InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Future Beginnings ❯ Ch 23: New Truths ( Chapter 23 )

Inuyasha belongs to Rumiko Takahashi

 

 

Ch: 23: New Truths

 

 

Peter and Noriko stopped by to see them on their way back to school Sunday night. They seemed to be getting along nicely, which suited Miss Kagome Matchmaker very well. She could never leave well enough alone. Inuyasha wondered who she had in mind for Jen.

 

“Your place looks very nice,” commented Noriko. The Christmas tree by the window glowed with tiny red lights but no ornaments. Inuyasha had seen only lights on the one across the street, and only lights were what his tree would have. He wouldn't listen when Kagome told him he probably just couldn't see the ornaments from a distance.

 

“Sesshomaru,” said Inuyasha in reply, much to Noriko's surprise. She hadn't thought Sesshomaru was the family type.

 

Peter was obviously excited about something. Every now and then he would look at Inuyasha as if he were about to speak, but then he would settle back down. Inuyasha figured he would talk when he was ready.

 

“Did you have a nice Thanksgiving?” Kagome asked.

 

Peter seized his chance. “Yeah, it was fine, and the next day Noriko and I went for a walk in the woods, you remember, the path we took when you were all at my house the weekend before Halloween?”

 

They nodded, looking curiously at Noriko, who blushed.

 

“I think there are youkai in my woods,” Peter continued, lowering his voice to a whisper.

 

Inuyasha's ears shot forward. Before he realized what he was doing he grabbed Peter's arm. “Tell me what happened,” he said, in an echo of Sesshomaru's words to him.

 

Peter winced, and Inuyasha let go of his arm before his nails broke through the skin. As it was, there were little gouges in Peter's shirt.

 

“Well,” he began again, “the whole path was ripped to shreds. Trees were gone—even rocks—you could drive a car through it now.”

 

“Did you see any youkai?” asked Inuyasha. He began to get a sinking feeling in his stomach.

 

“Well, no, but—“

 

“It sounds like youkai to me,” said Kagome. “Inuyasha, do you think you should go check it out?”

 

“Oh, it was youkai,” agreed Inuyasha. Of course it was. He did it. At the time, he had thought Peter would be pleased to have a wider path. How could he have known what would happen after that night?

 

“This is awful!” said Noriko. “We're being targeted just because we know about you!” She looked up quickly at Inuyasha. “Oh, I didn't mean it like that!”

 

Inuyasha knew he should tell them the truth, but he just couldn't do it. So he compromised. “I'll go take care of it. You don't have anything to worry about as long as you stay away from the woods.” That was partially true. The lesser youkai seemed for the most part to keep to the wilder places. And he would go `take care' of the problem that didn't really exist and nobody would be the wiser.

 

“I'm coming with you,” said Kagome. Well, almost nobody. He didn't have much hope of keeping a secret from Kagome. But he could delay the inevitable.

 

“I can go tomorrow after Noriko's lesson, but you have classes,” he told her.

 

Eventually Kagome agreed that it would be best for Inuyasha to go tomorrow on his own to take care of the youkai. He planned on shooting out to Peter's place, then back up north to see Mr. Rinks. He could take care of both problems at once.

 

As usual, life didn't work out as planned. After his lesson with Noriko, Inuyasha headed back to the apartment to change clothes and grab Tetsusaiga. He smelled the youkai before he got to the apartment and skidded to a halt just outside. Mr. Rinks sat in a rusty old pick-up truck waiting for Inuyasha.

 

“You!” he growled, as he yanked open the passenger door. Mr. Rinks motioned for him to get in.

 

“There are some others you should meet,” said Mr. Rinks. He started to pull away from the curb but Inuyasha put his hand on the door handle. This stupid modern world where you had to leave your sword on your desk. He needed his sword.

 

Mr. Rinks braked.

 

“Wait here,” growled Inuyasha, and he bounded up the stairs. He felt better once he had his normal clothes on again. Out on the street a little boy waited at the corner bus stop with his mother.

 

“Look!” The child pointed at Inuyasha. “It's Santa!”

 

Inuyasha stared at the little boy, who was jumping up and down excitedly. He felt his head, thinking that maybe he had forgotten to put on the red knit cap Kagome insisted he wear in the cold weather, but no, the knit cap was firmly in place. What's with that kid, he wondered.

 

Mr. Rinks drove until they reached the access road for the camp, then he turned off on a side road and parked the truck. “We go on foot from here,” he told Inuyasha, who up until this point had gone along with everything Mr. Rinks had said because he wanted answers himself. But this was too much. He refused to budge.

 

“Where are you taking me?” he wanted to know.

 

“Some of the others want to meet you,” said Mr. Rinks. “Would you rather they come knocking at your door?” he asked wryly.

 

Inuyasha was surprised. After Sesshomaru had told him that the other higher youkai of this place were solitary and uninterested in talking with him, he had thought the same would apply to him. But maybe it was just Sesshomaru they had a problem with. Inuyasha grinned at that thought. “Let's go.”

 

They headed off through the woods, climbing steadily higher. Mr. Rinks glanced at Inuyasha as he ran through the trees. “Why don't you transform?” he asked.

 

“What?”

 

“Wouldn't it be faster to travel in spirit form?”

 

At Inuyasha's look of confusion, Mr. Rinks shrugged and increased his speed to match Inuyasha's. After a moment, Inuyasha realized what Mr. Rinks had been asking, and he belatedly responded, “You forget, I am hanyou. I can't transform.”

 

It was Mr. Rinks' turn to look confused. “Why not?” he asked.

 

Inuyasha stopped suddenly and Mr. Rinks did the same. They faced each other halfway up the mountain. Inuyasha was not about to get into a conversation in the middle of the woods about his weaknesses. He actually could transform into a human and even into a full-blooded youkai at times. But because of his mixed heritage he did not have the ability to become pure spirit or take on his full animal aspect like Sesshomaru could. Didn't Mr. Rinks know what it meant to be hanyou? Maybe they didn't have such things here. Inuyasha cursed under his breath. Then he changed the topic.

 

“So where are these other youkai?” he asked. “I don't smell anyone except you out here.” As he said it, Inuyasha realized that now he could smell something. It hadn't been there a moment ago. He crouched, arms open, and growled softly. He didn't like being surprised.

 

A tall slender youkai approached from the north. She had long silvery white hair and ears like Sesshomaru's and, like Inuyasha, she wasn't dressed for the weather. Her clothing was modern—jeans and a pale yellow top—but she wore a bow slung across her back. Kagome would probably like her, thought Inuyasha.

 

“Ah, you do have the senses of your animal,” she said. “How wonderful!”

 

Inuyasha growled again, then whipped around to face the east, where another youkai now stood. This one was tall, too, and definitely shared the same fine features as Mr. Rinks and the female youkai. He smiled at Inuyasha as he looked him up and down. “And yet you live with the humans,” he said in amazement. “You don't just imitate them. It's as if you are one of them!”

 

Inuyasha growled louder and dug his hands and feet into the hard ground. What was up with these youkai? If he didn't already sense that they were comparatively weak, he might be worried. As it was, he knew he could take them. He straightened up and put his hand on Tetsusaiga's hilt. “What's this all about?” His ears swiveled as he tried to keep tabs on both youkai at once.

 

“Greetings, youkai Lord,” said the woman. “Please come sit with us and talk.” She gestured up the mountain. This time Inuyasha could sense the auras of several more higher youkai waiting for them near the top. So much for Sesshomaru's theory that they weren't organized. He followed the youkai the rest of the way up the hill.

 

The youkai stood or sat in a semi-circle at the top of the mountain. They were all fairly tall, with mostly light colored hair. They didn't look like Japanese youkai, that was certain; however, they didn't look like the other humans Inuyasha had seen here either. Enough was the same that they could blend in better than Inuyasha ever could. But if you knew what to look for, you could see that they were not truly human. They were too perfect.

 

Mr. Rinks introduced him. These youkai lived in several different areas of Inuyasha's domain. They each maintained a small piece of wilderness and put on a human façade in the community they inhabited, interacting but never too closely. They drew their power from the land, enough for themselves to go on living on the edges of human society. It was a satisfactory arrangement. They were intrigued by Inuyasha, but all the same they didn't want him to jeopardize their existence. On the other hand, they thought that he might be able to teach them to increase their power by attuning themselves more closely to the land like he had done. They saw what he had done for the lesser youkai.

 

Inuyasha raised an eyebrow. He was attuned more closely to the land? “Yeah, er, about that…” Inuyasha began. He had no idea what he had done for the lesser youkai, unless it really was his presence alone that caused them to manifest. But what was it about him that triggered such a response?

 

“We see that you are different from that other foreign youkai—Sesshomaru—who has approached some of us in the past. He is more like us.”

 

That was certainly true, in Inuyasha's estimation. These youkai were just as aloof as Sesshomaru. “Yeah, about that too,” replied Inuyasha. “Why didn't you meet with him? He only picked me to be Lord because he couldn't get anyone else to do it.”

 

“I doubt that was the full reason,” answered a youkai who appeared older than the rest, although it was hard to tell with youkai. “You have great strength.”

 

He knew that. It didn't answer the question, though. “What has strength got to do with anything?”

 

“We do not mean your physical strength, although you have that too. We are referring to your spiritual power. It radiates from you and attracts us, greater and lesser, to you. Didn't you know?”

 

“Not really.” Inuyasha knew he had grown in power over the last few years, but he had never had this kind of reaction back in his era. Maybe that was because the youkai presence was still very strong at that time. It wasn't until recent centuries that youkai all over the world had begun to dwindle, according to what Sesshomaru had told him. Hmm, he could get used to this. “You mean there's no one else who has as much power as I do?”

 

Several of the youkai glanced at each other. This was a question they preferred not to answer. “Your power is different from ours,” one of them replied. “Our power comes from the land itself, and out of it we fashion ourselves after living creatures. But your power comes not only from the land but from life itself.”

 

Sesshomaru had said something similar about his youkai power coming from both their father and the land. And of course, he was half human as well. He wondered if that made a difference. “I always thought my power was limited because I am half human.” He couldn't believe he was admitting this to these strange youkai.

 

“Aah.” Inuyasha could see heads nodding all around the semi-circle. Surely they had known he wasn't full youkai. Mr. Rinks knew it. “That is why your animal aspect is so predominant,” said the woman with the bow. “Human blood strengthens the living power you inherited from your—father? mother?—“

 

Inuyasha didn't answer. They didn't need to know that. So all this time he had thought his human blood was a weakness. Sesshomaru probably knew about it the whole time. Inuyasha growled softly until he heard the pleased exclamations of the surrounding youkai, who thought his growls were yet another sign of his, what did they call it, `animal aspect.'

 

The lesser youkai, many of whom took their forms from the surrounding wildlife, had looked upon Inuyasha as vindication of their chosen shapes. When they saw that he chose to exist solely on the material plane, they decided to do it also, which explained why there were so many more manifestations of youkai since Inuyasha made his appearance.

 

It made sense to Inuyasha when they explained it like that. He was still a little vague on the phrase `chose to exist solely on the material plane,' as that's all he was able to do. But he didn't want to correct them in case he was wrong. Maybe he could take on spirit form. Too bad he hadn't any idea how to go about it.

 

“Ok, but all your youkai aren't warm and cuddly,” Inuyasha said. “I've seen some nasty youkai that gave me almost as much trouble as the youkai from back home.”

 

Mr. Rinks picked up on that. “I hadn't realized you still had a problem with malevolent youkai in Japan.”

 

“Are you kidding?” Inuyasha started to say, before he realized that his Japan wasn't the same as modern day Japan. “Well, not anymore,” he amended. “I meant in the old days.”

 

Two of the other youkai slapped hands together in the air. “See! We were right! We could tell from your preferred clothing that you must be very old. That kind of power takes centuries, if not millenia, to develop.”

 

Inuyasha smiled. It hadn't taken quite that long for his powers to grow. Preferred clothing? He looked around the group and noticed that although many of the youkai adopted modern dress, several wore clothing that definitely belonged to other eras. He was glad that they had no inkling of how young, in youkai terms, he really was.

 

“Did something happen around here? These youkai were more than just some kid's nightmares.”

 

Mr. Rinks answered. “There is a reason I took up residence on this mountain. A few hundred years ago there was a native Indian settlement here. When the first Europeans came, there were the usual disagreements and even some bloodshed, but the tragedy was sickness. The native people all came down with a mysterious illness but not one of the European settlers got it. As the Indians began dying, the ones left behind became very bitter. Eventually they all died, and their settlement was gradually taken over by the new inhabitants of the land. It was the bitterness and misunderstanding that eventually transformed the spirit of this land and spawned the malevolent youkai. I came here to keep them under control, and until you arrived, I was succeeding. Those youkai were no more powerful than the angry thoughts they had originated from. Every summer I would make it a point to tell the story of the Indians to the new crop of campers. I thought that if the story were told often enough, it would diffuse the vengeful youkai over time. Then you showed up and, just like the animal youkai, these youkai copied you too, and became stronger.” He looked up at Inuyasha. “Then you destroyed them.”

 

Inuyasha reddened. “I didn't know,” he replied. “But I would have done the same thing even if I had known.” Several of the other youkai were nodding their agreement. “They were threatening to hurt us.”

 

Mr. Rinks sighed. “I know. I warned you that night.”

 

“Do you know some of them followed my trail?”

 

“I'm not surprised. You are an enigma to all of us, including the angry and lost ones. I trust you took care of them, too?”

 

“Yeah. I did what I had to do. But I promise you this—I will not attack unless I am provoked. And I will come around more often. If it's my presence that is agitating them, then maybe I can do something to make it better.”

 

The youkai were more than satisfied with that answer, and Inuyasha felt better now that he knew where the vengeful youkai had come from. It was time to go.

 

“What's your cell phone number?” One of the youkai asked, taking out his own phone.

 

“Cell phone? I don't have one. You can call Kagome if you need me,” replied Inuyasha, and he proceeded to give the youkai Kagome's number. She's going to kill me, he thought.

 

“So it is true, you have a human girlfriend?” Another youkai asked.

 

“Yes, I do.” said Inuyasha.

 

The older-looking youkai nodded. “He completes the circle—human, animal, spirit. He continues the path his parents began with his birth. One day, with this one's children, we shall see the world whole again, and we will no longer live in the shadows.” His words sounded like a prediction.

 

Inuyasha didn't wait for Mr. Rinks to take him home. He knew the way by now. It was getting late, so he hurried. Along the way, he thought about how to go about changing to a spirit form. It would be faster. But he still couldn't figure out how to do it. He'd have to ask Kagome what she thought.

 

When he got home, Kagome was waiting for him. “What took you so long? I was so worried! Were there youkai in Peter's woods? Are you all right?”

 

Inuyasha took Kagome into his arms. He had a lot to tell her, beginning with the truth about Peter's woods.