InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Catch Me ❯ Chapter 1 ( Chapter 1 )

Title: Catch Me

Author: Angela Kau

Genre: Inu Yasha

Chapter: 1

Characters: Kouga, Aphreal, Sesshomaru

Rating PG-13 for profanity

 

 

Disclaimer: Ooh! I'm so dizzy! *stumbles around* What's my name again? What, it's not Rumiko Takahashi? Oh darn, I'm not the owner of this show!

 

 

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Last time on Catch Me:

“Stand aside, Jaken,” he coolly stated as he drew the blade. Jaken immediately ran from site as the demon lord held the blade high in the air.

With the power of sight that the blade had given him, he could already see the hellish demon imps fall upon her. However, they seemed to take an unusually keen interest in this one's soul, much unlike when they were festering after Jaken's. `Perhaps she may have been telling the truth,' he considered as he swiped the blade swiftly across her form, destroying the imps and healing her somewhat.

Eyes suddenly painfully bursting into focus, she drew first breath at a peel, her lungs almost collapsing on themselves in the force. `Am I in Hell already?'

`Her wounds haven't healed completely?' Sesshomaru thought in wonder as he stared perplexed at the creature before him and at his demonic blade.

Her blue eyes dodging in and out of focus, Aphreal slowly lifted her clawed hand to her face and shook in surprise as the child's hand was now on hers.

“Rin! What are you doing over there! Get back here now!” a shrill voice yelled from beyond her shaky sight.

“Leave her be Jaken. The hanyou will not harm Rin if she wishes to continue to live,” Sesshomaru breathed coolly as he stared at the strange scene before him.

Ignoring the shrill noises of Jaken - an annoying creature she placed a mental note to do something about later - she belligerently tried to focus her eyes on the girl before her.

“Who are you?” the child asked.

“Aphreal,” she croaked. “Aphreal Sin.”

Upon uttering the last word, the world fell black once again, but under the careful guidance of the child and Inu-youkai, her heart did not stop.

 

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Aphreal awoke several hours later on the desolate, frigid ground. Wondering as to why she wasn't on her mat, she begrudgingly began to open her eyes, making it only halfway before closing them swiftly with the dizzying sensation. `Why am I so woozy?' she thought as she attempted to lift a hand to massage her forehead. Key word, attempted. Just from the simple movement of trying to lift her wounded arm she was hit with a wave of nausea.

“You shouldn't try to move yet,” a male voice said monotonously from nearby.

Thinking that opening her eyes would most likely make things a hell of a lot worse, she opted to sniff the air to test her location and who was speaking to her. The first thing that hit her was the overwhelming scent of blood; it flowed in and around her senses, filling her mind with its presence. The second thing is that she smelled a full demon male close by, followed by the miniscule scent of a small toad demon and little girl far away.

`What the hell?' she thought to herself. None of these beings smelled familiar, in fact nothing smelled familiar except…

She painfully tore her eyes fully open, marveling as gold shook from her eyelashes, and gaped at her blood caked form. The only familiar scent was that of her own blood smeared all over her body.

“We were going to have Jaken bathe you, but it did not seem sensible to move you until your wounds healed more fully,” Sesshomaru coolly replied before continuing. “You had better be thankful for Rin, hanyou, for you should be dead and would be, if not for her.”

`Dead?' she thought and that's when it all came back to her. The attack, the blood, the burning, and then, death. She remembered the small annoying toad demon and was rather thankful that she was too wounded to wash earlier, for she did not want to be touched. From here he already smelled as though he himself was in dire need of a bath.

“Where am I?” she asked aloud.

“My forest.”

“I know that,” she whispered irritably. “Where is this forest?”

`Moron,' Sesshomaru thought to himself before answering, “You are west of the human village Edo, if that will answer your question.”

“Oh…” she replied, her words trailing off as she considered the information. `Edo? Where the hell is Edo?'

Almost seeing the gears turning in her head, he looked away and mumbled, “I suggest you get some sleep. We depart at dawn and if you are to continue with us, you had better regain some strength. If you cannot walk, you will be left behind for other demons to eat you, for only the human rides the beast.”

At the mentioning of the human child, Aphreal turned and squinted at her.

“Who is she?”

Gesturing with his right hand as it rested on his knee, he stated, “She is my human pup. I resurrected her - same as I did you - after the imbecilic wolf tribe had slain her.”

From the tone in his voice she could tell that this was a subject to be dropped and did not pursue it further. Instead, she continued to ask, “Who exactly are you?”

He turned and looked at her fully for the first time that evening. “I am Lord Sesshomaru. That is all you need to know.” He then proceeded to turn himself away and walked over to his human pup before lying down. Aphreal soon closed her eyes and was pulled in as well. Apparently, being dead is an exhausting business.

 

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It wasn't long before dawn broke and she was forced awake.

“Come on! Wake up! Rin don't want you left behind!” she heard accompanied by a jostling motion as she peeled her sore eyes open.

Slowly stirring, two things struck her: one, she was really cold, and two, she was really sore. She sincerely considered just lying there and letting the beasts eat her. Dying the first time didn't hurt that bad, why would it this time?

“Please…” the little girl whined, the tone tugging at her heart and making her begrudgingly move. The actual process was a lot harder than one thought, though, as she tried to stand and was forced to move at a snail's pace. If she thought she hurt before, it was no comparison to now, for she felt as though every muscle had managed to rip at the same moment.

“Augh!” she uttered as she teetered and fell again. Certain wounds at her thighs and side had managed to reopen. “Shit…”

Rin immediately scurried to her side and tried to lift her to her feet; however, Sesshomaru just tossed over his shoulder, “Move hanyou. Move on your own and do not accept the help of a child.”

`This guy is really starting to tick me off,' Aphreal thought as she dragged her feet to a standing position with Rin's now demure gestures. Every movement was tainted by pain as she stumbled in the direction in which Sesshomaru was walking.

 

The sun was nearly at its peak when Sesshomaru finally allowed them to pause. Currently, Aphreal was being steadily suspended between the heads of Ah and Un while Rin rode carefully behind her, but in stopping, she fell. Her chest contracted but she didn't make a sound, such was her exhaustion. The blood loss kept her at so little energy. Rin immediately hopped off the beast and ran over to the hanyou, the fear that she may have died again overriding her orders. Sesshomaru stood curiously close by watching the odd display before him. How could Rin have taken so quickly to this hanyou?

Wind wafted through their area and swirled around the lord's face, bringing him a rather recognizable scent followed swiftly by the loud yell of, “Sankotetsu!” His amber eyes narrowed at how near the scent was. A half smile almost dawned on the stoic lord's face as he thought of the close proximity of Inu Yasha's current battle. Within minutes the battle party would stumble upon their little camp, taking away any reason for him to even bother to move.

“Jaken,” he said, not removing his eyes from the direction of the skirmish. “Take Rin away from here.”

“Mi lord?”

“Do it now Jaken. It will not be spoken twice.”

“But Aphreal…?” Rin piped up, concern clearly evident in her voice.

“The hanyou will be fine. Now leave.”

Uneasily nodding, Rin ran with Jaken deeper into the woods. He need not worry; he could pick up her scent later without difficulty.

“Hiraikotsu!”

The battle was getting closer; the giant boomerang could already be seen dipping in and out of the trees.

“Kaze no Kizu!”

Light shattered through the forest in five golden beams signifying the end of the encounter and alerted the red hanyou of his presence.

“You know, you didn't have to break my trees in order to settle what dispute you had with whatever monstrosity that was,” replied the white lord in his brand of sarcasm.

“Keh, whatever. What do you want?” The red hanyou snorted.

“Ah dear *little* brother, can't this Sesshomaru come but for a simple visit?”

“Of course not! You're just a blood thirsty monster that's after the Tetsusaiga!” a young woman in rather queer tiny robes yelled from behind the red hanyou. “Why don't you just give up on it? You can't touch it anyways let alone use it!”

“Ah, but you see I intend to rectify two problems at once by using the added help of Tokijin. If I had another arm, I could add the Tetsusaiga to my collection.”

The red hanyou's eyes widened in realization at Sesshomaru's intentions and growled in response, “I like my arm where it is and no mutt like you is gonna take it!”

Sesshomaru's eyes leveled as he coolly replied, “Take heed to which you call a half breed. This Sesshomaru is pure, whereas you are not… I could take an arm from your nosy companion if it suits you, but in the end I will have an arm AND your sword.”

Noticeably disturbed, Inu Yasha drew the Tetsusaiga whereas Sesshomaru drew Tokijin.

“Kagome, get back! I don't want you to lose a limb!” Inu Yasha belted behind him.

“Better do as the master says,” Myouga yelled as he hopped on Kagome's shoulder.

“Besides, your aim is bad with two arms, let alone one armed!” Inu Yasha tossed over his shoulder. Kagome had to bait her breath not to `sit' him before the fight.

Tired of their little repartee, the demon lord bolted at the red hanyou at alarming speeds, barely missing the left arm. Inu Yasha had casually stepped to the side.

“Testing your blade already, eh?” Inu Yasha said in a flippant tone. He was being all too cocky for the demon lord's taste. What had changed in his little impure brother?

Slightly miffed, Sesshomaru switched between his poison whip and blade, the red hanyou easily dodging one, but suffered the biting blow of the poison band. Driving his brother into the ground brought a slight smile to his face as he chided, “You should know better than to stray from your place. I must say, the dirt suits you well. You must taste it often.”

A low growl came from the red hanyou on the ground. He knew the demon lord was referring to Kagome's sit command and it peeved him to know that Sesshomaru knew. “Bastard…Sankotetsu!”

The youkai lord sidestepped it easily, the blades barely nipping a few stray hairs from his tail and unknowingly scarcely missing the unconscious hanyou on the ground.

Waves of energy scorched the earth below them as the two violent blades crossed, the wind being cast in all directions with the motions. It was becoming highly dangerous to watch nearby, causing the Inu-hanyou's companions to consider moving further away.

“Kagome-chan, I think we should distance ourselves. It is unlikely that we will be able to help in this fight…” Sango's words were brought to a halt as she and Miroku abruptly noticed the same thing. “Is that what I think it is?”

Barely unscathed from the current battle was some creature on the soil of Sesshomaru's side. Miraculously the various blasts of energy narrowly missed it each time. “Is that…” Sango began.

“…a woman?” Miroku finished. Apparently his female radar had kicked in, for - in general - it was sensitive enough to pick up a woman's presence within 500 yards. However, youkai women were harder for him to trace.

What was a woman doing wandering around with that monster?

A stray Sankotetsu grazed the woman, causing fresh blood to mingle into the twisting air; the demon lord's keen sense of smell immediately picked it up. He paused for a moment and adjusted his stance to block the next onslaught. The action, although tiny in its precise movement, did not go unnoticed by the hanyou brother as he quirked an eyebrow and asked, “What are you shielding over there?”

He sniffed the air and blanched, “A female?!” His face paled. Sesshomaru had always seemed of an uncaring and callous personality and the simple thought of a woman being in his company just did not sit right. “What business do you have with a female? Captured her for an afternoon feast?”

Deep within the dwelling of the back of his mind, there was a galling sweat drop as Sesshomaru replied, “You and I both know that I do not eat youkai…”

Inu Yasha sniffed again, “Your sniffer must be out of order then, 'cause that aint no youkai. Unless I'm wrong and my nose fell off, that is a hanyou, although I don't know what the other half is. Isn't it a bit below you to be in the company of us `half-breeds'?”

As the youkai lord's expression resumed its flatness, the miko's attention was finally drawn to the reddish lump on the ground. It had a hinting lilting glow to it, but its presence was not that of a Shikon shard. The wind resumed its natural course and in her new position Kagome could without difficulty pick up the scent of stale blood. It was so old yet so fresh that canine-ish senses weren't needed to draw out the metallic scent of it.

Kagome then took her turn at growling before yelling at his silence. “Even if it is below him to be in a hanyou's company, apparently it is not below him to let them bleed to death. My sense of smell isn't all that great and even I can smell the blood on her from all the way over here. I thought you were vile before but now you truly disgust me. Even I thought you couldn't sink so low…”

The tirade was cut short as she suddenly realized the flat stare suddenly turned cold. Although there is very little distinction between the two emotions, she caught the hint and fell silent.

The current discourse was beginning to irritate Sesshomaru. Sure, maybe it was a bit harsh for him to let her bleed, but it was none of their friggen business. He didn't even know why he was helping that hanyou in the first place. Why, if it weren't for Rin he would have left her there dead. Rin…that's right. He promised Rin that the hanyou would come back alright. His mind then drifted back to previous battles with his brother. As it seemed, hanyou innately heal slower and the human seemed to speed the healing of his brother somehow. His scent always seemed to change as if some foreign substance were clung to him…

Testing the air, he picked the foreign scent from the rest and resolved the source was the wench's enormous yellow sack.

Without further ado, Sesshomaru moved once again at alarming speeds as he zipped past his brother, tore the sack from the wench, retrieved the bloody hanyou and took flight in the general direction Rin went. The entire scenario happened all within a matter of seconds and it took minutes for the Inu Yasha gang to register what happened.

“HE STOLE THE RAMEN!”

Ignoring Inu Yasha's mournful raving, Kagome pondered what just happened. `He stole my pack, but I doubt it was because of the ramen. Was Sesshomaru actually using reasoning for others instead of just himself? Was he actually being considerate? Did he steal my pack for the medical kit?'

“MY RAMEN!!!”

It wasn't long for the irritating ranting to ebb as it was suddenly cut off by a loud shout of, “AUGH! I CAN'T THINK STRAIGHT! INU YASHA, SIT!”

BLAM!

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“Jaken-sama…” Rin muttered. Jaken became leery as she never added `-sama' to his name unless she wanted something. “Rin is worried. What if something went wrong? Why aren't Sesshomaru-sama and Aphreal-sama back yet?”

“Aphreal-sama?!” Jaken sputtered. “She is a hanyou and is to be treated as such! Why if Sesshomaru-sama heard you say that he would just…”

“Tell you to be silent, Jaken,” a cool voice said from the tiny toad.

“S-Sesss-Sessho…” he barely squeaked.

“Sesshomaru-sama!” A little white and orange blur rushed past him and latched onto the white prince's leg. He paused a moment to pet the girl's head before bending to gently let the giant yellow sack drop, followed shortly by the hanyou. A cloud of medical and other scents burst from the bag, causing the girl to cover her nose and complain, “Ewe! What's that smell?”

Ignoring the little girl's reaction, he proceeded to rifle through the sack trying to figure out the weird scent that often clung to his brother. He picked up the first item, a moderately sized blue thing covered in what appeared to be lace. It had two bumps on it with a strand to connect them and four strands sprouting from them, two looping back to the bumps. “That won't help.” He threw it aside, the item landing on Rin's head. She immediately began to play with it a little bit before deciding to snap it under her chin.

The next item wasn't much better, for it was lacy as well and seemed to go with the first item. It had three holes and was moderate in size. Once again he threw it to the side, landing near to Rin. Immediately she placed it on Jaken's head.

“Sessho-” Jaken protested.

“Be silent Jaken,” Sesshomaru interrupted. He needed his concentration on the scent of the particular objects needed.

He came upon the third set of items in the sack. Although the box smelled slightly of blood and medicine, it was not the same scent. For the third time he threw the items to the side near towards Rin. Upon seeing the bright blue packaging the child opened the box eagerly and was overjoyed at the squishy objects packaged in pale pink. Gingerly she tore open the packaging, finding half of the surface of the object inside sticky, and half soft like a sponge. Although it smelled slightly odd, to Rin it would make her sandals much softer. So placing the soft side towards herself, she attached the pads to her shoes. They delighted her with their softness as she anticipated the next item that Sesshomaru would throw from what - to her - was a magical bag.

Becoming rather peeved, Sesshomaru quickly sniffed the next three items before briskly throwing them towards Rin. None smelled like what he was after, although one smelled strongly of a plant he once ate.

Not even letting them fully hit the ground, Rin ran to catch the next three items. One was tubular in shape with a little weird brush attached to it, another was shaped like a square with a half circle on top, and the last item was tubular as well, but much larger than the first. She took the first tubular object and sniffed it. It smelled good enough, so she tasted it. The taste wasn't to her liking and the texture was too grainy, which gave her the idea that maybe it wasn't food…maybe it was some sort of paint and the brush was to apply it. Immediately she went over to Jaken and began painting designs in white on him with the brush. Once satisfied, she fashioned the brush onto her kimono to save for later like a businessman would fashion a tie in the future. She opened the second item and found that it smelled good as well; however, it didn't feel at all like a liquid like the last item. Not knowing what to do with it, she set it aside for later and opened her last gift, the second tubular item. Even before it was already opened, she realized that it smelled like the first item, but more powerful. Knowing that she didn't like the last one in taste, she didn't put any in her mouth. Still… it still did smell good to her. Perhaps it was some form of perfume. So she squeezed a bit out of the tube and rubbed it onto her skin. First she delighted in the fact that it smelled good, but then she freaked out that her skin felt icy cold and yet hot at the same time. Then she could barely feel her skin at all.

“AAAIIIEEEEE!!!! Sesshomaru-sama!” she yelled, flailing her arms in the air. “I can't feel my arms!”

Smelling the odd scent on Rin, Sesshomaru stopped in his tirade of throwing cooking supplies from the bag and latched onto her with his right arm. In a split second he was running to a nearby stream in which he used to dip the child in. In the end, he got nearly all the substance off; nonetheless, she did spend the rest of the evening whining, “My arms are tingly!”

Deep in the bottom of the bag he found what he was looking for. It was a shiny metallic box with a red emblem on it…a plus sign? He opened the tin and inside were little rolls of cloth, sticky things, items oddly wrapped in paper, and a book.

Sesshomaru was a demon and having always been a demon, he had no idea as to how to bind wounds. It was in the demonic code of ethics to let wounds heal themselves. If your wounds did not close, then it was deemed that you were not powerful enough to survive and therefore not worth saving to begin with. Luckily for him, he had not sustained such an injury in the presence of other demons, but that still left him with the task at hand. He had promised Rin that the hanyou would be kept well but he still didn't have a clue as to what to do. He unrolled the cloth, tore open the packages, opened the sticky items and sat in wait. This was future stuff. All he'd have to do is open it and it would do the rest, right?

Five minutes passed by and still the items on the ground didn't move any aside from Rin's random proddings. In the end, Rin contented herself to squat next to Sesshomaru while Jaken went out looking for firewood. It didn't look like they were going anywhere for quite a while.

“Sesshomaru-sama?” she carefully prodded.

“Hmm?”

“Why hasn't anything happened?”

“I don't know. Maybe if we wait a while longer.”

“Rin doesn't think so. In Rin's village, when someone got hurt, Rin's mother would use strips of cloth and wrap it around where the person was bleeding from. Then she'd tie it in a knot and a few days later they got better. Maybe that's what you're supposed to do.”

Sesshomaru had always considered Rin to be a little human girl. Someone with intelligence, just not anyone he considered to have high levels of intelligence that would pertain to something useful to him. Human ideologies just never interested him. In this instance though, Rin had given him something very valuable. This nonetheless gave way to a new problem. The hanyou was bleeding from everywhere, including places covered by what used to be a cloak. He could take care of the wounds just fine, but Rin was someone who might get squeamish from the blood.

“Rin, go get some food.”

“But…”

“This Sesshomaru doesn't know what the hanyou eats. She might eat the same items as you. Don't you want her to have something good to eat for when she wakes up?”

After all the time that she had spent with him, Rin could easily tell that it was important that she left. Sesshomaru never asked her a question unless he had something important to do.

“Hai Sesshomaru-sama,” she mumbled before walking off.

 

Sesshomaru, being the demon he was, was too completely overconfident for his own good. He had no idea as to what he was getting himself into until it was too late. Had he known, he would have had Rin do it instead of him. First of all, the smell of the medical supplies was enough to make him nauseous as it assaulted his heightened senses and second, the wounds were numerous in places he just didn't want to go. He had to remove articles of clothing that had scabbed to her body and then find something to clothe her with. And considering the fact that the clothes were ruined beyond repair, for saying that they were in tatters was putting it loosely, he'd have to quickly find something to cover her with. He sighed in discomfort. That meant that his pristine white haori would have to do, something that the demon lord would hate to have tarnished.

Carefully the demon lord removed the once pristine white split cloak from the hanyou's form and winced as he heard more flesh rip. He then moved to remove the other scabbed over garments, trying not to look directly at her while doing so. Although she was a hanyou and therefore in his mind inferior, she was still female, which still required a little more respect. It also made him squeamish to know what he was doing. Careful as to not look at the blood gushing body parts that he was wrapping, such as her breasts and thighs, he did as he was instructed by the six year old. Only when he was finished did he look directly at her.

She looked so different without the bloodied cloak, almost as much demon as he was. Now that he thought about it, the wounds that she had on her face almost gave her the appearance of a creature that could have been a part of his pack. She had a moon mark on her forehead, he had one on his. She had two marks on either side of her face, so did he. But she had blue pupil-less eyes that looked to be once golden like his, and all of her marks were wounds, wounds that were probably going to scar. She would look that way forever even though she wasn't born with that appearance. He thought all this as he carefully pulled off his haori, cautious as to not let it get snagged on the spikes of his armor.

His thoughts were abruptly disturbed however as he heard Rin chuckle. Apparently when Rin came back she thought him wearing his bulky armor without a shirt on was funny. It did really dwarf his form in reality though, so he didn't retort as she grabbed onto his leg. She peered around them to look at the hanyou. “Is Aphreal-sama going to be ok?”

Not moving his head, he peered down at the girl. She looked as ridiculous as he did with that garment on her head. “Aphreal-sama, huh?” Rin nodded her head. “I think Aphreal-sama will be just fine.”

With that Rin squeezed Sesshomaru's legs tightly in a hug.

 

The fire was built closely to Aphreal that night. Rin and Jaken slept close by. All through the night Sesshomaru sat awake and at guard, or at least that is what his intention was. In reality he was staring between the hanyou and the girl, wondering as to how he had allowed himself to become so soft. Somehow he had allowed for not only one female under his care, but now two, each resurrected under the careful guidance of that blasted sword of his. What was happening to him?

 

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So, what were the “magical items”?

Bra

Underwear

Period gear

Toothpaste/brush

Deodorant

Bengay

Medical kit