InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Becoming Sesshoumaru ❯ What's In A Name? ( Chapter 2 )

Disclaimer: I don't own “Inuyasha” at all.

 

However, in order to write a fanfic that makes sense, I've had to create some original characters of my own.

 

The following chapter explains how Sesshoumaru got his name, which some have said either translates to “Killing Perfection” or “The Destroyer of Life”, amongst many other likely interpretations. I wondered what kind of parent would give their son this sort of name and under what circumstances.

 

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Leiko scrutinized her small son quietly from the shadowy recesses of her cavern home. Around 70 years passed since the day he was born. As a full-blooded demon, the boy grew very slowly and physically appeared as a silvery-haired 7-year-old with sharp fangs and claws at the end of his slender fingers. His canine form was equally unimpressive, for he was no bigger than a large dog.

 

The demoness frowned with great displeasure as the lad tripped, stumbled and landed flat on his face while playing with the smallish orbs of werelight that floated around her sparkling cavern. Despite being the scion of a mighty warrior, the lad possessed a surprisingly slender build and seemed uncoordinated. Looking scornfully at her son, Leiko quickly scrapped her initial plan to turn him into her heavily-muscled bodyguard. As the child-like laughter of her son reverberated off the walls of the cave, Leiko wondered with some annoyance if her whelp was also a dull-witted boy who was easily enticed by silly baubles.

 

Brooding over the spanner that fate had somehow thrown in her well-laid plans, Leiko stepped from her shadowy watching post and let loose a torrent of curses at her son. She railed at him for making too much noise and giving her a headache before kicking the boy out of her lair.

 

“Mangy Cur! Do not return until you've learned how to be silent!” she screamed at her son as he fled down the mountain trail that led from the cavern to a lush, green forest below.

 

With his raggedly cut hair flying like the wind, the golden-eyed boy sped as fast as he could along the rocky trail. Despite his age, he was already able to recognize his mother's moods. Often, she would rail at him for no apparent reason and on those unpleasant occasions found himself forced to leave the comfort of his cavern home, even if a storm was gathering out in the highland country.

 

~~~~ Flashback ~~~~

 

Although she never really explained the cause of her apparent anger towards him, the boy supposed it might have something to do with her long periods of absence from their home. Once, she returned with a terrible wound on her side that caused her a great deal of pain. He asked her about it gently, but was quickly rebuffed and locked up in his room. As he waited miserably for his mother to release him, he started to hear awful sounds coming from outside.

 

Peeking out through the keyhole, he saw his mother locked in mortal combat with a huge, clawed monstrosity. Although she was a fearsome creature herself, he would never forget the look of helplessness and pain when the creature held her tiny waist and crushed her with its gigantic claws. The boy cried out in terror and a feeling of anger and sadness crept into his heart for the first time in his life.

 

Fortunately for him and for Leiko his mother, the struggle turned in her favour and soon the blood and guts of a huge beast decorated the walls of their home.

 

When she finally unlocked the door to his room some minutes after the gruesome battle, the awful spectacle of black blood covering his mother was broken only by the zen-like expression of emotionless calm on her face. It was a sight both demonic and divine that created feelings of fear, admiration and envy in the little boy and added to the confusion that he felt regarding his mother.

 

~~~~ End Flashback ~~~~

 

 

 

He supposed that her stern demeanor and frequent outbursts of temper had something to do with having to deal with so many life-threatening enemies. Apart from her dark moods, Leiko was even tempered and provided a rather comfortable roof over his head. However, there was something else that he desired from her, but he simply couldn't find a singular concept in his mind that adequately described that need.

 

As he ran down the slope into the cool, awaiting forest, the smell of pine and aromatic grasses caused an instinctive transformation into his four-footed form. He ran around in great bounding strides, leaping over tall bushes and shallow streams. Soon, his jaunt took him to a clearing where he knew a group of young kitsune (fox demon/spirit) frequently played. He had tried to approach them once, many years ago, but found that the greatest pleasure he derived from these little bushy-tailed individuals was in scaring the daylights out of them.

 

He found them now, frolicking in the tall grass of the clearing. Making a huge leap, he opened his mouth and gave the most ferocious growl he could muster. Almost on cue, the little kitsune scattered, screaming in terror. He raced after a few of them, pretending to snap at their cute, little tails. However, when he got close enough to actually take a chomp out of one, he stopped and redirected his attention at another. He didn't really want to hurt them because it was so much more fun chasing them around, than to have one actually lie at his feet like some of the dead hares he occasionally killed.

 

Suddenly, a flurry of orange dashed out from the side and knocked him aside before his jaws got too close to a stumbling youngster. He smelt the scent of an adult fox, as he went tumbling towards a tree. Then he saw it, the largest fox that he had ever laid eyes on. It was nearly three-times his size and had a jaw that could snap off his head with a bite.

 

Knowing that it was impossible to defeat his opponent, the transformed boy gave his best growl and ran off. However, he didn't go too far, for he resumed his humanoid appearance and rounded back to study this new addition to the group. Hiding in the trees, he came again to the clearing, and saw the huge fox licking the forehead of one of the smallest kitsune who had sustained a bump in this latest romp. As he watched, a glowing light surrounded the large fox and its limbs and snout shortened. Soon, a ginger-haired woman clad in a simple but elegant kimono with a fluffy orange tail came to view. She carefully picked up the little fox spirit in her arms and held it close to her heart while quietly calling its name in soft, loving words.

 

A lump formed in his throat as the ginger-haired lady softly crooned to the little fox child in her arms. All thought of a rematch with the large fox left the boy as he stared in amazement and confusion at the scene before him. The scent of the pair told him that the two were mother and child. Although he didn't fully understand the emotions that were expressed, the boy felt a surge of envy rise in him.

 

He had no friends and knew next to nothing about the bond between members in a family. The only people he ever saw were his own mother and some of the demons she associated with. They were strong, vicious and ruthless individuals, and the boy assumed that he too would one day become as they were. Thus he accepted as natural his mother's cold demeanour towards him. He never knew that the bond between mother and son could consist of tenderness and love.

 

Because the sight of the happy kitsune family created feelings of longing and deprivation, the boy ran towards the mountain and back up the trail to his home. He was going to ask Leiko why she didn't hold him, or tell him that she loved him or even bothered to give him a proper name. In fact, as far back as he could remember, his mother either called him “boy”, “dog” or a nickname that sounded a little like “mangy pup”.

 

As he neared his mother's cavern, his acute sense of smell picked up the scent of an ogre. Tracking the smell, he found his way into the cavern, where his ears picked up the sound of a struggle coming from a cave that was his mother's private chambers.

 

Quickly, he rushed to his mother's room and found an ogre “wrestling” with his beautiful mother, its huge, horned head positioned at her slender neck, hiding her face from view. His mother's kimono was hanging away from her hips exposing her tender, creamy skin and perfect breasts to the rough, warty hands of the ogre.

 

“Stop… stop, you nasty beast,” he heard his mother's voice, much softer than it usually was coming from behind the huge ogre's head.

 

Snarling in anger with claws extended, he leapt in his canine form and chomped as hard as he could downwards on the ogre's arm. The ogre roared in pain and flung his arm aside, throwing the young lad against the hard stone wall of the cave. As the world exploded into a red haze of pain, he dimly saw the ogre advancing on him. Bracing himself for an attack, he tried to move his hurting body into a more advantageous position. However, the ogre stopped as a familiar slender hand laid itself on his arm and the owner; his half-clothed mother stepped forward.

 

Confused by what he saw, the lad's eyes widened as his mother's talons flew downwards in a stinging slap that hurt worse than the concussion he had received from the ogre.

 

“You shame me! Get out of here!” his mother hissed, pointing at the exit of the cave.

 

Tears sprung into his eyes, but his mother's hand returned in a backhanded blow to his face. She then dragged him by his hair and hurled him out of her cavern, yelling, “Don't come back, you ungrateful boy!”

 

Confused and staggering from the blows he had received, the lad reverted to his humanoid form and wept, calling out to his mother. He got up and ran towards the entrance of the cavern. However, as soon as he reached it, a tremendous force, like a bolt of lightning threw him backward down the mountain trail. His mother had somehow formed a barrier so that he could not enter. He then sat outside calling her name for 2 hours, but there was no response at all from the occupants of the cave.

 

He was finally forced to leave when a storm broke and rain began to fall down his poorly clad body.

 

Miserable and bruised, he wandered for days in the hills around his mother's cavern, wanting to go back home but fearing his mother's awful rage. He wondered if he should apologise to her, but something inside of him rebelled at the thought. A great sadness crept into his soul at the thought that he was finally being abandoned by the only person whom he could speak to. He had no friends, not even among the kitsune he enjoyed chasing around.

 

Finally his wanderings brought him to a wide river near his home. As he thought of how he might soon have to follow the river out to the great wide world, since he could no longer go home, he saw a familiar figure, his mother in fact, fleeing across the sand bank beside the river. She held something that glowed in her hands and was being pursued by a very angry ogre, the same one that he had bitten some days ago.

 

His instincts fired up and he ran like the wind to intercept the ogre. As soon as he was near enough, he jumped towards the ogre's face and slashed downwards with his claws. Caught by surprise, the ogre received welts across the side of his face that burned with the poison from the boy's own talons. Roaring in pain and anger, the ogre swiftly responded and delivered a blow to the lad that made him land with a hard thump on the sandy ground.

 

The world spun around crazily as the crushing blow caused blood to pour forth from his pointed ears. Seeing the ogre's massive form loom over him, the boy quickly grabbed a handful of sand and flung it in the general direction of the ogre's eyes. Although he didn't quite manage to see it, a roar of frustration signaled to him that the sand had done its work. Despite the dizziness, he sprung towards the ogre's chest, thrusting his sharp claws like a dagger into the ogre's chest!

 

Suddenly he felt an explosion of pain in his left side as the ogre's claws found his ribs and tore a chunk off his chest. Despite the intense pain, he pushed ahead, forcing his claws deep into the ogre's chest where it found the monster's pulsating heart and tore it out in a single impossible motion.

 

Then, he felt a rush of warm, wet blood raining down on him as the sounds of the world became muffled and hollow. He had reached the end of his strength and fell into dark oblivion.

 

 

A long, silent, dreamless darkness passed before the lad opened his eyes again. With some difficulty, his eyes adjusted to the dim orbs of eerie light that hung suspended from the roof of his mother's cavern. His sense of smell told him that he was back in his own room at home and that there were some healing herbs nearby.

 

His ears picked up the rustle of silk brocade beside him and he turned his head with some difficulty to see the perfect, serene face of his mother looking down at him in an expression that was unfamiliar but strangely welcome.

 

He opened his mouth to say something, but only managed to make a soft, rattling sound.

 

“Welcome home, my son,” his mother spoke in a voice of such infinite tenderness, that he was taken aback by it. She then moved to sit by his bed, lifted him gently and brought a cup of warm water to his lips.

 

“Mother?” he looked up with huge eyes at Leiko, his mother.

 

She stroked his forehead softly, “Rest well… you are safe now.”

 

Tears sprung to the boy's eyes, he wanted to cry, but held them back. There were many questions in his confused mind. He wanted to ask her why she acted the way she did, and didn't show him any affection before and why she did so now. However, as long suppressed emotions welled up to the surface, the only thing he could say was, “Please don't send me away!”

 

“What do you think, my son?” She was now smiling, a new sight that brought tears to the boy's eyes. His heart seemed to grow warm and yet ached at the same time when he heard the words “my son”. She had never called him that before.

 

“I'll be good, I swear!” the boy pleaded as he looked into his mother's large eyes.

 

Leiko pulled her son close to her and whispered tenderly in his ear, “My dear son, born in my image, you have this day, shown me the strength of our blood. I am proud of you, my hero… my protector… the sword on my right arm… my… Sesshoumaru…”

 

“You are mine forever…”

 

Leiko kissed her son's forehead.

 

 

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Leiko smiled as she left her sleeping son. Things had turned out better than she had expected. It wasn't quite what she would have planned, but it worked out none the less. Since he was little, she had allowed her son to wander around seemingly unsupervised in the nearby forest, watching him closely to see if left on his own, the wilderness would bring out his instincts to hunt and kill. Naturally, she was disappointed to find out that after so many rounds of scaring the local fox-children, he just didn't have it in his nature to kill them.

 

She really didn't plan on having him stumble onto her tryst with the ogre, but the whole incident somehow brought out the killer that she hoped existed in her son. As soon as she realized how ferocious her son could be when he thought she was being assaulted, she arranged for the boy to see her being chased by that stupid ogre.

 

Pulling out a glowing object from the folds of her kimono, she studied the precious magical bauble that she stole from the ogre in order to incite him. After a few seconds, she tossed it aside where it landed on the hard, rocky floor of her cave and shattered into a thousand glittering pieces before vanishing into the darkness.