InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Bishies Without Shirts ❯ Like father, like son ( Chapter 37 )

Chapter 37: Like father, like son

"You heard me! I said….fluffy!"

"Fluffy? We sit here trading insults and that's the best you can come up with? Gods you're even more pathetic than I thought!"

"Well my head hurts and I'm tired and I really don't feel like talking to you any more. Besides I think I'm going to be sick again!"

"There's the bucket." Sesshomaru pointed to the bucket on the floor next to the sofa. "Try not to miss. Now if you're going to lie there quietly I just might be able to fall back asleep."

"Never let them say I robbed you of your beauty sleep, Onii-chan" he managed to choke out before he grabbed the bucket. Following it up with a few gagging noises as he had a case of the dry heaves; Inuyasha lay back eyes closed looking very pathetic as he tried to calm the storm in his stomach. "Oi Sesshomaru, you can rinse it now." He said weakly.

"Get one of your women to do it for you. You do have a remarkable talent for getting them to look after you…rather like Chichi-ue." He finished under his breath.

"Nanitozo…Onii-chan???"

"No; now stop your whining and either do it yourself or live with it."

"But I'm sick and injured…." He whined.

"Fuck off! I'm not going to do it; not now not ever. Now shut up and stop whining for Kami's sake! Shit you're worse than Chichi-ue!" he glared at his younger brother. Shaking his head as he looked away; something hit him in that moment and he started laughing.

"What's so funny Shit-head?" All traces of the whining gone from his voice as Inuyasha started getting angry at being laughed at.

"Certainly not you, Baka Kusotare! I think I've just realized why Chichi-ue kept all those women." He chuckled to himself.

Inuyasha stared at him with an expectant pout on his face. Sesshomaru ignored him and patted his lap for he had spotted Buyo as she sauntered into the room. Buyo paused looking from one brother to the next before deciding that time spent on Sesshomaru's lap was worth the possibility of torture by Inuyasha. So in that slinky way that cats have, she walked over to Sesshomaru while making a wide berth around Inuyasha. Pausing just long enough to gather her feet under her she jumped onto his lap where she happily settled in. Hearing the cat purr under Sesshomaru's touch instead of the hissing and the low growl he usually got from her only increased the hanyou's annoyance at his older sibling. "So are you going to rinse it or not?" he asked making sure to increase the whining tone in his voice.

Sesshomaru looked at him out of the corner of his eye and said simply, "No."

"Keh! Fine! Then don't do it! And while you're at it go ahead and be a shit-head and don't tell me why Oyajii kept all those women! I don't care….." he lay there and sighed loudly. Then he started clicking the long sharp nails of his claws against one another as he thought of something else to do that was equally annoying. "Oi Onii-chan, if you thought I was annoying before when I was just a whelp…wait 'til you see how annoying I am now!" he thought.

Finally after what seemed like hours, Sesshomaru shouted at him, "Stop it already! You're behaving worse than Chichi-ue! Shit! I never thought I'd see anyone act like a bigger baby than he did when they didn't get their own way! Fine I'll tell you! The reason he had all those women is none of them could take him for very long! Since I spent more time growing up in the women's quarters than you did, I know things that you've probably known too but forgot!" He sighed as he tried to control his anger.

"What kind of things?" Inuyasha lay there hardly believing his luck. He had always wanted to know more about his parents other than some vague memories of what they looked like and now it seemed like he would at least get to hear about his oyajii.

"Well for one thing he could drink more than you can before becoming sick. He also had insatiable lusts; in that one woman wasn't enough for him…yet the woman he was with at the time was always his most special and favorite one. Perhaps it was good that Haha-ue knew how to prevent the other women from having pups or I'd have more of you to deal with!" he shuddered. Then he went on as if he were thinking out loud. "Funny how they all came running to do his bidding too including Haha-ue! And what did it get them? A moment's pleasure with Chichi-ue between their legs! But they all wanted him and all of them put up with his whining too!" he paused as he remembered his father's ways.

"Gods how he could lead his men into battle! He was fearless and he could carry on wounded, where other men would have long fallen. You know it was like he could get wounded to within an inch of his life; lead the battle until it was won, and yet get him within sight of a pretty woman, and he was like a different man! Kami knows how all they had to do was flash him a smile and they would be called to spend the night, fussing over him, tending his wounds, drinking along with him into oblivion, and then leaving the rest of us to deal with it in the morning!" Becoming tired of hearing Inuyasha's low moaning he sighed and shooed Buyo from his lap. Getting up he barked, "Stay here and don't move!" then spinning on his heel, he headed towards the kitchen.

Inuyasha who had no intention of moving anyways remained where he was on the couch, staring at the ceiling as he waited for his brother's return. He could just hear him moving about the kitchen; opening and closing drawers as well as cabinet doors, before he heard the sound of the back door opening and closing. He lay there half asleep as he wondered what Sesshomaru was up to and why all the sudden revelations about their oyajii too? He was then brought back from his reverie by a harsh, "Sit up and drink this!" and a cup of vile looking not to mention equally vile smelling liquid being shoved in his face.

"What is this shit?" he asked mildly surprised that his stomach had at last calmed down; considering the way that thing smelled he was sure that the bucket wouldn't be enough.

"Shut up and drink it. It's Haha-ue's remedy for hangovers. Chichi-ue also believed in the pain killing powers of sake." He gave out a short bitter laugh as he watched his brother drink it. "You may have your ofukuro's face, but your ways are a lot like Chichi-ue's." At Inuyasha's questioning look he went on. "Anyway, I learned to make it after Chibi-Nezumi died. For some reason, she was able to conceive a whelp, perhaps because Haha-ue never thought Chichi-ue would mate with her." At his brother's questioning look he explained as he once again sat in the comfy side chair. "Chibi-Nezumi was small, misshapen and ugly as hell. Yet until your ofukuro arrived she was one of Chichi-ue's favorites. Anyway, he took her to his bed often…and yet for some strange reason, Haha-ue never minded. Even when she grew great with child, she was treated royally by both of them until she died trying to whelp a pup as big as she was. I guess that's where you get your taste for strange women."

"Kagome is NOT strange!" Sesshomaru rolled his eyes at his brother's outburst for he had his own opinions concerning the wegome and her family. What he didn't hear was the softly added "and neither was Kikyo…"

"If you say so….anyway, when she died Chichi-ue became overcome with grief as he felt it was all his fault she died. So he went looking for trouble and it found him…mmmm… this sounds remarkably like some we all know and love, doesn't it Oto-chan?" he said sarcastically. "Well he did something stupid and became wounded." Sesshomaru then gave his brother a pointed look. "Anyway, Fumiko in her infinite wisdom decided that best way for him to deal with his pain was to drink himself insensible. Funny how shortly after that Haha-ue had her married off to one of Chichi-ue's men who had just lost his wife….anyways he woke up half-way healed except for a monster hangover. I'm sure you can imagine the whining, moaning, groaning and complaining that went on that morning…"

"But what about my Ofukuro? How did she meet Oyajii? Who cares that he was a drunken waste before she came? I'm sure your precious Haha-ue drove him to it!"

"Do not ever speak of her in that tone ever….." Sesshomaru hissed. "What's to know? Your ofukuro was a whore and Chichi-ue liked whorish women! Shit! You know… he could do that too!"

"Do what? Bed a woman? From what you say he had tons of practice…"

"No not that! He could sit and speak with an enemy and drive them to violence! Then he would dispose of them as if it was nothing and everyone would congratulate him on saving his own skin! And he was impatient too! He would never listen to what anyone told him, for he always felt he knew better! Keh! And he could read about as well as you do too." He laughed again. "That's why he liked smart women! In fact if he had a choice between two women and one was very beautiful as well as stupid, and the other was as smart as she was plain; he'd choose the smart woman every time. Just like you …." He trailed off into a bitter laugh. Sesshomaru sat there staring off into space remembering things from his own childhood, so that he never saw the hurt expression on his younger brother's face.

Inuyasha lay there quietly as he took in all the hurtful things his brother told him. As much as it hurt to listen to his brother's bitter tirade he was pleased to find that he was very much like the father he really never knew.

"So I guess that's why you were the favorite. Chichi-ue saw in you someone who was very much like him. Someone I couldn't be…."

Inuyasha sat there amazed at how Sesshomaru could be so hateful towards him one minute and then twist the whole thing around so that he wound up feeling sorry for him. "Nani? That's it? You sit there and spew venom about me and Oyajii and you know what? He doesn't sound anything at all like the great Chichi-ue you always go on about! I thought for once in your life you'd be able to tell me something important without drowning it in lies! Kami knows which one is real and which one is just your way of punishing me for some imagined hurts! What did I ever do to you? I couldn't have been your enemy back then for I just a little whelp!"

"You were always my enemy from the moment you were whelped! Gods! The way he carried on about you as if you were the most amazing thing in the world! How kawaii you were, what a strong cry you had, look at how amazing it is that you cold hold his finger! He would tell everyone and anyone who would listen! And most galling part of it all was you were just a stupid hanyou! You weren't even a full Youkai for Kami's sake! So I guess in a way you were amazing…."

"Cut the sarcasm! For once in your life tell me the truth without all the lies and counter lies and the sarcasm and all the other crap you like to pull on me! Just how am I like Oyajii?? You knew him… and I barely remember him. Nanitozo….Onii-chan."

Sesshomaru sat there brooding. This was starting to get uncomfortably close to what he had talked about with Higarashi-sama and he hadn't wanted to talk about it then and he certainly didn't want to talk about it now. So for the first time in his life he didn't retreat when he felt the odds were against him. Taking a deep breath and letting it out he started again.

"What's to say….he loved women and he was very skilled at flattering them and telling them what they wanted to hear. Seems to me you do the same thing to the Wegome. I've heard it said you have chased after the soulless body of the dead miko only to come running back to the live wegome, where you tell her how much you love her." He held up a hand to stop Inuyasha from crying out. As if reading his mind he answered the unsaid question. "You roam about my lands for Kami's sake, so I do find out what you've been up to. Anyway, you have a knack for getting women to adore you…even Tsukikage loved you as much as the rest of them. Do you know how nauseating it was to listen to her carry on about you, only to have Chichi-ue repeat the same things at dinner? You do find the ningen just as fascinating as he did for didn't you both choose one as your mates? And before you interrupt me, let me say this: my Haha-ue was married to Chichi-ue simply because he conquered her oyajii's lands and felt that having a princess for a wife would better his station. Her oyajii was probably so relieved he was getting away with his head still attached to his shoulders that he agreed. They never loved each other the way he loved your ofukuro. She really was his mate. Your ofukuro was hated and feared for that."

"Really??? You're telling me the truth here? No bullshit, no lies?" Inuyasha asked softly.

Sesshomaru looked him in the eye. "No lies little brother…she truly was his mate and if someone could have persuaded my Haha-ue to commit seppuku, I'm sure she would have been set up as queen. Happy?" He arched an eyebrow at him. "He would also fight until the point of death, something I've seen you do…and you're good at it too, just like him. I don't know if you would have been educated if he had lived or perhaps it just suited him to educate me, or maybe even my Haha-ue insisted I be educated. But I can tell you this, you're just as ignorant as he was, and it seems it really doesn't matter in the long run as you don't seem any worse for it. You're both… I don't know…simple." He shrugged. "But you have those who would follow you to the gates of hell and back and thank you for the experience. I still don't know why you were given the Tetsusaiga and I was not…but it doesn't matter to me anymore… and in case you forgot, while I look something like him…your spirit is more like his. When you're upset you go looking for trouble or perhaps that is the time you are most venerable so it finds you?" he shrugged. "Anyways I have heard it said that his blood runs strong in you….what that means I don't know. Maybe it is merely a poetic way of saying you are most definitely your father's son." He looked away again and fell silent as Inuyasha thought about what he said. So wrapped up was he in his thoughts that he nearly missed what Sesshomaru said next.

"Whatever it is… I know one thing is true: you both have this way of making me feel as though I can never measure up against you. And I hate you both for it….."