InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ How Do We Learn to Love the Ones We Hate? ❯ Please Dont Die ( Chapter 18 )

No poseo nada! (I own nothing!)

 

Please Don't Die

 

Shippo slashed again, finally managing to tear off one shoulder pad of Suikotsu's armor. He leapt back as fast as he could, barely avoiding the razor sharp metal that whistled where his neck had been only seconds ago.

 

Suikotsu had gotten some very good hits in while Shippo tried to chip away at his armor, namely, a huge gash that left his left shoulder basically in shreds, a large cut above Shippo's eye that was freely dripping blood, making Shippo's vision literally go red, and another gash on Shippo's chest, the one on his chest being the least serious of the three.

 

Shippo lunged the second he had his feet on the ground, aiming only for Suikotsu's shoulder as he struck repeated, not letting any breaks between his attacks. Suikotsu dodged them as best as he could, yelling curses as he did, but human speed can be hindering compared to demon speed.

 

He snarled as Shippo bit off his other shoulder pad, smirking when he administered another gash to Shippo's leg and bottom lip, but swore again when Shippo ripped off his chest armor.

 

Shippo yelped as he misjudged and landed wrong, his ankle nearly snapping beneath him. He froze as Suikotsu appeared above him.

 

Then he smelled her.

 

His blood ran cold, and then froze into ice. Her scent was almost hidden beneath all of the blood, but she was there, and she was close.

 

Suikotsu raised his claw, preparing to behead Shippo in one swift movement, when she screamed.

 

Shippo's head whirled to the side. That stupid woman! Is she trying to get herself killed?! He felt his heart stop beating as Suikotsu turned from him and lunged for her. She was small, just a child, and vulnerable, and scared.

 

Scared for him.

 

He forced himself to his feet and lunged, his eyes on Suikotsu's open back, left completely unprotected.

 

Earlier

 

Rin gasped again, sucking lungs into her pained lungs. Her leg had gone numb enough that she could limp on it at least, and she had forced herself to go even faster as the sound of claws and blades crashed. It was close. She didn't have to far to go.

 

She grabbed a tree branched and pulled herself up to the outer edge of the clearing, forcing herself not to shriek.

 

Shippo was on the ground, Suikotsu above him, Suikotsu's claws poised to behead him. Her fiancé. Her love. The father of her baby. The man she lived for.

 

She didn't know why she decided to scream, but all she could think at the time was how he needed a distraction or he wasn't going to get out of there alive, and she was next. But as the bloodcurdling sound ripped from her throat, she didn't care.

 

She knew it put her in danger, but even as Suikotsu charged her, the claws set to come at her throat, she wasn't afraid. Only happy that Shippo would be safe.

 

And Shippo came out of nowhere, his speed giving him the advantage. His talons descended on Suikotsu's heart, but then Suikotsu did something that neither of them expected or could foresee.

 

He whirled, the claws that had been out for Rin's neck, immediately switched to Shippo's neck.

 

Shippo dodged and his claws pierced Suikotsu's chest, smashing through the armor, and shattering the metal. His hand burst through Suikotsu's back, gone all the way through his lung and a strange gurgling yell of anger erupted from the mercenary's mouth.

 

Shippo smirked, his fang poking over his bottom lip.

 

It's over, and Rin's safe---

 

The sound of tearing flesh and severing bone ripped through the night and Rin screamed again, this time, in true fear.

 

Shippo saw white, and pained seared like fire through him, his body frozen in that position, with his hand in Suikotsu's chest. He swallowed, managing to work up the energy to look up. Suikotsu had plunged his claws into Shippo's back, all the way to the hilt.

 

Shippo staggered back, his hand pulling from Suikotsu as Suikotsu lashed out once more before falling back himself, blood steadily dripping from the corner of his mouth.

 

Shippo, not having enough strength to stop himself, flew through the air, hit a rock, snapping his already injured ankle, and flipped himself over the small cliff. Rin screamed again and hiked up her skirt, running over to the ridge, ignoring the fire burning in her knee every step she took.

 

She jumped down the three feet, landing in the knee-deep water. She gasped and wailed, fighting her way through the mud, throwing herself next to Shippo.

 

“Hey.” He smiled weakly, trying as well as he could not to worry her anymore.

 

“You're going to be fine!” she blubbered, holding him above the water as best as she could on her knees.

 

Rin sucked in a sharp breath, clinging to Shippo tighter as trees smashed not a mile away from them.

 

“That's Kyokotsu!” she wailed, burying her head in Shippo's neck.

 

“Rin,” Shippo looked around frantically, his vision starting to go black, then he saw it, the full moon's reflection on the water. The water had long since run pure red from his blood, but the shimmering silver beauty was still visible on the water's surface.

 

“Rin, I took those papers from that book. The papers for the spell.” He said finally, closing his eyes. This was the only chance she had. He was dead as it was, but she wouldn't survive Kyokotsu for ten seconds as a human.

 

“For the…” she knew instantly what he meant. “Why?” she winced as more trees shattered, the sounds growing rapidly closer. “I wanted to become a demon to not die on you, so I could live with you and our baby forever too.”

 

“They were dangerous, I was worried.” He sighed, and gingerly reached up, pulling a foxglove flower from his coat.

 

He placed it gently on the water's surface, so it floated, and then he turned back to Rin and ran his thumb along her bottom lip. “Do you still want that?” he asked quietly, barely audible above the sound of another tree smashing.

 

She nodded, tears streaming endlessly down her face.

 

“…Do you trust me?” he asked finally, replacing the thumb on her lip with a claw. She nodded again, squeezing her eyes shut to try to hold back the tears.

 

She flinched and her eyes flew open as he pressed the tip of his claw into her lip, tracing a small line. He drew his finger back and a small trickle of blood started from where he had cut. He slid his hand behind her neck, smiling as she shivered, and pulled her head down, crushing his lips against hers. The cut on his lip, pressed to the one on hers.

 

“I love you.” He whispered before he went limp, his eyes going blank as his head tipped to the side.

 

“No, no. NO, NO, NO, NO! Shippo!” she screamed, gripping him tighter, even shaking him to try to wake him. “Shippo!” she screamed again and again, but he stay motionless no matter how much she called or shook him.

 

She ducked as the trees right behind them flew apart in a million pieces. She winced as a piece of wood sliced her ear, noticing that the pain wasn't as prominent now. Her hand shot of to the side of her head and her breath hitched. She ran her finger along the edge of her ear again. She wasn't delusional, they were pointed.

 

Her fingertips leapt to her mouth next, where she promptly nearly skewered her finger on the razor-sharp fang. She sniffed curiously and grimaced. She could smell him, the monster behind her, he smelled of rotting corpses, and murder, and blood, though she hadn't the faintest idea how she identified those.

 

“Well, well, look what we have here.” His low voice rang throughout the clearing.

 

She turned, looking through her raven black hair with eyes that could see everything, every line in Kyokotsu's skin, and she could imagine seeing every blood cell as it spewed from his chest. She had no sense of reality, or morality as she gently set Shippo down, rising to face Kyokotsu.

 

“For Shippo.” She whispered dangerously, and lunged, her fangs bared, a snarl from her throat shattering the cold night air, the cold she no longer noticed.

 

Meanwhile, Another Edge of the Takashi Forest

 

Ayame pressed her hand over her mouth, plugging her nose as she did, rocketing through the trees.

 

“Heh, heh, heh, you can't run.” A voice above her laughed. She jammed her heels into the ground, looking up into the trees.

 

She yelped as her feet started to burn, an acid she hadn't noticed until then seeping across the ground. She gritted her teeth, not being able to smell because of the lethal poisons was really starting to get on her nerves. How wasn't Mukotsu affected?! He was human, and he was swimming in poisons and acids that would melt her! A full-grown and full-blooded demon!

 

She growled, running out of air, and started running again, she had to find some uncontaminated air or choose between suffocation and have her lungs be burned from the inside out.

 

She took a curious sniff as she neared three miles away from the poison user and sighed out loud, finding it clean. Her face was red from holding her breath for so long and she was about to collapse from having no oxygen running through the blood she was using to run.

 

“Did you think that you could get away?” a voice from behind her laughed.

 

“What?!” she shrieked, whirling to face the almost deformed looking man. “How did you catch up to me so fast?!” she clenched her fists, preparing to fight.

 

“Heh, heh.” He chuckled, his eyes closed calmly. “The poison that you inhaled has impaired your judgment, for example…” he paused, then punched the air in front of him, and something iron hit her squarely across the cheek. She grasped it and rolled out of the way, looking around for what hit her.

 

“I probably look about twenty or thirty feet away to you right now, but I'm actually standing right above you.” He laughed.

 

“What?!” she yelled, yelping as she was knocked back again by a kick that looked as if it should have missed her by at least twenty feet.

 

“You probably thought you ran a mile or two, but you actually only ran about fifty feet, as I said, you can't escape.”

 

She gritted her teeth, scrambling back as he took another step closer and raced off into the trees.

 

Ok, no big deal, I just have to stay a lot farther away, and I have to be careful of how close poisons are to me.

 

She took another sniff of the air to find out where he was and gagged, her hand shooting up to her throat as it started burning. This was bad, she could barely breathe, let alone smell him through the smoggy poisons, and she didn't trust her sight in the least at the moment. That thought was reinforced as she ran straight into a tree that was forty feet away from her.

 

She picked her self up off the ground, shaking her head and rubbing the new bump right above her eye.

 

“Did you not understand when I said that your judgment is off?”

 

Ayame shrieked, the voice came from right behind her. She jumped up to some tree branches, gripping them liked they were lifelines. He looked forty feet away, but the voice had definitely been from right behind her.

 

“Your sight and smell is off, you can't fight me if you can't find me.” he laughed, pulling the top off of another tube of poison.

 

Ayame pressed her hand over her mouth and nose. He was right, if she couldn't see or smell him… she could still feel, but that was pretty useless if she couldn't get her hand around his neck-less body.

 

That was it! Her eyes lit up. “If I can't see or smell,” she murmured, and closed her eyes, “then hear.”

 

She waited, sitting completely motionless until he took a step. Just one step, just shifting his weight from on leg to the other, but it was enough.

 

“Got you!” she roared, using the rebound off the tree and launched herself to the direction of the sound. Mukotsu screamed in agony as she sliced his arm off, and it gave her the direction for her next attack. She lunged, growling as he dodged, but as he took those necessary steps to doge her, she attacked again, severing his top half from his bottom half.

 

“How…” he gasped, struggling for his last breaths on the ground.

 

Ayame smirked at him, cracking her knuckles. “Sight and hearing aren't my only senses you know, and as a demon, they are multiplied by a hundreds times, much more than a human could ever comprehend. You picked the wrong opponent to fight today.”

 

“Maybe.” He smiled, Ayame's brow furrowed at his still never-dying confidence. “But I can still take you down with me.”

 

Ayame gasped as he grabbed one string and pulled, taking the tops off every single one of the poison tubes at once. She screamed, lunging forward and slicing him in half with her claws in and effort to stop him, but in her motions, she accidentally inhaled a considerable amount of the poisons.

 

She staggered back, her eyes tearing up and brimming over as the poison burned them. She clutched at her throat and clawed at her chest as her lungs seemed to swell, cutting off all air and threatening to shatter her rib cage. She gasped, frothing a bloody, green substance at the corner of her mouth that was bubbling up from her stomach and collapsed backwards. She lay there, twitching, bloody tears leaking from her eyes as she raked at the ground with her claws, struggling frantically for breath.

 

Meanwhile

 

Kagome flew through the forest, using her spiritual powers collecting in her hands to propel herself forward and keep herself aloft. Only one thing was on her mind: Inuyasha. Nabiki's words ran through her head over and over again like a steam engine through her: “It was on purpose, but, we don't know where they are or if they survived.”

 

She had to find him, find him preferably before he died, but even if she was too late, it would be better to be with him than to just find him after he'd died.

 

She skidded to a halt, and closed her eyes. She thought she had… her head whipped to the right and started flying in that direction. Yes, she had definitely sensed Ayame's demonic aura. She gulped, eyeing all the blood on the trees and the ground as she flew.

 

She came to an abrupt halt as she rocketed into the clearing. There was a dead member of the Band of Seven at her feet, sliced in half between his stomach and waist, and the again, right down through his skull. Whoever had take care of him really didn't want him to have any chance of recovering. Kagome shivered and quickly looked away.

 

Kagome prepared herself as she took another slow step forward. She knew what she was going to see, she just had a feeling, but she knew. She gulp and took another step forward, and another, another and stopped. She swallowed and took a few deep breaths before opening her eyes, looking slowly to the right.

 

Ayame was nearing unconsciousness and death fast. She was lying on her back on the ground, twitching and frothing something sickening from her mouth. Kagome lunged, she checked Ayame's pulse, and then her breathing.

 

“Damn it!” she screamed, grabbing Ayame and heaving her onto her back.

 

She's not breathing, and I can't even fly to get back to the castle because it takes purifying energy that would purify Ayame in the process!

 

“Damn it, damn it, damn it!” she yelled. Ayame shuddered violently on her back and latched onto her shoulders, digging her claws into Kagome's flesh as she vomited blood all over Kagome's back.

 

“Don't you dare die!” Kagome screamed, forcing herself to run faster despite the weight.

 

A Half a Mile Away

 

“It came from over there!” Akane pointed.

 

“Stupid girl.” Mousse muttered, pulling seven different blades out of each sleeve.

 

“Stupid is right, why would she just run off like that?!” Ranma yelled, the Nerima wrecking crew had been chasing Kagome for the past twenty minutes after she had suddenly just jumped out of the window and flew off, telling them that it was dangerous and they should wait at the castle. Yeah right, like they would be able to sit there that long with nothing to do but worry.

 

“She was worried!” Akane defended her. “I mean, if you were---” she shut her mouth instantly, realizing what she had been about to say.

 

Ranma looked over in shock, he and Akane had… kind of… confessed their love… that… ahem, night a few days back, but he never expected her to say anything out loud.

 

Everyone else aside from Mousse was just pretending that they hadn't heard it, and plotted how to kill either Ranma or Akane in their heads.

 

“Hey!” Shampoo yelled suddenly, coming to an abrupt halt and taking out Mousse as he couldn't stop fast enough behind her. “Shampoo see priestess girl go running that way!” she pointed.

 

“Let's go!” Ryoga yelled, taking off after Kagome.

 

“Kagome, stop!” Ranma yelled, catching sight of her, and the… dead girl on her back.

 

“Who's that?” Akane asked, calling up to her. “Is that the one that killed that copy-cat demon?”

 

“Don't stop me! I need to get her back to the castle!” Kagome yelled dangerously, clearing threatening anyone who dared to touch her in her voice.

 

“What happened to wolf-girl?” Shampoo yelled, everyone was finally running along side her now because of the extra weight Kagome was carrying.

 

“Are you blind?!” Kagome barked. “She's been poisoned with enough toxins to wipe out five hundred humans!”

 

“Let me carry her!” Ranma yelled, trying to take her from Kagome, Kagome gave him a look that would have killed someone who hadn't been fighting his entire life.

 

“I'm stronger!” he continued. “We'll get there faster!”

 

Akane came up and touched Kagome's shoulder reassuringly. Kagome looked painfully back over her shoulder at Ayame and loosened her grip, letting Ranma slide the now unconscious and quickly suffocating Ayame onto his back.

 

Kagome breathed a sigh of relief as every doubled their speed.

 

“Hang in there Ayame.” She whispered, racking her brains for any sort of poison nullifier they had in the castle.

 

XXX

 

“Kasumi! Kasumi!”

 

“What is it?” Kasumi smiled, coming out of the castle with her normal apron on.

 

“We need help! Wolf-girl is dying!” Shampoo yelled.

 

“Oh my,” Kasumi touched her fingers to her top lip as she looked at Ayame in Ranma's arms, “what happened?”

 

“She was poisoned!” Kagome yelled. “I think it's in her stomach, she keeps vomiting up things!”

 

“Ranma, will you please bring her into the kitchen?” Kasumi asked gently. “I need someone to come with me to help me carry things.”

 

Ryoga and Mousse ran later Kasumi, who was trotting down into the basement while Ranma dashed into the kitchen. Akane and Ukyo held Ayame down on the table as she was twitched and thrashing too much to stay on herself.

 

Kasumi came back with Ryoga and Mousse, all carrying six different jugs of alcohols.

 

“We aren't going to toast to her passing!” Kagome barked.

 

“Don't worry Kagome, if this works, she'll be fine.” Kasumi pulled out a glass and started pouring the alcohols into it, some more than others.

 

“How can you be so calm at a time like this?!” Kagome threw her hands in the air, glancing nervously between her and Ayame.

 

Kasumi instructed Akane and Ukyo to hold Ayame's head up, and them tipped the entire glass down Ayame's throat. Ayame shuddered, and her eyes flew open. She wrenched out of the grips of Akane and Ukyo and threw her head over the side of the table, retching and emptying her stomach onto the floor, coating it with a bubbling, thick, bloody, green liquid. Everyone yelped and jumped back.

 

Kasumi stepped forward around the contents of Ayame's stomach on the floor and tipped another full glass of the liquid into her mouth. Ayame gasped, covered her mouth, and threw her head over the side of the table, retching again.

 

Kasumi repeated the process six more times until on the seventh time, Ayame vomited up just the alcohol. Kasumi then wiped her forehead and set the glass in the sink, washing her hands and going off to look for a mop as Ayame gasped, finally breath, sprawled on the table.

 

“What…?” Kagome finally asked, pointing at Ayame.

 

“Sweet alcohols make you throw up.” Kasumi explained, her smile back on her face.

 

“Oh.” Kagome murmured in realization. She was trying to get the poisons out of Ayame's system. “I'm sorry,” Kagome said quietly, walking over to Ayame, “I thought… I don't really know what I thought you were doing.” She admitted.

 

“It's fine.” Kasumi smiled back at her, running the mop across the floor.

 

“Did you order my death?” Ayame asked suddenly, her face's color finally returning.

 

“What?!” Kagome shrieked. “You nearly die and that's all you have to say?!” she screamed right in Ayame's ear.

 

“Good.” Ayame sighed. “You aren't that demon, you would yell at me, she wouldn't have.” She laughed weakly.

 

Kagome rolled her eyes and grabbed Ayame, crushing her in a hug.

 

“I'm glad you're ok.” She whispered.

 

“Me too.” Ayame whispered back, wrapping her arms weakly around Kagome. “It would have really sucked to die back there.”

 

Kagome couldn't help but laugh.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The good news is that my wrist is better. The bad news is that school starting has kind of swamped me. Sorry chapters are taking longer to be posted up! Sorry!