InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ And Times In-Between ❯ Meditations - Prelude Chapter Three ( Chapter 3 )

She hadn't really been telling the truth when she told Inuyasha she needed to go home to take another exam. It was a bold-faced lie, in all honesty. She just needed to take a break, to fall back in step with the rhythm of her regular life. It happened sometimes, that she would feel the need to go home just to be there again… to be just Kagome, to go to school with her friends, to gossip, to stay up late and watch TV. She didn't get the chance often, but she couldn't avoid it this time.

It was getting to the point where she was forgetting who just Kagome was. It was getting to the point where she felt more synchronized with the life she was leading in the past, than the life she should have been leading in her own loop of time. It was getting to the point where she felt like being with her family was a special treat. She was losing herself in a life she couldn't lead forever. She was deluding herself into believing that when things were over, she would be able to keep going back.

Kagome knew for a fact that she wouldn't be able to, but she wanted to believe it more than anything. She knew that once the jewel shards were all collected, that her life in the Sengoku Jidai would be over. Sango, Shippo, Inuyasha, Miroku… they would all fade into the past. They would disappear into her memory, only to be lost with the passage of time. In the end, it would be her biggest betrayal of them all. She would forget them, she knew, and would finally fall into step with the life that she had let play second fiddle to her adventures in the past.

And it was this that she feared and dreaded the most.

*-*~*-*

And Times In-Between

Chapter Three

*-*~*-*

The castle was silent when Sesshoumaru returned. It was some time after midnight, he surmised, taking a look at the moon from his personal balcony before turning back into his room. He slowly stripped himself of his clothing, laying them neatly on his bedcovers. For a moment, he stood bare in the center of his room, both his good arm and the short stub of a left arm falling at his sides. When the chill night breeze went through the open balcony door, he moved to an elegantly carved wooden dresser, pulling out his night clothes and clothing himself.

He had neither the need nor the desire to sleep, and moved back out into the fresh night air. Aside from the issue of the humans settling without permission, and the short little run-in with Inuyasha and his pathetic little group, things had gone rather well. It was usually enough to leave him satisfied. For some odd reason, though, he felt slightly hollow. It was the feeling that one gets when longing for something while having no idea what it is mixed with the feeling of being hungry and presented by such a large variety of choices of foods that making up ones mind was impossible, leaving the hunger unsatisfied.

It was a disturbing feeling.

A small, frustrated frown spread over his features, and he settled down on the ground, his back against the railing of the balcony. He closed his eyes. He needed to destroy something. To utterly crush and disable something. If Naraku had been handy, it would have been enough to satisfy his thirst for blood for decades, but alas, the foul creature was in hiding. It wasn't really blood that he craved at the moment, though. He wanted to obliterate something, not someone.

He stood again and returned to his room, heading toward the private baths. Once he had bathed, he would dress himself and leave home once more. He'd find something soon enough, that deserved to be an outlet of his wrath.

*-*~*-*

Miroku walked up through the woods toward the small clearing that housed the well. He had often considered how this little area in the woods was so peaceful, giving off a soothing atmosphere that rose from the ground itself. He supposed that the cause was due to Kagome's constant trans-era travel through the well itself that had imbued it with her sweet, pleasant aura. He looked up, and saw her there, leaning against the lip of the well. What was she still doing there? He could still go back… He looked at the wooden structure for a moment, before walking forward again. He paused in front of it and sat down at its base, remaining silent. The silence remained uninterrupted for quite a while.

"Ne…" Kagome murmured softly, and a cool breeze drifted in through the trees. "Is everyone else in town?"

He moved to sit in a meditative position, with his staff neatly across his lap, but rested his head on the well behind him, looking up into the sky. "Sango and Kirara are on their way to visit her town again, and Shippo is with Kaede."

"And Inuyasha?" she asked.

"I saw him sulking in his tree just a few minutes ago." Kagome didn't move. "Ill sense him if he comes near, don't worry." That was all she needed to hear, and she took a seat next to him on the grass. He closed his eyes, his head still tilted back. "You haven't gone yet."

She shook her head. "I wanted to get some thinking in before I did. Once I get home its all chaos for me. Why are you here?"

"I wanted to think as well." There was a moment of silence between them.

"Do you always come here after I leave?"

"It's peaceful here," he responded, a little flustered.

Kagome smiled. "I'm glad."

Miroku looked over at her, a thoughtful frown on his face. "What did you want to talk about, Kagome-sama?"

She sighed and scooted a little away, turning so that her back was toward him. Then, she flopped backwards, falling again onto the grass, her head landing neatly onto his lap. He was a little surprised but shifted so that she would be more comfortable. "That thing with Sesshoumaru was bothering me." She closed her eyes and exhaled slowly.

"Sesshoumaru, is it?"

"All those people are dead because he felt like it. He's no better than Naraku… just killing people for pleasure."

Miroku looked thoughtful for a moment. He was a peacekeeper at heart, a mediator. And… although Sesshoumaru was definitely not one of his favorite people in the world, he was certainly not on Naraku's level. This little misinterpretation of things on Kagome's part couldn't be allowed to go on uncorrected. "Maa, Kagome-sama… Sesshoumaru may not be the most approachable man in the world, but putting him on the same level as Naraku… I think you're exaggerating things."

"Oh?"

"He's not devoid of honor - it seems he gets a little carried away with it, most of the time, so… I guess, what I'm saying is, the logical conclusion would be that those people - well, not deserved - got what was coming to them. It don't think he'd go on arbitrary sprees of mass-murder…" Kagome laughed, looking up at Miroku's face. He was looking skyward, his nose crinkled and his hands folded in his lap, making him look terribly innocent.

He huffed, mumbling about never being taken seriously, and Kagome mellowed out, mulling over what he'd said. She liked that about him. He was always so reasonable… whatever he said made complete sense. "It's never affected me this badly since that first time… at first I couldn't handle the sight of dead people, or the sound of people screaming. With the battles that you guys are always fighting… I've seen the people dear to me suffer and I've seen many, many people die… It doesn't shock me anymore. It still bothers me, but… I don't know. It's stopped affecting me so much. So I don't really… understand…"

Miroku tilted his head back against the well, his eyes trained on the clouds. He placed a hand on top of her head and stroked her hair affectionately. "You've always been a compassionate person, Kagome-sama. It's your instinct. Of course it will affect you…" He paused and breathed out slowly. "Maybe it did more so this time because of the seeming senselessness of the act?"

"Well… I guess you're right…" she conceded after a while. "He's not all evil. And maybe he did have a reason…" A small pout appeared on her face. "But I still hate him," she huffed.

"That works," he said, his lips twitching into a smile. Miroku couldn't help it. He laughed. Kagome joined him after a moment, sheepishly at first. She could be a little childish at times, she supposed.

When their laughter quieted down, Kagome closed her eyes and let a small contended smile come over her face. Miroku sat there, looking down at her for a while, and then finally leaning his head back against the well, closing his eyes and letting the sun bathe his face. All was peaceful, all was quiet. It was comfortable, sitting here in this silent sanctuary amidst the trees, with Kagome for company, her head lying in his lap. He could smell the sweet perfume of her shampoo, drifting up from her hair, and it tickled his nose. It seemed that everything about her was sweet. That he knew of, at least.

"I have to go," Kagome said abruptly, shattering their peaceful, quiet atmosphere, grabbing her bag, and jumping onto the lip of the well. "Bye, Miroku-sama! And thanks," she added, tossing him a smile and disappearing into the depths of the well.

Miroku sighed. It always ended like that. Just when things started getting comfortable and really nice, she always bounded up and left, ruining everything. For once, he wanted to have some quality time with her that didn't end with a crash. He sighed, moving to stand and move to the other side of the well, where it was shadier. After a frustrating moment, he realized that he couldn't move. His leg had fallen asleep. "Well, shit."

"Oi, Miroku!" he heard the voice coming in from a distance away. Miroku grumbled and stood, limping to the other side of the well. Inuyasha approached and sat down beside him. He sniffed delicately for a moment, his nose twitching. "I thought I heard Kagome here just a second ago. And her scent is still fresh. Didn't she leave before?"

"Ahh, no. She just went into the well quite recently," Miroku intoned. "I had a brief conversation with her before she went through."

"Brief? It's been almost two hours."

'Two hours? Wow, that's a record-breaker.' The long silences must have been longer than he'd thought. Either that, or he'd fallen asleep during one of those long silences and time had just escaped him. He cheered silently. Either way, it had been two hours. "I assure you, it was a brief conversation. She jumped in after we exchanged a few pleasantries." Why was he explaining himself?

Inuyasha nodded, apparently satisfied with the answer.

Miroku shifted around a little, suddenly terribly uncomfortable. "I'm going to go and see to Shippo. Excuse me, Inuyasha." Inuyasha snorted and Miroku stood, walking away hastily, disregarding the fact that his leg was still asleep. He felt a little guilty, all of a sudden. After a moment of reasoning through it, though, he stopped feeling guilty. Now all he needed was to find another quiet place to think.

*-*~*-*

The first thing that Sesshoumaru had gotten his hands on was a boulder roughly twice his size. It took him almost three seconds to decimate it completely. It was all that he needed. Watching the ageless stone crumble before him into dust so fine that it was almost invisible was the most pleasing thing he could have experienced. He watched as the spray of stone dust was lifted up on a slight breeze and drifted away, shining and dark as it sailed into the morning light.

The disturbing feeling he had been experiencing before was gone now, and that it no longer plagued him, he felt good. It had been a simple act, one that required little to no effort, but it had set him in the right mood. He could still feel something eating away at him, like a sort of instinctual apprehension. He frowned and concentrated his senses. There didn't seem to be much in the immediate area. After a moment though, he caught on. There was the feeling of something dangerous approaching.

He moved a hand to the sword at his side, Toukijin, and turned toward the direction of the approaching demon. It was approaching rather slowly, he realized, but waited without moving in his spot, his hand ready to whip Toukijin from its scabbard. He stopped paying as much attention to the demon's aura, when it got close enough for his senses to study. It smelled familiar, but the scent was distorted. All he could hear was steady breathing and the rapid trotting of feet as the demon neared.

It finally approached his clearing and pushed through the bushes. Sesshoumaru's eyes widened considerably. "Sesshoumaru-sama…" said the small voice that he recognized immediately. "I'm here to kill you, Sesshoumaru-sama."

There was no way that this was right. He had made sure that she was safe in the castle before leaving. It was an imposter, for sure. The scent was too unclear. But somehow, he wasn't so sure. "… Rin?"

*-*~*-*

Title: And Times In-Between

Rating: R, eventually.

Coupling: Wouldn't you like to know?

Summary: Kagome has an epiphany when conflicts start to reach their worst. The results of her sudden enlightenment are far more than anyone could have expected, and the well stops being merely a door… it becomes her destiny. *Updated Weekly*

Disclaimer: In author Profile.

AN: I have to apologize for the over-use of the word "breeze". I don't know what came over me when I wrote this, but I had an apparent fixation on breezes, ahaha… *sweatdrops*. Anyway.

ALSO - I know not a lot happened in this chapter, but its okay cuz it's the next chapter after this one that things start to happen. And yes, later, there will be a healthy balance of plot and fluff. Yay.

Thanks to Kachi-Chan, who has a website on www.darkness-eternal.net, a kickass site, which has my original story, [Trigger] posted. (You can find it on fictionpress.com, under the Author Name of Iron Lotus as well). It's a new site, but it's gonna be big, I can feel it. Kachi, you kick ass.

I would also like to thank LilNezumi LilInu and small fry on ff.net for their kind reviews. You guys rock.