InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Finding Kagome ❯ Finding Kagome - Prologue ( Prologue )

A/N : I do not own the characters featured in this work of fiction, they are copyrighted by Rumiko Takahashi. This work is merely a fan's musings in a 'what if' environment. Some of the characters are represented as variations on the original premise (everyone has matured, relocated, and many have cycled to another incarnation). It is my greatest hope that no one be offended, hence the ...

WARNING: MATURE THEME – Profanity, Violence, Adult situations, Sexual Innuendo and content.

With that said, I present to you, dear reader, my very first fanfic.

FINDING KAGOME




Prologue

He took her frail hand into his, trying not to let the sense of total defeat overwhelm him. He had watched her slowly slip away from him for so long now, helpless to change the course of events. And now here they were, nearing the end.

Without her he had no desire to continue. No reason to move forward. And he found himself desperately wishing to go back. Back to the beginning, rewind it all. Back to that time when they were both whole, and young, ready for adventure at every turn in the road.

But the task had been completed.

Finally.

So much had been lost, and then, so much was gained.

There could be no turning back, and he was losing her.

“I don't want to go now. It still feels... unfinished, somehow,” she whispered weakly.

“It is unfinished,” he responded horsely, angrily choking back on his grief.

Ever so gently his hand swept across her brow, to smooth away the errant wisps of her silver bangs, smoothing, soothing the lines of her forehead. A simple act, one he had performed perhaps a million times in their years together. It made her smile, and for the briefest of moments... her eyes sparkled as they had so very long ago. Kami, but he loved her so.

“I will wait for you...” and she coughed weakly, wincing with the pain.

Too weak to raise herself, he anticipated her need, adjusting pillows around her, gently lifting her up to place a plumped one behind her back.

“Don't,” he replied curtly. “It will take too damn long for me to follow you, I don't want to wait it out by myself. I am too hard to kill, and I won't use Tetsussaiga on myself. I won't do that to my father's memory.”

“Kami!” she gasped, “ I would never ask you to do that!”

Her breath had be reduced to near gasps.

“Surely... you don't mean... for me to go on... without you. I will... be so lost...”

“You will see everyone... everyone we lost... your momma, your dad... your grandfather will want a full report...” he tried to smile as a tear finally made it's way along the side of his nose, and he sniffed as his battle with grief was lost. “Don't wait for me... follow them... go on together.”

“It wont... be right... without....you...” and her eyes began to close.

“I will find you, I promise...” sobs threatened to ruin his oath. He leaned in close to her ear, as he touched her cheek, “what we have can't be broken... not by time or even death... I will find you, I promise!”

Her eyes had closed for the last time, the ragged breath had stopped.

He had one last task remaining, but he couldn't move.

Flashing memories flooded his mind, of waking from the seal to the wide eyes of this girl, watching the destruction of the Shikon no Tama, of running in the wind, searching for the fragments, learning to fight as a team, finding a sense of acceptance... family in the midst of chaos, even the last battle with Naraku and the sorrow at losing Miroku to his curse, and then watching Songo wilt and seem to fade away. It was like he had heard others say, when you die your life passes before your eyes... he felt as though the best part of him had done just that, as he sobbed like a child against her breast.

He had no idea how much time had passed, he knew he had to tell Souta. He would bury her underneath the Goshinboku, the place where they had met for the first time.

And he would bury the completed Shikon no Tama with her. He no longer desired it for his own purpose. One last trip they would take together into the well... better for it to rest in her time, than this one.

* * *

“Half-breed... what are you doing?”

“What does it look like I am doing, Jackass?”

“It appears that you are sitting in a tree...”

“Brilliant, as always,” a scowl briefly shadowed his features, then passed as his eyes following the drifting clouds.

A silence stretched, as the sound of birdsong and the rustling of leaves filled the afternoon air. Inuyasha let one foot drape as he balanced with ease on the high limb, cradling his sword, and watching the sky.

“Half-breed”

“Nani?” The response was absently preoccupied, his gaze remaining to the heavens.

“Just what is it, that you think you are doing?” Sesshoumaru spoke softly standing still as stone, only the light breeze lifting the odd stray strand of his long hair gave away that he was not some regal statue, errantly placed in the woods of Inuyasha's forest.

“You've already asked that question, baka... and answered it yourself.” He glanced down at his half brother in irritation. He he then returned his attention to the drifting clouds.

“Have you nothing better to do?” Sesshoumaru's expression didn't change, as he seemed to be frozen in time and space.

“Nope.”

“The miko is dead.”

“You're point?” Inuyasha's irritation with being disturbed was becoming apparent. He didn't need to be told, he knew this fact only too terribly well.

“This will not bring her back. She's gone now...” He paused, a momentary shadow of something crossed his stony features. “You can't believe she would want this.”

“Feh, how do you know what she would want, Jackass?”


Sesshoumaru would not flinch. Inwardly he regrouped his resolve. The hanyou could not continue like this, it was just... wrong. He had mourned when Rin had left him, surely. But it had not disabled him. It was as though Inuyasha's spirit had died along with the strange little miko.

“It's time to move on.”

“Then go”

“Time for you to move on.”

“Hn”

That fleeting shadow reappeared on Sesshoumaru's features, and he raised his voice, “You accomplish nothing from that tree limb.”

“Sure I do” Inuyasha adjusted his position, refusing to look down at his half brother. “I'm waiting.”

Another lengthy silence passed, as Sesshoumaru pondered the half-breed's response. Finding no logical basis for it, he drew slightly closer to the tree for emphasis.

“You wait for nothing, Half-breed”

“Get lost, Jackass!” Hissed Inuyasha, as he brought his leg up to sit cross-legged on the branch.

Taken aback by the hostility behind the retort, Sesshoumaru stepped back a pace. He had never seen Inuyasha like... this. The stubbornly miserable hanyou was frozen with his grief.

“As you wish... However this Sesshoumaru is not the one who is lost.”

And he walked away silently, not even disturbing the leaves on the ground. Inuyasha glanced down, and he was gone, nothing to indicate that he had even been there at all.

“Kusoyaro”

* * *

The passage of time was tediously slow, and Inuyasha occupied himself with the more mundane activities of survival. Food, shelter, occasional visits to human villages to remind himself that he was after all half human. Things hadn't changed much since the demise of Naraku, people busied themselves with their tasks, sold their wares, celebrated with festivals, warred on one another, buried their dead, had more children.

Children became a fascination for him. He would sit just outside a village and watch them play, wondering what it might have been like if he and Kagome had been able to have a family.

It was Kagome, always Kagome... his desires were for no other, and even when he was occasionally approached by fascinated young women, he found no interest in them.

Only the things they did or said that reminded him of Kagome.

His precious Kagome.

“I will find you,” became his prayer.