InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Heart of a Warrior ❯ Heart of a Warrior ( One-Shot )

[ Y - Young Adult: Not suitable for readers under 16 ]

It was supposed to be a simple favor for Gin, nothing more than a few hours of his time spent trying to save a life, and in the end, he saved three. Of all the dogs he ever adopted, Inuyasha had never met one that need him as much as Captain did.

A Purity one-shot

Anime/Manga: InuYasha Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Angst / Drama | Type: One Shot | Uploaded On: 06.06.2017 | Updated On: 02.22.2018 | Pages: 16 | Words: 35.7K | Visits: 561 | Status: Completed

AN: Heart of a Warrior is a stand-alone chapter of the coming series Child of Earth and Sea, an off-shoot of the Purity series, and set in the current time line of Charity and Ben's story. Rumiko Takahashi owns Inuyasha and all recognizable characters from the anime, all characters from the Purity universe belong to Sueric, I have simply been granted the honor of taking them out to play for a little while. This one-shot has been written with the approval of, and in collaboration with the original author, Sueric.

Heart of a Warrior

A Purity One-Shot

November 2, 2074

Bangor, Maine

There was a crispness to the air signaling the first cold snap of the winter season. Gin had said October had been warmer than usual, but today? The sky was slate grey with fat silver clouds hanging low with the promise of snow, hiding the sun from view. The wind was blowing gently, a breeze that lifted his hair, making it dance behind him as the length of it was tossed about, his long bangs blowing in every direction imaginable. The scent of evergreens and maple trees filled the air, wildflowers and damp earth calling to him with a wild abandon. His muscles fairly vibrated with the desire to run, to feel the grass and leaves beneath his bare feet, the bark of the trees in his hands as he leapt through the forest, bounding from one tall guardian to the next. The desire was so strong that he could practically taste the forest.

Instead, here he was, navigating a car into a large - mostly empty - parking lot. He lifted his hand to the controls above the rearview mirror, pressing the button to close the retractable sunroof, and listened for the click of the latch before he turned off the engine. He stepped out of the vehicle, more than a little annoyed by the shoes adorning his feet and the casual black dress pants and crimson brushed linen shirt he wore. What he wouldn't give for the freedom of being barefoot and dressed in his fire rat clothes on a day like today. Inuyasha released a heavy sigh as he pressed down on the key fob in his hand, his right ear rotating back as he listened to the beep of the car alarm securing the vehicle before he dropped the keys into his pocket.

He looked up at the building in front of him, his ears turning out to the sides, rotating as he monitored his surroundings. There was a group of human children playing in the park across the street, a couple walking down the sidewalk to his left, and he arched a brow as he only half-listened to their conversation. She was talking about wanting children, but the man walking next to her - her mate, he reasoned - was all but ignoring her. Idiot.

He grunted, narrowing his eyes as the sound of Kagome's voice rose from the shadows of his memory, his left ear flicking back in irritation.

“Gin, you know your father doesn't handle inactivity well. He's restless, just give him something to do. Surely there's something you need help with.”

The clouds parted for the briefest of seconds, just long enough to allow a single ray of sunlight through, the watery-gold beam reflecting off the polished steel letters that formed the name of the building. `New Hope Oasis'. Beneath the sign, crafted in stylized black letters that were only a quarter as large, were the words `Wounded Warrior Alliance'. All Gin had given him was a slip of paper with an address written in her careful script, and made him promise to help a dog named Captain. She hadn't told him what to expect, but then after reading the building's name, maybe she hadn't been able to.

Stuffing his hands into his pockets, his fingers curled loosely into fists to keep his claws from tearing the fabric, he stepped forward onto the concrete sidewalk. His daughter always had been a gentle spirit, and when it came to the darker subject matters, she rarely said much. She was a bit like her mother in that regard, never quite knowing what to say that could accurately prepare a person for what they might find, and so she typically didn't.

“A dog, huh?” he asked of no one as he walked beneath the covered stone awning, and reached out for the polished chrome handle on the door.

He grimaced, his ears folding flat against his head when he heard the squeak of the unlubricated hinge high on the door - too high for anyone to reach without a ladder - except maybe Bas, he allowed with a snort. The sound the door made as it closed was almost worse, the rubber inside the door guard grinding against the metal. It was akin to youkai claws on a chalkboard, he thought with a wince. His brows furrowed as he watched a woman in a white coat dash across the hall, the flat rubber soles of her shoes barely making any noise at all. He lifted his chin, his right ear rotating to the side as he listened to the conversation the woman behind the desk was having on the phone, and shook his head. He was fairly certain a heard of elephants could have come racing through and she wouldn't have noticed.

`It's not like she was talking to her boyfriend,' his youkai-voice pointed out. `Did you pay attention to what she said, what she was asking for?'

`Legs,' Inuyasha replied, a deep furrow between his brows. `What the hell kind of place is this anyway?'

Inuyasha narrowed his eyes as he stared down the hallway past the receptionist's desk. There were a few people moving back and forth, a human man in dress uniform - maybe thirty or thirty-five at most - who stepped through the open double doors of another room, and a woman in a white lab coat with unruly bright copper hair walking next to a man who was a good foot taller than she was. She was leading him, he thought with a frown as he watched them. Something was wrong though; the man's gait was unsteady and slow. He was shuffling almost like he couldn't make his own feet move, and that didn't sit well with the hanyou at all.

His eyes narrowed as he studied the woman, his gaze flicking down to her arm when she grimaced. The man she was helping to walk had a death grip on her and she was a tiny thing, barely Kagome's height, but a bit more slender. Willowy, he thought. The man tripped, his grip tightening, and Inuyasha's left ear flicked back before snapping forward at the sound of her hiss. He didn't give it any thought as he darted toward them too fast to be seen by human eyes, and caught the man, steadying him while removing his grip from the woman's arm none too gently.

“Oh!” The woman blinked at him in shock, her pale blue eye wide. “Thank you.”

“Keh! He was about to tear your damn arm off,” he told her gruffly, his brow arching when her lips twitched with barely hidden amusement.

“S-Sorry, Jemma,” the man stuttered, leaning heavily against Inuyasha for support. “I think that's all I've got for today.”

“What the hell was that anyway?” Inuyasha snapped irritably, his eyes narrowed in suspicion. “Can't move your own feet?”

The man laughed tiredly, his dark eyes shining with wry humor. “Not my feet,” he said, reaching down to pull up a pant leg.

“The fuck?” the hanyou growled as he looked at the metal prosthetic. It looked more like a cane, or a pole, with a shoe attached.

“Roadside IED,” the man said matter-of-factly. Inuyasha's brows furrowed as he stared at him blankly. “You've seen them in the news, in video games,” the man said to him, grimacing as he shifted his weight. “Those big HMMWVs - military vehicles - most people call them Humvees, the vehicles built to take a hit and keep on truckin'. Some of them have the big guns on top?” he asked, and Inuyasha's frown deepened as he nodded once slowly. “I was manning the gun,” he said slowly.

“Here?” Inuyasha asked in confusion, and the man laughed tiredly as he shook his head.

“Libya. Combat patrol.”

Inuyasha narrowed his eyes as he shook his head slowly, understanding only a little of what the man was telling him. He could feel the woman staring at him, and arched his brow as he looked at her from a sidelong glance. She nodded at him, her eyes wide with encouragement that he didn't understand.

“Keh.” He looked back at the man next to him. “You tellin' me a gun did this to you?”

“Not exactly,” he offered in return. “I was manning the gun. You have to stand on a platform in the center of the vehicle,” the man continued, releasing a ragged sigh as the hanyou returned his attention to him. “There's a uh . . . there's a metal cylinder - shield, really - that surrounds you and then you've got the gun handles with the triggers, and the armor plate that rests over the barrel of the gun. It's there to protect you from enemy fire,” he said, offering a shaky laugh, though the sound lacked any humor.

Inuyasha felt his ears fold back slowly as he clenched his jaw. He really didn't think he was going to like where this was going. The man's aura was growing darker, his scent changing as his heartbeat increased, fear overshadowing the man's once-calm demeanor.

“I'm not sure which hit first,” he confessed, his grip tightening around Inuyasha's arm as the hanyou steadied him, bearing his weight as the injured man's balance on the prosthetics he wore became precarious at best. “The ground beneath us exploded, the vehicle was tossed up on its side like it was nothing more than a matchstick car, and then there was this . . . this . . . explosion underneath us - RPG, I guess - that threw us another fifty feet or so.” He blew out a harsh breath as he shook his head, his eyes cast down to the right. “We were pitched in the air by the bomb we drove over, and then hit mid-air by a fucking grenade. You always think you'll be different, that you'll keep your head, that you won't scream. . . Everyone screams.” He released a heavy exhalation. “At first, you're in so much pain that your brain can't even process it, and then it all comes rushing at you and you just pray for . . .”

The man grew silent before shaking his head and forcing back his emotions. Inuyasha watched as he swallowed with difficulty, taking in one deep breath after another until he was finally as calm as he'd been pretending to be. He lifted a fisted hand to cover his mouth, his forced exhalation almost a cough.

“They said that I survived where the others didn't because I had that steel shield of the turret gun around me. I was with five other people, and I'm the only one who made it out.” He shrugged a moment later, whether it was because he accepted reality, or because he couldn't quite believe it, the hanyou wasn't sure. “PFC Andrew Marks, US Army,” he introduced himself with a wry grin, “or at least I was.”

Inuyasha lifted his chin as he studied the man. He survived, that was all there was to it. There was nothing that could make up for the lives lost, no pretty words that could be offered to make what he'd been through any less harrowing. He'd made it out the other side of Hell, now he just had to find a way to live with it.

Inuyasha's eyes slid to the right as he watched a man in blue scrubs step toward them, moving through the open double doors of the physical therapy wing to stop next to him. The man didn't say anything as he handed Andrew a single grey forearm crutch, nodding silently to indicate that Andrew release his hold on Inuyasha's arm. Part of him wanted to step forward, in between Andrew and the staff member, but he held his position, lifting his chin as he watched Andrew clench his jaw as he adjusted his stance, gaining his balance once more. The man in the blue scrubs motioned with his arm toward the room behind him, and Inuyasha bit back a growl as he watched Andrew grimace before shuffling slowly on his prosthetics.

“He'll be all right,” Jemma assured him, laying a gentle hand on his arm when Andrew stopped halfway to the door only to take in a shaking breath before moving once more. “It's instinct to want to protect them, to do anything and everything to take away their pain,” she said when Inuyasha turned his gaze on her, watching from his peripheral vision as Andrew made his way slowly into the therapy center, the man in scrubs keeping pace beside him, but not touching him. “But you can't,” she said. “You have to let them find their way, let them adjust and come to terms with their lives as they are now.”

“How's he adjusting?” Inuyasha asked, jerking his chin in the direction the men had left in.

Jemma sighed. “Ask anyone and they will tell you that Andy has the best attitude in this place. He's always calm, even keeled, takes everything in stride and rarely ever loses his temper. I can count on one hand the number of times I've even heard him raise his voice. He makes the others laugh, keeps them upbeat, keeps their minds off the pain with jokes, and tales, and stories.” She shook her head as she looked away. He followed the direction of her gaze, watching the subject of their conversation shuffle slowly toward a dark wheelchair. “Andy is what I call a pretender. Since his first day here, he has given it his all, acted like what happened out there was nothing. Like it was some kind of dream, or other life, or. . . In the four - almost five - months that Andy's been here, you're the only one he's talked to about what happened. Thank you for that. You helped him more than you know.”

His left ear twitched as he watched her step away, following her with his gaze as she walked into the room in front of them. The physical therapy wing was the size of two school gymnasiums, he thought as he stepped in through the double doors, his ears folding back against his head as he looked around. He had seen people hurt from battle before, sure, but this was different. Sango and Miroku had suffered bruises, broken bones, cuts from youkai claws, swords and weapons, but nothing like this. The kind of injuries he saw here - the missing limbs, the disfigurations left behind after surviving a fire - would have been fatal back in the Sengoku Jidai.

`It's not . . . that . . . bad,' his youkai-voice spoke to him, and he snorted in response.

`Not that bad?' Inuyasha snarled back. `Have you fucking looked around?'

`Yeah, they're human, but not all of them. That one over there, you see him in the back by the woman?'

`Yeah, I fucking see him, what of it? He just another . . .' Inuyasha's nose twitched as he tipped his head up and sniffed at the air. `He's a fucking badger youkai? And she,' he sniffed at her as he narrowed his eyes, `finch hanyou? I thought the bastard banned them from being in the humans' military?'

`He never banned them,' his youkai-voice reasoned with a sigh, `he just strongly discouraged it. What would happen if one of our kind got shot and killed out there? There'd be nothing but dust left behind, and whole host of questions no one could answer.'

Inuyasha's brow furrowed, his eyes narrowing to slits as he stared across the room at the youkai in question. He'd lost his hand and part of his wrist. All in all, the injury might only take him a decade or so to recover from, but it looked as though he was being fitted for a prosthetic in the meantime. He couldn't imagine the false part would be comfortable. Hell, how many different youkai limbs and fallen human limbs had Sesshoumaru tried after Inuyasha had cut off his brother's arm, before Sesshoumaru had finally given in and accepted the loss? None of those had seemed to do anything except cause him pain.

`Keh! At least youkai and hanyou will eventually heal, their limbs will grow back, but the humans?'

A spike of unfettered rage caught his attention, and Inuyasha's ears swiveled to the sides and then behind him as he searched for the source of it.

“You can't just kill him!”

The hanyou's gold eyes narrowed as he turned around, his ears moving, rotating as he followed the sound of the man's voice. His brow furrowed as his gaze came to rest on a man facing away from him in a wheelchair, the uniformed man he'd seen in the hall earlier standing in front of him.

`That one in the wheelchair?' his youkai-voice scoffed. `He's a pup. I'd eat my shoe if he's even twenty-five.'

`You don't wear shoes, and you can't eat,' Inuyasha fired back at his youkai-voice. `Kami, what the fuck happened to that pup?'

He studied what he could see of the human, the muscle in his jaw ticking as he ground his teeth together. He might have been sitting in the wheelchair, but Inuyasha couldn't see any legs hanging down from where he stood. There was barely a stump where his left arm should have been, at most maybe four inches left from the top curve of his shoulder, and his right arm had been amputated only an inch or two above his elbow. The ends of both of his arms looked to be capped by some kind of peach colored silicone cup, the tan wrappings of ace bandages holding them in place. His cinnamon-chocolate hair was uneven, the longer sections on the sides and tops were curled at the ends in a haphazard array, holding highlights of ginger-blond, but a patch at the base of his skull on the left side had been shaved, a healing scar running up from the side of his neck to the edge of his jaw.

`Kichiro could smooth that out. Whoever did it left it rather jagged, but your son could probably make that invisible.'

`Keh.'

The man's anger spiked again, the rage in his aura cutting through the air like a knife, and Inuyasha's ears folded back halfway in response. His anger didn't sit well with him, did it? After everything the pup had clearly been through, the last thing he should be was upset. Inuyasha winced as his ears flattened against his head, narrowing his eyes as he focused on the pup he was watching and tried to close himself off to the rest. Full of too many scents and sounds, he was as overwhelmed in this place as he was on an airplane, and it didn't help matters any that as an inu-hanyou he was more sensitive to all of the heightened emotions around him.

“The fuck is wrong with you? Captain saved lives out there, and now you're just going to throw him away!” the man fairly snarled, and Inuyasha growled low as he stomped toward them, unwilling or unable to let the pup fight his battle alone anymore.

“Corporal,” the uniformed man in front of him barked to get his attention. “You know the protocol.”

“Screw the protocol!” he fired back, and if he could have attacked the other man, Inuyasha was certain he would have tried.

“What the fuck's going on?” Inuyasha snarled as he came to a stop next to the quadruple amputee, his temper rising higher when he saw that the pup's legs had been cut off just above his knees. The same kind of caps and bandages that were on the ends of his arms were attached to the ends of his legs.

The man in the wheelchair looked up to meet his gaze, defiance in his stone-blue eyes as he jerked his head toward the uniformed man in front of him. “This son of a bitch wants to put Captain down,” he growled, and Inuyasha frowned, recognizing the name of the dog Gin had sent him there to save.

“Why?” he demanded, the hanyou turning his attention to the other man as he crossed his arms over his chest.

“Captain came back from war changed,” the uniformed man said with a sigh. “Most people were against him being trained for this anyway, seeing as he may look like a Belgian Milionis, but he's half Pit Bull. They were all worried he'd be too aggressive, but he turned out to be one of the best damn bomb dogs I've ever seen. That was until Corporal Dobson here, and his unit were ambushed. Seven of the thirteen men and women in his unit never came home. Mike came back like this,” he said, and nodded to the man in the wheelchair. “And Captain came back unable to trust anyone, snapping at everyone, and so terrified of loud noises that even a door being slammed can set him off.”

“Keh!” Inuyasha felt his ears fold back as the edge of his lip curled up in a barely disguised snarl. “So, you're telling me, that you'd fight for him,” he nodded to the pup next to him. “For them,” he snarled, and jerked his head to indicate the rest of the wounded warriors. “But couldn't fucking care less about the dog that saved your kami forsaken lives?!”

“It's not that simple,” the man objected, his uniform marking him as a Marine. The man's green eyes were fierce, made brighter by his short black hair and square jaw.

“It is that fucking simple!” Inuyasha fired back, taking up the Corporal's fight and staring down the man who was almost as tall as he was. “You save him,” he nodded to the man in the wheelchair, “you save the dog!”

“Thank you!” the man next to him said, the remnants of his arms lifting in response. “Finally, someone who's on my side about this. Without Captain, I never would have made it home,” he told Inuyasha, and the hanyou stared at him silently when he noticed the man's eyes changing from the stone blue they had been when he'd first stepped up to them to a darker cerulean as the anger faded from his aura. “I'm Dobby by the way,” he introduced himself. “No one calls me Corporal Dobson anymore, and the only one aside from my mother who's ever called me Mike is this blustering idiot. I'd shake your hand, but . . . “ he trailed off as he shrugged. “And the blustering idiot,” he began with an amused twitch of his lips.

“General Karl Doggert, USMC,” the uniformed man finished his own introduction, and the hanyou narrowed his eyes at the letters he'd attached to his name. Inuyasha snorted as he stared at the man's outstretched hand before shaking it. “And you are?” he asked.

“Inuyasha Izayoi,” he replied, narrowing his gaze as he sniffed at the general. He was almost certain the man smelled of youkai, but he was human.

“Mr. Izayoi - “ General Doggert began.

“Keh!” the hanyou cut him off. “Inuyasha,” he corrected, and looked down when he felt the weight of Dobby's stare. “What?”

“Any relation to Gin Zelig?” Dobby asked him, studying him through narrowed eyes.

“She's my daughter,” he offered with an arch of his brow. “How do you know her?”

“Met her about a week after they brought me here,” he said, a bittersweet smile tipping his lips up at one side. “There must have been thirty of us here that day. She looked ready to pop then, and that was a couple months ago,” he recalled, chuckling softly. “She sat with each one of us, let some of the others lean on her as they learned to walk again. By the time she got to me, she was in tears. I tried to make her laugh,” he said with a sheepish grin. “Never could stand to see a woman cry. Anyway, when I couldn't find anyone here to help me fight for Captain, to get him to a good home instead of the wrong side of a needle, I emailed her.” He chuckled again as he shook his head, his eyes opening wide for a moment in humor and disbelief. “All she said in her reply was `I won't let them say no to me.' I get the impression that she's not someone to lose a fight.”

Inuyasha's eyes brightened with pride as he lifted his chin. No, she wasn't, he thought. “Why not take him in yourself?” he asked, frowning when the man's aura darkened with regret.

“The injuries I have now, there's no longer an option for living alone, someone has to be with me,” he told Inuyasha. “It's not like these damn things will ever grow back. Right now, I'm splitting my time between the few dorms they have here, and my mom's house. She won't have a dog, any kind of dog, but she especially won't have Captain anywhere near her. She blames him for what happened to me.” He shook his head as his gaze hardened. “The first thing she said to me when I woke up in the military hospital in Germany, was that I should've let him die. Then after they brought us all home, she refused to take me to see him. But even if she would let him come home with me,” he told Inuyasha as he sighed and looked up to meet his gaze once more. “Captain won't come near me anymore. I had one of the nurses here take me to see him, and he just cowers away from me and cries. I swear, it's like he thinks the whole damn thing is his fault, and it's not. If it weren't for Captain, I never would have made it home.”

“It's the damnedest thing,” General Doggert added. “I went down there with the kid once,” he told Inuyasha. “I had two of his uniform shirts with me. One from his pack that he'd worn a few weeks prior to the ambush, and one that he's worn here after getting home. Captain is calm - sad, but calm - when he has the uniform top from before the injuries, but he cowers away from and cries at the shirt from after.”

`It makes sense,' Inuyasha's youkai-voice said. `That pup reeks of burned flesh and gunpowder. Whatever his scent was before, it's hella different now.'

Inuyasha heaved a mental sigh as he acknowledged the truth in his youkai's words. `He's just a pup,' he thought as he looked at Dobby. `If it was Captain's job to protect him, to protect their pack, and his scent changed that much, he would think he'd killed him.'

`And if Captain does believe he killed him, that he failed to protect his pack when the others died . . .' his youkai pointed out reasonably.

`Then being near Dobby, or anyone else from that pack would be torture for him. He'd be afraid that he'd hurt them all again. But it wasn't his fault!'

`Fault, or not,' his youkai-voice responded. `You and I both know that dog will blame himself, and even though Dobby doesn't blame him, that doesn't mean the others don't. Hell, how many times did we take the blame for the pain Naraku put Sango through? Maybe we didn't fail her or Kohaku . . . '

`But it sure as hell felt like we did,' he replied in understanding.

`It makes you wonder, seeing as how young that pup is, do you think he understands things any more than we did back then? One fight to the next, we were just trying to survive, to keep our pack alive, and so was that pup.'

"How old are you?" Inuyasha asked as he studied Dobby through narrowed eyes.

"I turn twenty-one in three weeks," Dobby replied, only to drop his gaze as he sighed. "Doesn't really feel like there's anything to celebrate anymore. Captain was more than just my dog, he was my friend, my brother. And if the powers that be have their way, he'll be dead by the end of the week."

"How did this," Inuyasha motioned to the man's body, "happen?"

"We were ambushed," Dobby said simply. "It happens a lot out there, but it was worse than I've ever seen. There were insurgents with RPGs and others with suicide bomb vests. I got hurt, and I saw one of them aiming at Captain." He fell silent as he recalled the incident, his emotions darkening his aura and written in the furrow of his brow, the tightness of his eyes and mouth. "I covered Captain, rolled him underneath me, and took the bullets aimed for him instead. It wasn't even something I had to think about. He was my brother in arms, he'd saved all of us so many times."

“Finding explosives,” Inuyasha said, his tone turning the words into a question as he tried to understand, and frowned when Dobby chuckled.

“So much more than that,” he denied. “Yeah, he found bombs, and weapons, and all that stuff, but uh . . . He protected all of us.”

General Doggert grunted as he shifted his stance, tucking his hands in his pockets. “Handlers and their dogs have a special bond, it's the only way they work well together.”

“It's more than that,” Dobby snapped as he glowered at the man, before turning his attention back on Inuyasha. “When we were away from base and camped out in the desert, he stayed up most of the night to keep watch over us. When one of us had nightmares out there - not that many would ever admit to it - he would curl right up next to us and make this little growling whining sound until the nightmares passed. Hell, I remember this one day, we were out on a normal patrol, everything was just routine, until we stepped down this one road. The village was abandoned as far as we knew, most of the houses and huts were nothing but rubble and burned out husks. Out of nowhere, this guy appeared with an AK-47. Before I even had time to raise my rifle, Captain had him down in the dirt. He had us from behind, he could have taken us all out, but Captain got him first. Didn't kill him or even seriously hurt him, but he saved us all that day. Every single one of us owes him our lives, a dozen times over.”

Inuyasha stood silent as he studied the man, his arms crossed over his chest. In a way, he thought, Captain had been to Dobby's pack what Kirara had been to his back in the Sengoku Jidai. Maybe their battles hadn't been quite the same, and perhaps Inuyasha's pack had more good days than bad in between the fights, but he understood. How many times had he and the others gone up against a youkai that he wasn't sure they'd be able to beat? And how many times had Kirara been the one to make up the difference even when it didn't seem like the feline did much of anything?

Dobby blinked as his gaze slipped to the side, a harsh exhalation falling from his parted lips as he shook his head. “I guess there aren't that many of us anymore. Nothing could've stopped that.” He looked up to meet Inuyasha's gaze, his cerulean gaze fierce. “I made Captain a promise that I wouldn't ever let anyone treat him like a tool or a weapon to be tossed aside. I promised him that I would make damn sure I kept him with me after the war, that I would give him the home he deserved. I can't keep good on my promise anymore, so I need you to do that for me.”

“Dobby.” Inuyasha looked up as he watched the nurse from earlier step forward, her gaze fierce and challenging. “Since when won't you take visitors? And don't tell me you can't have any, because I'm the one who decides that,” she said, and Inuyasha frowned in confusion.

“Tell her to go, Jemma,” Dobby said as he turned his head, the muscle in his jaw ticking.

“She's been here to see you every single day for the past month,” she argued. “The least you can do is tell her why you won't see her.”

“I'm no good to her like this!” he snapped, and lifted what was left of his right arm before dropping it with a heavy sigh.

“Dobby . . . “ she tried to deny him, her tone softer.

“Tell her to go,” he insisted, and Jemma nodded, before turning to look back over her shoulder at another older woman.

Inuyasha watched Jemma nod to her, the older woman's shoulders moving up and down as she sighed, her brow furrowing with frustration as she turned away. He narrowed his eyes as he looked back at Dobby, watching as Jemma grabbed the handles of his wheelchair to turn him around.

“It's time for your fitting,” she told him, wheeling Dobby away.

Inuyasha crossed his arms over his chest, releasing a deep breath as he watched Jemma push him to the front of the room and over to the right. He narrowed his eyes as he looked at the man who stood waiting for them beside a padded table, a large black plastic case sitting on top of it. His ear swiveled to the side, catching the sound of the General's sigh, and turned his head just enough to look at the man from the side as he stepped up beside him.

“Vanessa - Nessa - Beaumonte,” General Doggert offered the name. Inuyasha frowned as he arched a brow. “She's Dobby's girlfriend, or at least she was. From what I understand, they were pretty close before he left for war, they even had an apartment together, but ever since he came home he's been trying to sever ties with her.” His jaw moved to the side as he dropped his head, looking down at the floor as he crossed his arms before looking back up at the man they were discussing. “I've talked with her a few times when she's come by before. She's always so quiet, rarely makes eye contact. She really doesn't say much, and being around people seems to make her rather uncomfortable - scared even - but she makes the effort for him, and to me that says a lot.”

Inuyasha looked at the General from the corner of his eye before turning his gaze across the room once more, shaking his head in confusion as he watched Jemma remove Dobby's shirt. The man standing at the table opened the case, but he was too far away to see what was inside, and Inuyasha shook his head slightly as his frown deepened. Whatever was in the box was some kind of technology, he assessed, as he watched the man take out a tablet to tap on the screen before pressing down on the thing inside the box. He narrowed his eyes as he shifted his gaze, watching Jemma unwrap the bandage from around Dobby's left arm before gently pulling off the silicone cap.

“The fuck?” he growled as he caught sight of something shiny at the end of his amputation, the metallic sheen glinting in the bright lights of the room.

“They're experimental right now,” the General told him as Inuyasha watched Jemma step to the side, the man lifting a metallic arm from the box.

The prosthetic didn't look anything all like the others, he thought, stepping forward a few paces to get a better look. It was formed just like a normal arm, except that it was made of metal. The fingers reminded him of snakeskin, small metal scales that fit neatly together and folded over top of each other to create a seamless appearance.

In fact, the whole arm seemed to be made of that, he thought as he studied the appendage, watching as Jemma spoke with the man, helping him attach tiny filaments he was barely able to see up across the back of his shoulder blade, pressing another set of them over Dobby's pectoral muscle. He heard a distinct clipping sound as the arm was hooked into the metal pieces attached to what remained of Dobby's arm, the muffled cry of his pain drawing a low growl from the hanyou.

“Cybernetic limb replacement,” General Doggert said as he moved to stand beside him, one step in front of him as though prepared to stop Inuyasha if he tried to go to Dobby. “There's a neural interface that allows him to control the limbs the way he would his natural ones. Those little ribbons that Jemma pressed against his back and chest actually secure into his skin and fuse with the underlying muscle and nerves. They say that the initial attachment is very painful, but that the pain goes away after the brain learns to accept the new information.”

“Why is she only putting on one?” Inuyasha asked as he studied them.

“Because he has to adjust to each one of them individually. It can take a good three months before his body has fully adapted and accepted these new cybernetic prosthetics. Jemma described it as being similar to an organ transplant. They have to make sure his body and brain accepts the first one before they attach any others. In time, he will be able to have a full range of movement and use of his hands, feet, arms and legs again, but it's going to take at least a full year before he's able to move around without the help of a therapist all the time. He will still need someone to put them on him, but all of this is experimental. He agreed to do this as part of a clinical trial.”

“That's a good thing, right?” Inuyasha asked as he studied the General suspiciously.

“Maybe,” General Doggert replied at length. “It's a clinical trial, and they do need him to use the prosthetics for at least two years to truly test out their effectiveness over time.”

“But?” Inuyasha said as he sensed the man's irritation.

“But there's a good chance that at the end of those two years, they could take the prosthetics back,” he said. “A full set like he has, cost two-point-five million dollars. He doesn't have that kind of money, and using them for the trial, doesn't guarantee he gets to keep them.”

“So, at the end of it all, once he gets used to having them, they could just take them away?” Inuyasha snarled in disbelief.

“Yeah, they really could,” he said with a heavy sigh. “It's another reason why Dobson knows that he couldn't keep Captain, even if he wanted to, even if Captain was willing to be near him. If they do take those prosthetics away, there could be long lasting complications. I didn't understand all of what the doctor explained to Dobson, but I was in the room with him when they presented the trial to him. The one thing they did make clear was that during the first two weeks of attaching any of the implants, they would have to remove them at different intervals. They used a lot of intense medical terms, but what I did understand of it was that there was a greater risk of infection and rejection if they simply left the limbs attached without giving his body time to adjust.” He sighed. “That kid made it through one Hell only to come home and have to fight his way through another. It's why he keeps pushing Nessa away, he says she's better off without him.”

“K-Dog!” a man yelled from across the room, waving with a plastic arm that had a hook for a hand. “Come on, bro, I can take you now!”

“Go on, Larson, ya old coot!” General Doggert called back with humor. “Most of the kids in here aren't even thirty yet,” he told Inuyasha. “I met Gin the first day she'd stepped in here. She was here looking for one of the physical therapists, his daughter has acute lymphoblastic leukemia, she's one of the patients at the Children's Hospital Gin visits. He was in the middle of his shift helping out Brianna Copland,” he said, nodding to the side and Inuyasha followed his gaze watching a young woman brace her hands on a set of waist-high bars as she practiced walking with a prosthetic leg, “but when she saw what this place was . . . She came back every day for a month after, and just sat with each one of the kids that was here. She talked with them, treated them with respect, with honor. She did what she could to help them reconnect with their families. You have to understand, most of the kids here, they're afraid to reach out to their parents, their families, afraid of being looked at like monsters, I guess. But Gin, she took away their fear and gave them hope instead. I remember seeing her crying once when she was leaving, and then a few days later she dragged a tall blondish-bronze guy in with her. The rest, as they say, is history.”

“Keh.”

“I haven't seen her in a few weeks, though. Not too surprising, considering.”

Inuyasha narrowed his eyes as he looked at General Doggert, inwardly rolling his eyes at the nickname he'd heard others toss the man's way. K-Dog, he scoffed, and looked out ahead of them at the almost two dozen men and women going through physical therapy as those who hadn't been torn apart learned how to stand and walk again. There were others too, who were learning to use false limbs to walk again, or lift and hold things, despite the pain of their injuries. He could understand how his daughter would be drawn to come back to this place. She was too much like her mother. The same pain and confusing storm of emotions that he felt surrounding him from the patients here would be a beacon to Gin. Instead of wanting to leave, she would be motivated to help them in any way she could, to take away their pain.

“How is he recovering?” Inuyasha asked in reference to Dobby, his tone gruff. He looked at the General from the corner of his eye as he continued to watch the therapists and nurses work with the wounded. “I get how he lost his arms, I know bullets can shatter bones.”

“His legs, you mean?” General Doggert said as he crossed his arms over his chest. “It's the part of the ambush Corporal Dobson didn't tell you about. He and Captain were the best damned team I've ever seen. I didn't work with them personally, but I've reviewed their records and videos. They were sent into a village to check for illegal weapons. The place they were in, the rebels there were known for laying waste to entire towns and villages, killing women and children and anyone that wouldn't join them. They'd gotten a tip that there were insurgents hiding in the village, threatening the locals who had been helping our guys, arms dealers and such that had made that place their way station.”

“The fuckers attacked,” Inuyasha filled in with a growl.

“Yeah,” General Doggert replied, and sighed. “I thought the after-action reports were bad enough, but we got copies of the footage from the cameras attached to Dobson's helmet and the breastplate of Captain's armored vest. Everything seemed normal until Captain and Dobson entered the house that was supposed to belong to the village elder. It was too quiet, and the elder and his family were nowhere to be seen. Cracks of gunfire came from one of the back rooms, and Captain started barking like crazy. I've seen them in tougher situations and that dog always remained calm, but not this time. Dobson didn't pay attention to the warning Captain was giving, and ended up detonating a landmine that was buried into the dirt floor beneath the carpet. His legs were blown off, Captain moved to defend him when three men came out from the back hallway, and despite the pain he was in, Dobson grabbed onto Captain and rolled him beneath his body to shield him from the gunfire. That was the last thing their cameras recorded.”

“Fuck,” Inuyasha said, and the General nodded his agreement. Inuyasha frowned as something else occurred to him, and turned to look at the man beside him. “Why weren't either of you surprised when I said I was Gin's father?” he asked suspiciously, and General Doggert laughed, before covering his mouth with his fist as he coughed to calm his amusement.

“Of all the places like this,” he said to Inuyasha, his amusement tempered by the gravity of the conversation. “Why do think Gin chose this place to dedicate her time to? Why do you think she kept coming back here?”

“How the fuck am I supposed to know?” he snapped. “I only just learned about this place today.”

“PFC Garret McHenry,” he said, and nodded toward the man being taught how to use the prosthetic hand that appeared to be somewhat robotic, but nowhere near as sophisticated as Dobby's cybernetic arm. “I'm sure you noticed he's badger youkai,” he said, and Inuyasha turned his full attention on the man standing beside him. “This place serves both youkai and humans. Most of the youkai and hanyou in our ranks are special forces: MarSOC, Marine Force Recon, Navy Seals, Army Rangers and Delta Forces, and so many other teams people only hear about as rumors. I know about them because my wife is youkai.” He laughed suddenly and Inuyasha stared at him as though he'd lost his mind. “Michelle is a panther youkai. It was always a joke between us that I'm allergic to cats.”

“You're mated to a youkai, and you still do this?” Inuyasha asked fiercely, and General Doggert shook his head.

“I'm strictly stateside now,” he told Inuyasha. “I don't go out into the field much anymore. Benefits and annoyances of being in the top command level. I was MarSOC before I was this,” he said, and Inuyasha frowned in confusion. “Marine Special Operations Command,” he clarified. “MarSOC. You know,” he laughed, “one of the more amusing assignments I had was guarding this punk of a rocker on a SO tour a few years back. Zel Roka, of all people. Someone needed to slap a leash on him, and the powers that be decided that I was going to be that leash. I don't know how many times I caught him trying to sneak out. Idiot was in the middle of a war zone and he was still trying to go off on his own.”

“Keh!” Inuyasha scoffed. “That pup never has had much sense. I blame his father.”

General Doggert laughed as he nodded. “I learned early on that the only way to keep him safe was to give him something to do. I sparred with him more than once in hand to hand combat - he's good, damn good - and a few of the men stationed there sparred with him, too. Those kids loved every moment of it, too. Zel told me that his `Old Gramps, Inuyasha' taught him how to fight. He danced around half the time like some drunk ballerina, but when he did focus on the fight, he impressed the hell out of me,” he said with respect and approval. “And after meeting you, and learning that you're the one who taught him to fight,” he said, shaking his head as his voice trailed off. “If it were up to me, I'd hire you on the spot and send you down to Quantico as the ACTI. The one they have now is a joke.”

“AC-what?” Inuyasha asked, and the General shook his head.

“I keep forgetting you're not military. You carry yourself like you are,” he said. “ACTI - Advanced Combat Training Instructor. They're the ones who teach the special forces how to fight.”

“That explains you,” Inuyasha said with an arch of his brow. “What about the pup?”

“His sister, Gwen, is married to a wolf youkai. I met Morgan once when he was talking with Dobby on a video call, and he told me his father is a retired hunter. He didn't say which one, and I didn't ask, but I did tell him to let the `Big Dog on Campus', as he likes to say, know that if he ever needs help with the human side of things, that I and a few retired Navy SEALS would be willing to lend a hand.” He frowned as he tilted his head, the expression on his face rather curious. “You know, come to think of it, I don't think he ever told Dobson what it meant to be a hunter. Michelle explained it all to me, but I remember Dobson didn't seem to take it that seriously.”

“Human side?” Inuyasha asked with confusion, interrupting the man's musing.

“I was at a bar a few years back with a few friends retired from the service, and I watched as these five guys took another outside. Ever since Michelle marked me, I've been able to see past the concealments. I knew the kid they were ganging up on was youkai, not sure what kind, but I followed them outside. The second they started to beat up on him, I went in to defend him. My boys joined me. Michelle was pissed off, but proud, an odd combination on any woman,” he said with amusement, his gaze drifting over toward the doors. “Damnit,” he cursed, sighing heavily as his humor died away.

Inuyasha followed his gaze, his brows drawing together in a deep furrow as he studied the young woman who entered the room. She was youkai, he could tell that easily, but there was something off about her that he couldn't quite define. Her back was turned to him, the sweater she wore falling down over her hands. He narrowed his eyes as he focused on her and shook his head in confusion. She felt like an earth youkai, but when he sniffed at the air to catch her scent, his nose told him she was something else.

“Who is she?” the hanyou asked as he continued to study her, watching as she moved slowly.

She seemed to have to concentrate on walking, he thought with a frown. She was turned to the side, the length of her dark cherry wood hair hiding her face from view. His ear flicked in irritation as he tried to reach out to her, brushing his youki against hers only to watch as she startled, jumping back as she looked around her with wide eyes. He growled low when he felt her pull her youki in, strangling her own power, and winced at the way he had to concentrate just to feel her presence. The scent of her fear struck him as she spun toward the doors, looking ready to run, only to still. She stood stiffly for a moment before turning back around, crossing her arms tightly over her chest as she forced herself to stay and look around the room once more.

`What the hell was that?' his youkai-voice demanded.

Inuyasha narrowed his eyes. He didn't have an answer to that question any more than his youkai did.

“Vanessa - Nessa,” General Doggert answered with a heavy sigh. “Poor thing's scared of her own shadow, but she still comes here every day trying to see him, and every day,” he said, shaking his head when another staff member stepped toward her to lead her away, “Dobson sends her away.”

“That's Dobby's girlfriend?” Inuyasha snarled as he watched Vanessa lift a gloved hand to push her hair back behind her ear, cursing at sharp angles of her cheeks, her sunken eyes. She'd hidden what she could behind makeup, but there was no hiding the scent of her depleting youki. “Are you fucking kidding me?”

“What are you so upset about?” he asked with a shake of his head. “She's just a girl,” General Doggert said with confusion.

“She ain't fucking human, she's youkai,” the hanyou snapped, the edge of his lip curling up in a snarl.

“Well yeah,” General Doggert agreed with confusion, and Inuyasha bit back a growl.

“Look at her!” he snapped, raising his arm in her direction.

“Yeah, okay, she looks tired,” he admitted, and shook his head as he shrugged in confusion. “Maybe she could use a hamburger . . . or five.”

“Your mate ever tell you what happens when one mate rejects the other?” Inuyasha snapped, and moved to intercept the young woman as she was being led away.

~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~

A low whine came from her as she opened her eyes slowly, blinking in confusion under the overcast shadows of the day, and tipped her head back against the tree she was sitting at the base of. Had she fallen asleep on her way to see Dobby, or had she not made it home last night? She couldn't recall. Vanessa groaned as she rolled to her side, panting as she braced her gloved hands on the hard ground and levered herself upright. It took more energy than she thought she had just to stand up and brush the leaves and dirt from the back of her denim pants. She leaned to the side, her hip and shoulder against the tree with one hand braced against the trunk, as she felt what little energy she had leave her slowly. She had been so cold just a moment ago, but she couldn't feel it anymore, she thought, her brow furrowing as her eyes fell closed, the world around her fading away.

The distant sound of half-dry rubber scrapping again cold steel roused her, her brows drawing together and lips pursing in a grimace as she rubbed her ear against her shoulder at the sharpness of the noise. The breeze blew past her, the cold wind infiltrating the loose weave of the sweater she wore, her indrawn breath hissing as the air passed through her teeth.

She groaned as she pushed away from the tree, hugging herself and rubbing her arms against the cold temperature that only seemed to fall further with each breath she took, whishing she could separate herself from the cold as she had been just a moment ago. But the peacefulness of oblivion only came when she was on the edges of sleep, her mind too sluggish and slow to process anything. She was awake now, and with consciousness came the reality of pain. It hurt to breathe in the air, she thought, wincing at the way it burned against her sinuses and the back of her throat, only to freeze her from the inside out as it filled her lungs.

She couldn't do this again, Vanessa realized as she stepped out of the tree line across the street, and shuffled her way to the corner to wait for the light. Today would be the last time she came here to see Dobby, and maybe - just maybe - he would let her close enough to say goodbye. She really wasn't sure what was happening to her, but she did know that once she made her way home and was able to climb beneath the warmth of the blankets covering the bed she'd once shared with him, there would be no coming back. At least, not for her.

Her brow furrowed when she thought she heard a familiar voice whispering to her, encouraging her to keep moving, and shook her head, unable to make sense of the warmth that suddenly wrapped around her. She thought she was moving, but couldn't be sure, the fog surrounding her mind almost complete in its devastation. Her toe caught against the lip of the curb, her brow furrowing as she tripped only to catch herself mid-stride as she lifted a shaking hand to rub her gloved fingertips against her brow. No one was with her, she noted as she looked back across the street behind her, frowning at the realization that there weren't even any cars on the road.

But someone had been with her. The warmth of an arm wrapped around her, the feel of a strong body walking next to her, supporting her, the voice that had sounded achingly familiar. Her brow furrowed at the scent of her father that hung in the air around her, Vanessa dismissing the possibility that he had been there at all as she told herself it was just a similar scent. But when she looked back across the street and to either side, there was no one to be found. She hadn't walked across the street alone . . . had she? Was her mind playing tricks on her again, telling her that someone or something was there when, in fact, she'd been alone the whole time?

Vanessa bowed her head as she wrapped her arms around herself, turning to look at the building behind her as she felt the sting of tears behind her eyes. She could feel her energy waning, knew that she didn't have much time left before her body would demand she sleep, and in that same moment, she knew she wouldn't be waking up again. One last time, she thought as she pursed her lips, swallowing thickly as she tried to stave off her tears. If she could just get close enough to see him, to hear his voice . . . She had to at least try, and then - and only then - could she lie down to sleep.

`Keep moving, sweetie,' her youkai-voice called to her tiredly, the sound of the voice so much like her mother's, encouraging her to walk even when the task felt impossible. `Just a few more steps and you'll be at the door. It's not so far away.'

She thought she nodded as she winced, scrunching up her shoulders as she braced herself against the cold breeze that swept around her, turning faster as it circled behind her. It took effort to lift her hand to the loose knot at the nape of her neck, pulling the cloth covered elastic free and letting her hair fall down around her in an effort to keep warm. She reached out when she was close enough, wrapped her hand around the door handle and winced at the cold that bit through the polyester lined faux-leather that covered her palm.

Vanessa gritted her teeth as she braced her feet against the ground, pulling on the door and winced painfully at the sound of its abrasive squeal, the hinges protesting the movement. She gritted her teeth as she opened it wider, wondering when the door had gotten so heavy. A rush of warm air blew over her as she stepped inside, the brine of sweat and waxy-powder smell of makeup greeting her. The same receptionist who usually stopped her was busy on the phone, her artificial nails clicking against the computer's keyboard, the woman's distraction giving her the opening she needed to slip past her desk unnoticed.

For once, Dobby was in the physical therapy wing, the pull of his aura drawing her closer. She didn't have to wait for someone to call down to his room, or to let her know where she could find him. Even if he refused to see her, she might still be able to see him, no matter how far the distance between them was. Just a few minutes more, she told herself, shivering as a chill coursed through her and shuffled slowly in through the open double doors, each step slower than the last.

`Left,' her youkai-voice told her, the single word making no sense to her as she ducked her head, her hair falling forward to cover her face.

`Left?' she repeated with confusion.

`Left,' her youkai said again, sounding just as tired as she was.

Vanessa narrowed her eyes as she focused on where she was, turning slowly to her left and looking across the room. She could feel his aura, at least, she thought she could, but she couldn't see him. She couldn't smell him, either, she realized. She felt like she was rocking back and forth, but nothing appeared to be moving. She shook her head slightly, blinking slowly as she fought to stay awake, the sounds around her coming at a distance. She frowned as she tried to focus past the overwhelming scent of the other humans in attendance, their presence only serving to discomfort her as they seemed to close in around her, and felt her already sluggish mind begin to falter.

She exhaled slowly, her eyes falling closed as she breathed in, gathering what little focus she could muster to search for Dobby's scent. Her brows furrowed as she squeezed her closed eyes tightly, the corners of her lips pinched and turned down as she whimpered silently. He was there, but it wasn't his scent, not the scent she remembered, the darkness and smoke that blanketed the once-familiar scent bringing her pain as she lifted one hand to her throat.

`Ness,' her youkai-voice called out to her almost desperately, breaking her from her concentration. `You need to go. Get out of here.'

`But . . .I just found him,' she protested weakly, unable to understand why her youkai wanted her to leave.

`Vanessa!' the voice shouted at her, but the warning came too late.

Vanessa gasped as the weight of another youki brushed against her, the power of it stronger than anything she'd felt before. She jumped as she spun, searching for the source of it as she pulled her youki in, coiling it as close as possible around herself as she scanned the room with wide eyes. She'd been here several times before and not once had she felt another youkai reach out to her like that. The finch hanyou on staff was content to leave her alone, to ignore her very existence, and in a way, she appreciated that, but the youkai who reached out to her now was focused solely on her. Whoever was there was strong - dangerous - and she whirled around, lurching toward the door, only to choke back a whimper as she squeezed her eyes closed.

Dobby. She couldn't leave him, not when she'd just found him. She couldn't be that weak. As scared as she was, and as much as she wanted to run, she couldn't. Dobby was more important, he had to be. She clenched her jaw as she forced herself to turn around, crossing her arms over her chest tightly as she fought for a safety she didn't feel, and made her best effort to ignore the other youkai as she focused on searching for Dobby instead.

A heavy sigh caught her attention and she looked up, catching the apologetic gaze of one of the orderlies she had spoken with a few times before, watching the human man move toward her. Her brows pulled together as she narrowed her eyes, scrunching up her shoulders as her gaze fell to the floor. She knew what his look meant, she thought, feeling the sting of tears behind her eyes as Corey wrapped his arm around her shoulders and guided her toward the doors. Dobby knew she was there, and he had asked them to make her leave.

“Would you . . .” She coughed delicately as she tried to clear her throat, and looked up at the man beside her. “Would you tell him I won't come back, and that I'm sorry,” she asked of him, her voice a hoarse whisper, and watched him nod slowly.

“Eat something for me, okay?” he asked in return as they stepped through the open double doors into the hall. “You're starting to look like one of those runway models, and not in a good way,” he told her, and she offered him a shaking nod in return. “You want me to call you a cab?”

“Keh! Don't bother!”

Vanessa gasped at the almost-angry sound of the voice behind them. The feel of the man standing behind her was the same as the youki that had brushed over her earlier, and she pulled her youki in tighter in an effort to get away. She didn't understand why he had followed her, but a lifetime of experience had taught her that the only course of action now was to run. So, why did she spin around to face him instead?

Ears? she thought as she blinked slowly, distracted by the white fuzzy triangles sitting on top of his head. Why was that familiar? Why did someone she didn't even know make her feel safe, the same way her father once had? Who was he?

She thought he said something, watched his lips move, but couldn't hear him over the low buzzing around her and closed her eyes. He caught her by the arm when she nearly lost her footing, her eyes opening as she frowned, almost certain that he'd shook her, but unable to remember it clearly. He held her arm for a moment longer, the hanyou wincing as he made certain she had her balance before releasing his hold on her.

`Why aren't you running?' her youkai-voice hissed at her.

`I don't know,' she offered in trembling whisper. `I don't know.'

“Don't even think about it,” he said when her eyes flicked toward the building's exit in the distance behind her. “Get back in there and talk with him,” he demanded.

Dobby? she thought, her brow furrowing in confusion. He wanted her to . . . Vanessa closed her eyes as she lowered chin, shook her head.

“It's not that simple,” she said as she looked back up to meet his gaze. “It'll be all right.”

He narrowed his eyes as he studied her, the fierceness of his gaze making her nervous. “Come on.”

~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~

Inuyasha narrowed his eyes as he watched the girl behind the counter drop the tea bag into the thick earthenware mug of boiling water, covering it with a saucer in order to steep it without losing any of the heat. The thickness and design of the mug reminded him of the ones Griffin had made, he thought, his gaze slipping back to the wooden rack sitting on the back counter where all the other mugs were hung. He arched a brow as he looked at the sign above the mug rack, the name of a local arts college painted in stylized letters. He nodded his thanks when she handed him a bottle of water, the hanyou making short work of snapping open the seal to take a drink, and handed his credit card to the girl as he screwed the cap back on. For all the fear that had darkened Vanessa's aura, she had come with him willingly, though a part of him wondered if she had even been aware of it.

His ear flicked back as he looked around the small coffee shop, catching sight of the table in the corner that was open, and another by the window. It was warmer in here, the heat making the small dining area cozy, and he gritted his teeth against the irritation of having to go back outside. The cold didn't bother him, he barely noticed the change in temperature, but that girl out there was barely more than skin and bones and in her weakened state the last thing she needed was to be out in this weather, the dampness in the air making it almost bitterly cold.

`You tried,' his youkai-voice reminded him. `She was too damn scared to even set foot inside here. But that girl making her tea, she said Vanessa comes here every now and then, but always stays outside.'

His lips parted as he sighed and reached for the large handcrafted mug of jasmine oolong, steam rising from the surface of the fragrant tea. Opening the door with the same hand that held his bottle of water, Inuyasha stepped outside the coffee shop, closing his eyes against the blast of cold air that hit him full on, his ears folding back against his head to avoid the frigid wind.

General Doggert hadn't been exaggerating, he thought as he turned to make his way around to the side patio. Vanessa really was scared of just about everything. She was nervous, but almost comfortable around humans, so long as there were only a few near her, but him and the youkai patient that had walked out as they were leaving? She was terrified of her own kind, enough that it even put him on edge. It was completely unnatural, he thought.

He bit back a growl as he looked across the tables, the patio almost deserted save for one human woman and from the way she kept glancing at her watch, he suspected she was waiting for someone. Just as he was beginning to suspect that Vanessa had taken off on her own, he caught sight of her mane of dark cherry wood hair. The table she had chosen was tucked away in the back corner, the only one that was under the thick cover of the aspen tree, the branches carefully trimmed back to provide shade without being intrusive.

“Damnit!” he cursed, hurrying to her when he noticed that she wasn't actually sitting up.

Her arms were folded together on top of the table in front of her, her cheek resting on her forearm, her face turned toward him. Her eyes were closed, the pallor of her skin just a little bit more ashen than it had been when he'd left her only moments ago, and the closer he got, the more he noticed how slow and shallow her breathing was.

She offered a broken whimper when he clacked the mug down on the table, the sound rousing her as the hot liquid inside splashed over his hand. He didn't care. She hadn't opened her eyes, he thought with a frustrated growl, his brows drawn together as he set his bottle down on the table only for it to topple onto its side and roll toward the edge. The thin lip of the table was the only thing that kept it from falling to the ground, not that he noticed, as he crouched next to her chair, shaking her as roughly as he dared in an effort to wake her.

“. . . Papa?” she mumbled, her eyes barely open, her breath coming in short near-silent pants as though the very act of being awake was exhausting.

“Keh! Inuyasha,” he corrected her as he stood, taking his seat across from her as he watched her sit up. “I told you not to fall asleep,” he reminded her gruffly.

She whined, but didn't offer anything in return as she sat back heavily against the metal chair and rubbed her hands over her face. He narrowed his eyes at the gloves she wore. There was something about the gloves he didn't like, he just didn't know what it was. A terse half-growl spilled from his throat, his ear flicking back in irritation when he looked back up at her face only to find her sitting with her eyes closed. He reached across the table, shook her arm to rouse her, and watched her blink rapidly when her hands fell into her lap.

“Stay. Awake,” he commanded her fiercely, the muscle in his jaw ticking when she nodded, the movement barely perceptible. “Drink it,” he ordered as he moved the mug of tea closer to her.

She lifted her hands to the table, wrapping her palms around the mug and interlacing her fingers as she huddled over the steaming beverage as though trying to borrow its warmth.

“Why did you bring me here?” she asked, her voice thready and weak.

“To figure out what the fuck happened,” he told her, narrowing his eyes when she stared at him through the fringe of her lashes, her brow furrowed and lips pouted in confusion. “You're dying, if you hadn't noticed.”

He narrowed his eyes when she offered him an exhausted smile, the expression barely more than an upward tilt at the corners of her mouth. “Yeah, I kind of figured that out,” she said, nodding slowly as she looked down at her tea.

“Figured it out?” he repeated, his ears folding back before springing forward. “You tellin' me your old man didn't tell you about this?” he demanded, snarling when she shook her head. “Why the fuck not?”

“Never really came up, I guess,” she told him with a shrug, coughing as she sipped at the tea. “You don't need to worry, you know,” she said, and he frowned. “Dobby will be fine.”

He couldn't silence the low growl that rolled in the back of his throat, his eyes narrowing to slits. Toga had said the same thing once about Sierra, and he'd wanted to thump his nephew then. He wanted to beat some sense into the youkai sitting across from him now and her mate, too, but neither one of them looked like they could take any kind of hit at all.

Vanessa was only a hair's breadth away from where Gin had been when he'd found her in her bed all those years ago, and the image of his daughter that had long since burned itself into his brain played in agonizing detail in his mind's eye now. He had moved heaven and earth to help Gin, to do whatever he had to do, including swallowing his own pride. From what he'd been told by General Doggert, Vanessa had been slowly wasting away in front of everyone's eyes and not one person had done a damned thing to stop it. It pissed him off beyond description that no one had intervened on Vanessa's behalf before it got to this point. The badger youkai had been wounded, and maybe he hadn't noticed, but the finch hanyou that was part of the staff hadn't done a damn thing, either. She hadn't even seemed to care.

`Maybe she didn't know. Not everyone has experience with this like you do. Toga and Sierra. Gin and Cain. To an extent, even Sami and Kurt.'

`Keh! Don't get me started on that baka! Someone should have fucking done something before it got to this point!'

“And what about you?” he returned, his temper rising as memories he'd rather not think about played in sharp relief in his mind's eye.

“What about me?” she asked a few moments later.

Inuyasha stilled as he stared at her. “What the fuck do you mean `what about you'?” he snapped. “You're dying, you idiot! What does your family think about all of this?”

She laughed softly, shaking her head slowly as her hair fell over her shoulder, burnt honey and sorrel highlights showing through the mahogany strands. “I don't have any family,” she told him softly, blinking slowly as she met his gaze. “My parents died a few years ago. Dobby's all I have - had,” she corrected herself as she looked down.

“Aunts, uncles, grandparents?” he demanded as he stared at her, desperate for anyone who might be able to care for her, his hand tightening around the bottle of water he held, the plastic crackling as it protested his grip. Vanessa shook her head slightly as she lifted her right arm, propping her elbow on the table, as she moved to lean her temple against her hand. “Don't fucking fall asleep!”

She whimpered as she dropped her hand, blinking slowly as she turned her eyes down to the mug in front of her. He watched as she lifted it to her lips, drinking slowly as the mug shook in her hold. His hand shot across the table, catching the heavy earthenware cup when it slipped from her grasp, her hands too weak to hold it, and set it down on the table as he stared at her.

“Your family,” he reminded her fiercely, and she shook her head.

“There isn't anyone. It was just us. I'm not . . . we weren't . . . my family was . . . different,” she said, pausing as though she didn't know what she wanted to say.

“Keh! Like I didn't already know. Damn! What the hell kind of youkai are you anyway? You feel like earth, but you don't smell like it,” he said, and frowned when she shrugged.

“Papa always said I was a perfect fusion of him and Mama. According to my parents,” she said slowly. “I was their miracle baby. According to the few other youkai I've met over the years, I'm an abomination.”

“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?” he snarled. How the hell could she call herself an abomination?

“My father was like me, but he could separate his powers. When it was needed, when he had to . . . prove himself . . . he could pass for a normal earth youkai, but I've never been able to. I'm . . . “ She fell silent, shook her head as though to dismiss whatever she had intended to say, grimacing as she swallowed thickly. “Mama was . . . she was Kujira - shachi,” she said, the last word whispered, and Inuyasha narrowed his eyes. Kujira were myth, or so he'd always been told. Even back in the Sengoku Jidai, he'd never met one, or ever heard of one as actually being anything but a story. “I'm not one or the other. I . . . They were always in danger because of me.”

He narrowed his eyes when she failed to continue. “Your father's family?” he demanded, his temper spiking again as he prayed to the kami that she wasn't as alone as she appeared to be.

“Papa never talked about them. The only thing he ever really said was that his father claimed he was defective,” she offered, her voice hoarse. He watched her throat move as she swallowed, grimacing as though the action caused her pain. “He always looked really sad and hurt whenever I asked about his childhood, so I stopped asking. Mama . . . “ She sighed, shaking her head as she looked down at the table before meeting his gaze once more. “Mama gave up everything for us. She told me once that Kujira - all Kujira - are born, and live and die in the water. They know how to take on a humanoid form, but rarely ever do. Mama's family disowned her when she chose to live on land, in a humanoid form instead of her true form, but even if I knew how to contact them . . .” Her voice trailed off as her eyes fell closed.

“Damnit, pup! Don't fucking fall asleep,” he snapped when she remained silent, her eyes opening slowly, and the tired laugh she answered him with was full of grief.

“I used to tell Mama I wanted to find her family. I wanted to meet them, swim with them like she'd always talked about, and she always looked so scared. She made me promise never to look for them, and when I asked why . . . Mama said they don't abide mixing of the blood.” She panted softly as she closed her eyes, and he counted the seconds until she opened them again. “Kujira only mate Kujira. Anything else is discarded.”

The way she spoke about her family, the things she'd revealed, it sounded as if she'd never spoken of it with anyone. So why was she telling him now? “Pup,” he called to her sharply, and waited for her to meet his gaze. “My imagination, or are you tellin' me family secrets?” He narrowed his eyes when she offered him a melancholy grin. “Why?” he demanded.

“You said it yourself,” she reminded him, her voice scratchy and weak. “I'm dying. So, what does it matter anymore?” she asked, and Inuyasha growled low as he stared at her belligerently. “It's okay.”

“The fuck it's okay! Why are you accepting this?” he demanded.

“Why are you so upset?” she returned with confusion. “You don't even know me. I'm nothing. There's no one I'm leaving behind.”

“Keh! You're leaving your fucking mate behind!”

“Dobby's human,” she reminded him as though it answered everything. “He'll move on and find someone else. In time, I'll be nothing more than a faded memory. He'll be fine.”

He wanted to shake her until her teeth rattled, wanted to make her fight; but the more he watched her, talked with her, the more he came to realize that she truly believed she had nothing at all to fight for. Was this how Gin had felt, he wondered.

“How did you survive him being out at war?” he asked, changing tactics, his brows drawn together in a deep furrow.

Vanessa shrugged. “He promised to come home,” she said, her voice barely audible. The breath she drew in rattled, her lips trembling even as he watched her try to push back her emotions. “And I wrote to him every day, little things, just something to remind myself that he was coming back. It was hard, and I got sick sometimes, but . . . I held onto his promise . . . Stupid.”

She shook her head as she looked down at her tea, studied the thick earthenware mug, and he realized absently that she didn't believe she could lift it without dropping it. He pinned her with a look, silently daring her to fall asleep, as he stood from the table and made his way back into the coffee shop. He returned a few minutes later with a paper cup and a straw, pouring her tea into it before setting the empty mug aside. She nodded her thanks as she lifted the lighter cup, slipped the thin straw between her dry lips, and sipped at the liquid inside before setting it down once more.

“Dobby and I have an apartment together,” she told him. “. . . Had . . . I guess it's just mine now,” she said with confusion as she lifted a shaking hand to rub her fingertips over her brow. “We lived together for the year before he left for the Marines.” She offered a breathy laugh when he sniffed at her. “We never - we didn't - Dobby's parents got married because of an unplanned pregnancy. He told me he never wanted that to happen to us. He said he never wanted either one of us to feel trapped.” She looked down as she took in a deep breath. “Each moment we spent together, I felt closer to him, and it got to a point where before he left, we didn't even need words to talk to each other. We knew what the other was thinking . . . feeling . . . Being with him was . . . as natural as breathing.”

“You never told him,” he said with certainty, and watched as she gave a tremulous smile before looking down.

“Papa always stressed that I couldn't tell humans about us, but even if he hadn't . . . What I am . . . How do I even begin to explain that? I'm not like other youkai, I'm . . . “ Her voice trailed off as she turned her gaze up to meet his, looking to him as though he held the answer, and he narrowed his eyes in response. “His mom . . . She never wanted anything to do with me, but . . . After he left for war, she was . . . I don't know, she was nice to me, but she's different now. She didn't tell me he was home. I didn't even know he was back until I saw the center featured on the news and Dobby was in the video. I didn't even know he'd been hurt. She hates me now and I don't know why. Dobby, he . . . “ She trailed off as she lowered her chin, shook her head. The scent of her tears stung his nose as she pushed her chair back and moved to stand. “I should go.”

“Keh! The fuck you should,” he snapped belligerently. “Sit down,” he commanded.

“I'm okay,” she told him again, panting softly as she pushed herself to her feet. Inuyasha stood as well, moving to catch her under his arm when she lost her footing. “I just want to go see Captain,” she whispered as she leaned against him, and he winced at the bones he could feel beneath her clothing. “I just want to say goodbye to him.”

“You ain't fucking sayin' goodbye to anyone,” he snarled at her. “Not if I have any say in it. You know where he is?” he asked, cursing under his breath when she offered an affirmative hum, her eyes closing as she fell limp in his hold. “Damnit!” He jostled her until she opened her eyes, hating the discomfort he knew he was bringing her, but refusing to let her fall asleep. “I'll take you to see him, but you gotta fucking stay awake,” he demanded as he led her toward his car.

There was a four-inch rise in the concrete around the patio, a separation between the coffee shop and the sidewalk, and he knew she wouldn't be able to clear it on her own. Inuyasha tightened his arm around her, growling softly to soothe her when she whimpered at his hold, and lifted her up just enough to help her over the lip and onto the sidewalk. He gritted his teeth as he jostled her, doing his best to keep her awake as she grew heavy against his side. Stopping beside the passenger door of his car, he withdrew the key fob from his pocket and pressed down on the unlock button before reaching out to open the door.

He turned his head to look at Vanessa when she didn't move away from him, and cursed when he found her eyes closed. He was losing her, he thought desperately; his ears folding back against his head as memories of Gin flared to life in his mind, haunting him as the pain and helplessness he'd felt back then burned through him now as fresh as it had so many years ago. Gin had him, her mother, her entire family as far as it reached, but this girl had no one, and he would be damned if he let her die when there was something he could do to save her instead.

“Stay. Awake,” he growled at her, jostling her as he lifted her into his arms and lowered her to the passenger seat, reaching over inside her to secure the safety belt around her.

He rounded the car, slipping in behind the wheel, only to snarl when he found her sitting with her eyes closed. He shook her shoulder to rouse her, demanded she stay awake, and clenched his jaw as he reached for the environmental controls as he started the car. It was cold enough as it was outside, but he needed her to stay awake, he thought as he turned on the A/C as cold as it would go, clenching his jaw when she whimpered and wrapped her arms around herself.

“Tell me about Captain,” he demanded as he backed out of the parking space and drove out to the street.

“He was always really sweet,” Vanessa told him softly. “When Dobby would come home between assignments, he would leave Captain with me. Captain would always curl up next to me, sleep in the bed with me. Sometimes - not always, but sometimes - I would wake up and Dobby would be there, too. It's funny,” she said, coughing delicately as she shivered. “Dobby never really liked his mom before he left for training, but every time he came home after his first deployment, he would go see her, even stay with her. I didn't get to see him very much.”

“He didn't come see you?” Inuyasha demanded, confused as to why the pup wouldn't want to see her, and glanced at Vanessa when she shook her head. “Why the fuck not?”

“He always said that I looked tired,” she told him, looking down at her hands as she toyed with the gloves she wore. “He always promised to come by later, telling me I should rest, but all I ever did back then was sleep. In the past two years, the only time I saw him was when he was dropping off or picking up Captain. I knew he didn't get much time, and his mom is the only family he has. Well, the only family he's in touch with. He talked about his sister once, but I've never met her. They had a falling out, I guess.”

“Captain,” he reminded her, his hands tightening around the steering wheel.

She nodded slowly, biting her lip as she reached for the dials on the console. He watched from the corner of his eye as she turned the temperature from cold to halfway into the red. Her brows furrowed as she closed her eyes, tugging at her glove only to hiss as she halted her movements.

“What's wrong?” Inuyasha asked as he pulled to a stop at a traffic light. “Pup?” he called to her when she didn't answer.

“It's nothing, the lining just got caught. I'll take them off later,” she said, tugging the glove back into place as she rubbed her lips together. “Captain,” she began, taking in a deep breath as she nodded. “I've gone to see him every day since I found out they were back. There's a guy down at the kennel where they keep the dogs, he lets me in. Always says he's not supposed to, but . . . “

“But what?” he asked when she remained silent.

She took in a deep breath, the air releasing in a broken exhalation. “Whenever they were home, I'd play ball with Captain, or throw a frisbee for him. Now, he barely looks at me. Turn here,” she directed, and he switched into the left lane as he slowed for the stop light. “He usually snaps at me now, growls and barks, but sometimes he cries,” she said as tears filled her eyes, a soft sob breaking from her.

Inuyasha glanced at her from the corner of his eye as he executed the turn, wincing at the salt in the air, the tears she tried to hide. He followed the directions she pointed to, narrowing his eyes as the bustle of the city faded away, the near-desertion of the industrial park making him shake his head. He glanced at her as his left ear flicked back. She didn't have a car, at least not that he knew of, he thought as he looked at her.

“Do you have a car?” he found himself asking, and watched as she shook her head. “Take the bus?” he asked, feeling close to losing what little control he had left over his temper when she frowned in confusion, shaking her head as she pouted. She walked between the center and the kennels every day, in her condition, and back and forth to wherever her home was, as well? How in the hell had she lasted this long?

“It breaks my heart when Captain cries,” she said, her raspy voice pulling him from his thoughts. “They want to kill him, you know? Like he doesn't mean anything to them,” she wept, droplets of salted water slipping down her cheeks. Inuyasha's knuckles turned white as he bit back a growl. “Those dogs are just equipment to those bastards,” she said with a sniffle, swiping her hands across her cheeks as more tears fell. “They tattoo serial numbers on the inside of their ears, put tracking chips in them. It's one thing to give a dog a purpose, but they act like he's nothing more than a tool. Do you know how many times I've heard those men down at the kennel say `it's just a dog'? Like his life doesn't matter because he walks on four legs.”

She was getting angry, and while he appreciated her passion, he didn't want her exhausting herself any more than she already was. She didn't have the energy to spend, he thought. His ears flicked when he realized he was growling softly to her, and felt her aura calm as she grew quiet beside him. He watched her blink slowly from the corner of his eye, nodding when she lifted her right hand to indicate the nondescript building in the distance, and turned in by the black lettered sign with the Marine Corps emblem.

The man at the guard post looked at him as he slowed the vehicle, coming to a stop in front of the cross bar. Inuyasha nodded when he asked for his ID and handed it over, watching as the man studied the laminated card with a frown and realized too late that he'd handed him his Japanese driver's license. He shook his head as he looked up, stilling as he stared past Inuyasha, and the hanyou turned his head to glance back at Vanessa, biting back a curse when he found her almost asleep.

“Inuyasha Izayoi?” the Marine asked as he handed the license back, and the hanyou nodded. “General Doggert called over about half an hour ago. I don't know what you said to him, but you've got full clearance to the kennels here granted by the General himself.”

Inuyasha nodded as he watched the crossbar lift, driving slowly past the entrance only to be stopped by another uniformed man. He leaned down to direct Inuyasha to the visitor's parking lot, only to still when he caught sight of Vanessa. His expression softened, his eyes growing sad as he nodded to himself. Vanessa was drowsing in the seat beside him by the time he'd found a parking space and turned off the car. The man at the gate had recognized her when he'd pulled in, so had the man keeping watch over the parking areas, the humans looking at her with sympathy as they'd each directed Inuyasha where to go. The people here knew her, but they all thought she was just sick, didn't they?

“Pup,” he called to her, shaking her shoulder gently.

“. . . Papa?” she mumbled without opening her eyes, her voice little more than a breathy whisper.

“Inuyasha,” he corrected her, watching her brows furrow as she frowned in her half-sleep state.

“. . . Yasha . . . ?”

“Vanessa, wake up!” he commanded, and she groaned as her eyes fluttered open only fall closed once more. “Vanessa!”

“I'm . . . awake . . . “ Inuyasha snorted. He very much doubted her claim to consciousness. “. . . Nessa,” she mumbled, and he nodded as her eyes opened once more,

“Nessa,” he repeated, unhooking his seatbelt before stepping out of the car.

He clenched his jaw as he helped her from the car, holding her against his side as he supported her weight and led her inside the building. The nauseatingly sweet almost-putrid metallic smell that came with the breakdown of her youkai filled his nose, his ears folding back against his head as memories of Gin assailed him, reminding him of just how close he had come to losing his daughter. Vanessa may not have any family, but she had him, he thought. He didn't care that she wasn't his pup, or if she thought there would be no one who would miss her, he wasn't about to let her die because her mate was being stupid.

`Would you want to let Kagome stay beside you if you thought there was no way you could protect her?' his youkai asked.

`Keh! I'd fucking find a way to protect my mate. Damn pup's just given up and it ain't like she's fighting.'

`Gin didn't put up much of fight, either, if you'd recall. Hell, even Kagome didn't. Females are different - `

`Different, my ass!'

`They are and you know it. Sierra, Gin, Sami, and yeah - even Kagome - each one of them thought they were doing the right thing.'

`By giving up?' Inuyasha snapped. `Keh!'

His youkai released a slow heavy sigh. ` . . . By letting go.'

Inuyasha was snapped out of his thoughts by the sound of dogs barking and the sharp clang of metal against metal as a few of them jumped at the gates holding them in the concrete-walled cells. The sounds startled Vanessa, the feel of her jerking against his side and her whimper making him aware that she had been almost asleep, before the dogs had woken her. It grated on his nerves to see the animals locked up as they were, and he growled low, issuing a sharp chuffing-bark. The dogs calmed at once, some offering whimpers and whines of hellos, while others were content to sit on their haunches and wag their tails.

“Which one is Captain?” he asked of Vanessa, and looked to where she pointed. “Here,” Inuyasha said as he lowered Vanessa to a chair sitting against the wall between two of the kennels. “Wait for me here, and don't fall asleep,” he said gruffly, and she gave an exhausted laugh as she nodded.

“You're going to make me start to believe that's my name,” she teased him in a low breathy tone that spoke of her exhaustion as she tipped her head back against the wall behind her. “Don't fall asleep.”

“Keh!”

Her soft laughter followed him as he moved down to the kennel near the end of the row. He looked back over his shoulder as he stopped in front of the enclosure, turning his head to look back at Vanessa, the muscle in his jaw ticking as he clenched his hands into fists. Her head was tipped back against the wall behind her and her eyes were closed, but when he called her name she turned her head to look at him.

He pressed his lips in a thin line as he stared at her for a moment longer before turning his attention to the animal in front of him. The dog inside didn't look to be in any better condition than the girl was, and Inuyasha growled low as he crouched down in front of the chain link door. Captain barely lifted his head off the floor before he let it drop back down, a sharp low whine sounding from the dog as he cried. His coat was dull, and Inuyasha could tell the animal had lost weight, his food and water bowls sitting untouched by the right wall.

Captain . . . kill . . . Pack die . . .

Inuyasha listened to the abbreviated speech as the dog lay unmoving on the floor. “I heard what happened, Captain,” Inuyasha called to the dog, and watched as the animal's ear twitched. “What happened wasn't your fault.”

Captain protect pack . . . Pack die . . . Captain kill pack . . .

`So, we were right,' his youkai spoke to him with a sigh. `Captain believes he killed them.'

`Yeah,' Inuyasha agreed. `Fuck.'

“Is he eating?” Vanessa asked, and Inuyasha looked up in surprise, not having heard her move from the chair at all.

She gasped and stumbled back - Inuyasha catching her before she fell - when Captain scrambled off the floor to lunge at the gate. His lips were pulled back in a deadly snarl as he barked viciously and rose up on his hind legs to slam his front paws against the gate repeatedly as though trying to break through. Inuyasha growled back, snapping at the dog as he commanded his silence, but Captain refused to quiet down until Vanessa was out of sight. The hanyou's brow furrowed deeply in confusion as he watched Captain drop his front paws to the floor before turning to limp back to the place by the back wall where he'd been lying earlier, walking as though his joints hurt him, and laid down once more.

`He didn't really lay down. That was more of a barely controlled fall. That dog is in bad shape,' his youkai said. `Why the hell did he react like that to her?'

`I don't know,' Inuyasha growled in reply. `But I'm sure as hell going to find out.'

“Captain!” he barked the dog's name, and watched as the animal barely moved his front paw in acknowledgement. “What the hell was that? Why did you threaten Nessa?”

Captain kill pack . . . Captain kill Dobby . . . Captain b-b-bad d-d-dog . . . Save Nessa . . .

Inuyasha's frown deepened. “You're driving her away to save her? From you?” he asked, and Captain whined low in affirmation.

Captain bad . . . Captain kill Dobby . . . Captain bad . . .

Inuyasha sighed as he watched Captain's eyes close, the animal's breathing slowing as he fell asleep. Sighing heavily as he stood from the floor, Inuyasha knew that there was no way any human could take this dog. No human, no youkai other than an inu would understand. It was only because he was half inu youkai that he understood Captain's abbreviated speech at all. And he knew that the only way to help Captain would be to get him away from this place. He needed to be somewhere new, somewhere that he would be surrounded by other inu youkai, by those who could speak his language and help him understand all that he had been through and that none of it was his fault.

“I won't let them kill you,” he promised the sleeping dog. “I'll find a way to take you home with me.”

~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~

Cain released a deep sigh as he looked up at the sound of the front door slamming shut, the noise echoing upstairs to where he stood in his studio. Glancing down at the still image in his hand, his lips curled up in a lopsided grin, his gaze softening as he ran the back of his claw over the curve of the tiny face in the center. Triplets, he thought as he nodded to himself before setting the ultrasound down on the lip of the easel to his right and looked up at the blank canvas. He still wasn't sure what he wanted to paint, but he did know that the finished product would be something for his, as of yet, unborn pups and their mother.

`Can you feel that?' his youkai-voice asked, and Cain blinked in confusion. `Inuyasha is on edge. I don't think Gin told him what he was he walking into.'

`. . . He went to talk to someone about a dog,' he replied slowly, only to be answered with an annoyed sigh.

`Idiot.'

It didn't take him more than a few seconds to leave the studio and make it to the top landing of the stairs leading to the main floor of his house. He narrowed his eyes as he watched his mate step in the room from the direction of the kitchen, releasing deep exhalation as he shook his head. She was supposed to be resting, he thought as he glanced over her head, watching as Inuyasha's ears swiveled around to the sides and behind him before the hanyou turned away from where he'd been staring out the front window.

“Hi Papa,” Gin greeted her father with a smile, only to grimace as she braced her hands against the small of her back, and pouted as her ears dropped to the sides. “I look like a planet.”

Inuyasha lifted a fisted hand to his lips, forcing a cough to cover the laugh her words inspired, and stepped closer to hug her as best he could. “How are you feeling, Baby Girl?”

“I thought I told you to rest?” Cain grumbled as he descended the stairs to the floor below.

“All I've been doing is resting. I'm tired of resting,” Gin snapped back.

Cain sighed as he came to stand next to his mate, intending to guide her back to the couch where she'd been napping previously, only to be stopped by the irritation in her aura. If they'd had this conversation once in the past month, they'd had it a hundred times. Her small stature made her appear far larger than most women would be, something that had upset her from the start with this pregnancy, and Cain was running out of ideas on how to reassure her. As much as he wanted to beat on Inuyasha most of the time, Gin's precious papa was the only one who seemed to be able to soothe her at all in the later stages of her pregnancy.

“Gin,” Cain started, only to watch as irritation flashed in her eyes.

“No,” she interrupted with a stomp of her foot. “You're the one who did this to me. OSUWARI!” she yelled, and pointed her finger at the floor, only for both her father and Cain to stare at her as they blinked in the following silence. “Well, shoot. I really thought that would work,” she said with a pout, her ears falling to the sides, only to rotate back at the sound of stunted choked laughter behind her. “Mama!” she reprimanded as she turned to face the woman.

“I'm sorry,” Kagome said as she hugged her arms around herself, not sounding apologetic in the least as she laughed, her eyes sparkling with mirth. “I suppose I could make Zelig-san a kotodama rosary, if you really want, Gin,” she offered, Inuyasha and Cain both answering with low growls of irritation.

“Over my dead body, Wench! Oh . . . Wait,” Inuyasha said as a slow smile curled his lips up, and he turned his triumphant gaze on Cain. “Make it for him, Kagome. I'd love to watch him eat dirt.”

“Papa!”

“Inuyasha!” Kagome growled, and he flinched at the tone of her voice. “I could always put the curse back on yours,” she threatened. “Come on, Gin,” Kagome said as she stepped up to wrap her arm around her daughter's shoulders. “It looks like the boys need to talk.”

“Keh. Fine,” Gin said as she let her mother lead her out of the room. “As long as no stubborn people try to make me rest,” she shot back over her shoulder in reference to her mate.

“Baby Girl, you need your - “

“OSUWARI!” Gin shouted back with a growl. “It'll work eventually.”

Cain heaved a sigh as he watched the women disappear around the corner, his eyes narrowing at the sound of the sliding door opening and closing. He didn't like the idea of her being outside right now with the temperature dropping, but she was with her mother, and he knew Kagome wouldn't let Gin take any risk that she herself wasn't comfortable with. At least it was warmer here in Bevelle than it was in Bangor currently, though not by much, he thought with an inward sigh. Shaking his head as he turned his attention back to the hanyou in the room with him, he crossed his arms over his chest and stared at Inuyasha. The other times Inuyasha had been present for Gin's pregnancies, he'd begrudgingly agreed with him that she needed to rest, but this time he didn't.

“Well?” he asked, his brows arched as he leveled an expectant stare at Inuyasha.

“Keh!”

Cain narrowed his eyes, his tongue slipping up over his canine beneath his lips. If that's the way he wanted to play it . . .

“All right, what didn't you want her to hear?”

“Fucking bastard,” Inuyasha growled, his ear flicking in irritation as he stomped past Cain, the North American Tai Youkai following after him. “I need it,” he snapped as he dropped into one of the chairs in front of the desk in Cain's office.

“Need what, oto-san?” Cain asked tightly, Inuyasha's irritation only serving to fuel his own.

It didn't help that he hadn't slept well in the past few nights. Gin only seemed to sleep comfortably when she had her belly pressed up against his back, which would normally be fine, if the pups inside her belly didn't see fit to kick him all night.

`Just remember, Cain,' his youkai cautioned him, the voice sounding far too amused. `It could always be worse.'

`How do you figure?'

`Gin could always want to sleep facing you.'

Cain narrowed his eyes in response, knowing exactly where those strikes would land given his mate's small stature. `Pfft!'

“Don't fucking call me that, you bastard,” he snarled, his brows furrowed, eyes narrowed in a mulish expression. “You know damn well what it is.”

“Pfft. If I did know, I wouldn't be asking, oto-san,” he stressed the honorific, knowing how much the hanyou hated it, as he moved to stand beside his desk facing Inuyasha.

“Keh! That picture you drew of Gin,” he clarified with a snort, and Cain froze in place as he studied Inuyasha with wide eyes.

“I thought Gin sent you out there because of a dog,” Cain said with confusion as he stared at Inuyasha.

“She did,” he growled low.

Cain wondered just how upset Gin would be if he were to beat on her father.

`You really are an idiot today,' his youkai-voice scoffed. `A sparring match out in the yard with weapons, she wouldn't bat an eye at, but what you're considering would end up starting a fist fight right here in the house. That Gin would most definitely have a problem with.'

`Pffft!'

“She did,” Inuyasha growled, his ears twitching with irritation as Cain moved behind his desk to the cabinet against the wall. “I'll need you to clear it so that I can bring Captain here, and take him home with me when we go back to Japan.”

Cain looked back over his shoulder from the cabinet he kept the portfolio in with a frown. “Why are you taking the dog? I thought the plan was to keep him from being put down,” he said as he pulled a photocopy of the sketch from within the leather folio and retied the ribbons before returning it to the shelf and locking the door once more.

“Fucking idiot!” Inuyasha snapped. “Just do it! Damn! Thought you'd been to that place, or so I heard. You should fucking know why.”

“I didn't go with her, half-wit,” Cain parried back. “Bas did. You want to take the dog, you tell me why.”

“Keh!” Inuyasha snarled as his ears folded back, his tone making it clear that he believed he was being made to list the things he thought Cain should already know. “Captain can't be near humans at all, and of the youkai that were there, not one of them was inu youkai,” he said belligerently as he leaned back in the chair and propped his feet up on the surface of the wooden desk. “He's still a pup,” he added with a harsh sigh. “I'd be surprised if Captain's older than three.”

“So, what happened?” Cain asked as he slapped Inuyasha's feet off the desk, and wiped his hand over the wooden surface before sitting down on the corner of the furniture.

“Take a wild guess,” Inuyasha snapped, and Cain narrowed his eyes.

“You want to take this outside?” Cain offered.

“Anytime, anyplace, bastard,” Inuyasha returned. “Don't worry, I'll take it easy on you seeing as how old you are.”

“Pfft! I can take you easy, old man,” he taunted calling him the same thing Evan did. “Now answer the damn question.”

Inuyasha snorted his displeasure as he snatched the picture from Cain. “He's a military dog - bomb sniffer. Captain and his pack - unit,” he amended using the humans' term with a roll of his eyes, “were ambushed. Dobby - Corporal Dobson, when you talk to those bastards - was Captain's handler. He got both his legs blown off, and lost his arms when he used his body to cover Captain when they were attacked. Whatever that pup used to smell like, he stinks of gunpowder and burnt flesh now. Captain doesn't know his scent anymore. And to make matters worse, there were thirteen people in his pack, only seven made it back home.”

“The dog thinks he failed his pack,” Cain said, his brows high on his forehead as he nodded slowly. “You're right, there's no human that would understand. But why you?”

“Because I fucking said so!” he snapped, and crossed his arms over his chest. “Keh! Can't fucking believe my daughter chose a mate so damn stupid.”

“Pfft,” Cain scoffed as he rolled his eyes. “Is he dangerous?” he asked, and Inuyasha sighed as he stood from his chair.

“You'd think I'd fucking bring him here if he was?” Inuyasha snapped irritably. “How hella stupid are you anyway? He's scared, mostly of himself. For the most part, he just lays around and cries. The caretaker there said that he only eats when he absolutely has to - maybe once a week. And the only time he shows any aggression at all is when he sees Dobby's mate. It's not like he would hurt her, he only wants to scare her away.”

“That explains the dog, sort of,” Cain said, and narrowed his eyes. “But why the picture?”

Inuyasha heaved a sigh as he narrowed his eyes on Cain. “He's human,” he said slowly as if speaking to a child. “He went to war whole, he came back without his arms or legs. His mate is earth youkai,” he revealed. “He thinks he's giving her a chance to find someone better than him, someone who can take of her.”

“Has she told him that her youkai chose him?” Cain asked.

“Keh! She ain't even told him she's youkai,” he snapped back. “But I do know that she's real damn close to this,” he said, and waved the picture of Gin.

“Bas should be out that way in an hour or so, I'll have him stop by and look in on Captain,” he offered.

“Keh! You tell him to get Captain outta there. I don't want those bastards trying to pull any shit with him. Just tell Bas to give them my name,” Inuyasha commanded as he pinched the long sides of the paper together before stomping from the office.

~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~

Inuyasha narrowed his eyes, his ears folding back against his head as he looked down at the piece of paper loosely folded lengthwise, the ends pinched together between the fingers of his right hand. Gin didn't know about the sketch, at least he didn't think she did, and Inuyasha refused to be the one to show it to her. The last thing he wanted was for her to know the truth of what was happening with Dobby, and even less for her to know what was becoming of his mate, Vanessa. Gin would try to fix things, wouldn't she? She was too much like her mother in that regard.

`And you're not trying to fix things?'

`Keh! I ain't almost nine months pregnant.'

`I should certainly hope not,' his youkai shot back drolly. `As irritating as you can be on your own, I'd hate to have to deal with you being pregnant.'

`Oi!'

Inuyasha narrowed his eyes as he came to a stop, his ears straight and tall. Kagome. That just might work, he thought, sniffing at the air as he searched for his mate, and followed her scent into the kitchen.

`I say pregnant, and you think of Kagome.'

`Shaddup.'

“Inuyasha,” Kagome greeted with a smile. “Gin is asleep,” she said, and nodded to the large tree outside the kitchen window. Inuyasha looked over her shoulder out the window, his eyes brightening when he caught sight of his daughter wrapped in a heavy blanket, her head tipped down, face half-buried in the folds of the cloth. “What did you and Cain talk about?” she asked as she leaned up on her tip toes to kiss his cheek.

“Keh.” He turned his head to meet her kiss before stepped away. “Nothing,” he dismissed, letting one side of the paper drop to reveal the picture he carried, his ears catching Kagome's quiet gasp when she saw what he was holding. “I'll be back later.”

“I'm going with you,” Kagome said, hurrying to grab her coat.

“Keh. We ain't going anywhere fun, wench. And I sure as hell ain't going shopping after,” he said, needling her for her near predictable insistence that they go shopping at least once a week, while they were in Maine, for things they really didn't need.

“I'm going with you, dog-boy,” she insisted stubbornly, pinning him with a glare as she slipped her feet into her shoes by the front door before chasing him outside. “Don't!” she snapped when he opened his mouth to argue. “I'm going with you, whether you like it, or not.”

“Keh!”

~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~

Kagome winced as she glanced back at the open door leading to the stairwell behind her before turning her attention back to her mate. Irritation was rolling off of him in waves, his aura crackling with his rapidly dwindling patience as he stared at the closed door in front of him through narrowed eyes as though he could will it to open. Parting her lips as she prepared to speak, Kagome remained silent instead as she watched her mate bring the side of his raised fist down on the door yet again, pounding repeatedly in an effort to get a response.

Almost five minutes ago, when they'd first arrived, she had suggested that perhaps Vanessa had stepped out, only to have her head bitten off in response. Not only had Inuyasha tossed that idea aside, but he'd very nearly come unglued at the idea that the girl was anywhere but where he had left her. She shook her head slowly as she glanced at the wall to the left of the apartment door, narrowing her eyes at the cold painted brickwork. She still didn't understand how an earth youkai could live in these dwellings, not that there was anything wrong with the apartments per say - at least not by human standards - but by youkai standards . . .

The building itself - once an industrial warehouse - stood ten-stories high. There were three others exactly like it, all of them built of smoothed polished concrete, steel, and glass. The window frames were formed by wrought-iron, painted black and treated in such a manner as to prevent rust. The conversion had been done within the last seven years, or so she had read online when she'd accessed the apartment complex's website from her phone. Ranging from two to four-bedroom apartments, the top floors of each building had been divided into four very large townhouses. The website had made the apartments sound warm and inviting, hadn't it, but the reality fell far short in her estimation.

She sighed as she leaned to the left, rising up on the toes of one foot as she lifted her chin to look out the window at the end of the hallway. The glass was polished and clear, energy efficient, but even with the sunlight shining in through the window, warmth wasn't what she felt, she thought, her brows drawn together as she looked out across the property below. There was no grass, no trees, not even any potted plants, or shrubbery. The property of the apartment complex sat on a one and a half square mile plot of roughened concrete, the expansive warehouses - now converted into apartment buildings - and giant silos, all that remained of the once prominent paper mill.

The silos were still in the process of being converted into townhouses, one per floor, each completely round. But as the silos had once been used to store chemicals and wood pulp waiting to be turned into paper, and had sat abandoned for almost fifteen years - allowing the residual chemicals to soak into the concrete - it made the process a slow endeavor. She turned her gaze away from the round buildings in the distance, her eyes falling to look at the area in between the four converted warehouses, the angle of the sun casting a shadow across the ground.

A playground had been created in the center for any children that might reside there, a false park made from some kind of rubber matting and plastic turf. Humans, and even some - very few, but some - mononoke, could be appeased by the false plot of land, but an earth youkai couldn't. She didn't understand how Vanessa could be living in this place, she thought, narrowing her eyes at the knowledge that due to the area they were in, the closest natural park was almost five miles away.

“Damnit!” Inuyasha snapped, the sound of his voice pulling Kagome from her thoughts, and she returned her attention to him as he growled low, watching his ears fold back against his head before springing forward once more.

“Inuyasha,” Kagome admonished when he pounded on the door with the side of his fist once more, hard enough to rattle the hinges and locks. If he wasn't careful, he would end up breaking the door down.

“I'll stop knocking when she fucking opens the door, wench!” Inuyasha shot back at her as he banged the side of his fist against the door. “Nessa!” he called out, and lifted his foot to kick the door in.

“Don't you dare!” Kagome snapped as she pulled him back by the sleeve of his shirt. “Move,” she commanded impatiently as she scrutinized the simple lock. “All of our children may have high tech security and fancy locks, but Vanessa doesn't,” she said as she pulled a hair pin from her purse.

“The hell are you doing?” Inuyasha barked when she slipped the pin into the lock.

Kagome glanced back, arching a brow at him before returning her attention to the task at hand. “Learned that from your sons,” she told him, standing up as the lock sprang free, only to pin him with a reproachful stare as she twisted the knob to open the door. “Don't think I don't know what they were like before they got mated.”

“Keh!” He turned his head to the side dismissively. “They ain't that much different.”

“You're right,” she offered. Kagome's lips twitched, a giggle coming from her when he glanced back at her from the corner of his eye. “They're just on leashes now.”

Inuyasha's eyes widened comically, his golden gaze bright with defiance. “Oi!”

Kagome shook her head, a smile twisting her lips up at one side as she turned away from Inuyasha and stepped into the apartment. She stilled, her smile falling away as she shook her head slowly. She wasn't sure what she had expected, carpeting perhaps, even faux-hardwood paneling, something - anything - to offer the apartment a little bit of warmth, but there wasn't any. The floor was the same smoothed and polished blueish-grey concrete that was in the hall, the walls were made of cinderblocks, the outline of them clear underneath the plaster and layers of ash-white paint that had been spread over them in an attempt to make it look more inviting.

There was a five-shelf bookshelf by the wall along the door, one of the black pressboard build-it-yourself constructs. Every inch of space had been taken up by books and manuals and spiral bound notebooks. There was something next to it, whatever it was covered by a white sheet, with an open toolbox sitting between it and the bookshelf. The window frames along the far wall hadn't been changed or updated, she noted as she narrowed her eyes. The glass may be energy efficient, but the windows gave away what the building had once been, somehow leaving the apartment that much colder because of it.

There was a dark brown couch in the center of the room, by the looks of it, the furniture either made of suede or something similar. Between the couch and wall of windows, there was a single area rug. Kagome narrowed her eyes as she studied it, almost certain that the woven cloth was handmade. Something about it looked eerily familiar. She blinked, her suspicion falling away, as she realized that she had seen one just like it at a stand in the farmer's market. Behind the couch, on the other side of the wide apartment was an island counter, separating the open kitchen from the rest of the living room.

“This is where she lives?” Kagome asked, unable to believe what she was looking at. It wasn't that it was run down, she thought, because it wasn't. It was just . . . “Unnatural,” she whispered to herself.

She moved forward a few more steps, allowing Inuyasha enough room to slip into the apartment behind her and shut the door. Her brows drew together as she looked toward the window, spotting the single plant encased in a green plastic planter. What once had been a small indoor herb garden was now nothing more than wilted leaves and stalks bowing over the sides in abject despair.

Kagome grew still, the furrow between her brows deepening, her eyes narrowing, as her gaze came to rest on the cup lying forgotten on its side on the floor, the contents inside spilled out onto the cement. Tea? Coffee, perhaps? She wasn't sure what it was, but it still looked wet, she thought, the corners of her mouth turning down in a frown when she thought she saw something else near the mug, the couch and end table hiding much of it from view. Her eyes widened, her mouth falling open as she realized what it was she was looking at, her breath catching somewhere between her throat and lungs.

“Oh, Kami! Inuyasha!” she shouted as she darted across the apartment, coming to stop near the darkened hallway on the other side of the open room, and knelt next to the youkai woman crumpled on the floor. “She's barely breathing!” she called back desperately as she looked up, watching her mate's ears fold back as he knelt beside her.

“I told her not to fucking fall asleep!” he snarled, the anger in his tone completely at odds with the gentle way he lifted Vanessa from the floor, cradling her against his chest. Kagome stood, her fingers fanned over her lips, as she watched Inuyasha tip Vanessa closer to him until her face was pressed into the curve of his throat. “Fuck!” he snapped, and she knew he had felt the girl's shallow breaths - the only sign of life, and one that seemed to be fading with each passing moment.

Kagome smashed the back of her hand against her mouth as she stared at Vanessa, her brows furrowed high on her forehead, her eyes wide and filling with tears as she shook her head. In her mind's eye, the girl's dark hair faded until it was a silvery-white - the same as Inuyasha's - pointed white puppy ears appearing on the top of her head, the angles and shadows of her face morphing into her daughter's. She took in a shaking breath as she squeezed her eyes closed, tears leaking from between her dark lashes as she gripped her temples tightly between the thumb and middle finger of her left hand. She choked on a sob as she forced the image of Gin back, swallowing the memories from so long ago, in an effort to focus on the young woman who needed their help now.

“Here,” Kagome said as she moved to the couch, taking the hand-stitched quilt from the back of the furniture as she sat down, and held the heavy cloth open beside her in her outstretched arms. “Give her to me,” she commanded softly, realizing absently that she was shaking as she watched the tremors vibrate through the quilt she held. “Gin was always cold after she woke up,” she reminded Inuyasha as he lowered Vanessa down to the couch, sitting her carefully inside the quilt.

Kagome wrapped her arms - and blanket - around Vanessa, pulling her closer as she cocooned her in its folds. Lifting her eyes to meet her mate's gaze, she watched as he crouched down in front of them, his hand lifting to rest on top of Vanessa's knee over the blanket. The furrow of his brow, the defiant - almost angry - glow in his gold eyes made Inuyasha appear furious, but she could feel the edges of his fear, his desperation. She watched as his ears folded back against his head only to spring forward and bend toward Vanessa as though every single one of his heightened senses was focused on the unconscious youkai in her arms.

She pressed her lips together as she looked over the young woman, noting the bruises beneath her sunken eyes that spoke of sleepless nights, the ashen skin pulled taught over her delicate features that spoke to the breakdown of her youkai. The fading sunlight that cast shadows across the floor shone on Vanessa, bringing out the deep red highlights in her dark brown hair. Kagome tucked a lock of hair behind the girl's pointed ear, the tresses soft and light even though it, too, lacked the luster she was sure it had once held. She tipped her head up, pulling Vanessa closer as she rested her chin on top of the girl's head, and pressed her lips together in a thin line as she smoothed the pad of her thumb over the curve of Vanessa's cheek.

Part of her wanted to scream, Kagome thought as she pulled back slightly, rubbing her hands up and down Vanessa’s arms, over the blanket covering her, in an effort to warm her. The young woman slipped down, her weight resting more heavily against Kagome, the miko uncertain if she had pulled Vanessa closer, or if the girl was simply curling against her in her sleep. Kagome rubbed her lips together as she closed her eyes, reaching out to Vanessa, wrapping her in her aura in the hopes of bringing her some semblance of comfort. Maybe if Vanessa knew that she wasn’t alone, then she would wake up, she thought desperately, remembering having done the same thing with Gin. How many times had she tried to reach her own daughter through the use of her miko powers, holding her hand as she meditated, only to tire herself out instead? Maybe it wouldn’t have any effect at all, but all the same, she had to try.

“Inuyasha,” Kagome called his attention to her, and he replied with a grunt, refusing to take his attention off of the girl. “You never said . . . Where’s her family in all of this? Why aren’t they here with her?”

He replied with a short half-growl, his eyes narrowing defiantly as though he believed he could will her to wake up. “She ain’t got any,” he answered, his voice rough with irritation. “She said her parents died a few years ago, while her damn mate was out at war.”

Kagome’s eyes widened, the air rushing from her as if she’d been struck. “She’s alone?”

“Keh! She ain’t fuckin’ alone anymore, wench,” he shot back, his ears rotating back only to snap forward when Vanessa groaned.

Kagome gasped as she turned her attention down to the girl in her arms, watching as her eyes fluttered slowly without opening, a pained whimper coming from her when her eyes finally – mercifully – opened a few moments later. Just the act of being awake seemed to take more energy than the girl had to offer, her eyes falling closed a few seconds later, only to open again reluctantly when Inuyasha growled low, shaking Vanessa roughly to wake her up.

“I told you not to fucking fall asleep!” he snapped at her.

“ . . . Papa,” she mumbled, her voice barely audible, a quiet sigh falling from her parted lips.

Kagome gasped as she felt her relax further, feeling her slip away, only to stare at Inuyasha when he uttered a terse half-bark in reply. She opened her mouth, ready to reprimand his roughness, only to fall silent as she watched the girl move beneath the blanket. One of Vanessa’s hands slipped through the copious folds of the heavy cloth to wrap around Inuyasha’s wrist, a slow tired smile bending her lips up at the corners as she closed her eyes once more, as though she were saying goodbye.

“No!” Inuyasha snarled, shaking Vanessa again until she opened her eyes. “Don’t you dare fucking fall asleep! You hear me?” he demanded.

Vanessa panted softly, the effort it took simply to breathe seeming to exhaust her as she leaned heavily against Kagome’s side. “It’s okay,” she said slowly, only to groan when Inuyasha jostled her again.

“Keh! The hell it is! You fucking stay awake!”

“Inuyasha, go,” Kagome told him, her soft voice resolute, and met his gaze when he turned his attention to her. “Go get her mate,” she instructed, shaking her head when he looked ready to argue. “You know we can’t leave her alone. Go get her mate,” she commanded again. “Before we lose her like we almost lost Gin.”

Inuyasha nodded stiffly once, his eyes turning back to Vanessa as he stood. “Keep her awake, wench,” he ordered her. “Keep her alive.”

“Hai,” Kagome promised as she reached out to wrap her fingers around his hand, taking comfort from the strength of his grip. His hand slipped from hers a few seconds later, and she closed her eyes when he leaned down to press a kiss to her brow before turning to leave. “Please hurry, Inuyasha,” she begged quietly as the apartment door closed, and squeezed her eyes shut against the rising panic that chilled her to the bone.

~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~

`Nessa, you need to wake up.'

Wake up? But she wasn't asleep, was she? No, she decided, she wasn't asleep. She was certain of it because when she slept, she would be locked in a world of nightmares where the only things that existed were pain and fear and an agony so deep - so dark - that she couldn't breathe. But here in this place, she was at peace, and for the first time in longer than she could remember, she felt safe.

`That's because you're on the brink. You were ready to let go this morning when you woke up under that tree. You gave up the fight when you stepped into the place to see Dobby, and I know - I know - how much it hurts just to open your eyes. And I know that hope is a more dangerous enemy than anything else because it lies to you. Time after time hope has whispered in your ear and told you that everything will be all right, and at every turn, it's failed you. But just this once, Nessa, I need you to believe it. Open. Your. Eyes!'

Vanessa groaned as she gave in to the demands of her youkai voice, squeezing her eyes closed against the invading light, her nerves rapid firing under her skin as every touch became too much to bear. It was cold here, shivers wracking her frame as she tried to breathe in, only to feel the sharp ache in her chest. The pounding in her head only grew stronger, her eyes stinging as tears gathered behind her closed lids.

Every joint hurt, every muscle felt too heavy to move, and the only thing she wanted was to sink back into the fathomless abyss she'd been in only moments before. It was warm there, safe. She didn't feel anything in that place, not the pain in her body, or her heart, and the doubts that plagued her were gone. She sighed as she felt her muscles relax, the pain easing as something warm wrapped around her. The sweet scent of sun-warmed grass and orange blossoms wafted to her, beckoning her closer with a promise of safety and comfort.

Her brows drew together as she heard the sound of voices, recognized the language spoken to be Japanese. She'd only ever heard her parents speak Japanese, comforted by the dreamlike belief that they'd somehow returned to her. She thought she smiled as she sank further down, closer to the unfamiliar yet soothing scent, and the voice that her mind told her was her mother's. Sensation dulled, the voices growing quiet as the warmth and silence of the darkness rose around her, and just as she began sink further, she felt herself pulled roughly from her refuge back into the harsh cold of the waking world.

“I told you not to fucking fall asleep!”

She knew that voice, she thought, forcing her eyes open as the blurred image of a man with white hair and puppy ears faded in and out of her vision. What was his name? She couldn't remember. On some level, she knew he wasn't her father, the color of his hair and eyes were different, as was his voice, but he made her feel safe, just like her father always had, and her mind whispered to her that they were one in the same. She blinked slowly, her eyes refusing to open after a few seconds and, even as she told herself that he wasn't really there, that he was nothing more than an illusion, she allowed herself the comfort of believing that for once she wasn't alone.

“. . . Papa?” she called out to him, her brow furrowing when she could only barely hear the sound of her own voice. The bark he answered her with confused her and comforted her in turn, and she closed her eyes as she sank further into the welcoming warmth that surrounded her.

“No!” he shouted at her desperately. She whimpered when he shook her again, refusing to stop until she opened her eyes and met his gaze. “Don't you dare fucking fall asleep! You hear me?” he demanded.

`Inuyasha,' her youkai voice whispered to her. `I think his name is Inuyasha. He's gruff, isn't he? But he makes you feel safe. Just like your father always did. It feels like nothing can hurt you when he's near.'

`Papa,' Vanessa whimpered, tears stinging at her eyes. `I tried, Papa. I'm sorry I let you down. Dobby . . . Dobby doesn't want us anymore. It won't be long now.'

`That hanyou wants to save you,' her youkai replied slowly, softly, as though it were trying to comfort her.

`Hanyou?' she repeated with confusion, her mind moving too slow for her to understand much. `Papa? There's nothing left to save.'

Her youkai-voice released a trembling sigh. Why did it sound afraid? `He's not your father. Not Papa,' her youkai told her gently. `Inuyasha. Remember?'

`Inuyasha?' Vanessa struggled to recall. `He talked to Captain.'

`That's right.'

`. . . He can save Captain.'

It was hard to keep her eyes open, even harder to move, but for him she made the effort. It seemed to take forever until her hand was free of the blanket, her fingers wrapping around his wrist slowly. Her joints felt wooden, difficult to bend, but she needed to hold onto him - to say goodbye. She thought she smiled as she looked at him, wishing she could do more, wishing she could take away the fear she saw in the depths of topaz fire gaze.

“It's okay,” she promised him quietly, her eyes closing of their own accord only to feel Inuyasha shake her roughly once more, an angry snarl rumbling from him.

“Keh! The hell it is! You fucking stay awake!”

She blinked heavily as he swam before her eyes, heard the sound of the woman's voice beside her. She sounded scared, Vanessa thought, only half-aware of what was being said, too tired to decipher if the woman holding her was speaking English or Japanese. The voices faded away, the dull sound of a door closing coming to her at a distance, and she sighed as she felt the woman beside her hold her closer. It was over now, wasn't it? She could sleep now?

“No!” the woman's voice shocked her, pulling her back to a half-conscious state. “Vanessa, you have to stay awake.”

“. . . Who?”

“Kagome,” the woman answered. “My name is Kagome.”

“. . . Oh . . .”

“Vanessa! Open your eyes!” she demanded.

Vanessa frowned at the sharpness of her tone. Why did she sound so afraid? She curled closer to Kagome, not knowing why, but hoping that maybe she could bring the woman some semblance of comfort. She whimpered when Kagome grabbed her shoulders, forced her to sit upright, and shook her until she opened her eyes.

“You have to stay awake,” Kagome told her, and Vanessa pouted as she narrowed her eyes. “I know you're tired, Baby G - Vanessa.” Why did it sound like she was correcting herself? Did Kagome think she was someone else? “How about something to drink?” Kagome asked as she stood from the couch. “Water maybe?”

Vanessa took in a breath to speak, only to feel that same air choke her, and began coughing harshly. Kagome was at her side at once, holding her, shushing her as she rubbed her back. Vanessa felt her move away, tears leaking between her tightly closed eyes as she felt a tiny straw slipped into her mouth.

“Just drink, sweetheart,” Kagome soothed her.

Vanessa grimaced as she sucked on the straw in between rattling coughs, the dry tang of cranberry juice burning down the back of her throat. She turned her head away after only a few swallows, shaking her head when Kagome offered the small juice box to her once more. Her brows furrowed when she thought Kagome mentioned having the box in purse, something about Inuyasha and other juices being too sweet. It didn't make any sense, her mind discarding the information before she was even able to understand it.

“Water?” Kagome offered instead.

“I can't stomach straight water,” Vanessa told her weakly, blinking up at her when she felt Kagome's hand smoothing down over her hair. “It makes me sick.”

“Sick?” Kagome asked, shaking her head in confusion, and Vanessa nodded tiredly.

“Mama couldn't stand it, either.”

“No no no no no,” Kagome chided her, shaking her gently when she closed her eyes. “Don't fall asleep.”

“So tired,” Vanessa whimpered. “I just need to sleep.”

“No!” Kagome shouted, shaking her shoulders. “Don't you dare go to sleep!”

“It's okay,” she offered, trying to comfort her. “Dobby will survive this. He's human, he doesn't feel the same draw.”

“You don't know that!” Kagome shouted at her. “Kami, you sound like Toga.”

“. . . Toga . . . ?” Vanessa repeated the name slowly, her breathy voice little more than a whisper, her eyes falling closed as the sound of Kagome's voice grew softer.

The feel of Kagome shaking her was dulled - distant - awareness slipping away. Her body felt lead-weighted, her breaths slowing as the aching coldness faded into a soothing warmth, and felt herself sink further into the welcoming darkness.

~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~

Inuyasha's heart raced, thundering madly in his chest, his ears folded back against his head, as he pushed himself to go faster. The wind pushed back against him, whipping his hair behind him as he crouched low, his muscles coiling tight, before he sprang from one rooftop to the next. He could hear Ryomaru's voice behind him, his son talking to Kagome as he gathered the details Inuyasha hadn't stopped to share.

Damnit! They weren't moving fast enough! He ran faster, pushed harder, leapt higher, as he darted across the Tokyo skyline until finally, he reached the apartment building Gin lived in. He nearly took the door off in his haste to get inside the building, only just remembering to slow down his pace in the presence of the humans milling about. It was the sight of Kichiro in the hall outside of Gin's apartment that turned his fear into suspicion, his anger into something a little darker, a little harder to control, and he knew then that the youngest of his twins knew something about it all.

“Outta my way!”

The feel of the door giving way beneath his foot, the sound of wood splintering as the lock was torn free of the latch, was of little consolation to the emotions that stormed through him, twisting inside his heart and mind in a maddening cyclone. The phone call from the school, the alert that Gin hadn't been to any of her classes in four weeks and that no one at the school had been able to reach her directly, had been enough to send him spiraling down a rabbit hole of worry and irritation that morphed into a thunderstorm of panic and rage when he couldn't get Gin on her cell or home phone.

She was his baby girl, he thought as he entered the apartment, unable to reconcile the dust covering the shelves and furniture as he moved to the hallway and back to his daughter's bedroom. The curtains had been pulled tight, the room stinking of stale cigarettes and the sickening smell of dying flesh. He wouldn't have believed it was his daughter lying beneath the covers of the bed if it hadn't been for the wisps of silvery hair that were fanned out across her pillow.

He couldn't reconcile the daughter he knew with the ghost of her lying in the bed. Her ashen face, bruised and sunken eyes had been bad enough, but when Kichiro pulled back the blankets - revealing her emaciated form - he felt something inside him snap. She was his daughter - his baby girl - and the one job - the only job - he had and he'd failed. If he had protected her better, looked after her the way he was supposed to, made certain that she knew -

The blaring of a car horn jarred him from his thoughts, and he growled low as he pressed down on the accelerator beneath his foot, his mind still half inside his memories as he cursed the late afternoon traffic he was caught in. Inuyasha narrowed his eyes as he struggled to push the images and lingering emotions back, a low deadly snarl rumbling from his throat.

The almost uncontrolled feeling of his thundering heartbeat, the sound of his youkai railing at him that something was very seriously wrong, the darkness of the fear in Kagome's voice when she had called him, all of it was coming back to him now as sharp and as painful as it had been that day. He had told himself that he was over it, comforted himself with the knowledge that Gin was fine, that she had survived and lived. Hell, his grandchildren were more than enough proof of that, but . . .

`But it's all coming back now,' his youkai-voice acknowledged. `You never really got over it, you just moved past it. It took her awhile to recover, but you brought Cain back and she woke up, and there were a few iffy moments in between, but . . . But she was okay. But Nessa? . . . she might not be, and that terrifies you, whether you're willing to admit it or not.'

He clenched his jaw against the scent of Vanessa that clung to his clothes, drove his temper to the very edges of its breaking point. It was the almost-sweet putrid smell of her body and youkai breaking down that dug at him, opening old wounds as it cast blame upon him for not doing more, all the while merging Vanessa's image with Gin's inside his mind. It took concentration for him to make out Vanessa's own natural scent of warm cedar, damp earth and sun-kissed plum and jasmine blossoms that lingered beneath the heavier scent of death as though some part of her was waiting to be found, to be remembered.

`Nessa will be fine, damnit!' Inuyasha snapped at his youkai, refusing to accept any other outcome.

`You don't know that,' his youkai cautioned him sharply. `Gin and Cain, what happened between them was almost . . . simple. Can you really say that what's happened between Nessa and her mate is any manner simple? She may have survived until he got home from war by convincing herself that he was coming back to her, but he never came back to her, not like he promised anyway.'

`You think I don't know that? Damn!'

`He's human, baka! It's not like you can just tell him that her youkai chose him and have him accept that - accept her.'

`Keh! Wanna fucking bet?'

~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~

Bas pressed his lips into a thin line as he stared at the animal lying on his side on the cold concrete floor of the barren cell. There wasn't even a cushion or blanket for him to lie on, just a small stand tucked against the right side of the kennel with two metal bowls, one filled with water, the other with food. Both looked to be untouched.

“Hey, kid.”

Bas turned his head, looking over his shoulder at the boar youkai walking toward him, and arched a brow in silent question. He hadn't noticed the shift change before, unless the uniformed man had simply been on break when he'd arrived, the human female previously manning the post no longer in the building.

“I've got to do my rounds, check on the other kennels before locking up. The doors lock automatically, so if you step out of here while I'm gone, that's it. You won't be able to get back in before tomorrow.”

Bas nodded, recognizing the slight accent in the man's voice to be of Puerto Rican descent. It didn't really surprise him that the boar youkai didn't immediately recognize him as being the next North American Tai Youkai, or maybe he did, Bas reasoned with an inward tilt of his head. It was quite possible the man knew exactly who he was, and that was why he was willing to leave him alone here, when Bas was fairly certain anyone else would have been shooed out of the building.

He nodded once, watching as the youkai exited through the far door before he returned his attention to the kennel, frowning as he stared at the enclosure. Plastered and painted cinderblock walls on three sides, a smooth concrete floor, and a door that was nothing more than chain-link fencing with a heavy metal frame; there wasn't a single part of it that looked in any manner comfortable, and after all these animals had been through, was comfort too much to ask for?

His brows drew together in a frown as he looked down at Captain. He had been around several dogs in his lifetime, and each one that he could remember had always acknowledged him, been excited by his presence, but not Captain, he thought with a sigh. From the few things his father had told him on the phone, this dog had lost everything in one traumatic moment that would be more than most people could bear, but for a dog who only knew his pack, and was the sole guardian of that pack . . .

“Captain,” he called to the dog as he crouched low, his hands hanging down between his spread thighs.

He offered a short growling bark, the sound only used to gain the attention of another animal or youkai, but still there was no response. He shook his head as he stood from the floor, and retrieved his phone from his pocket. It only took a few seconds for the call to connect, and he met his father's gaze in the video feed just long enough to switch the camera.

“You didn't tell me he was this bad,” he said as he let his father get a good look at Captain.

“Son of a bitch,” Cain said, horrified as he looked at the creature. “Is he even alive?”

“Captain's alive, but he's not moving. You can hear him, right?” Bas asked, and switched the camera back to meet his father's gaze in the screen.

“Yeah, I can hear him,” Cain said and heaved a sigh. “That dog is grieving.”

“Grieving?” Bas asked incredulously. “That dog is broken. Captain's spirit is broken. What does jiijii think he can do?”

“I don't know,” Cain said. “Maybe nothing. Maybe everything. Is he responding to you at all?”

“No,” Bas replied, sighing as he switched the call to voice only, and brought the device to his ear. “I've tried talking to him, calling to him in the inu language. He just doesn't respond.”

“Take him to your house for right now,” Cain told him. “I don't want him to upset your mother.”

“I'll let jiijii know,” Bas said, and disconnected the call before texting Inuyasha. “Captain, I'm coming in,” he said as he tucked his phone into his pocket and reached out to lift the latch on the gate.

Captain didn't respond as Bas opened the door. He didn't move or stop issuing the whispered high-pitched whines, tears leaking from the corner of his eye to slip down his muzzle as he cried, when Bas crouched next to him. The future North American Tai-youkai reached out his left hand, resting it on the dog's side as he studied the mourning animal. He could feel the sharpness of the dog's bones beneath his fur and skin, able to count each rib - feel each vertebra - as he moved his hand up through the thick coat. Bas pursed his lips as he lifted his hand to the dog's head, petting Captain's pointed ear, smoothing his hand down over his neck and shoulder.

“You're not eating are you?” he asked Captain, and watched as the dog lifted his head just enough to look at him. “You saved a lot of lives.”

`Killed . . . pack . . . Kill friend . . . Dobby dead . . .

“Dobby's not dead,” Bas assured him, recalling the conversation he'd had with his father hours earlier. “You saved your pack.”

`Captain . . . kill . . . Dobby. . . Captain sad . . . Captain s-s-sorry

Bas sighed as he leaned forward to slip his arms underneath the dog, and lifted him from the floor. Captain didn't growl, he didn't snap or fight, and had Bas not been able to hear his abbreviated speech and the weak thready heartbeat, he might have even believed the dog to be dead already.

“It's going to be okay,” he told Captain as he carried the dog out of the building and to his car. “Somehow, jiijii will make it okay.”

~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~

“Damnit!”

Inuyasha slammed his hand against the steering wheel, the car offering a groan of protest. He had one turn - one - until he reached the medical center where Dobby was. He could walk there, he thought, a growl rumbling through the enclosed space around him. By car, he was less than two minutes away. If he were on foot instead of sitting in traffic behind a damn moving truck, he'd be there in ten - maybe twenty - seconds, at most. And the reason he was sitting in traffic, he thought with an impatient sigh, Dobby couldn't be transported any other way.

`Not that you didn't think about tossing that pup over your shoulder and racing across the rooftops.'

`Keh!'

`At least you realized that you'd have to drive him before you were too far away from the apartment.'

A low growl spilled from his throat, his ear flicking in irritation as he considered finding out if it really would be possible to beat the crap out of his youkai-voice. He narrowed his eyes at the amused chuckle that came from his youkai in response, only to still as a shiver ran up his spine, his ears folding back against his head as the cold wash of dread settled over him. Inuyasha fisted his hand when the sound of Kagome's ringtone broke through the silence around him, and knew at once that the dread he felt was coming from the bond he shared with his mate.

“Wench,” he answered her tersely.

“Inuyasha,” Kagome's carefully controlled tone trembled slightly, speaking of her fear. “I did everything I could,” she told him, and he frowned, his eyes widening. “She's asleep, and I can't get her to wake up. I can barely feel her heartbeat. I called Isabelle, she should be here soon, but please hurry. I can feel her slipping away.”

He pressed down on the gas pedal as soon as the truck moved, yanked the wheel to the right, the tire thumping against the sidewalk as he drove over the curb. “Keep her alive,” he growled, ending the call as he turned into the parking lot of the medical center.

The tires screeched at the sharpness of his turn as he directed the car under the overhang, not bothering to turn the car off as he jumped from the vehicle to run inside the building. The last threads of the control he had over his temper were fraying too fast to be held together, his eyes fairly glowing as he ran down the hall and stomped into the physical therapy wing. His eyes scanned over those in attendance, a low growl rolling in the back of his throat when he saw the finch hanyou working with a patient on the far side of the room by the parallel bars.

“Gym, down the hall.” Inuyasha turned his fierce gaze on General Doggert, watching as the man stepped up to him quickly. “I called Michelle after you left with Nessa. She explained things,” he said, his eyes fierce. “Go out the doors in the back corner, turn left, and it's the second door on the right. They're having him test the strength of the implant - prosthetic - using free weights. Anyone tries to stop you, just toss my name at them,” he ordered, and Inuyasha offered a curt nod in return.

He didn't ask any questions, didn't wait for further information, as he darted through the room and along the path he'd been given. It didn't take him more than a few minutes to find Dobby, the man sitting in his wheelchair as he lifted a two-hundred-fifty-pound free-weight barbell with seeming ease. He didn't care enough to be impressed, didn't have time for formalities, as he stomped into the room, watching as Dobby let the weight fall to the floor with a jarring thump.

“Sir!” the nurse yelled after Inuyasha as he grabbed hold of the handles for Dobby's wheelchair, and rolled him toward the doors. “You can't just take him out of here!”

“Keh!” he called back with irritation. “I can, and I am!” he snarled. “You're damn lucky I'm taking the wheelchair. Be fucking faster if I just carried your ass.”

“Where are you taking me anyway?” Dobby asked, the pain he was in lending his voice a hard edge.

He grimaced as he shifted his prosthetic arm, what was left of his right arm lifting before it fell back into place as though Dobby had forgotten for a moment that he couldn't do whatever he was trying to do.

“To see your fucking mate,” the hanyou snarled in reply.

“Ness?” Dobby asked with alarm.

“You got another fucking mate I don't know about?” Inuyasha snapped.

“Turn me around,” Dobby demanded as he shook his head. “She's better off without me,” he said as he looked down, watching his mechanical hand clench into a fist. “She doesn't need me.”

“The fuck she doesn't!” Inuyasha snarled, his ears flattening against his head as he growled low. “Have you seen her since you got that bug up your ass? Cause if you had, you'd know that she ain't better off. Youkai ain't like humans,” he growled as he all but tossed Dobby into the passenger seat of his car, and watched how fascinated the man seemed to be when he was able to buckle his own seatbelt with the use of the mechanical arm. “Keh!”

Inuyasha didn't wait for Dobby to speak as he slammed the car door closed and sprinted to the other side of the vehicle. He didn't know how long Vanessa had left, but he knew he couldn't waste any time. Slipping behind the wheel, he slammed his door shut and threw the car into drive. Yanking on the wheel as he pulled away from the building, he cast a sidelong glance at the human sitting next to him. On some level, he could understand Dobby's efforts to push Vanessa away, but on the other hand he really couldn't.

“Was she upset by your injuries?” Inuyasha asked Dobby gruffly as he pulled out into the late afternoon traffic, not caring or noticing that he'd left the wheelchair behind on the sidewalk.

“. . . I don't know,” Dobby replied, confusion in his tone, and Inuyasha felt his blood boil

“You never let her see you, did you?” he snarled, the silence from the man next to him all the confirmation he needed. “Are you fucking kidding me?”

“You don't get it,” Dobby snapped in return, shaking his head in silent denial. “I can't even touch her,” he said ruefully. “I can't hold her. I can't protect her.”

“So, what?” Inuyasha snarled. “You just pushed her away because you felt sorry for yourself? How fucking stupid are you?”

“Sorry for myself?” Dobby repeated incredulously. “Look at me!” he demanded. “Without this,” he said as he lifted the cybernetic prosthetic arm, “without this, I'm nothing. It's barely a stump underneath it! And it'll be a full year before I will have all of the pieces on together at the same time, and be able to move around without the aid of a cane or a physical therapist. I've still got at least three more surgeries to go through, if not more - and that's just to see if they can pull all the shrapnel from my back, not to mention any complications that may come from the amputations and the damn anchors they put in for this Frankenstein experiment.”

“And you don't think she'd want to be there for you?” the hanyou snarled, barely holding onto the last vestiges of his temper.

“How the hell can I ask her to stay by my side for that? This is a damn experiment! And on those who can afford it,” he said, the pitch of his voice wavering as he spoke his fears. “These cybernetic implants - these prosthetics - are supposed to be permanently fused with the nerves. Your brain - my brain - is supposed to accept them as part of my body, but I can't because I'm part of a damn trial!” he shouted. “And at the end of it, they could take this all away. What good will I be to her then?! Tell me, because I don't know! All I know is that I can't do anything on my own anymore! I can't even go to the bathroom on my own anymore, I sure as hell can't dress myself, or even feed myself anymore.”

“Don't you think that should be her fucking decision to make?” Inuyasha growled back. “Youkai aren't like humans! Damn! I thought you knew this!” he snarled as he pulled the car into a parking space in front of the apartment building.

“Why the hell do you keep calling her that?” he demanded, and Inuyasha turned his defiant gaze on him, ready to thump the man, injured or not. “She's not youkai, and how do you know about them?”

“How fucking dumb are you?” Inuyasha snapped, feeling his concealment slip as his temper flared, and watched Dobby's eyes widen as he turned off the engine and got out of the car.

“It's a walk-up,” Dobby told Inuyasha with an annoyed sigh when the hanyou opened his door.

“Fuckin' fine then,” Inuyasha said as Dobby unsnapped his seatbelt and the hanyou lifted him from the car, none too gently. “Be grateful, I don't have Tetsusaiga, or I'd shove it up your ass!”

“Hey what the hell!” Dobby protested, when Inuyasha tucked him under his arm, turning away just enough to keep Dobby out of harm's way as he slammed the car door shut. “I'm not a damn football,” he growled as Inuyasha carried him into the building not bothering to change his hold. “Put me down, damnit!”

“Shut up!” Inuyasha snapped in return as he ran toward the stairs and leapt to the first landing.

“Oh god,” Dobby groaned. “I think I'm going to be sick.”

“Keh! You fucking puke on me, I'll drop your ass,” Inuyasha warned him, and leapt to the third-floor landing.

Dobby groaned again when Inuyasha vaulted to the fourth-floor landing, and made a sound of protest as the hanyou stomped down the hallway towards Vanessa's apartment.

“Keh! Fucking idiot,” Inuyasha grumbled with a roll of his eyes as he reached for the door, turning the knob and slapping his hand against it to push it open before stepping inside.

“Jiijii?” Inuyasha turned his head to meet Isabelle's wide eyes, his granddaughter standing still in the middle of the living room with her medical bag in hand. “Oh . . . my.”

“Tell me I'm not seeing you carry some poor child like a sack of rice,” Kagome admonished Inuyasha, and his right ear flicked back and forth in irritation.

“No elevator,” Inuyasha said as though it should explain everything, and dragged a chair across the floor to sit in front of the couch before tipping Dobby up to plop him in the seat. “Now,” Inuyasha said as he pointed a claw-tipped finger at the sofa. “Fucking look at her!”

“What the hell is your problem anyway?” Dobby snapped. “She's - Nessa?” Inuyasha watched Dobby still, the color leeching from his face as he stared at the couch. Dobby's eyes widened as he stared at Vanessa, her ashen skin and sunken cheeks horrifying. A hand-stitched throw pillow was beneath her head, propped against Kagome's thigh, a quilt covering her depleted form. “W-what happened to her?” he asked with disbelief, his eyes wide as he shook his head. “What the hell?”

“You happened, that's what!” Inuyasha growled at him, and was met with Kagome's disapproving glower.

“Don't be so harsh, Inuyasha,” she reprimanded him. “Dobby,” Kagome turned her attention on the man, and to her credit, didn't react to the sight of his missing limbs, and the scars visible on the side of neck and jaw. “General Doggert called here a little while ago to check on Vanessa,” she said, nodding to the cordless house phone that sat on the arm of the couch beside her. “It's my understanding that you know of youkai and hanyou,” she said, and Dobby nodded silently, his eyes fixated on Vanessa. “Vanessa is an earth-based youkai,” Kagome told him, and he turned his gaze on her with a frown. “Did she ever tell you that?”

Dobby shook his head. “No, I - I just assumed she was human. I know she's really good with plants, and I've seen how animals just seem to respond to her, but . . .” He stilled, his gaze falling to the side as his eyes narrowed. “That summer, before we moved in together, I remember falling asleep with her in the woods by her old place. The ground was hard when I fell asleep, but when I woke up, I was laying on a bed of ferns and clover, it was so soft. She never said anything,” he said as he looked up to meet Inuyasha's gaze, before looking at Kagome, “and I never asked. I'm such an idiot. I should have known, it was right there in front of me the whole time, she just never explicitly said it,” he said. “Why is she like this?”

“Because her youkai chose you,” Kagome told him, and Dobby shook his head.

“I don't know what that means,” he said.

“Are you fucking kidding me?” Inuyasha snapped, well beyond his breaking point.

“If it helps,” Isabelle whispered to him as she stepped closer to Inuyasha. “I know Grandpa's been getting on Grandma's nerves a lot and she's been looking for someone to spar with him since she can't,” she offered in reference to Gin and Cain, and Inuyasha snorted in return, crossing his arms over his chest.

“What do you know?” Kagome asked, holding up a hand when Inuyasha looked ready to release a tirade.

“I know that Gwen married a youkai - wolf, I think she said,” Dobby answered, and Inuyasha narrowed his eyes at the set of the man's jaw. “I know that the only reason she told me about it was because I didn't want her to go to the dig site she was working on a few years ago in Sierra Leone, and she only told me about him in order to get me off her back about it. She said if anything happened to her at all, Morgan would be able to track her and that no human ever stood a chance against him.”

“What else?” Kagome asked, and Inuyasha cursed when Dobby shook his head in confusion.

“Keh! They didn't explain any of this to you?” Inuyasha snapped, and Dobby shook his head. “Fucking damn!”

“I've only talked to Morgan once on that same video call, just long enough for him to show me his true face. All he ever said was that I needed to find a nice human girl,” Dobby said. “Why?”

Kagome pinned her mate with a glower, a determined warning sparkling in her eyes, and Inuyasha threw his hands up in the air before turning around to stomp toward the window on the other side of the room, leaning against the corner of the wall as he watched them. Kagome pressed her lips into a thin line as she returned her attention to Dobby.

They didn't have time for this, Inuyasha raged silently as he listened to Kagome ease Dobby into what it meant to be youkai, to be mated to one. He shook his head as Isabelle explained the physiological aspect of youkai - the life span, the marking ritual, the way his life would be extended to match Vanessa's once the marking was done, and what happened to youkai when they were rejected by their mate, explaining why Vanessa was in the condition she was now.

He was ready to put his fist through the wall, Inuyasha thought as he turned away from the window to pace the length of the row of windows and back, only to stop when the apartment door opened and Griffin stepped inside. The old bear youkai didn't say anything as he stayed near the door, his large arms crossed over his chest, looking distinctly uncomfortable by being there in the first place.

`Keh! This would have been easier if I'd just thumped that pup like I wanted to.'

`Baka!' his youkai scoffed. `And give him brain damage on top of everything else?'

`Damnit.'

`You heard that pup, he knows practically nothing about youkai. General Doggert just assumed he knew, no one ever asked, and it's not like his mate was ever going to tell him.'

`She might have if that idiot pup hadn't kept pushing her away. Damn!'

`Maybe Isabelle was right,' his youkai mused. `Maybe it will make you feel better to shove Tetsusaiga up Cain's ass.'

Inuyasha blinked as he felt a tug on the bond between himself and Kagome, turning to meet her gaze when she glanced at him over Dobby's shoulder. His brows drew together as he stepped closer, moving to stand beside his mate, his arms crossed over his chest as he watched her withdraw the photocopy of the sketch from her purse.

“Several years ago, we almost lost our daughter,” Kagome said, as she began the story of Gin and her mate, and handed Dobby the photocopied sketch.

Dobby reached out for the piece of paper, taking it before he thought about it, and blinked in surprise as he stared at the mechanical arm. He shook his head, his brows high on his forehead, his eyes slightly widened as he studied the limb before finally turning his eyes to the sketch in his hand. He stilled then, his lips falling open as he stared at the image, his brows drawing together slowly. Inuyasha could hear the speed of Dobby's heartbeat increase to a maddening rhythm before he took in a deep breath, releasing it in a heavy sigh, and handed the sketch back to Kagome.

He nodded once before looking up at Isabelle. “Whatever you need to do, do it,” he issued the command.

“I need you to be absolutely certain about this because once it's done, it cannot be undone,” she cautioned him.

“I'm sure,” he affirmed. “Do it,” he commanded again, and she moved at once, setting up the apparatus as Inuyasha moved Dobby to lie down on the coffee table in front of the couch.

“You and Vanessa will be staying with my mate, Griffin, and I, until you've both recovered enough that you can be on your own,” Isabelle informed Dobby, the bear youkai grunting in response from where he stood near the door. “I also understand that you've got a long way to go yourself,” she said, nodding to Dobby's injuries. “I won't lie to you, Dobby, none of this is going to be easy, but if you're willing to fight, then we'll be there to help you.”

Inuyasha watched as Dobby nodded, his head moving against the accent pillow Kagome had tucked beneath him. The man grimaced when Isabelle tied the rubber tubing around his right arm, and blew out a heavy breath.

“Take off the cap on the end of my arm,” Dobby instructed. “There's a shunt or something like that in there. When the doc at the center needs to draw blood, he just sticks a needle in there. Hurts like a son of a bitch, but it seems to be quick and easy.” He sighed when Isabelle gasped as she removed the bandages and silicone cap from his arm, barely able to hide her reaction to the metal pieces secured into his bone, the skin puckered and stitched around them. “Anchors,” he said simply, Griffin stepping forward with a deep scowl. “I have `em in both of my legs, too. Secures the cybernetics in place so that the nano-fiber filaments on the prosthetics can fuse with my nerves - or so they tell me.”

Inuyasha had to give the pup credit, whether he was bothered by the attention he was getting or not, you couldn't tell by looking at him. He was doing a rather admirable job of playing it cool.

“We'll talk about that later,” Isabelle promised sagely. “Now, I need to know if there was one particular spot that Vanessa - “

“Ness, or Nessa,” Dobby interrupted her.

“Nessa,” Isabelle repeated with a nod, “was fond of.”

“On me, you mean?” he asked, and Inuyasha rolled his eyes.

“Yes,” Isabelle nodded. “That would be the spot where her mark would show up on you,” she informed him, and Dobby blew out a heavy breath.

“That's going to be a little bit difficult,” he said, lifting his head from the pillow in order to meet her gaze. “The one spot she always seemed to be drawn to,” he said slowly, “was the inside of my right wrist.”

“Damn,” Inuyasha cursed, grunting when the back of Kagome's hand connected with his abdomen.

Isabelle nodded slowly. “Okay,” she said simply. “We'll do this like a normal blood transfusion then and the new mark should appear on its own.”

“Is she strong enough for this?” he asked in return.

“There is some concern,” Isabelle answered him honestly. “But I'll be monitoring both of you very closely. I won't let either of you die,” she promised, and he nodded.

“All right, doc,” Dobby said as he released a steadying breath. “Do your worst.”

~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~_~

Inuyasha sighed as he let his head fall back against the wall behind him from where he sat on the floor, closing his eyes as he took comfort from the sounds of night that spilled in from the partially open window beside him. He could hear the hoot of an owl in the distance, at least thirty feet away, he would guess. The crunch of leaves and snapping of twigs as small animals - racoons and opossums from the smell of them - moved around the ground outside, foraging for food.

The air was still crisp, the trace moisture in the air hinting at snow on the horizon. For the first time that day since stepping into the medical center in downtown Bangor, Inuyasha felt himself relax. Today had been one of those days that he didn't want a repeat of. The kind of day that dredged up too many memories best left buried in the dark recesses of his mind, and served as a warning for those yet to come.

He didn't know what the future held for Dobby and Vanessa, knowing without a doubt that the road ahead of them was going to be difficult to say the least, but worth it in the end. There hadn't been any thought in his mind, any doubt to his actions, when he'd placed a call to General Doggert, and asked for the information for the people heading up the trial Dobby was a part of. He had spoken with the person in charge of the trial, making absolutely certain that the threat of Dobby losing the cybernetic limbs had been neutralized, and offering up enough of an additional donation that the people in charge had been willing to keep his name out of it.

Inuyasha was pulled from his thoughts by the sound of a soft rolling whimper, cracking one eye open at the stunted request to be let closer, and patted his knee in reply. He watched as Captain scooted across the floor before rising to his feet with difficulty. It would take a long time for the dog to return to health, both physically and mentally, but there was hope, and maybe that's all either Dobby or Captain had ever needed - hope, and someone to believe in them.

It had been a harrowing few hours, but Isabelle had completed the marking ritual, and Vanessa had survived it, all without showing any undue signs of stress. She had still been unconscious when Inuyasha had wrapped her in the blanket, lifting her from the couch, and carried her down to his car. Griffin had carried Dobby, despite Isabelle's protest that she was plenty strong enough to carry him herself and Dobby's almost embarrassed refusal to be carried by a woman - youkai or not.

Kagome had been everyone's center, keeping all of them calm and focused as Dobby and Vanessa had been transported to Griffin and Isabelle's house. As much as they had all wanted Vanessa and Dobby to share a room - even share a bed - it simply wasn't an option. Dobby's injuries were still very raw for the most part, and even the slightest risk of Vanessa rolling over and unintentionally applying pressure to his wounds was a chance they couldn't take.

`Not to mention that if Nessa doesn't wake up soon, Isabelle will very likely have to put her on a respirator and IV like Gin was,' his youkai-voice offered up the unwanted reminder.

He closed his eyes as he remembered carrying Vanessa into one of the two guest rooms inside Griffin and Isabelle's home. As though he'd known that she needed to feel someone there with her, Isabelle's dog had followed behind Inuyasha, waiting until he'd finished tucking Vanessa beneath the blankets before climbing onto the bed next to her. And when he'd left, Inuyasha recalled, Charlie was still lying beside her with his large head resting across the woman's stomach.

He blinked, his thoughts fading away, his eyes turning down to watch as Captain nuzzled his way under his hand. Inuyasha's lips pulled up to the side in the barest hint of a smile. He moved slowly, smoothing his hand down over the dog's fur, and watched as Captain blinked slowly. Shifting his hips forward, Inuyasha slipped his hand into his pocket and pulled out the Milk Bone biscuit tucked inside. He broke off a small edge of the bone, and laid his open palm in front of Captain's muzzle, watching as he finally ate the small morsel of food. It wasn't much, but it was enough, he thought; the smallest sign that maybe - just maybe - everything would turn out okay in the end.

*~*~*~*~*AN*~*~*~*~*

Kujira = whale

shachi = killer whale/orca