InuYasha Fan Fiction / Crossover Fan Fiction / Naruto Fan Fiction ❯ Mors Mortis Miko ❯ Lonely ( Chapter 7 )

[ X - Adult: No readers under 18. Contains Graphic Adult Themes/Extreme violence. ]

She knew she shouldn’t be enjoying this, but…She couldn’t help but smile.
No, she wasn’t full out laughing anymore, no, all she could manage was a smile.

“You can’t run forever!” The demons yelled behind her, making her smirk.

What pathetic excuse for demons. On arrival to this strange land, her suspicion of the jewel’s wakefulness was confirmed after hordes of crazed demons had come searching for the source of the strange powers. Demons, though they were, they were unable to comprehend that the power was coming from the jewel and not her, so this is why she constantly found herself on the run now.

Yet she didn’t mind the non-stop running, at least this way she didn’t have time to let her sanity reminisce on her current state of loneliness, or her tragic life, or her mistakes, or past events, basically everything. So she figured not being able to think was worth running for three days straight without rest.
She hadn’t been running from the start. No, she’d been in the new world long enough to realize a few things. Demons, it seemed, used to coincide happily with the humans, then they just went nuts. Terrorizing the countryside and townspeople. Every now and then she’d meet demons who weren’t insane, but they were few and far in between.

There could have been more sane demons, but she was too busy to notice. Sango had run here after she had left Kagome with Alucard, whom Kagome felt a longing for every now and then. She spent most of her time, when not being chased by demon hordes, trying to catch and kill Sango, who, unlike Miroku, spent her time terrorizing people and avoiding Kagome.

Kagome couldn’t get a good reading on her. Sango never called out, she’d always move whenever Kagome came close to tracking her, and Sango’s exploits went mostly unknown until Kagome came across a village that heard from another village, that a neighboring village knew of a village that had a family that had been slaughtered with only one girl surviving. And this only came if the surviving girl was found from where Sango had buried her alive.
Sango was bitter.

Kagome’s boot caught a branch.

“Oh this isn’t good.” she managed to moan as she went tumbling head over heels and head into rock.

~___~

Trees.

Road.

Trees and road.

They never ended. They just kept going on and on. There seemed to be no end in sight, and the Sanzo-Party were dieing.

Not from lack of food. No the forest provided plenty of vegetation and wildlife for them to consume. No, they were not dieing from starvation. They weren’t dieing from dehydration either. They had been stocked up on plenty of water when they had set off into the forest and they had just restocked what they had consumed when they had passed a secluded lake a few miles back. No, they were not dieing from dehydration. Nor were they sick, wounded, or tripping on psychedelic mushrooms. Though they would have welcomed the change.

The Sanzo-Party were, in fact, dieing from boredom. Seven days they had been traveling on the road through the forest, and they had yet to reach the end. They were bored out of their mind.

They drove with a zombi-fied, numbness to their surroundings. Staring without seeing, sprawled listlessly in their seats, not speaking and only mumbling or groaning if the need came. And the need rarely came now.

Routine zombie doings, dulled the senses, it made you slow to react and unaware of the happenings around you until it was too late. Which is why when the group of demons suddenly ran into the road, Hakkai hit them, or maybe he did it just for something to do.

“What the hell was that?” Gojyo yelled, becoming alert for the first time in days.

“Vehicular homicide.” Sanzo answered flatly, straightening himself in his seat, while Hakkai smiled sheepishly.

Goku, in the meanwhile, after rousing himself from his stupor, was currently trying to figure out just what the demons were up to. The ones that got hit were recuperating, but the others, the others had barely acknowledged them. They were the Sanzo-Party for crying aloud, yet, the demons were busy fussing with some lumpy bag they had dropped.

“Is everyone alright?” Hakkai asked turning around to examine them himself.

“Better than that demon you hit.” Gojyo replied shortly before turning his attention to the silent Goku. “Hey, wake up, time for some exercise.”
Goku barely spared the kappa a second glance as all his attention was now on the bag too. He wanted it, and didn’t know why. “Hey what’s wrong with you? Didn’t you hear…?”

“Hey!” Goku suddenly yelled shrugging off the hold Gojyo had gotten on him.

“What?” Gojyo yelled back defensively, “I was just…” but his words fell onto deaf ears as Goku swiftly leaped from the jeep and ran towards the unsuspecting demons.

“Hey let go!” one of the demons yelled frantically as Goku grabbed the bag and tried to yank it from their grasp.

“No, you let go! I want this bag!”

“But it’s ours!” the demons’ yelled in protest as they yanked the bag closer to them.

“Let me just have a peek then!” Goku yelled pulling harder.

“Uh…is he mugging them?” Gojyo wondered aloud as they stared at the bizarre tug-of-war.

“It would seem like it.” Hakkai.

“Give it up!” Goku growled threatingly.

“Take a hike!” the demons yelled back.

The tug-o-war continued back and forth, neither gaining nor losing their grips. Goku, for unknown reasons, had suddenly been gripped by a desire to have the bag, while the demons, on the other hand, had every right to fight back. It was their damn bag. The two sides fought diligently for control of the bag, the bag just hung neutrally between them, and it wasn’t until Gojyo joined the mêlée that the bag began showing signs of indecision.

“Lay off, and just give them the bag.” Gojyo reasoned as he came over to snatch the bags from both their grasp, but as he laid hands on it and tugged…the bag ripped.

“Our food!” the demons wailed as a mound of rolls, cheese, and meat formed on the ground.

“You bastard, why?” One of the demons yelled aloud, shaking a fist to the heavens and crying like the entire world was doomed.

“Food?” Gojyo said in disgust, looking from the demons scrambling at their meal, to a misty-eyed Goku. “What’d you, smell it through the burlap?”

Instead of answering, Goku ducked his head in embarrassment while smiling sheepishly at no one.

“You disgust me.” Gojyo managed to spurt out before he was tackled from behind.

Goku, who had gone into a fighting stance when Gojyo went down, felt his breath catch in his throat. He had thought it was a demon that attacked, but after seeing the obvious feminine body straddling Gojyo’s back he had eased up a bit, but when the lady picked herself up and looked up at him, a feeling had run through his body that had never crossed his thought of mind. So alien the feeling, he couldn’t even identify it.

“Hey, get the hell off me!” Gojyo growled as he began to sit up and sent the girl toppling onto the ground where Goku was quick to assist.

“Hey are you alright?” Goku asked concern deep in his voice.

“Yeah, I’m fine I just…” Gojyo, upon discovering that Goku wasn’t talking to him, stopped talking and turned an irritated eye to see who Goku was more concerned about.

What he saw was Goku fussing over a silent woman with thick, black hair pulled back into a braid. She stood only a few inches taller that Goku and wore khaki shorts, with a button-up white sleeveless shirt tucked into them and brown boots on her feet. She looking like a wanna-be hiker.

Gojyo’s assessment of the woman ended their, for behind him, a horde of demons burst from where the woman had come and surrounded them.

“Give us the girl and no one gets hurt.” One of the demons, the leader, they guessed, threatened in a cocky and grisly manner.

Goku pushed the woman behind him and whirled his staff around expertly, partly to intimidate the demons and partly to show-off; a grin spread out onto his face.

Gojyo, with his shakujo placed leisurely across his shoulders, stood up straighter, cocked his head to the side and looked at the demons; a crooked smile erupted onto his face.

“Oh, someone’s going to get hurt alright.” Gojyo said, seeing an end to the boredom.

“But it’s not going to be us.” Goku added, giddy glee causing him to fidget.

With confused looks on their faces, the demons glanced at each other in a moment of hesitation before attacking.

‘What are they, bored?’

Kagome wondered as she let herself be protected by the strange men. Well, demons, well a demon, a hanyou, a human, and…something old. The something old was the one protecting her, and he reeked of an otherness. He slightly resembled Death in that sense.

The demon and the human, she saw, sat unconcerned in a jeep, watching the other two fight. She caught a whiff of the human‘s soul, and she smiled curiously at the odd mixture of smoke, annoyance, and holy powers.

She was suddenly jerked from her observations as the old smelling one snaked a hand around her waist and tossed her. Well, that was what she would call the sudden increase in elevation and the disorienting turnabout with vertigo followed by an abrupt decrease in altitude. She landed on her feet with her heart thumping madly in her chest and her mind trying to overflow and escape from her grasp.

That had been just a bit too much fun.

“Hey, are you alright?” The old one asked worriedly after dispatching the demon that had been sneaking up behind her, answering the question as to why he had tossed her.

Still recovering from her shock, Kagome just stared at him as she tried to catch her breath.

“Uh, yeah, sorry about that, but he was about to get you and I couldn’t think of any other way.” He answered with a nervous laugh, looking sheepish.
Still trying to calm her heart, Kagome just stared, and in doing so, caught the eye of the demon about to clobber the old smelling young man in front of her.

“Hey…I didn’t hurt you did I?” he asked hurriedly, concern written all over his face. She would have laughed at his distress, but she was too focused on returning the favor.

“I’m sorry,” he apologized, reaching a hand out to grasp her shoulder in a reassuring manner, but before he could touch her, Kagome had snatched it and yanked him toward her.

To say he was surprised would have been an understatement, but when the woman used his momentum to hurl herself pass him and land a knockout kick into the face of a lurking demon, he was simply shocked.

“Hey!” he called out as he hit the ground.

The woman heard him and turned to look down at him. However, when their eyes met, he found he couldn’t say anything. He just stared at her, while she basically did the same, but after a second she quirked her head and gave him a curious smile. He actually guffawed as a goofy smile sprang onto his face.

The woman’s smile widened at this before she turned-tail and ran.

“No wait!” he yelled springing his feet, intent on chasing after the woman, but found himself back on the ground as he was trampled by demons on their way after the woman.

They didn’t get far before Gojyo was on them.

“Where the hell were you?” Gojyo yelled, “I’m busting my ass and you’re taking a nap?”

“You seem to be doing just fine to me.” Goku muttered as he finally joined the fray, ready to be rid of the scum so that he could go after the woman.

“Let’s get the hell out…” the demon was cutoff mid-sentence as the butt of Goku’s staff collided with his head. Thus, the fight was over, all the demons were dead, unconscious, or fled for their lives.

“Hey, where do you think you’re going?” Gojyo demanded catching Goku by the arm and holding him back.

“I have to go find that girl, the demons were after her.” Goku’s yelled through his struggling. But for all his work, he didn’t move an inch while within Gojyo’s grasp.

“That girl?” Gojyo asked, using his magnificent skills to light a cigarette while still keeping the struggling Goku in restraints. “She’s probably a native in some village close by and came a little too deep into the woods. She’s most likely more than halfway home by now.”

“But the demons.” Goku persisted although his struggles began to ease.

“We scared them off. Let her go.”

Goku became slack in his grasp. “You sure?” he asked, looking longingly at where the girl had disappeared.

“Yeah!” Gojyo snapped, dropping his companion to the ground. “Let her go! What’d you, smell food on her too?”

“She smelled like ramen.” Goku moaned loudly.

“Stop screwing around!” Sanzo yelled from the jeep, finally annoyed to the point of blessing them with the sound of his voice.

~____~

Time seemed to slip by in the jeep as road after endless road streamed alongside tree after endless tree. Three more days of the same old thing and the group was back into coma-like trances.

The first day had been fine, they talked about their fight with the demons and Hakkai’s and Sanzo’s lack of participation. They talked about Goku’s freaking out over the smell of food. But the talking became monotonous and soon dwindled into grunts and finally silence.

Zombi-fied Sanzo-party part two.

Boredom does strange things to people, you learn things about people you never knew, and so if a woman suddenly drops out of the sky to land on the hood of a jeep, no one could be blamed for letting out a high pitched, girly scream and pissing Sanzo off.

“Who the hell was that?” Sanzo growled angrily, his ears still ringing, as he turned to glare into the backseat.

“Hey…. “Goku groaned as he came out of his stupor. “….change of scenery.” Looking around, Goku saw that they now had left the woods behind to travel in the valley of two rocky hills. But on further inspection saw that the forest laid just on the other side of the hill and just behind them. “Nice.”

“What’d you hit this time, Hakkai?” Gojyo unconcernedly asked as he stretched.

“I didn’t hit anything.” Hakkai responded in defense. “But there does seem to be a dead girl on the hood.”

Said dead girl, took that moment to regain consciousness and groan loudly in pain as she seemed to try to curl up into herself. The awkward silence that followed was broken by Goku’s yell of outrage.

“You said you were sure!” Goku yelled as he proceeded in attempting to end Gojyo’s life.

“Get off!” Gojyo hollered in return, fighting the angry monkey off.

Sanzo took a deep breath and prayed for patience. “Go…check…the girl….”

Hakkai tried to hide the smile that threatened to erupt onto his face. He simply nodded as he got out the car, ignoring the sudden yells of pain that issued from the backseat as Sanzo issued his wrath. His attention was mainly on the girl writhing in pain on the hood of the jeep.

“Are you alright, Miss?”

She opened her eyes, eye, at the sound of his voice. “I’ll be alright in a moment,” the lady answered, cringing as she spoke. “You look nice. Please don’t be a psycho.”

Hakkai smiled down at her. “Do not worry, but, I can not say the same for my companions.” This earned him a pained laughed from the injured woman as he gently hoisted her off the hood and carried her off to the side of the road, his hand splayed across her back giving off healing ki.

“Ooh, that’s nice.” she murmured into the crook of his neck as she held onto him.

“How ever did you manage that little feat of yours?” he asked as he sat her down and releasing his hold as Goku was suddenly there and propping her up himself.

“Lots of practice.” she said with a weak smile as she arched her back experimentally, and then Gojyo was suddenly there. “Oh, and you have to be dropped from a great height by a big bird.”

“A big bird?” Goku asked skeptically as he helped the woman to her feet.

“Well, bird demon, I guess. Demon with feathers and big talons, smells like guano. Him in-fact.”

“What?”

“That demon!” the woman yelled, pointing up into the sky, before diving to the ground, and effectively bringing the boys down with her just as a pair of sharp talons passed over their heads.

“What the hell was that?” Gojyo yelled.

“I call him Jim,” the woman answered as she got to her feet and dusted herself off. “But you don’t have to worry about Jim, I think he likes me, but it’s the rest of the flock you have to watch for.”

“The rest of the flock?”

“Yeah, birds fly in groups called….” but what they were called never left her mouth for the next moment they found her rising rapidly into the air.

“You see, flock!” the woman yelled down to the group as she tried to dislodge the demons claws from her forearms.

“Yeah, yeah.” Gojyo muttered to himself as he launched himself at the two and caught the woman around the legs, his added weight making the demon fly lower.

“Is that all you had planned?” the woman asked in a calm voice, despite the situation.

“Beggars can’t be choosers.” Gojyo retorted, his feet dragging the ground with his effort to pull the woman down.

“Let go, my pants are falling!”

“I think you can handle the embarrassment, for the price of your life.”

“Well when you put it like that…”

A gunshot suddenly tore through the air, the hold on Kagome’s arm was finally elated, and she fell to earth. Unfortunately, Gojyo hadn’t released his hold and became her landing mat.

“Hey...I recognize that waistline! You’re that guy I fell on a few days ago.”

“Are you serious?”

“What are you doing?” Goku yelled as he made it to their side, throwing a hand around Kagome’s waist and lifting her up while throwing Gojyo a dirty look.
“Who shot me down?” Kagome asked, oblivious to the arm around her waist.

“Hey, you two, leave that damn woman alone and get to work!” Sanzo barked making his presence known as he and Hakkai crowded around them, firing down any and all bird demons that came too close.

“Hey, I appreciate your help, but I don’t think that's going to be much help against the dirt divers.”

“Dirt divers?” Sanzo muttered, turning to glance at her.

“The other demons that were chasing me.”

“Who are the dirt divers?” Goku asked, swatting at the airborne demons.

“Them.” she answered simply, pointing off to the side.

Sparing a glance, the Sanzo-party saw the ground boiling as something rolled underneath its surface toward them.

“They’re not really under the ground, they are the ground. They melt into rock too. I just thought I’ll let you know that.”

“Why are they all after you?” Sanzo asked, in his growling voice.

“Because I’m pretty and they’re jealous.”

“Right.” Sanzo quipped, while simultaneously grabbing her by the arm and throwing her out of harms way as one of the bird demons made a lunge for her. But while firing at the demon, another one swooped her up from behind. This time there was no one grab hold of her legs.

“This is getting the old!” Kagome yelled as she threw her legs up and repeatedly kicked the demon in the face, until she was dropped once more. This time, there was no hanyou for her to fall on, but the ground did explode and she fell into the arms of the five demons that had collected there. For a moment, although they were on the same team, the demons fought over her, buying time until rescue came in the form of an old smelling young man with a bow staff.
Goku had gone into berserk mode. He maneuvered his staff faster and deadlier than ever. Each impact caused the dirt demons to implode, and he didn’t stop until it was no one left but he and Kagome.

Breathing heavily, Goku planted his staff onto the ground and leaned on it for support as he grinned at her. “So, what do you think?”

“You did good, but you might want to move.”

“Huh?”

The ground became liquid, and before Goku could issue another word, his staff sunk into the ground, making him lose his balance and fall. And before he could register what had happened, a pair of hands oozed from the ground and pulled him under.

“No, you don’t.” Kagome told no one in particular, reaching for the lost boy before the ground solidified again.

“It’s horrible in there!” Goku cried out as he was hauled back into freedom, staff securely in hand, and filth covering every inch of his body.

“I know, huh?” Kagome laughed. “And some people take mud baths for comfort.”

“You can’t imagine the horror I’ve…HEY!” In the middle of his rant, to his utmost horror, the woman suddenly disappeared. “NO!” he yelled, catching sight of her hands, as she was drug underground.

“Got you!” planting his feet, Goku grabbed what remained of her hands and pulled.

But the demon on the other end pulled harder and Goku found himself half buried again. “Hang on!” he called, though he seemed to be talking more to himself than the woman lost underground. Still feeling her hands in his grasp, he tightened his hold, and though the position he put himself in was awkward, it gave him the right amount of leverage he needed. With his feet planted firmly on either side of his head, his muscles bulging, and dirt in his mouth, Goku pulled again. Nothing happened at first, except that his muscles began to tremble from the effort, but after a moment’s hesitation, Goku moved. The movement was subtle, barely even an inch, but it did happen.

“Come on!” he grunted, pulling harder.

The fingers in his hands wiggled in response as inch by inch more and more of the owner was exposed, until, with one mighty heave a woman, a filthy woman, burst free from the earth and latched down onto an equally filthy Goku. Right on her tail, the angry dirt diver emerged from the hole, growling angrily and brandishing threatening claws at them, but a vicious swat from Goku’s staff sent the demon flinging from it’s hole to crash and crumble feet away from the two.

“Hey,” the woman breathed, wiping dirt from Goku’s face.

“Hey yourself.” Goku smiled, never letting up his hold on the woman.

“Goku, we could use a little help over here.” Hakkai’s polite voice announced over the ruckus.

“Oh, right!” Goku agreed, setting the woman down but grabbing hold of her arm as he ran over to the others, who were busy fending off bird talons from the air, and grabbing hands from the ground.

“Stay here!” he told her, placing her close to Sanzo and Hakkai, as he went to assist Gojyo.

“He’s sweet.” Kagome said aloud to herself, or to anyone who was listening.

“Get back!”

Kagome wasn’t sure who had yelled at her until something big, tall, and blonde had forcefully pushed her out harms way, as a double attack form both land and air, had nearly gotten her.

“Oh this is really getting old.” she mumbled to herself, pushing herself off the rocky hillside she had fallen into.

“Hey, I don’t like getting…hey!” At first getting ready to yell at the blonde, Kagome had gotten distracted by the eye that was suddenly looking at her from the hill. “Hey, somebody.” she called out warningly, but before anyone could come to her rescue, the demon attacked.

“No!” she yelled, as the demon grabbed her shirt and tried to pull her into the rocky terrain. “Be gone you grimy whore!” Though the demon had a hold on her, Kagome thought she was holding up good on her own. She had one foot planted on a firm piece of rock face and she was successfully keeping from getting drug into the rock, but it wasn’t until the demon had grabbed her hair did she let out a war cry.

“Ahh! Let go!” she yelled, striking out at the demon’s face, but as her fist made contact, the demon had pulled his head back into the rock, she only felt stone and pain as her fingers broke on impact.

She didn’t so much as scream as she did growl, which ever one it was, it did what it was suppose too. She got someone’s attention.

“Hi, Blondie!” she greeted enthusiastically, as Sanzo, growling and scowling, arrived and attempeted to pull her free. Attempt being the keyword. “Come on, pull harder!” she coaxed huffily. “Put your back into it! You’re a big strong, healthy young man, use that…” Kagome stopped her rant and looked at him over her shoudler. “…30, 40 something? Use that 40 something year old back!”

“Would you be quiet!” Sanzo growled angrily, grunting against the strain of keeping the annoying woman alive.

Instead of replying, Kagome braced herself against his chest and began stomping angrily into the rock, hoping to get a hit on the actual demon. Succes came when the hold on Kagome was realeased and she and Sanzo fell to the ground.

“Freedom! NO!” her success was short lived as she found her foot was cemented into the hill and something on the other end was pulling. “Don’t you have a gun?” Kagome yelled springing to her other foot and twisting to face an irritated Sanzo. “Shoot it!”

“Shut the hell up, and let me handle this!”

“Right.” Kagome answered, letting the blonde takeover, while she hung listlessly between the two, but since she was literally being stretched to her limit, no one noticed.

“Hakkai!” Sanzo yelled, as he altered the woman’s position in his arms. Hakkai stood at his elbow a second later, looking at their predicament with mixed feelings.

“Need assisting?” he asked, trying to keep his face straight. Sanzo didn’t appreciate the effort.

“What do you think?” Sanzo growled.

“You are going to hurt your throat.” Kagome commented, but other than a look from Sanzo, she was ignored.

Trying to hide his smile again, Hakkai made to help, but before he could move he was fending off the attack of one the aerial demons. With all three distracted, the demon in the rock took the opportunity to act. He let his hold on Kagome go, causing the two to fall to the ground, and while their guard was down, he grabbed her foot again and made one more mighty lurch while simultaneously erupting from the rock to tackle Hakkai. What the demon wasn’t counting on was for Sanzo to still have a hold on her, and instead of having Kagome trapped in the stone where he could get her later, he instead had a partially trapped Kagome, with a partially trapped Sanzo in her face.

Everything from her thighs to just below her chest was stuck in the stone, along with her elbows, while Sanzo’s left knee disappeared in the space between Kagome’s legs and both his arms were gone up to the forearm on either side of Kagome’s torso. The two were so close together that they had to hold their heads in the crook of each other’s neck to keep their faces from being mashed together.

“Well, this is awkward.” Sanzo surprisingly said, making Kagome laugh.

“Okay, this has got to end. Cover your ears.”

On hearing this, Sanzo raised his head up just enough to give her a look.

“Right, you have no arms.” Smiling, Kagome maneuvered her arms just enough to cover Sanzo’s ears. “Hey, I give up! I give up!” she yelled over the din of battle, making everyone stop to stare at her in astonishment.

Goku, who was being held in the air by a bird demon, stopped strangling the dirt demon in his hands, but kept his teeth firmly clamped on the bird's leg. Gojyo, with a bird demon pulling his hiar, and a dirt demon waiting to be punched in his arms, stopped his assault mere inches from the demons face. And Hakkai, along with the two bird demons and one lone dirt demon he was trussing around on the ground with, all stopped their battle to stare at her.

“What?” she heard someone, or something, ask.

“I give up! I’m just tired of being used for tug-o-war practice. I’ll go along quietly.”

“But…!” Goku began in protest punching his demon one last time, but Kagome continued over his yells.

“Please!But I don’t want just any old demon to have me. I’ll go with the strongest pack.”

“Then that’s us!” the bird demons yelled swooping in to collect her, but a clod of dirt and stone stopped them mid-flight.

“She said strongest, not dumbest!” One of the dirt demons yelled, all of them rising from the ground to fight.

The fight that issued was funny, entertaining, and quite effective in getting rid of their pest problem.

“So stupid.” Kagome muttered once the demons had finished themselves off. “Okay, guy, how are we going to get out of here?”

That was a good question.

“Sanzo!” Goku yelled loudly, finally getting an eyeful of their predicament. “What are you doing?”

Sanzo sighed. “Hakkai.”

This time, Hakkai didn’t even try to hide his amusement. “Don’t move.” he told them as he held up his hand.

~___~

“On the count of three! And pull!”

“Oh, I felt a little movement that time.” Kagome laughed.

They had been at this for over half an hour now, and all they managed to do was pulverize the hell out of the rock face, yet she and Sanzo were still stuck.

“I think I see a way out for you guys.” Gojyo stated, spinning his shakujo before inserting the butt end into the craggy rock on side of the stuck couple. “Goku you get the other side. Now when Hakkai pulls, we push. Got it?”

“Yeah, yeah.” Goku muttered, imitating Gojyo’s act and placing his staff into the rock. “It’s going to be okay. We’ll get you out of there real soon.”

“Thanks, you’re sweet.”

The comment had Goku grinning ear from ear, yet he didn’t blush, and she thought that was cute of him.

“Ready? One…two…three!” they pulled, they pushed, and finally Sanzo was free, and with his arms still around Kagome, he managed to pull her free along with him.

“Oh thank, you. All of you.” Kagome told them as she examined the large cut the rock had caused in her side.

“Hey, you’re bleeding! Are you alright? Do you need to lie down?”

“No, it’s just a scratch. Thanks for the concern though, um, you.”

“Goku!” Goku said enthusiastically. “I’m Goku.”

“Kagome.” she offered with a smile, reaching out to shake his hand.

After Goku’s vigorous handshake, she then turned to the others. The monk didn’t offer his name nor a handshake, he was too busy lighting a cigarette and so his name was given to her by Goku.

“This is Hakkai!” Goku continued, deciding to make the introductions himself. Hakkai did shake her hand, clasping her hand with one of his and embracing her wrist with the other.

“And that’s Gojyo!” Goku said, but his voice was less enthusiastic this time around.

“Nice to meet you all,” she smiled, shaking Gojyo’s hand. “…and again thank you for saving me…for the second time.”

“So…you going to tell us what that was all about?” Gojyo asked, voicing what they all were thinking.

“Well,” Kagome began. “…when people first meet it is customary to shake hands and give….”

“Not that! Why are demons so intent on capturing you?”

Kagome looked at them from the corner of her eyes. “You mean you don’t know?” She asked, skepticism evident in her voice. ‘What kind of demons are they? Can’t sense the shikon, must be stupid in the senses.’

“Know what? Goku asked.

“My flesh is magically delicious.”

“What?” they all asked, either they voiced it or their faces said it, but they said it.

“All the demons I come across think that I taste like every conceivable flavor imagined. And that eating me will give them a kick to the taste buds. And so…that’s why they’re after me.”

“Surely you must be joking.” Hakkai said after a moment’s pause.

“Then why else would they be after me? Here.” she said brandishing her arm. “Want a lick?”

“No thanks.” Hakkai declined.

“Yeah, I am a bit dirty.” Kagome realized, looking down at her torn and filthy self.

“Right.” Goku began, trying to get off the topic of Kagome’s supposedly chicken tasting skin. “So is your village somewhere close by?”

“Are you kidding? I’m been stuck in this forest for two weeks.” Kagome laughed.

“Really?” Goku asked, sounding excited. “We’re heading out of here ourselves, you want a lift?”

Kagome stopped laughing and quirked her head as she smiled curiously at him then at his companions. “Thanks, but no thanks.” she answered after a while, watching what seemingly looked like the life deflate from Goku’s demeanor.

“Why?”

“Because…” she said, smiling softly at him before she began to walk off. “I have some things to tend to, whose to say you want flip out on me and actually be psychos, and you know, it’s not safe for a female to be alone with strange men these days. Besides, I don’t think your father likes me very much. Looks like he‘ll shoot me first chance he gets.”

She didn’t turn around, but she did have the pleasure of hearing someone choke in anger.

“Hey,” she heard from behind her. When she didn’t answer, she heard feet running to her, and when the hand grabbed her arm and spun her around, she thought she would find herself looking at Goku. But instead, she had to look up at the redheaded Gojyo. When she met his eyes he seemed to flinch back, releasing his hold on her arm immediately. She smiled cruely at him, knowing what he had seen.

“You can’t go off by yourself.” he said, his voice holding none of the hesitation he had demonstrated a second later.

“Yeah I can. I’ve been at it for a while. I know how to handle myself.”

“Where are you going?” Goku asked, suddenly there and standing in between her and Gojyo. “The road leads out of the forest, going the other way.”

“Yeah, I know, but I’m a bit filthy, as you can tell, and I remember passing up a creak a few yards back.”

“You’re going to bath?” Goku asked, his voice and face showing his bewilderment.

“Yeah.” she laughed. “Which is another reason I can’t travel with you. Sometimes, I get the tendency to strip naked and pour soap and water all over my body to remove debris and filth from my ever flavor skin.”

The boys were speechless, and laughing aloud to herself, that’s the way she left them.

~___~

Kagome sighed longingly as she bathed herself later that evening.


The stream was cold, but she hardly noticed, she was too busy not looking at her reflection and thinking about the young men she had departed hours ago.


With them she saw an end to her loneliness, but she also saw that they would add to her madness. When it came time to leave, she wasn’t sure if she’d be able to keep herself from repeating old mistakes. She hated being alone, but she also hated encountering Death. But by avoiding them, she knew Death was pleased with her, and she hated to do anything that would please the dead man.

Decisions.

She hated to admit it, but with her sanity back, somewhat, she realized she’d be better off avoiding the company of others. She’d just be putting them in danger. Danger from her friends and herself. Even now, she regretted leaving behind Naruto, and her lonesomeness was so severe, she missed the time she spent together with Alucard. Even if it was just for his amusement and torment of others. Unhealthy thoughts, but at least she wouldn’t have been alone.


A shooting star fell across the sky, and stopping in the middle of scrubbing her hair, Kagome looked up at it. Mesmerized, Kagome watched it fall in the distance and explode somewhere far off in the nebula.

Kagome was silent a moment before springing to her feet in anger. “Did I just miss my chance to make a freaking wish?”

Her answer was the empty silence of the forest.


“Damn it!“ Kagome yelled angrily, cursing the amount of insanity that remained, for making her slow to respond.


Unbeknownst to the cursing and screaming Kagome, the star she seen hadn’t been a star at all, nor was it a fiery mass of rock from space, meteor, it had infact been an arrival. Someone was there…and they were looking for her.