had obviously been wrong in thinking that only the weird and blood and death and the supernatural happened on the other side of the well.
Apparently, her side wasn't that different after all.
With a will of effort she did not feel like she had, she simply shook it off. Took a deep breath, and shook it off.
Kagome lifted her head and smiled. "How can I be of service?"
The man blinked in puzzlement, shooting her a sidelong glance. Kigiku drew her attention though with pursed lips and a puff escaping her nose harshly. "Are you hard of hearing?"
'Are ye hard of hearing, Kagome-sama?'
She reeled back, staring at the woman that looked aggrieved. Her voice had suddenly overlapped with Kaede's, a memory that was suddenly pushed to the forefront of her mind. Kagome knew it hadn't been healthy to suppress the memories, but what else could she have done? Her family obviously didn't want to know more of the harsher details, and she didn't want to share anymore, so it was a balance that was comfortably straight.
But now this…?
Kagome brushed the memory back to the place it had come from and dipped her head in acceptance. "Sorry. I'm afraid you need to be more specific with what kind of help you need."
"Hah," she breathed out in annoyance. "Alright. I can find my way to the after-life myself, thank you very much, but I have a duty to do first. Don't you have a duty too?" She paused, eyeing her critically. "Sorry, how silly of me. A girl like you have probably never even seen the face of a devoted one, let alone has had the responsibility for one."
Kagome ducked her head in shame. It pierced her heart, a faint image of Batsuni and his comrades resurfacing. She does, or at least she did have a duty. They were probably still waiting for her on the other side of the well... If she could even go back that way.
How could she just have left them? But what else could she have done?
"Anyway," the woman continued on, shaking Kagome off her mood, "I need you to retrieve something for me."
She gave her a strange look at the request. "I can do that," Kagome nodded slowly, then paused when a thought occurred to her. "Can you even use items since you're, err..."
"A ghost," Kiguki Ana bluntly fills in, unimpressed.
She smiles sheepishly. "Yes. That."
"I'm not going to use them," she tells the girl exasperatedly, rolling her eyes. "I simply want my family heirlooms gone from my storage. They would probably go to my ex-husband, and there is no way I'm letting that happen."
Kagome curiously notes the distaste curling her lips. "How so?"
She wrinkled her nose. "What would he need with my kimono and, heavens forbid, the jewels?"
Oh. Well, an image of a man dressed up in woman's clothes pops up, and she hazards, "Maybe to do a kabuki play?"
A startled laugh escaped her mouth. "Are you serious? That's just... No." Her previously good mood evaporated like nothing as something dark flickered over her eyes. "Rotten no-good bastard. How dare he leave me like that? Because of him, I'm dead!"
Kagome was taken aback by the venom in her voice. She sneaked a glance towards the other ghost and saw him shrinking in against himself, nervously wringing his hands. "Really?" She asked her, shocked. She couldn't remember anything like that in the newspapers. "Did he really murder you?"
"Of course he did! He never picked me up! Said he had something more important to do and canceled. Because of him I got on that taxi and was killed!" She threw her arms out, and the man flinched.
"So… It was an accident?"
"Didn't you hear me? It was his fault I even got in that car in the first place!"
Glancing again at the man showed him to almost be cowering, an expression of regret and guilt. The ghost followed her line of sight. "Oh. Him. He was my driver," she introduced him flippantly with a dismissive wave.
Kagome frowned, looking directly at him. "You died at the same time? I can't remember hearing about that..." She trailed off, thoughtful.
Watery brown eyes opened again when he was directly addressed and he sighed, reluctantly standing straighter. "Technically, I died less than a minute before Kigiku-san," he corrected, smiling humorlessly. "And I'm a simple man. I lived a simple life, had a simple job, and a –" he briefly looked away, but he went on after swallowing hard, "a simple family. Nothing special about me, so I doubt they would have bothered writing about me."
An odd look flickered across the celebrity's eyes, but she reverted to her sour mood when she caught Kagome staring. "Well?" She demanded. "Are you going to help me or are you going to do twenty questions?"
The man smiled humorlessly again, shuffling his feet as he straightened out his wrinkled suit. Kagome's eyes lingered slightly on the man before she turned to Kigiku Ana. There was something inside her that clenched when she thought about the ghost and the vision she had seen overlapped over them. Didn't it hurt? If she took the woman's family heirlooms from the storage, would she find peace? Would the ugly bruising and snapped neck heal, and would she cross over to the other side?
It was worth a shot, she thought. She couldn't bear thinking about not helping a person if she could make a difference.
Decision made, Kagome nodded and smiled. "I will do my best." She bowed. "Please take care of me."
Kigiku seemed startled by the formality, but she gathered her bearing quickly, bowed and murmured the same thing, the words echoed from the man only a second later.
Kagome woke up in the middle of the night, scrambling to get out of her bed and almost diving towards her desk in a frantic search. It wasn't that a nightmare of blood, teeth ripping and eyes full of promises that had scared her. It wasn't even the echoes of ghosts and mutilated bodies that pulsed behind her eyelids. It was much more simpler, really.
Kagome woke to the strongest feeling of... yearning in the air. She didn't know exactly how to describe it. Whatever the feeling was, she knew it came from the jewel, and it was confirmed when her hand closed on its resting place inside a drawer as it fairly pulsed with want. She stared at the jewel in her hand. Kagome frowned when some discoloring on its surface was suddenly wiped away like it had never been there, and she figured it was a trick of the light when it began to shine more brightly again.
At the same time, Kagome noted that what she usually grasped at when she felt something wrong and otherworldly soothed down from its restless complaining and began to hum quietly instead. She rolled the jewel around in her fingers.
Not quite entirely used to the strange things happening in her life, Kagome continued to stare dubiously at the Shikon no Tama.
The back of her mind continued to hum lightly.
"... Is it that you don't want to be alone?" Kagome tentatively asked. When nothing answered, she felt silly for trying to speak to it. Grousing under her breath, she slipped the garish necklace over her neck anyway.
Just in case, you know, if it really did feel lonely.
She glanced at the clock on her way to the wardrobe and almost slipped headfirst into the wall in surprise. "It's three in the night!" Kagome gasped out. She could have sworn it would be around six, at least. Why the hell was she not tired?
Or, wait, maybe she was. She did feel more irritable than before, like an itch she couldn't scratch.
Kagome glared at her alarm clock like it was to be blamed and scowled. She allowed herself a moment of pity for her loss of sleep. Then she sighed, shook her head, and began to dress herself. It was no use going back to sleep when she was already up. School would begin in about four hours and she did not think sleep would come easy.
Her nightmares wasn't particularly scary, but they were a hindrance to sleep anyway.
She didn't know what exactly had compelled her, but she sneaked downstairs after putting on her school uniform and slipped on her shoes to go outside. The warm and fresh breeze hit her almost immediately as she closed the door.
Kagome took a deep breath and smiled.
She had missed this. The quiet murmur of a city below the shrine's stairs and the sense of peace that seemed to spread from her house. Kagome had countless of times declined to play with other children when she was little for the joy of running around in her own backyard. Her mind would conjure the most ridiculous scenarios that all came down to her running around in some spot or another.
That was actually how she had found the formerly stray Buyo; the cat had been mewing miserably under her house's foundation, and the only reason she found him was because she had been 'exploring a highly dangerous cave for the bird-people who wanted to try and nest underground'. She had run out immediately after finding the cat, whispering loudly to the first family member she could find, "Okaasan! Why didn't you tell me another family lived below?!"
Kagome had, at that age, been under the impression that she was never to raise her voice too much because else the neighbors would hear. This did not faze her much since she knew their neighbors did not live anywhere near them as isolated as they were on top of the hill. So the thought of someone actually taking offense at her loud voice ashamed her. Of course, being the calm woman she was, her mother only coaxed out the cat after hearing a description and began to feed it.
Newly dubbed Buyo had never left their family since.
She smiled fondly at the memory. Unconsciously, her feet had taken her to the mighty tree that she always considered to be the center of their shrine. It was actually placed far-off and near the corner of the yard, but its sheer size when in full bloom made it stretch much wider.
The Goshinboku always had been a centerpiece of her memories, she mused. It was ironic that it also happened to be that very same tree Inuyasha had been pinned on. While the place it stood on in relation to the well differed highly from the feudal era, she was certain that it was simply some sort of weird supernatural explanation for it. The tree branches formed a crown that was without a doubt recognizable as the same one on both eras.
She trailed her fingers across the withered old bark, pausing briefly on the rope snugly twirled around it. Kagome smiled fondly. Funny how the world worked, sometimes.
A rustle, like the noise of a fabric being dragged across gravel and the groaning of a branch not quite breaking. Kagome jumped, startled, and slid next to the tree while looking wildly around. She unconsciously clutched at the jewel. "S-stay back!" She warned feebly. "I will scream!"
Nothing answered.
"Good," she smartly tossed into the air after a long moment of breathing. "Stay back."
Nothing, again, answered.
She laughed lightly to herself and rubbed her arm uncomfortably. The night time was probably playing tricks on her. With a sigh, she leaned her head back onto the tree and closed her eyes. Maybe she was more tired than she had thought? And why was she outside anyway? Too much fresh air might be unhealthy for her...
Just as she was about to resign herself to sit inside and do nothing while waiting for school to start, she heard a noise again. A shift of clothes and a slight hum.
She froze, listening intently.
Again, that inescapable rustle of fabric. It was so low Kagome doubted she could have heard the sound if it hadn't been coming from so close. At this noise level, even a pin dropping might be louder.
Debating the merits of running inside while screaming at the top of her lungs was quickly aborted when she saw from her peripheral a foot come out. A leg and then the rest of the body followed suit as a man, Kagome at least assumed it was a man from his clothes, smoothly stepped out from behind the tree and walked sedately to a patch of flowers. He never noticed her pressing herself closer towards the tree as she watched him hum under his breath.
With his back turned to her, Kagome didn't see much of the man itself. His clothing looked like something worn at the imperial court hundreds of years ago. Outdated, incredibly so, but still very wealthy. The pale green melted and blurred the lines of where the man began and the shining night ended. It was eerie.
The man turned around, eyes still turned upwards to track something she couldn't see, and Kagome held her breath. He took a few more steps forward, long black hair draped around his face to contrast greatly with his pale skin. Another step forward and she could reach out and touch his arm.
He stopped, suddenly and quite abruptly, from his sedate walk. The man sighed and dropped his head from its upwards tilt. He glanced at her curiously, sending a jolt of shock through her, before walking past her like she did not matter.
Kagome didn't get a sense of being brushed away... more like the man found her unimportant at the moment.
In the back of her head, Kagome felt a tingle and a brush of something otherworldly. She couldn't recognize the feeling right away, but it reminded her of the Shikon no Tama. That, more than anything, should have alarmed her.
It didn't.
Without conscious thought, she took a step away from the Goshinboku to see him better. The man with an almost ephemeral beauty to him stopped once again. He seemed startled from what she could tell of his stiff shoulders. The man looked to the left, to the right and even to the sky and the ground before he thought to look behind him. His eyes swiped the place and once again dismissed Kagome without even lingering on her.
Somehow, she felt offended when he turned back to walk sedately around the tree.
Maybe it was something about this man, or that she was beginning to get a track-record of strange things happening to her, but she did not really care. Any thoughts of screaming at the top of her lungs had been buried deeply inside her mind at this point.
"Can I help you?" She asked sweetly.
The man froze once again.
This time, he turned around at the first try and actually looked at her. Kagome could almost taste the surprise from him like it was a tangible thing. Or maybe it was that the surprise was all her. "You can see me?" He asked slowly.
That threw her for a loop. "...Yes?" She thought about when Kigiku and the driver had asked her that same question. Maybe he was a ghost too? That would explain the formal speech and the tingling in her head. "Why wouldn't I?"
He tilted his head, considering this. "You have not seen me before."
It was an odd statement. "I suppose I haven't," she agreed, squinting at him. Nope, no recognition. "Are you always here?"
His lips quirked slightly. "Yes," he replied.
So... A ghost from many years past had apparently always been right under her nose. That crossed off that she had always had the ability to see ghosts, then. Huh. "What is your name?" She asked politely. "My name is Higurashi Kagome."
His eyes darkened and looked almost sympathetic as he looked at her. "That's a very heavy name. A lot of words for a girl so young."
Kagome blinked, stunned. Her name was normal, thank you.
The man stared at her for a beat longer. Then, to Kagome's surprise, he swept gracefully into a low bow and held it for a second or two. When he met her eyes once again, he was smiling lightly. "My name," he began formally, "is Ki."
"... Ki?"
"Ki," he affirmed.
She tasted the short name dubiously in her mouth but accepted it as a strange nickname. "Ki-san, then. Any reason for you being out this early?"
It was a weak attempt at a conversation starter, and even Kagome knew it.
Ki only smiled that little half smile of his. "I'm always here. Why are you here?" He countered.
Kagome bit her lip, frowning. "I... don't know," she admitted. "Couldn't sleep. I'm feeling a bit restless, and it feels like I have to..."
A helpless shrug.
He hummed lightly, neither an agreement nor a disagreement, just showing that he was listening.
"What do you think I should do?" She blurted out. When he tipped his head to the side in surprise, she blushed. "I– I mean, you don't have to answer if you don't want to."
"You say you feel you have to do something?" He prompted after a moment.
Kagome smiled at his strange way of offering help, but felt relieved anyway. "I just left them there," she confessed lowly, glancing guiltily at the well-house. "I left without saying good bye and I'm kind of regretting it now. What if they hate me for it? What if Kaede-obaasama couldn't pass on my message and they all think I'm dead? What if they are all dead?" She voiced her inner fear out loud. Maybe the ghosts had been an omen?
She glanced at Ki to see his response. He looked amused, from what she could see of his dark eyes, and a little sad. "Why don't you simply go visit them again?"
Kagome nibbled at her lip, frowning in thought. "What if I can't?" She worried.
"What if you can," he countered.
She shot a half-frustrated look at him.
He dipped his head and asked her earnestly, "Wouldn't it be better to remedy those tumultuous feelings if you could, rather than to let them fester?"
It took a few moments for her brain to process his words and then translate them into something she could understand. When she did, she blew out a breath and slumped. "I should try to visit them, shouldn't I?"
Ki inclined his head and watched her carefully under hooded eyes. He didn't offer anymore words.
She glanced at her house where she knew her family was still sleeping, and then the sky that ensured her she still had at least three hours until school. Kagome teetered on the edge of both options, wary of actually jumping into either one. But then she squared her shoulders and looked up with a determined gaze. No one would be able to say Kagome wasn't headstrong when she wanted to be. "Alright,"she said, steel in her tone. "I will try, and if it doesn't work," she shrugged, "at least I tried."
Ki nodded amicably in agreement.
She took the first few steps strongly without wavering, but something made her hesitate as she glanced behind her. "Do you think I will be welcomed back?" She asked him timidly, a stark contrast from her former tone.
He actually began to chuckle. "I'm sure you will."
The hesitance was wiped away as Kagome smiled in relief and gratitude. "Thank you, I needed to hear that." She waved to him and then turned back. With renewed vigor she walked over to the enclosed house holding the well and carefully propped open the door. It groaned in protest.
She made a mental note to oil the hinges while she let her eyes adjust to the darkness. With unsure stepping on the stairwell, Kagome approached the well and glanced down. It was so dark she couldn't see the bottom. Thoughts of breaking her neck or being grabbed by a youkai was filtered out of her brain before she could chicken out.
A slight rustling noise made her look back to see Ki standing in the door opening. It was hard to see, but she thought he was smiling at her. "Be careful jumping down the well."
"Yeah," she glanced at the dark bottom again, "I will."
With a heave and not letting herself think too deeply about it, Kagome was falling into the void, time brushing against her skin and gentling her fall through five hundred years. It was only when her feet touched the ground that Kagome realized she never once mentioned anything about jumping down a well to Ki.
A/N Aaaand she's back! Kagome will now have to face her first enemy (technically the fourth if you're counting the Centipede, Inuyasha himself, the crow and the thugs). It's going to be interesting, so look forward to it!
In anyway, this chapter brought new characters that, I promise, does matter and I'm not throwing them in there so I can laugh at your attempt to remember their names. They will be back in due time. (Get it? Since Kagome is now separated by five hundred years from them so time is relative and – Yeah. I'm going to shut up now.)
But seriously, you're all wonderful! Your reviews flatter me enormously. Can you see me preening? The response so far is positive, so I thank you for that. I can't really tell from the silent readers since you're, you know, silent, but I think everyone reading these words are marvelous! See you at the next update!