InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Fallen Embers - The Story behind the Kikyou Flower ❯ Death as a Human ( Chapter 2 )
[ X - Adult: No readers under 18. Contains Graphic Adult Themes/Extreme violence. ]
...If only she had said something...
"Augh..." Kikyou panted softly as she rested her body agaisnt a tree, slowly sliding to a sitting position, a hand covering her shoulder wound, the other gribing her bow tightly. Her eyes closed in a pained state, though knowing her... She would never admit to such a thing. Feeling pain.
"Kikyou... Get out of here! Your Shindamachuu..They have to--" He began to talk rapidly, even in his weak state upon Kirara's back, who had landed obediantly at the Miko's side. But Kikyou... Laughed at him? "Huh?" He shared this confusion, though in a concerned tone.
"Don't worry about me. I'm already dead, remember? The Shindamachuu won't... Can't... Pass the barrier Naraku has set up." She told him.
"Barrier? Weren't they just here?!" He asked, remembering Kikyou being saved from the fall by her Soul collecters just a few minutes ago.
"Before he disapeared... He managed to put a shouheki around me, and me alone... Thinking in my state I wouldn't be able to do anything aobut it." Kikyou formed her words in the way she did to desieve his thoughts into thinking she could get rid of it. She wanted no help from Inuyasha at this point.
"So if the barrier;s gone then were are your soul stealers!?" He slid off Kirara and into a weak crouching position. "I'll cut through that damn thing with Tetsusaiga if I have too..." He sputtered weakly, grabing the hilt of Tetsusaiga.
"You won't even be able to lift it... And I don't need your help, Inuyasha. I'll be just-- Augh..." She smirked as she winced in pain. "What perfect timeing, ne?" She coughed softly.
"I don't care I'll gladly loose my life if I can save the one I was never able to in the fi--" He was cut off by Kikyou's fingers, who softly pressed agaisnt his lips in a 'Shh' gesture.
"He plans on finishing us off while he can, despite his wounds." She told, her icy brown gaze darting to the side with a serious determinded attitude flaring over her body. Naraku, was somewhere near, waiting... Sneaking around like the spinless coward he had always been. With a sharp intake of air, the miko emitted a pinkish light from her hands, a barrier of her own as it suddenly blocked several tiny, sharp shards of somekind. After the light stoped smoke clouded their vision breifly... And Kikyou lifted an arrow from her nearly empty quiver. Damn... That took almost all of my energy, if I were to shoot another arrow, would it even cause damage? She thought to herself, then she realised..
She wasn't able to pull back her bow.
With the loss of so many souls, her artifical body had become so weak!! Could she really not even pull back the weapon she had mastered in her earily age? Inuyasha had realiused by now that Kirara had taken some of the blows of... Whatever the weapon was. Naraku was obviously trying to end this at a distance. The nekomata lay, bleeding, useless... On the ground nearby.
Kikyou's eyes suddenly darted around desperately. And it was at this time were the Miko resorted to useing up everuy ounce of spiritual power she could, and forced up another barrier for the time being, though it flickered with a sort of weakness. "Inuyasha!!" She yelled, though softly. The chocolate colored gaze finally fell apon a flower bush that had been ensnared in her force field as well. "Get me--!! Get me one of those!!" Kikyou ordered.
"One of--?" He glanced to the flowers as she did, but couldnt even reasure what he was getting before she snapped again.
"Hurry!!"
Inuyasha did the best he could to stumble to the blossems, the purple slower had 5 pedals... If you could call them that. They were attached in a way, and counted as one simply flower. His eyes slightly widened at such a casual irony. The flower... Kikyou... The Inu hanyou thought. But with another yell from Kikyou he was rushing to her side though he was nearly at his knees. The barrier flickered again... And Naraku was now in veiw, across the clearing from them, stareing vicously as he slowly approached, "claws" extended like they were at Mt. Hakurei... When he again, attempted to murder her.
Kikyou suddenly snatched the single flower Inuyasha had given her and she closed her eyes softly. The souls that were flooding from her clay body, were becoming faint, and less of them were spewing from the wound. Her eyes opened a crack, to see two souls drifting into the flower, as her prayers purified and spiritualized the naturistic object. The women placed it ontop of the arrowhead of her arrow as she gave a horrible, defeated sigh. Naraku kept advanceing, and her barrier was slowly diminishing.
"Before the barrier stops, hurry! Help me pull back my bow!!" She yelped as she placed the arrow on the bow string, her fingers moveing a bit more slow then usual. She desperately tried to do it herself, only pulling the string to a mere quarter of the way she needed it to be. Inuyasha gave a soft compelled, and sad look towards his once-lover. With a nodd he got behind her, his hand encloseing over her's, in which was wrapped around the center of the wodden part of the bow, balenceing her arrow on her knuckle. The other, did the same, though clasped around the bow string as well, pulling it back the rest of the way for her, with all the streagth he still posessed.
She knew this was it. For her at least, but if she could save Inuyasha... If she could save the one she loved...
"Kikyou...As a fellow traveling Miko, I have a word of advice..." She heard the voice of Tsubaki, that greedy dark preistess Inuyasha killed with his Back Lash Wave... "A Miko must abandon her human heart in order to achieve power." The women paused. "In the case of a woman, this applies to love as well." Kikyou remembered... She remebered replying:
"Love, you say?" With a smirk she added: "You think I would?" At that point she saw Tsubaki's eyes flash a strange red breifly... "Dont forget. You must extingush love. You must never hold a man dear. If such a man were to appear, you would suffer an untimely death..."
"Hmph... I'll remember that." She replied. But Kikyou never did remember, did she? More irony...After her and her younger sister walked away, Keade... She remebered having another conversation on this topic.
"She's a cunning person, Tsubaki that is."
"Huh?" Her innocent little sister asked.
"She placed a curse on me, but don't worry. Itis nothing to be afriad of." She had seen the slight tinge of fear in Keade's eyes as she mentioned a curse.
"Naraku!!!" Kikyou yelled as she snapped halfway back into reality. For once she got to feel what she had always wanted. Revenge. She would take Naraku's life... And she would die as well... Like she promised. She would drag him to hell.
"After all, would I actually fall in love?"
That was how the conversation ended between her and Keade. "Die!!!" Kikyou added as her fingers let go of the bow string, and as if they were one, Inuyasha did the same...Both just about at the last of their streagth, struggleing not to fall over... The Arrow which was attached to the Kikyou flower, accompaied by two souls from her body... Shot towards the hanyou, and even though his barrier was reforced, the souls and spiritual powers.. Were too much, and the shapeshifter, was eventually to be overcome, and Kikyou would have her wish for revenge... For Death... For everything... But her love... Inuyasha... Kikyou suddenly collapsed on the chest of the inu hanyou, panting softly again, clutching her wound so roughly she wondered if the clay would shatter.
"Kikyou!! Kikyou!! Wait, your Shindamachuu should be--!"
He was cut off again by her pale fingers. Inuyasha's eyes widened... For once... They were giving off the warmth of life. Normally, her fake body would be cold from death... But no. He actually could feel her body heat now. "Kik..you.." He muttered softly through her fingers.
"I..Have to make sure... He is put in the deepest--Augh... Depths of Hell.." She told him, her body flinching slightly. She smiled, for once it was a real smile, like that of being alive... "The flower..." Kikyou sputtered. "Burry it... With..."
"I understand..." He told in a sorrowed tone, now sushing her.
She smiled a bit more, weakly. And slowly rain was begining to sprinkle from the heavens... Inuyasha noticed the flower in which she had shot from the arrow, had not only disinigrated the evil hanyou... But it had absorbed the evil energy so it should never arrise again under Kikyou's protection from the grave. Yes, he understood everything.
"Angh!!" Shindamachuu sudenly came rushing towards the scene... The inu knew that she was far from salvation. Only in death could she find such a thing. "I'm sorry... I should have known... It wasn't you." She told with a smile, indirectly refering to Naraku, and the fact she had pinned him to the God Tree.
"Kik--Huh?!" Inuyasha's eyes opened widely as he suddenly felt somthing spewing from Kikyou's shoulder... Blood...? But... She was made of Earth and bones! How could she.. Bleed...
"I..." She smiled, looking to the heavens as she removed her hand from her mouth, and held his cheek. "Wanted...To die human..." The miko sputtered, and closed her eyes... For a final time.
Unless you want to suffer an untimely death
These were her last thoughts... Untimely. To never die.
Whether it was from the rain or from Inuyasha's eyes... A droplett of water slide down the Miko's cheek from above her... Not even he was sure.
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