InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Choice of Destiny ❯ Within the Tapestry ( Chapter 9 )

Never owned Inuyasha, never intend to own Inuyasha, but wished I did.

I own this story, no one else will and should never intend to.

Choice of Destiny

By anglewings1

Chapter 9 ~ Within the Tapestry

It was as blue as a summer sky, and just as endless. There were no lines of corners. There was no distinction between roof and floor. It was however a place, you could even call it a room. She just had no contemplation of where it began or end.

Kagome stared in wonderment, blinking rapidly. She had never dreamed of heaven to be blue. She also thought it to be more complex, with land, ocean, clouds, something. All there was within the abyss was her. Yet it felt not empty, actually it felt full.

Emptiness was cold.

This was warm. She did not want to run from it. She was happy to bask in it for that moment.

Closing her eyes, Kagome inhaled deeply. The world smelt like nothing she could compare it to. It was a scent like no other, and by all means pleasant.

"Finally" an elegant voice startled her. She hadn't seen anyone else here.

Kagome opened her eyes and stared at the small child, floating within the blue vastness. The young woman blinked, "Destiny?"

The familiar child stared back the woman, her face blank, "I wish I could welcome you, Kagome Higurashi, but I cannot. For in fact you are not meant to be here."

"Destiny, what's going on? Where am I? What are you doing here?" the priestess asked, fear gradually rising.

"Calm yourself, Higurashi" the girl signaled with raised hands, "I promise to tell you all that I can. Now ask one question at a time."

Kagome's breathing grew heavy, "What's going on?"

Destiny glanced upwards, momentarily, "A few moments ago you sacrificed yourself for Kikyo. You're dead."

The miko gaped, "What?"

"Don't worry" the child began to giggle, "You'll be alright."

"Alright?!" the woman stared at the small girl incredulously, "I'm dead. Everything has ended. Everyone's gone."

Tears were already falling onto her jacket. She stared down at her feet, "I'm alone?"

"Did you think death would be perfect?" Destiny whispered, her words cruel to the dead woman.

The priestess turned around staring at the empty space. Pooling tears clouded her vision, "I didn't even think of death. I j-just stepped out knowing I couldn't let her die."

"Why?"

Kagome squeezed her eyes close, not wanting to live this nightmare, "Because he wouldn't be able to be with her, if she was killed again."

"Isn't that what you wanted?" Destiny asked knowing the miko's heart like someone who was much wiser than a child, "Didn't you want him to stay and be with you?"

Kagome whirled around.

"It's not what he wants!" she shouted through a sob.

It felt cold then, after her shout, like a vacuum sucking up the summer heat.

The priestess continued to cry as the young child studied her with curious eyes. Destiny inhaled sadly, "To you, what your heart feels doesn't matter. Than why should being alone matter?"

The miko trembled, her entire being screaming under torment. Kagome shoved her fists into her face, trying to block out everything. She never felt so lost. She fell to her knees, her entire body convulsing in bawling cries, "I don't know."

Gradually the woman had curled into ball, trying to find some comfort.

"Didn't you realize what heartache there will be if you give up what you want?" Destiny began to shout, refusing to be blocked out, "You can't think it's so easy to give up on something you want so badly."

"Please, stop!" Kagome covered her ears and hid her face beneath her long hair.

"You can't just hold back all of this remorse, Higurashi!" The girl continued to yell, her tiny voice rough as any adult's, "This is the path you took when you stepped in front of that arrow!"

"Why?" the miko sniveled, still lying down, "Why do continue to punish me like this? Do you enjoy watching others suffer?"

Destiny tiptoed to the distraught woman curled in a fetal position. If one might have stepped back to look at the situation, it might have been considered funny, even ironic. There laid a woman crying like you would see a spoiled child do, and there, watching the heartbreaking display, stood the youth, at least a decade younger.

Smiling sadly, the girl knelt down beside the miko and stroked the maiden's beautiful raven hair, "I never enjoy watching people suffer, especially you."

Before long, the sobs quieted down and gradually pink eyes peered out from beneath the black curtain, "Then why?"

Destiny's smile faded, her sparkling eyes showing an unspoken apology, "Because you need to understand what it is to give up what you desperately want."

Her words were soft and comforting slowly coaxing the miko out of her grief. The priestess slowly rose gradually leaving herself open to anything the child might say. Everything the child had spoken was damaging to heart, but true. Kagome stared at the little innocent face wonder how she could feel no malice towards this child.

Gradually the priestess's almond eyes drifted back to their ghostly chamber. Looking at the endless blue wonderment, Kagome whispered, "Where are we?"

"A dream perhaps" Destiny replied, almost making it sound like Kagome would know better than her, "Could one call it a vision, perhaps? This place was never given a name. It is a place where only your mind and soul can enter."

"But my body" Kagome stammered as she patted down her jacket and jeans, "I feel it. My body is here."

The child shook her head and tapped her forehead, "It's all in your head. Your mind was instructed to create this place and in doing so it automatically created your body within here."

Kagome looked up, scowling, "If its my mind, than, how are you here?

"I was the one who told your spirit to create this environment" Destiny replied spreading out her arms, "You created it, but I initiated it."

The priestess swallowed, stepping backwards. This person standing before her in this child-like form was supernaturally powerful to a measure beyond the priestess's imagination. Surely no demon could do this.

"Who are you exactly?" Kagome asked her voice choked.

Her fellow occupant offered a detached grin, "As I have said before, I am Destiny."

The miko wanted to pull out her hair. The woman threw up her hands and gave out a frustrated cry, "That doesn't tell me-"

Kagome stopped in mid sentence, and stared at the grinning child as the pieces fell into place, "You couldn't be."

"I am" she nodded, "I am Destiny."

The miko looked at the girl as if she was crazy, "That doesn't make sense! How could you be the embodiment of destiny?!"

Destiny sighed shaking her head, "It's very complicated, but I'll try and simplify it for you."

And thus the child, who had confused the priestess for several days, began to explain one of the most confusing aspects of life, "I could never explain exactly who I am, that is too far deep a question and too complex for you to think of right now. Know that I am Destiny. How am I personified, I can never explain to you. It is far too intricate in a supernatural sense to put in easy terms. I can tell you that I am a being that upholds destiny within life. I am the keeper and the writer of it.

"To help complete your destiny, Higurashi, I was forced to take on a concrete form. I led you to Naraku and I led you to Inuyasha and Kikyo. I did so by creating a physical body for you to interact with."

Kagome curiously scrutinized the small being, "Did you take a shape of an actual living girl?"

"Yes, but you don't know her. She comes from a different time. I chose a child's body so you would not be so suspicious of me" the supernatural creature spoke while fingering the silk kimono.

Looking up back at the miko the skeptical child asked, "Kagome, do you believe in destiny?"

Chuckling weakly the woman replied, "That's a complicated question you yourself present."

Leaning back her head, Kagome sighed, "Do I believe in destiny? I believe I'm in control of my life, but I don't think my appearance in the Feudal Era was a complete accident, either."

"Well destiny is not absolute as some people like to think," the child proclaimed, "Destiny is something that rules over all life. It is believed that people write their own fate, and that does hold some truce, but not completely. The confusing thing about destiny is that it is flexible.

"Destiny is written for an individual before even their birth. Most of what happens to a person in their life is already laid out. Foe example, you walking down a hall to a class and you meet someone who asks you to do something for them. You were destined to walk down that hall and cross paths with that individual.

"Now do you help the person by doing something for them?

"That where the flexibility begins to bend.

"That is where choice lies. You have been given the gift of choice, do the favor or not. If you choose to do the favor you will continue on a certain path, your destiny, but if you deny the favor, then you choose a different path and a different destiny."

Kagome scowled, "I don't think I follow."

Destiny shrugged, "Okay, lets say you do the favor. You go retrieve the person's books from another classroom, in doing so you run into a school bully and are beaten. However, if you refuse to help the person, you go to class and end the day without a bruise."

The miko's eyebrow rose, "Is destiny so irrelevant?"

"Not always" the child laughed, "Sometimes it far more dramatic, such as your arrival in the Feudal Era."

"I knew it" Kagome breathed softly.

Destiny nodded, "You were destined to come to this time and from there you were given multiple choices. Becoming friends with Miroku, Sango, Shippo, and many others. You helped many. Destiny has followed you all the way to the present moment.

"Destiny is a like a road you can never step off of or turn around on. You walk down it and suddenly it divides into a fork, where you must make a choice on which path to take. You have no idea where those paths end or lead, but you must make a choice to continue. So you choose and walk forward into the future."

Taking a deep breath, the girl said, "You, Kagome Higurashi, have crossed into a destiny that is radically important. You are being given a choice, that will alter the destiny of countless people."

"How?" the woman asked, "How could my choice be so important?"

The child pensively nibbled on her lip, before waving her hand. Kagome blinked several times as string unraveled in mid air before her. Soon different strands of twine were strung between the two girls, some vertical, some horizontal, some diagonal, some approaching Kagome, some heading into the vastness.

The two stood amongst the web, the priestess marveling at its sudden presence. Destiny caressed one of the lines with a thumb and forefinger, "Try to think of this as someone's destiny. It is, but one strand amongst thousands, and hardly holds more importance than the others. However, when that person makes a choice that changes their destiny the thread moves."

One end of the strand began to move further to the right. While it was moving the strand pushed against several other threads, pulling against other people's destinies.

"Sometimes a choice will not only change one person's destiny, but it might affect several others" her small emerald eyes followed the web. Waving her hand once more Destiny commanded one of the strings to crash violently throughout the web. In seconds the web was tangled around the single strand.

Walking through the fading string, the child looked as if she was at a funeral, her face hard and stressed, "Your choice has become drastic, Higurashi. Whatever you choose to do will change not only the lives of people you know, but it will change your own time period."

Kagome frowned, "What do you mean?"

Destiny inhaled deeply, knowing what she said next would be the hardest thing for the woman to hear, "You have been contemplating it for the last few days."

"What?" she breathed, her heart speeding up.

Emeralds locked with almonds, "You must decide what side of the well you must stay on?"

Kagome's mouth open and closed as hope flared, "Are you saying I'm not dead?"

Destiny shook her head giggling cruelly, "Oh, no you are dead, but I shall grant you life once more. Without you, both time periods will suffer."

Pointing at the older girl the child narrowed her eyes, "Once you arrive you must make your decision. Where will you remain for the rest of your life?"

"I've already made my decision on what side of the well I am staying on" Kagome sighed forlornly, spreading her arms.

"Do you?" Destiny persisted her eyes brittle, "Do you really know if you could make that decision?"

Putting her short arms behind her back the girl began to circle the miko, "Can you live with yourself if you seal the well and remain in the future?"

Kagome immediately faced the school child, her face contorted in emotional pain, "How could I live on if I seal the well and stay in the Feudal Era, only to watch him love another?!"

"Be sure of your answer, Kagome," the child whispered harshly, "Once the well is closed, nothing, not even the jewel, can open it again."

The priestess stared over the girl's raven head into the endless abyss. Was she sure? Was she ready to leave everything behind? Could she let go of four years in a heartbeat?

"Kagome" the child called, "You already know the jewel is the way to close the well, don't you?"

The young adult shrugged bashfully, "I never really thought about how to seal the well. I just knew I had to?"

Silently laughing, Destiny stared up into the woman's chocolate eyes, "You need only the last shards from Kohaku, Kouga, and Naraku for the Shikon Jewel to be complete."

Upon hearing the demon lord's name, the miko freaked, "What happened after I was killed?! What did he do to the others?!"

"Calm down" Destiny lifted her tiny hands, "They're fine. I took care of everything."

Kagome became even more frightened, "What did you do?"

"Once Naraku killed you, all of friends went suicidal and attacked at once" the little girl began, "If I hadn't intervened they would have been dead in moments. With the shards, Naraku has become a force they could never defeat, so I sent him away."

"What?" the miko gasped.

"It wasn't easy" the girl began to sound more like child again, "You've grown so strong, Kagome. When he attacked, he used so much of his powers that he hurt himself. That's what I did to help."

Destiny grinned acting boastful, "Naraku was so surprised he retreated with his tail between his legs, leaving everyone in shock."

Her small innocence face became stone, "He'll be back, though. Just before the next dawn he'll return, and he will hold nothing back. He'll kill all of you."

"How are we suppose to fight him, if he's so strong?" the time traveler became frantic, "You already said there was no way to defeat him."

"I never said that" Destiny grinned, "I said your friends had no way to conquer him. You, Kagome, were the one brought to the past to defeat him."

Her stomach dropped to her knees, the air in her chest leaving, "Me? How?"

The child hung her head sadly, "I have said too much already. You'll figure it out when the time comes. I'm only here to help you understand your choice for after the battle."

Kagome scowled, "My choice, on what side of the well I stay on, is more important than me figuring out how to defeat Naraku?"

The girl grinned, her green eyes laughing, "In a word, yes."

Her shoulders dropped, "You can't tell me what will happen if I choose the Feudal Era or the Future?"

"No" she replied easily.

Kagome let out a small groan, "So what now?"

Destiny smiled, a beautiful smile that lit up her face, "You will return to the Feudal Era. You will wake and it will be the dawn of that night. Naraku will arrive a few hours before the next morning, be prepared not only to fight, but also to make a choice."

"My friends" the miko jumped, suddenly thinking about the battle, "You say we will win, but will everyone make it out alright?"

Destiny cast down her eyes, "If you do not defeat Naraku quickly he could kill all of your friends."

Kagome clutched her jacket, just above her heart. Everything was riding on her. The world was giving way and she had to hold it up.

'I don't think I can do it. I'm not strong enough.'

Their eyes met one last time and Destiny softly gave her farewell, "You have one day, Kagome. Use your time wisely. If you don't make a choice by dawn the choice will be made for you. Good luck, and goodbye."

In that same moment when the child spoke that last word, a song began to drift into Kagome's ears, soft and enchanting. As her brown eyes slid close, the miko recalled it was the same song Destiny had sung the last time they met. She felt as if she was falling, almost floating as the words began to grow faint. As she heard the last syllable disappear, burning pain stabbed into her body, not a single inch overlooked in its assault. Kagome's jaw clenched, her nerves shooting off.

She let out a scream seconds before blackness pierced her.