InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ His Past, Her Present, Their Future ❯ Grieving ( Chapter 39 )

[ X - Adult: No readers under 18. Contains Graphic Adult Themes/Extreme violence. ]

Disclaimer: No own InuYasha.


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His Past, Her Present, Their Future
Chapter 39 - Grieving

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InuYasha whipped back around with his jaw practically to his knees, “Huh?”

“I want to know if Sesshoumaru is okay or not.”

He growled at her, his eyes narrowing, “Why? I don’t know. I only know the people who make it to the better plane, and gods know that he wouldn‘t. Probably is dead, good riddance.”

Kagome flinched and looked down, her eyes brimming with tears.

“Was that necessary, InuYasha?” a deep voice boomed.

Kagome’s eyes flew up and the tears became happy ones, “Mattaki-kun!” she cried, sprinting into the elder youkai’s arms. He grabbed her around the waist and spun her in a circle, his rumbling laugh filling the clearing.

InuYasha’s eyes were wide, “Uhh…Kagome? Dad? What the fuck?”

Kagome didn’t let go of the inuyoukai, but looked at InuYasha incredulously, “What?”

Mattaki let out a sound suspiciously like a snicker, “We never told him.”

“Nani?! How could he not know?!” she said, her eyes narrowing at Mattaki’s very nearby golden ones, her arms still latched around his neck.

“Would you believe me if I said we forgot, and he didn’t pay enough attention to notice?”

“Sure, I believe he wouldn’t pay attention, but I doubt you forgot.”

He grinned, his fangs flashing, “Ahh, my friend, it has been too long. I must say though, your storytelling was wonderful, but to watch it all was enlightening.”

“Would someone clue me in already, damnit?!” InuYasha boomed.

“O-su-wa-ri!” Kagome chimed in a sing-song voice, sending the hanyou into the ground and making Mattaki burst into peals of laughter, finally releasing her so he could brace his hands on his thighs.

“Mate, I think it is wrong to laugh at other’s misfortune,” a giggling voice chastised.

“Kaori-chan!” Kagome giggled, running to embrace the demoness tightly, “It is wonderful to see you again.”

“You as well, Kagome-chan. I missed you terribly.”

InuYasha tapped Kagome’s shoulder, getting a glare from the miko. He shrunk back, his ears flat to his head but scowled, “Can you please tell me how in the hell you are so friendly with my Dad and shit-head’s mom?”

Kagome sat him into a crater for that one and glared, but glanced over her shoulder at Mattaki, “He doesn’t know any of it?! None!?”

“We are not allowed to view the earthen plane for a century after our deaths…he missed it all and never asked.”

Kagome sighed into her hands, “Shimatta,” she moaned, “This will not be fun.”

“If you keep using the rosary on him, it will be!” Mattaki grinned, earning a smack from both Kaori and Kagome simultaneously.

She kneeled beside the recovering hanyou and sighed, “Long story short, when I wished you all back to life on the jewel, you know how Midoriko told me I would be leaving the Sengoku Jidai?” he nodded to her, “Well, I did…but I went back five hundred more years. I spent about three months with your Dad and Kaori there, along with Sesshoumaru.”

He growled and narrowed his eyes at his still snickering father, “Why didn’t you tell me you knew Kagome?”

“I thought this would be more fun?”

“Mattaki, your sense of humor never fails you,” Kagome said dryly, mock glaring at the Taiyoukai.

He glared back, “What’s that supposed to mean?”

She grinned, “Oh no! The glare! Kowai! Do I get the giggle next?”

He lunged at her and she rolled away, giggling all the way. InuYasha was still growling, “You have a better relationship with my old man than I do.”

“Daughters are always treated better than sons,” Mattaki retorted, using his knuckles to dig into Kagome’s ribs, sending the girl into peals of laughter.

“Daughter? Nani?! Don‘t tell me there‘s some freaky way she‘s related to me…I kissed her!”

After being released from Mattaki, Kagome glared, blushed, and sighed in succession, “He took care of me while I was back there, we are very close. Not to mention…” she trailed off, looking to Kaori for support.

She demoness knelt beside her and met InuYasha’s glare with one of her own, “She is mated to my son, so she is as close to our daughter as we ever got.”

“You’re WHAT?!” InuYasha boomed, his eyes flying wide.

“I am mated to Sesshoumaru…assuming he is still alive…assuming any youkai are still alive…,” she said sadly, looking at the ground with tear filled eyes.

“Worry not, child, I am sure he is. He’s a resilient boy, though I don’t agree with much of what he did over the years. I heard him tell you his excuse for trying to kill you…but gods, I wanted to enter the normal plane to beat sense into him when he did…in my own tomb, no less! But he is not in Japan, and that is all we can see.”

Kagome laid her head on the now sitting inuyoukai man’s shoulder, “Arigato for your concern, Mattaki.”

He pulled her close and stroked her hair as she looked into InuYasha’s burning gaze, “You…fuc…” he was interrupted by the ‘sit’ and ripped out of the submission spell, “You are with my brother?!”

“Hai, and I love him. Please, InuYasha, be happy that I am.”

He growled and looked away, “Keh.”

Mattaki growled at his youngest, “InuYasha, if not for her, you would never have been born. It was her connection to you that kept Sesshoumaru from slaying your mother while she was pupped.”

She extracted herself from Mattaki’s grip, letting Kaori go to his side as she went to the hanyou’s disgruntled back. She ran a hand over his ear and he leaned back into the touch, his eyes closed. She laid her head on his back and spoke softly, “You don’t know him how I do, InuYasha. He really is a good person, and I hope someday you’ll see that. I don’t think I could have survived…after you left me…I was so alone…”

He sighed and turned, pulling her to his chest, “I know, wench. Death doesn’t stop how I feel, though. That bastard had better treat you right, or I swear I’ll kill him.”

Kagome giggled, “How can you kill someone when you’re dead?”

“Fine, I’ll haunt him, that better?”

“Hai. So, are there still youkai in my time?”

“Of course there are! Shippou is running around somewhere.”

Kagome’s eyes glistened, “Oh my little boy…I hope I can find him!”

“Keh, he’s still just a runt.”

She shook her head and gave his ear one last tweak before standing, “What of Sango and Miroku? Or is this a youkai-blood-only kind of get together?”

“They were here for a while…but since bouzo left I’ve been bored. Their souls went on to reincarnate, so they can’t be here.”

Kagome’s eyes brightened for a moment, “So I could find them?”

“They wouldn’t be them, Kagome, just like you are not Kikyou,” Mattaki said softly.

She nodded, “I know, wishful thinking.”

“Besides,” InuYasha chimed, “Their about fifty years old, not much fun if you ask me. They’ll be back here soon enough, then I’ll have someone to screw with again!”

“Back? But if they went on to reincarnate…”

“Its complicated,” Mattaki said, he and Kaori moving to sit next to them, “You see, our souls are very complex. In every person’s soul, our past lives are imprinted. And so, rather than either punish all lives, that small bit of soul goes to its respective place with each death. There can be multiple aspects of every soul running around.”

Kagome blinked rapidly, “That is confusing.”

“Hai. But it means that Sango and Miroku will come back, and when you finally join us you won’t be stuck in hell because of what Kikyou did, though she will go right back again,” InuYasha said gruffly, still tense from revelations.

Kagome tried to understand this, but nodded slowly and smiled, “Well, I can’t say I’m in a rush to die, but at least I know I won’t be alone.”

Mattaki and Kaori laughed, a golden eye winking conspiratorially, “Now, now, child, I told you many years ago that you would have many waiting for you. And I meant every word of it. Now, you need to go find my son! He is surely going crazy without you.”

“Then why hasn’t be come?” she beseeched, her eyes filling with tears once miore.

Kaori pulled her into her arms, stroking her bangs from her forehead lovingly, “I think I can answer that. It seems that though it was five hundred years between InuYasha’s time and ours, it was only four hundred and fifty between then and now. They aren’t expecting you for another fifty years, my friend.”

Kagome face-planted without dignity, “THAT’S why?! Damnit all to hell…I shouldn’t have assumed it would be exact I guess,” she sighed and smiled, lighthearted for the first time since her return to modern times, “I’ll just have to find him then, ne?”

“I would suggest looking for your kit first, since we know he is in the country. He spent a lot of time with Sesshoumaru through the years.”

“Aa. Thank you, all three of you. I miss you guys so much.”

“Me too,” InuYasha said softly, pulling her to his lap and nuzzling his nose into her hair, “Heaven will only be heaven when you get here.”

Kagome blushed but smiled, leaning into the attention, “You are never far from my mind, InuYasha. Someday we’ll be together forever, and be able to relive our adventures, ne?”

“Of course, wench.”

She giggled and smiled over at the two elder inuyoukai, who were smiling softly back, “Kagome-chan, its time for you to go.”

Her eyes shot to Kaori, “But why?”

“We will visit again, friend, but night is over for you. You must awaken. Think of us, and we shall come to you again.”

“Hai,” she said sadly, rising from InuYasha’s lap to hug everyone goodbye. In a flash, they were gone, leaving Kagome to stare at her alarm clock in disdain. She growled and heaved herself out of bed, throwing on clothing but a smile stayed on her face. She had hope again, now she just had to plan.

Maybe she should put an ad in the paper? Or try and get a spot on the news for her books, like she always avoided. She used a pen name to be left alone, and people only saw her at her book signings. But exposure is what she needed now…something to let her lost friends know she was alive here and now.

Plans still whirring through her head, she heard a knock at the door, and absentmindedly called for whomever it was to come in. No one came this early by Ayumi, and she had her head in the fridge as she hummed, looking for a yogurt to grab for breakfast.

“Ready?” a voice said right behind her, making her jump from its nearness. Ayumi only giggled, “Are you?”

“Class isn’t for hours, what is it?”

“Duh, today is the field-trip Kouro-sensei was talking about. Don’t you remember?”

Kagome blushed, “I wasn’t really all there in class…its today?”

“Yeah, come on! He said it’s a ways out of town, so he rented charter buses. He gets so enthused about history…he probably overdid his budget again.”

Kagome grinned, her friend almost flinching in surprise at seeing the ‘old Kagome’ smile. She had no idea why her eyes had suddenly lit once again, of why her smiles brightened the room once more, but she wasn’t going to risk it stopping because she asked, so she didn’t. She recovered and smiled in return, waiting for her friend to follow her down the elevator to her car.

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Boredom. The bus drove on and on, two hours on. And Kagome sighed, still having no idea where they were going. She turned to Ayumi, “Where are we going, anyway?”

Ayumi blinked, “You really weren’t paying attention in class, were you? Its unlike you to not be rapt to everything in class.”

“I…have had a lot on my mind,” she grumbled, her eyes darting out the window.

“Well, its some old historical village. There’s a legend there that it was once the home to a bunch of demon exterminators or something. Kinda like the one in your story, you know?”

Kagome’s eyes were wide, and she gulped, “Yeah…kinda like that, I guess…” her mind was racing. Were they going to the Taijiya no Sato? Her heart pounded in her chest. Well, they were going north from Tokyo, and it was several hours out of the way. Not that she could really understand the equivalencies between the way she used to travel to it and by vehicle, but it seemed right. Her breathing was labored as her sensei stood at the front of the bus.

“Alright, students, we’re almost there. Remember to pay attention to the legend, I am going to want an essay on this place. I will give specifics when we leave, but for now pay attention to everything!”

Kagome hardly noticed them stop or her own feet moving her off the bus. The walls were the same, though the fallen areas had been replaced at some point. The entrance the same. The atmosphere the same. The area around the village was still rather rural, this far out of the way, and the village itself was rebuilt…but this was it. Sango’s hometown.

A tour guide led them along the wall and down beaten dirt paths, obviously unchanged for hundreds of years. Differences stood out like sore thumbs to Kagome…wooden doors on some huts, plastic cases enclosing bits of memorabilia. She listened to the guide as he droned, her heart still thumping frantically.

“It is said that hundred of years ago, this was the home to a tribe of Taijiya. They were slaughtered mercilessly by an evil villain, leaving all but one soul dead. That soul, after enacting revenge, was able to rebuild this village into what it is today, teaching her skills to all those who wished to learn. She took what was but a destroyed place of painful memories and made life stronger for it with her husband.”

He continued on but Kagome wasn’t listening. The tale was so accurate, though vague. How could such facts have survived history so strongly? Her mind was in a whirl as Ayumi cut through the whirlwind, “Wow, you must have used this myth as the basis for a part of your story, huh? About Sango?”

Kagome flinched hard, her friends eyes growing concerned, “Yeah, that’s it,” she mumbled, pulling away, “I am going to walk around. I’ll be back, okay?”

“Kagome?” her friend asked in concern, but she didn’t hear as she walked away, intent to be alone with her mind.

It was a slap in the face when she came to the northeast corner of the village, such a shock that she had to force her leaden legs to pull her forward before collapsing to her knees. At the far end of a long row of cordoned off graves were two that stood out amongst the others. They stood out for the plastic cases at their head.

Kagome scrambled on her hands and knees to be before them, still too far in shock to feel the hot tears streaming down her face. A sob left her throat that didn’t sound anything like herself, and she ducked under the fence to crawl toward, her hands resting on either side of her.

Slightly to her left on the wall, in a small plastic box, sat a tarnished gold hoop, with small rings adorning it. It had been a common item in those days, a top to a shakujou (the rest of the staff having long deteriorated), it was what was on the right that confirmed it all. On the right side was a larger enclosure, holding what was undeniably Hiraikotsu, in all its glory. The leather straps looked brittle, but the bone was as pristine as ever. Kagome sobbed harder.

She stayed kneeled between her friends’ graves for a long time, weeping silently. Of course they were head, they had been dead for hundreds of years, but to know it? To sit at their graves? It was too much.

“S-S-Sango…Mirok-ku…kami I miss you!” she choked out, shaking her head, “Why couldn’t I have stayed with you? Why did I have to go? Damn Midoriko, damn fate, and damn time! I HATE IT!” she screamed, pressing her forehead into the dirt, “I hate it.”

“Kagome?” Ayumi’s voice called tentatively. She head her friend scream, and rounded the corner to find her on her hands an knees, kowtowing in the dirt between two ancient graves. She was worried for her friends health.

The girl spun, her eyes wild and red faced, tears still rolling down her cheeks, “Just leave me alone,” she said in a cracked voice.

“Kagome, I don’t understand…”

“THEIR DEAD!” she yelled, her body shaking, “I’ve always known they would be, but it hurts so much!” she wailed, talking to herself as much as she was talking to Ayumi.

“Who? What are you talking about, Kagome?” Ayumi was really worried now.

“Sango and Miroku!” she said, flailing her arms, “Damnit, I wish I could have stayed with them…this isn’t fair…”

“Ka-Kagome…Sango and Miroku aren’t real. They are characters from your book…” Ayumi pulled her friend out of the fenced area and stood her up, “I think you need to see a doctor…”

“SHUT UP!” she yelled. All these years of bottling up her pain, she never really grieved. Why grieve for someone who died hundreds of years prior? Now, in her near hysteria, she saw her folly.

Ayumi held her friend, anxious over her friends demeanor. She was grieving fictional characters of her own creation? What in the hell was going on?

“Miss?” a man’s voice called, “Is there a problem?”

She turned to the voice, and blinked several times. His hair was short and messy, a dark shade of brown. He didn’t look much older than them, but she could tell by his suit that he wasn’t just another tourist. His face was half hidden behind sunglasses, but Ayumi was desperate.

“My friend…she’s hysterical all of a sudden…”

Kagome’s sobs were calming and she looked up at the prying man. To Ayumi, it seemed like he’d seen a ghost. He took a tentative step forward, “Kagome?”


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A/N NOT A PLANNED CLIFFIE….Gomen ne, loves. -bashful- Sorry. I needed to cut down, it was getting too long….and I couldn’t resist…..

Wont be long till the next chapter. -blows kisses-