InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ All My Little Words ❯ Chapter Four: No Tomorrows ( Chapter 4 )

[ Y - Young Adult: Not suitable for readers under 16 ]

Disclaimer: I don't own Inuyasha. If I did, I could afford a better car.

Summary: The darkest places are the places of the heart, and the darkest desires are those we don't know ourselves. The gang faces a new threat from Naraku - one that can destroy the bonds of affection and forever change their relationships.

Chapter Summary: Miroku takes a bad turn in a back alley off Memory Lane, and Kagome is suddenly out of her depth.

Spoilers: Very late in the manga. Basically an AU continuation of the series beginning at the end of manga volume 33, chapter 326. Why? I don't like rats. I'm avoiding them.

Warnings: Haha! Darkfic and unresolved sexual tension are like bread and butter to me. This fic deals with some dark themes, and has more pairings, both canon and non-canon, than you'd be wise to shake a stick at. Yes. Lots and lots of pairings, some blatant, some implied. If you're looking for fluffy Inu/Kag action, this is not the place for you. Also, I realize that it says "romance" in the categories, but let's not kid ourselves: there will be no ripping of bodices here. Possibly a love story, but Sango is simply not swooning into the arms of the Dread Pirate Shippou. Just so we have that cleared up.

Credits: The title comes from the song All My Little Words by The Magnetic Fields. It seemed appropriate.



It's time to kick off our shoes,
learn how to choose sadness;
it's time to throw off these chains,
addle our brains with madness."
- Barenaked Ladies, That Girl

***

When Miroku was nine - only two months after his father had passed into the next world and his own kazanaa had been opened - he had made good headway with a cache of sake that his foster father had forgotten about, hidden behind the woodpile.

Miroku had diligently chopped that wood himself in an afternoon as the wind had turned and the sky had blown gray and cold, heralding the coming cold of winter. Late in the day he'd finally laid down the hatchet and wiped an arm across his forehead, clearing off the last of the honest sweat that had beaded on his brow. Licking his upper lip clean of salt-water, he gazed at his handiwork for a while before nodding in satisfaction and stretching his sore muscles. He'd done a good, thorough job, he'd decided. Oshou-sama would be proud.

Smiling, he'd cracked his knuckles, preparing to move the fresh tinder onto the woodpile. His body ached pleasantly with the reminders of work, but it occurred to him that his right hand hurt more than the rest of him. Distantly, tiredly, he'd reflected that it felt more chafed than his left hand, but he'd reasoned that it was because his right hand was stronger than his left - of course he would use it more and it would be sorer. He hadn't even been thinking of the reasons for the rosary that had caused his pain when he'd unwrapped the beads from his hand; the only thing in his mind was the vague compulsion to wash the sore blisters and possibly smear on a salve to assist the healing.

It was only when he'd heard the roar and felt the pulling, sucking sensation on his skin, only when he'd lost his breath as it was torn from his lips, only when he'd almost heard the cracking of his own neck as the ripping, whirling void yawned wide to gather him in and swallow him whole - it was only then that he'd realized what he had done.

But realization wasn't enough to save him, and in that moment the world stretched out, whipping around him, moving past his still figure in an inescapable vortex of his own making. Pure, petrifying fear wrapped around his arms, anchored his feet to the ground, weighed him down, down, down to the earth as the wind beckoned him away, into the inevitable pit of his fate.

I'm going to die, he thought. I'm going to die, I'm going to die, I'm going to die, somebody save me, please, I'm going to die, die, DIE -

A scream - horrified, despairing - escaped his mouth, and his heart ceased to beat in that moment and lay like a lump of marble in the empty cavity of his chest, dull and lifeless, as though the burden could chain him to the ground, prevent him from being sucked in -

- and it would have been all over for him, if the instinct to live hadn't flared, bypassing any rational thought. Without even knowing he was moving, Miroku wildly wrenched his arm away, rearing back, his left hand coming up and wrapping the rosary around the offending limb unconsciously, without thought, without feeling, without will, sealing away the destruction and chaos he harbored.

The roar didn't stop, though, and it wasn't until he'd nearly passed out in the dirt of the yard that he had suddenly realized the howling, ragged noise was coming from his own throat. Desperately, Miroku choked off his voice and began to draw in great lungfuls of air that slid down the column of his esophagus and washed over the raw edges of his vocal cords like cool droughts of water over a bloody wound. His heart began to beat again, frantically, the blood thundering in his ears and pulsing painfully through his veins. It was a moment before the spots in front of his eyes, black and twisted from lack of oxygen, had faded enough for him to see the landscape that sprawled about him.

All around the small compound, the deceptive calm of the autumn day suddenly seemed excruciatingly cruel, unbearably mocking. A soft breeze - parody of his own wind-tunnel - whispered across the yard, pulling small dead leaves, like skittering skeletons of summer, across the ground in its wake, and the hints of winter in the air, so faint as to almost be nonexistent, promised the peace and slumber of the long, cold months ahead. The sun was hidden behind placid gray clouds that hung heavy and low in the sky, the harbingers of shadow and sleep. In a small tree at the edge of the yard, an early-rising nightingale sang sweetly into the cooling air, and Miroku, listening to the world that cradled him, fancied he could hear the fragile fluttering wings of his life, soaring away across the autumn sky. The serenity made him want to vomit.

All about him, the world turned and he stood still, the end of his life only a breath away. Even then, he'd mused as to how simple it would be to escape into the void, leave behind the horrible waiting. A simple twitch of his hand, letting loose the coils of the seal, and he could slip out of this world and into the next. It would almost an act of poetry, to choose when to die, rather than be pulled in without his consent. It could end easily, and the pain would be brief. In the short years following the incident, Miroku would muse upon this option, but could not bring himself to take his own life - that would be cowardly, would it not? But even if he didn't do that, eventually... eventually he would be swallowed whole, dragged out of life, betrayed by his own body. The outcome would be the same, regardless of whether the time was of his own choosing or not, and he had a lineage to avenge.

Still, vengeance can only carry one so far.

But all that speculation was in the future. In the immediacy of the moment, the young boy slowly, agonizingly, returned, caught up with the reckless spinning of the earth, and Miroku struggled to let his eyelids drop, frantically but deliberately pulling all his energy in, shutting in his fear, his anger, pushing it down and centering himself, shielding his heart against the storm. When his master stumbled out the door and into the yard a few moments later, Miroku knew his face was a calm mask that revealed little except mild amusement. It was a useful mask, and he'd learn to use it often in the years to come.

"Miroku!" Mushin cried, stumbling a little bit. He'd obviously just woken up from a no-doubt drunken nap.

"Hai, Oshou-sama?" he'd replied.

The old monk stopped in his tracks, looking at the boy that had been placed in his care. Miroku could see in his eyes the warring sorrows of knowledge and pity, and he hated it. It was then - that moment, barely minutes after he had almost allowed himself to be destroyed - that Miroku vowed to reverse at least one of those immense chasms of sadness. He couldn't change the knowledge - yet - but he could erase the pity.

Couldn't he?

His master had shaken his head. "Forget it," he'd mumbled, turning and walking back inside. Miroku had merely nodded and began to gather his chopped wood, piling it up against the back outside wall. He had to clamber over the slipping wood, and it was as he was placing logs on the pile that they slipped slightly and the hidden cache of sake was revealed.

Even as his eyes fell on the jug full of alcohol, anyone watching him wouldn't have thought anything was even remotely amiss. Smoothly, he'd righted the wood and stacked it again, neatly, against the wall, making sure that the stack was strong and sturdy and wouldn't eventually slip and clatter down the small hill. Then he had gone inside, to prepare food for himself and for Mushin.

It hadn't been until much later that night that the door had slid back and the shadow of a young boy had crept out of the building and around the side. Working swiftly but quietly, Miroku removed the wood that was blocking the jug of sake from view. Drawing it out, he moved a little further away, into the shelter of the trees, blowing on his cupped hands as he did so. It had become a little chillier in the intervening hours between the afternoon and the night, and Miroku's fingers were a little cold.

Finally judging himself to be far enough away, he gingerly opened the pitcher and took a tentative swig.

The alcohol hit his soft palate like a bitter wave, causing him to choke and splutter for a moment before he was able to swallow the majority of the mouthful. It landed sourly in his stomach, and Miroku would have thrown the entire container away in disgust if a sudden feeling of warmth suffusing his body hadn't stayed his hand. Curiously, he studied the clear liquid inside before taking another gulp. And then another.

When he'd awoken the next day, the young monk-in-training was covered in dew; his mouth was completely dry and a little fuzzy, his head was pounding, and some small creature had relieved itself in his nose in the middle of the night. Groaning, he'd rolled over and tossed up the remaining sake that his body had refused to absorb, along with the scraps of last night's dinner. A few feet away on a tree stump, Mushin had grunted, looking unimpressed with the boy's first hangover. Miroku would have wondered how long the old man had been sitting there, watching him sleep in the morning dew, but that sort of thing did not seem important. Far more pressing was the sensation that the top of his head was about to fall off.

He'd vowed to never drink sake again, but that vow, like so many he had made, was one that entirely failed to stick. There were many other brushes with the bottle, and Miroku swore off the drink on many an occasion, only to forget the vow when the dam holding back the river of emotion threatened to break and the bitter rice wine - and the escape it represented - began to look better than a woman. Still, no other experience with the drink had reproduced that first thrilling sensation of being without care or worry, of being free of his future. None had reproduced the feeling he'd had when first he'd sipped from that secret sake.

Until now, that is. Miroku forged ahead through the underbrush of the forest that surrounded his group's small encampment, Kagome's right hand firmly held in his left, and his entire body felt loose and relaxed. He would have sworn that he could hear his veins buzzing, and his mind was sinking into a delightful pink fog where nothing else really mattered except the delicious, almost velvety press of Kagome's palm against his own. She was making small, enjoyable noises of consternation as her free hand came up every other step to brush away the branches that clung to her hair and skin. Miroku found he couldn't blame them. She was a lovely distraction. Kagome was far more interesting than his future, far more intriguing to him than the weights that pressed down on his soul, day in and day out, and never left him alone... except for now. He felt suspiciously light, as though his bones had turned hollow in his sleep, or as though his heavy heart had vanished from his chest.

Right now, Miroku felt completely free of all that. It was as though his eyes had been opened, as though all the things he feared had been removed, and all his troubles had been passed onto someone else. And good riddance, he'd reflected happily. Vaguely, at the back of his mind, a tiny, uppity voice was prodding him insistently, reminding the monk that he felt extremely odd for someone who hadn't been imbibing alcohol, but Miroku wasn't in any sort of mood to take any back-talk from voices in his head that sounded annoyingly sane. He wrapped the little voice in pink fog as well, letting a smile crawl onto his countenance when it decided to shut up and go with the flow. All in all, he decided, he was pleased. This felt good.

No, it felt better than good. It felt intoxicating. It felt as though he had achieved enlightenment, as though he had touched upon the true epiphany whilst drifting through his dreams, and now he was reaping the pure, unadulterated ecstasy of knowing the hidden mysteries of the universe.

So much had remained hidden from him, apparently. Knowing his fate, knowing he must follow his path of vengeance out of duty and love, had kept him blinded and imprisoned. Care and devotion had shackled him. But none of that seemed to matter now.

Miroku wanted to giggle out loud, to shout to the stars, to let his feet dance against the earth, to take flight and soar above the tree tops that towered overhead. He wanted to do everything he'd ever held back from, out of fear or responsibility or tattered virtue. Those obstacles just seemed silly now, mere obstructions of thought. He didn't need them any longer, now that he had nothing to worry about. Around his brain, a million thoughts streaked and fizzed, flashing beautifully against the darkness of his head. Miroku couldn't help it.

He laughed, into the darkness, and it sounded like the flapping of wings.

The monk pursed his lips and sucked in a deep breath, still forging forward, looking for a good place to alight and talk to the girl who had so willingly agreed to come with him. She had fallen silent, almost as though she were deep in thought - Miroku pretended that he could hear the soft whispers of ideas nestled in her mind - but since she made no complaint, he hurried on. His skin felt tight and itchy, and the sooner he could stop running and inhale deeply and fully, the better. He felt like he hadn't breathed in years; it seemed to him he had been suffocating for a century. And now he was free.

Without warning, the two figures crashed into a clearing, not unlike the one they had left behind, and Miroku was finally able to lean on his staff and take deep, cleansing lungfuls of air. Off to his side and slightly behind him, he heard Kagome wheezing, trying to force oxygen into her body after the mad dash through the forest. When he turned to look at her, her beautiful face was red and she was bent over, propping one hand on her knees and gulping down air. Her other hand was still entwined with his.

He gave it a little squeeze. Normally he wouldn't have done such a thing, but tonight... why not? It seemed like the right thing to do.

She turned her head to look at him, still unable to speak, and he gave her the most reassuring smile he could dredge up. "Gomen, Kagome-sama," he found himself saying, "but I wished to talk to you in private."

She just nodded, and spoke between gasps. "Well..." she said, "...this certainly... is... private..."

Miroku felt his smile grow wider. Yes, it was a good idea to bring her here, and this feeling was so wonderful, he hoped that time would stand still, and they could stay there forever.

And if time didn't stand still, he hoped he would not have a hangover in the morning.

***

Kagome was having difficulties properly apprehending the situation she appeared to find herself in. She hadn't been fully awake when Miroku had started to drag her through the underbrush, and even the subsequent slight increase in speed toward... well, wherever they were... hadn't fully jostled her awake. It was amazing how tired she was for someone who'd spent most of the day being carried around by men of varying demonic ancestry, but she could still feel the thick fog of sleep trying to retake her mind despite the monk's quickening pace.

Unfortunately, she hadn't really had the chance to find a nice spot for a little lie down as Miroku, clearly under the impression that she was an Olympic sprinter, had sped up, and now she was quite awake, though excessively cranky and out-of-breath. For the second time that day, Kagome wished that every boy came with his own subduing rosary. But it was a useless wish; now there were other problems at hand, such as now she was in the middle of the wilderness, and alone with a perverted monk. Why did everyone insist on taking her to secluded clearings? Why not out for a nice lunch?

At hand... The phrase she had mentally uttered seemed to echo in her head. At hand... speaking of which, Kagome glanced along her arm to see her fingers still tangled with Miroku's. The moon was peeking through the trees, high above her, and in the strange, silvery half-light, their hands looked strange to be so entwined. He had long, capable fingers, and they were squeezing just a little too tightly - she held hers loosely, and the callouses on her thumb and forefinger, reminders of her bow, looked deformed, even grotesque, against the symmetry of his hand. Kagome suddenly felt uncomfortable, looking at her hand held in his. She glanced up to see Miroku staring at the sky through the branches; he looked enraptured with the night.

Discreetly, she began to disengage their hands.

She didn't get very far.

The man in front of her glanced down and stared at her face. She watched as slowly an expression of delighted surprised seeped into his features, lighting up his eyes as though he had only at that precise moment recognized her. Quickly, he captured both her hands in his left hand before reaching down with his other hand and gathering her upper body to him, all the while keeping that look of amazement plastered onto his face. Except...

Kagome frowned. It seemed to her that as soon as his sealed hand touched her, an expression of slight annoyance had passed over his face, but it had faded so quickly that she wondered if she had just imagined it.

The slight flicker of expression was soon forgotten, however. Instead of happily asleep in her sleeping bag, dreaming of oden, Kagome found herself, still out of breath, alone in the wilderness, being held firmly against Miroku's chest while his other hand held both of hers captive. She was breathing heavily, and the damn monk didn't help the situation by deciding to softly stroke a thumb across her knuckles, all the while gazing intently into her face with those wide, enlightened eyes.

Kagome squirmed. "Miroku-sama - " she began.

"Kagome-sama," he breathed.

It was deja-vu. Not ten hours ago, Kouga had whispered her name in the same way, but unlike Kouga, Miroku didn't seem feverish or sick or strange or drunk - he didn't seem violent, either.

"Kagome! You must come with me! Without you, I cannot defeat Naraku, and we cannot be together!"

"Kouga-kun!" she'd cried, twisting frantically, trying to disengage his grip from her upper arms - his fingers were digging in, painfully pulling her muscles apart, and the crazed look in his eyes told her that he was beyond the reach of her voice. He was trembling, and shaking her so hard her head was whipping back and forth, her neck snapping with pain.

It's not him, it's not him, it's not him, she'd thought, repeating it like a litany, a desperate prayer...

But she knew better.

"Kagome-sama?"

Her attention snapped back to the present. There was no Kouga, only Miroku. Kagome shook her head, trying to clear it of the bizarre memories that didn't seem real, except for the bruises patterned on her skin. Miroku was looking down at her, concerned, as if waiting for her to answer.

"H- hai, Miroku-sama?" she said, as strongly as possible. She was still gasping a little bit.

His features melted into a smile, and he opened his mouth. "Kagome-sama, how do you feel tonight?"

Kagome blinked. Whatever she had been expecting, it wasn't small talk. But deeply ingrained manners overrode any comment she could make.

"I'm okay, I suppose, although a little sleepy. And you?" she said automatically, then mentally kicked herself. How about, What are we doing here, Miroku-sama? What the hell is wrong, houshi-sama? Why are you looking at me like that? she thought. Just say it!

But Miroku spoke before she could put a voice to any of the myriad of thoughts sparking behind her eyes. "I feel great, Kagome-sama," he returned. "Better than I ever have before." He paused and seemed to think about what he'd just said before giving a little nod of satisfaction, apparently pleased with his response.

Kagome was speechless. No, really, what's going on? she wanted to ask him, but what came out of her mouth was, "Oh, how wonderful!"

If possible, the monk's grin stretched even wider. "Yes," he replied. "Yes, it is wonderful." The arm around her tightened ever so slightly.

This was getting a little too intimate for Kagome's taste. "Ne, Miroku-sama, why are we out here?"she blurted, seeking to distract him from the fact that they were pressed up against each other, in a secluded spot, on a dark night beneath the moon.

Pulling back a little bit, he stared intently into her face. "Kagome-sama," he said. "I have something to ask of you."

Echoes of that afternoon. A wisp of fear curdled in her stomach. Kagome swallowed hard. "H- hai?"

Suddenly, his face grew very serious, his eyebrows drawing down, shadowing his enlightened eyes. "Kagome-sama..."

Inwardly, Kagome tapped her foot. "Hai?"

"Will you please bear my child?"

Kagome stopped her mental foot-tapping, unused to being struck dumb twice in the space of two minutes. Shock overrode any coherent response. "WHAT?" she cried, jerking away from him, but she might as well have been held by steel for all the good it did her. "You woke me up to tell me jokes?"

But the expression of deadly seriousness did not lift from his features, and she suddenly felt very cold. "No, Kagome-sama. I am asking you to bear my child. I need an heir, and soon, and you are the most worthy woman to give it to me."

Out of hand, out of hand, she thought incoherently. "Miroku, what about Sango?" she demanded. "Don't you care for her? I thought you asked her to be with you!" Kagome could hear her voice rising in pitch, just a hint of hysteria edging it.

For a moment, she thought she saw a flicker of pain in his eyes before it passed and once again he was staring earnestly at her. "Ah, Sango," he sighed. "Sango is a good friend, and I wished to be with her..." He trailed off, staring over her left shoulder.

Kagome waited for a minute, watching his eyes gently lose focus, before speaking again. "And...?" she prompted.

The man pressed against her jumped, as though coming back from a long way away, and smiled. "And she cannot help me defeat Naraku."

Kagome frowned. "That's ridiculous, she's a much better fighter than I - "

Miroku cut her off by jerking her tightly to his chest and leaning down slightly to speak to her, letting his warm breath wash over her ear. "She is strong, but she does not have your powers," he said. "I couldn't defeat our enemy with just her by my side. She is only human, but you are a priestess. You can help me, and you can bear a strong heir should I fail."

Kagome wanted to cry out and shake her head and slap some sense into him. No, he loves Sango. She thought she could hear a strange desperation in his voice. She would have never dreamed that he would act this way, not in a century. I'm not here, and this isn't happening, she thought giddily. He meant to take Sango with him. He's afraid of commitment. He doesn't know what he's saying...

He did know what he was saying, though. She could see the knowledge in his eyes, as if he had gained a sick, horrible sort of freedom. He looked like a man on the edge of a cliff, waiting for that gust of wind that would push him over and into the rocks below.

She shook her head, trying to disentangle herself from the prison of his embrace. "No, you love Sango," she told him, hopelessly. "You love her and want to have a family with her."

"No!" Startled, Kagome stopped struggling. He looked almost angry as his gaze bore down on her, a fire in his eyes flaring. "No, she is no longer the future. There is no future now," he told her, his teeth clenching and his voice coming out as a hiss.

The world was racing away from her, and Kagome struggled to keep up. "What do you mean?" she whispered. "How can you say that? You're asking me to make a future with you!"

Miroku stopped breathing, and looked off into the distance. "You're right," he said, after a moment. "You're right."

Is he listening to sense? Kagome thought incredulously. It would probably be the first time in his life if he did.

"There is no need for you to bear my child. That is not something I need," he continued. The hand holding hers tightened perceptibly. "Help me defeat Naraku, Kagome-sama, and I can be free."

The words coming out of his mouth made no sense to her. For the third time, she was reminded of Kouga, but it was the addendum that worried her. "Free of what?" she wanted to know, but he just shook his head gently, as if to say that his secrets were his own, and that she would be better off not knowing.

"Defeat him with me, and we can part ways."

Kagome's stomach turned to lead. "What are you talking about?" she said quietly. "Why would you want to part ways?"

"Because..." he said, his voice almost on the edge of cracking, and a sharp feeling of pain lanced through her heart; she had never seen him like this, seen his face calm, but his soul trembling. She reached up and stroked a stray lock of hair back from his cheek, tucking it gently behind his ear.

"Because why?" she asked.

He closed his eyes, letting his head drop to her shoulder. "Because then I can forget," he told her.

She didn't understand, but that was all right. She didn't need to understand - she just needed to let him know that he wasn't alone, that she could help him through this. She could embrace him and love him back to himself, so he could see what madness he was speaking, what foolishness it would be to abandon love and friendship and the circle of warmth that was their bond -

Kagome got no further in her thoughts, though, because Miroku chose that moment to give her something she had never expected: her first kiss.

She hadn't even seen him coming, hadn't felt the smooth whisper of cheek against cheek as he brought his lips to hers from their resting place on her shoulder, so when she felt them, soft and gentle, and saw his own face, eyes closed and expression sweet, she was too startled to do anything. And then a slow, tingling feeling began to pool in the pit of her stomach, spreading slow, languorous warmth through her limbs, causing the hair on the back of her neck to stand up and the muscles to collapse. She gasped in surprise.

Sensing her consternation, Miroku chuckled against her, his deep, smooth voice vibrating against her skin, and he pushed her back into a tree, using its strength and his own arms to support her. In the back of her mind, Kagome was pathetically grateful that she would not be ending up, painfully collapsed, on the ground. The rest of her just struggled, inwardly, pleasure and discomfort, loyalty and sacrifice, while her hands rested on his arms, tangling themselves in his sleeves.

It seemed to go on for a long while, but it could have been more than half a minute.

He drew back and gazed into her eyes, a wide, impish smile gracing his lips, while she panted heavily, her mind roiling, her feelings circulating like pearl barley in a stew. She thought of kisses, and whom she wanted, and her horrified conscience slashed through the strange fog that surrounded her.

No... no, that can't have just happened... she thought, but the thoughts seemed distant and dark, not really illuminating anything about what had just occurred. Something soul deep in her shuddered at the memory of the moment, only seconds ago, that now seemed like something out of a dream. Her first kiss, and it hadn't been Inuyasha, hadn't been true love, had been Miroku, a friend, a confidant... and she'd liked it. She'd shivered in his arms, let him play with her.

That's not how it's supposed to be. It can't be this way.

But it was. She burned with mortification. Did she really hold such feelings for Miroku, and had only been ignoring them? For how long?

Was she really so inconstant? So disloyal to the one she loved?

Like the one you love is disloyal to you? a traitorous voice whispered.

No...

Little dancing shudders raced across her skin. Kagome wanted to hide her face away and never look anyone in the eye ever again.

"Why...?" she asked, but her voice was barely a whisper.

Miroku didn't answer, and Kagome wondered if he'd even heard. He was still staring down at her, smiling that ridiculous smile. "Don't worry, Kagome-sama, I will give you time to think about it. For now, let us return to the others. You may follow me through the forest, and I will lead you back safely." A hand stole up to her face, caressing her cheek, and Kagome didn't have the presence of mind to pull away. Something in his eyes softened before he abruptly turned.

"Come, Kagome-sama," he said over his shoulder as he started back in the direction they had come, leaving her slumped heavily against the tree, the bark biting into her back, reminding her that this wasn't a dream, that it was real.

Real... Kagome touched her cold fingers to her burning lips. Why is he doing this to me? she thought, although even in her mind her voice was soft and despairing.

And what now?

***

A/N: What now, indeed? Well, this chapter ended up being far more Miroku-intensive than I'd first planned, but that's okay. I seem to have quite a few Miroku fangirls reading this. But... what's up with Sango? And Inuysasha? And even dear little Shippou (whom I am trying to keep in the plot)? How are they doing? Possibly to be covered in the next chapter, hopefully, if it doesn't run away with me. ^_^

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