InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Agent Under Fire ❯ Chapter 14 ( Chapter 15 )

Agent Under Fire

A/N: Hey y'all! Back from Florida! It was great! I thought I'd have tons of ideas down there and I'd be able to write lots but it turns out I barely got two chapters out! And those might even turn into one depending on their length. Anyhoo. Here's the next update for AUF. R&R!

Disclaimer: I do not own Inu & Co.

Chapter 14

A dark shadow of a man walked quickly through the crowded streets. No one looked at him and most that did wished they never had. Although he was tall, shadows played across his features ads though he was lurking through the darkness.

He had long black hair braided back neatly and was dressed in dark slacks and a black long sleeved shirt. It was his eyes that scared anyone that glanced his way.

His eyes held so much venom, so much hatred, that they burned a deep scarlet. Now, most anyone who had a glimpse of the man's eyes would laugh it off thinking, It must be the glare from the sun, for after all, no one could have eyes that blazed red.

But deep down in their hearts they were afraid to believe what they had seen, because most people would go insane if they knew they had viewed evil in its truest form.

He hailed a cab at the corner of the street, gave the driver the address, and when they arrived left the cabbie with barely a quarter to spare for a tip.

"Don't hurt yourself, buddy," the driver said looking at his common passenger.

The man looked up at the cabbie, straight into his eyes, and started to laugh. His laugh was dark and sinister, almost maniacal. As he continued to laugh the driver began to scream; a horrible shrieking sound as though he was being murdered.

The dark man got out of the cab and closed the door just as the driver sped the car away. He got to the door of his destination in time to hear the sound of a car crash and strangers screaming. Some ran to the sight of the crash, trying to lend assistance, only to see a cap driver bleeding crimson blood from empty eye sockets, his eyes seemingly burned out.

The man walked into the building and to a set of elevators and got in, pressing the number six. The elevator opened into one very large room. The room seemed to have martial arts equipment and a workout area on one side of the room, lining the wall. Near the windows there was a small workstation; a cluttered desk, a small filing cabinet. But the most amazing point of the large room was the wall facing the elevators.

The wall had been covered with a huge tapestry woven with great intricacy and detail. The tapestry itself was covered with photographs, computer printouts, charts, timelines and other items. There was one part of the tapestry that remained uncovered, depicting the downfall of a demon during the warring era of the world. The demon was disguised, wearing the pelt of a baboon and its attackers were covered with paperwork.

The dark man moved towards the wall and stood glaring at the people portrayed in the photographs. He had captured the images of four young persons walking out of a café, a man and a woman leaving a vast home surrounded by a tall iron fence, a couple kissing in a dark alleyway, and the final images were those of young lovers caught up in the throws of passion.

One that particularly caught the interest of the man was of the young woman, in the darkened bedroom, riding her lover, her head thrown back, her raven hair cascading down in waves, and her mouth parted in a cry of ecstasy. This one, the man took great pleasures in, often, and wanted more than anything to change the young woman's cry of passion into a scream of fear. Fear. The man's glare slit into a sadistic grin.

He moved to pull the tapestry aside revealing a hidden room that would have been used as an office had the space been utilized as a firm. The windows had been darkened from the view of surrounding buildings, and the room looked similar to the old man's store with tapestries and armor decorating the walls. Weapons were lined up along the bottom of one wall.

Coming into the room the man noticed three dark figures on the floor. Lighting a lamp, he saw that two of the figures were the men from the attack yesterday. The third figure was the crumpled form of a small girl, blindfolded, gagged, and at the moment unconscious.

"Did you get the old man?" the smaller of the two asked.

"Yes you fool. I should have known not to send you two to finish a job," the dark man snapped back.

"We would have, if those feds didn't show up, Naraku," the shorter man commented.

"No more excuses, Kageroumaru," the man held up his hand to silence his hired assassin. "I wanted the old man dead before he said to much. He's already spoken to that dog and his bitch!"

"You want us to kill them?" Kageroumaru asked.

"You fool! You won't touch them! I will handle them," Naraku said looking over the sleeping girl, "and make them bend to my will!"

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Inuyasha and Kagome had been going through the Yukari and Shirakawa cases for hours and ha come up with very few leads. The girls were in no way related. The Yukari girl had no family in government. They did, however, find that Congressman's daughter was last seen with the girl she babysat for: Rin. Inuyasha called Sesshoumaru to find out where the girls had gone that day, knowing his older brother would have sent a guard to tail his daughter, no matter how trusting a babysitter was.

He spoke to Kagura briefly and found out they had gone for ice cream and to a park to play. Inuyasha thanked her for helping as much as she could, hung up, and turned to Kagome.

"Well that was about as helpful as getting shot yesterday," Inuyasha said.

"Inuyasha, we'll find her. You mentioned in the conversation they went to a park. We could go there see if the guy left something," she said hopefully.

Her desk phone rang as she barely finished her thought.

"Higurashi… what? When? We'll be right down!" she said hurriedly slamming down the receiver. Turning to Inuyasha he saw she was chalk white.

"What Kagome?" he asked quietly.

"The old man's dead," she breathed.

"What? We just left him two hours ago?!" Inuyasha yelled.

"Come on, let's go," she said grabbing his wrist.

"Where? The hold?" he asked.

She shook her head, "The morgue."

"Oh no!" he said stopping in his tracks.

"What?" Kagome asked looking back at him.

"Not near dead people, no ma'am," he answered backing away slightly.

"Taisho! You're an agent for Kami's sake!" she said exasperated.

"Yeah, I'm an agent. I've been one for four days! That doesn't mean I can just go and be around dead bodies!" he exclaimed.

"Actually, Taisho, that's exactly what it means. You get paid to file away cases, find missing persons, and look at dead people. Occasionally you get to fire a gun," Kagome said counting these off on her fingers.

"Higurashi," Inuyasha said dangerously low.

She stepped towards him and whispered, "Come on Inu, I'll come over tonight if you come downstairs with me."

He blinked at the nickname but began to move again when Kagome pulled on his hand.

They got down to the morgue and were let in to see the body. Kagome turned to the coroner after doing a brief overview of the body, "What did the blood test come back to say?"

"The results haven't come back yet. But it seems his muscles seized up in moments, including his heart and brain stem," the coroner explained.

"Poison?" Kagome asked.

"Most likely. I just don't know what yet. I haven't started the actual autopsy yet if you want to stay to see result," the coroner suggested.

Kagome looked at Inuyasha who had been standing against the wall the whole time looking a bit green.

"No, we need to do some work off site today. But I want to know what substance was used and where it could have come from," she said walking towards Inuyasha.

"Might want to check the hold. No one's come in and no one's come out besides you two," the coroner suggested.

Kagome and Inuyasha stopped in their tracks. No one came in.

"Guard?" Inuyasha whispered to Kagome.

"Oh gods, Taisho. Was he here?" Kagome breathed. They both thanked the coroner for showing them the body and headed off to the hold.

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"Who is that?" Inuyasha asked the security guard reviewing the tapes from the entrance of the holding cells.

"I don't know. The badge swiped says `Joe Baker.' But that ain't Joe," the man answered.

They had been reviewing the tapes for about twenty minutes and didn't see anyone enter or exit the holding area except the one guard.

"Why isn't there any closer footage?" Kagome asked.

"We don't have cameras set up near the cells. Just inside and at the entrance to the area," the guard answered.

"Can we get a closer image of his face?" Inuyasha asked.

The camera operator zoomed the image in and Kagome gasped when his face came into focus.

"He looks dead, Inuyasha," she whispered blindly groping for his hand.

"No, Kagome," he answered lowly and squeezing her hand, "he is death. Let's get this image cleaned up. We'll send it over to archives see if they can get a match. Higurashi, let's go."

Inuyasha lead them out of the security office and outside the building.

"Where are we going, Inuyasha?" Kagome asked after they had been walking for a few minutes.

"I don't know. I just needed to get out of there," he said. "He was there! Right fucking there!"

Kagome started to whimper causing Inuyasha to turn towards her.

"Oh gods, Kagome, I'm sorry I yelled. I just can't believe he was so close!" Inuyasha said wrapping his arms around her.

"I'm scared, Inu. He warned us not to get too close. He knows. What if something happens," she swallowed audibly, "to Rin," she paused again, "to me?"

"Nothing will happen to you, Kagome. I swear it," Inuyasha promised pulling her into an embrace, "I'll protect you."

"Inuyasha," she whispered into his chest. You can't promise something like that.

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Inuyasha and Kagome didn't go to the park to see if they could find a lead. Instead the couple headed to a bar only a few blocks from headquarters.

"I just really need a drink and from the looks of it, you do too," Inuyasha said as they sat down at the bar.

The bartender wandered over, "Hey Higurashi, missed you yesterday. Your usual?"

"You're the greatest, Bear. My usual sounds fabulous right about now, but make that for two, okay?"

"Anything for my favorite Charlie's Angel," Bear said pouring two beers for them, "I'll put your order in priorit-ay!"

Kagome giggled, "Thanks, Bear."

When she turned to look at Inuyasha she saw he had a confused look on his face.

"Come here often?" he asked raising an eyebrow.

"Inuyasha, you don't have to use those corny pick up lines on me," she giggled which made him roll his eyes. "But, yes, I come here most Wednesday afternoons, bring some work in, sit at the end of the bar, and Bear brings me the usual."

"So, what exactly did you order us?" he asked.

"Goat cheese salad," she answered with a straight face.

"What?!" he stuck his tongue out.

"I'm kidding!" she laughed. "I thought you could use a laugh after everything today. Relax. I ordered the standard chicken sandwich with fries and their best beer on tap!"

"I can live with that, Kagome," he said before taking a sip of his beer.

Bear brought their food out a few minutes later, "So, Higurashi? This your new partner?"

"Bear, Inuyasha Taisho," Kagome said waving her hand between them and grabbing for a fry.

Inuyasha put his hand out and shook the bartender's hand. Bear squeezed his hand tightly, "You protect Miss Kagome. She's been hurt somethin' awful after Onegawa's passin'. You hurt her, I'll hurt you."

Kagome expected Inuyasha to say something snide back. After all, he had been a government trainer for years, but Inuyasha looked straight into Bear's eyes and nodded. Bear smiled his approval and walked away.

"Come on, Kagome. You should eat something. You looked really shaky before," he said.

Men, Kagome thought. They ate lunch for the most part silently and headed back to headquarters.

"Any better, Kagome?" Inuyasha asked when they got back to the office.

"A bit. I want to call the coroner. See what the results say," she said, picking up her phone.

"It's Higurashi, I want to know the stats on the body you got in the cooler," she said when they picked up in the morgue.

After a few minutes of jotting info down, Kagome hung up the phone and rolled on her chair to Inuyasha's cubicle.

"Well?" he asked looking up form his paperwork.

"It seems the guy used non-traceable poison. There was nothing in his system," Kagome explained.

"But they found him after only 2 hours!!" Inuyasha exclaimed.

"Apparently it only took an hour to leave the system," she said shaking her head.

"This bastard's playing with us," Inuyasha said pounding his fist on the desk.

"But, there's good news, Inu," Kagome said softly.

Inuyasha raised an eyebrow.

"The results from the note found at your brother's house came back. There was a substance on the note, some type of dust put off from sanding drywall. And remember that muddy leaf I found?" he nodded, "Turns out its not mud, but a type of cement used in large skyscrapers," she explained. He put two and two together.

"So what do we do? Go around to every new building in D.C.? There must be hundreds!" Inuyasha said exasperated.

She lowered her voice, "Good thing you've got a logical girlfriend. We go to City Hall and look at the zoning records. This building is fairly new, we'll find it."

"Girlfriend?" he inquired smirking at her.

"I better be after last night, jerk!" she whispered harshly.

He placed a hand on her knee, "After last night and this morning I'm about to ask you to be more than my girlfriend."

She flushed, "What are you saying, Inuyasha?"

He leaned closer to her and his lips brushed her ear as he whispered. "I'm saying you should quit work and become my love slave," he said smirking against her temple.

He pulled back to see her glaring at him and her face was beat red, but as she opened her mouth to respond the lieutenant screamed their names.

"Taisho! Higurashi! My office! NOW!" he screamed across the office.

They both froze in place for a few seconds before Inuyasha spoke up, "Ever notice that he's only been yelling our names the last few days?"

"Story of my life," Kagome said standing up to go to the lieu's office.

"You don't think he knows, do you?" Inuyasha asked in a whisper, following her down passed the row of cubicles.

"Gods, I hope not," Kagome whispered back.

When they got to Myouga's office they found him staring out the window, his back to the two agents.

"Taisho, you first. Good work yesterday protecting agent Houshi in a situation that was completely out of your control," he said his back still turned to them.

"Thank you, sir," Inuyasha responded.

"Don't thank me yet, Taisho," he said turning around. His face was red, "What makes you two think I wouldn't find out what you have been up to!?"

Kagome's breath hitched in her throat and Inuyasha's heart rate sped up. They didn't dare exchange glances and both awaited the explosion that would come from their lieutenant.

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Ok.. so I had to push the two chapters together… apparently writing in a notebook isn't the same as typing it out (pout)… anyways…. Read and review! Hope you like! Sorry it took so long to update! Updates might be coming slower from now on… never a week long wait.. but still… it's gonna be a busy summer! Review! BakaInuGirl