InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Humanity's Valor ❯ Bedtime ( Chapter 9 )
Me: Well…apparently my only reviewers have given up on me, because I take too long…
MUSE: *cries!!!*
Me: just more motivation to get them back, which is why I’ll be getting my chapters in sooner than 5 months…
DISCLAIMER: I own nothing of Rumiko Takahashi’s.
Ok, so here’s a new thing. Instead of calling them physical bodies and mental bodies all the time, im just gonna shorten it to physicals and mentals. Im gonna ease into it though, so some words here and there will be with ‘body’ and without ‘body’. purposely done, no alarm needed.
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“Wha-what??” Kagome stuttered, “What do you mean what happened to me?”
“You were electrocuted! Kagome, how do you not remember that?!” Inuyasha said to her. He was still cradling her ethereal body, as everyone else stared at the strange scene before them.
“Oh…yea I remember that,” there was a long pause. “I…We…I…I don’t know. I just, I tried stopping Yukitani-” at Inuyasha’s blank stare, she quickly explained and continued, “the siren, the one the imp, Herutatani, listened to, from attacking Miroku. So I…I ran to him, no, into him, into his mental body. I was actually aiming for his, ah, physical body, but his mental body kinda floated in the way. I tried to get out of it, but it just…sucked me in! He…he had connections, er…I don’t know what to call them, they were like tentacles that suddenly came from his aura, and they connected with my own.” Inuyasha looked at her like she was crazy, “Hey! Don’t give me that look; it’s hard to remember this stuff! Anyway, he attached himself to me and it…oh, it was such a terrible feeling, it felt like I was part of him, like I wasn’t Kagome anymore, I wasn’t even human. I didn’t like it. No, I hated it, I hated that feeling, and I wanted to be me again. So, I tried to pull away, as hard as I could. I got out, and then I don’t know what happened. I just…blacked out. A mind is still capable of that, even without a physical body, apparently,” she finished.
“But what were those bolts between you two?” Inuyasha wanted to know.
“Inuyasha, what did she say?” Miroku asked. Consciousness had regained itself in him when Kagome was half the way through her speech, though he did not know she had been talking.
Inuyasha shortened it for him, plucking out the minor details.
Miroku tried to sit up, but was pushed back down by Sango’s firm hand. She may have been injured, but she was still strong. Miroku sighed and replied to Inuyasha, “I think I know what the electric currents between them were.”
This caught Inuyasha’s attention. He slipped his hand around the warmth, and held her up close to him, though she didn’t need the support, as he stood up to walk over to Miroku.
“Keep talking, houshi,” he ordered, as he stood next to the bed.
“It’s really simple, actually. When she was entirely connected with him, everything that was each’s own, then was shared. In this case, her miko powers were shared with him, and whatever powers he had transferred over to her too. What you saw was her powers pass through the air in a solid transference from him to her.” Miroku told Inuyasha. “That’s at least what I think happened.”
“It makes sense though. Because miko powers belong only with mikos. But what about his powers?” Sango asked.
“I don’t know if she continues to possess them or not.” Miroku glanced at the body next to him. “Her mark has grown,” he stated.
“Wait, but he’s a demon.” Inuyasha stated. Everyone looked at him like he was Captain Obvious.
“Keh, of course this would slip by you. He would have been purified if her powers would have been shared between the two.”
Miroku shut his eyes, and brought his hand up to rest over them. “Not necessarily. He was a very powerful demon. Her power might not have been the dominant one, however predominant it is for every other demon. It could have just mingled with his, or fought for the right of dominance. But it didn’t last long enough for us to know. In any case, we will never find the answer to this particular riddle unless Kagome does it again. And by the sound of things, it seems to me she won’t be doing it any time soon.”
“Inuyasha, tell them what I say: I don’t think my powers were dominating at all, because when I was…part of him, I felt disgusting. I felt impure, completely the opposite of what I do when I’m using my powers, or even when I’m just a plain old human. Like I said before, I hated it. If that’s what it feels like being a demon, then I don’t want to have any part of it.” Kagome said to the group.
Inuyasha’s ears flattened and he looked at the floor, scowling. His arms dropped and folded around each other. He repeated her exact words to Sango and Miroku. His last repeated words were so vehement, it surprised everyone. What had got him in this mood?
He turned and stalked out the door without a word to anyone else.
Kirara automatically went out after him. Sango beckoned her back, but Kirara didn’t listen.
Kagome floated there, and watched him leave. What the hell was his problem…?
“Well, Kirara will come back some time in the night, and he’ll come back to us in the morning. Right now, it would be best for us to clean up our wounds, get some food and some sleep until the morning.” Sango said, getting up slowly.
“Wait, where are you going?” Miroku said, struggling to get up too.
“No, lay back down Miroku,” she put her hand on the back of his neck, her other hand on his chest, and gently pushed him back down, “I’m just going to get more firewood, since I seem to be the only one able to walk at the moment.” she glanced at Kagome’s body, at Shippo, who had, out of sheer exhaustion, collapsed on the floor sleeping, and finally her eyes came to rest back on Miroku. She was still bent over, hands on his neck and chest. She sighed, smiled at Miroku, and slowly got up.
Sango walked out the door as fast as she could without keeling over in pain. She hadn’t been sure if Kagome was there still or not, so she didn’t do anymore than she had with Miroku.
But Kagome had been there. She saw Sango’s mind, floating around her physical, just begging to be let loose and take care of the one she loved.
What Kagome hadn’t seen was Inuyasha’s mentals. She would have given anything, absolutely anything, to see what he was thinking when she had said what she said. What had she said to make him act like that? Kagome, with a newly determined mind, floated up into the sky after Inuyasha.
Sango returned with an armload of firewood. She looked at Miroku and smirked, “Good thing we don’t need to start up a fire already, right?”
“Heheh, right,” he replied. He had forced himself to sit up when she was out. Now, she had no choice but to let him stay up. She put logs on the fire, and the rest into the smaller pile already on the floor.
“Ok, time to get you cleaned up,” Sango told Miroku.
She ordered him to keep his broken ankle on the bed instead of on the floor. She put her kimono underneath it, to keep it from swelling too badly. She’d need some ice for it later, and a splint…She fetched some water in a bucket, and a rag lying around. Sango dunked it into the water, wrung it of most of its water, and brought it over to Miroku.
He aimed to grab the rag, but she drew it out of his way before he could reach it. She eyed him, and pursed her lips. “No,” was all she said.
Miroku sighed, and sidled over a bit to make room for her on the bed with him and Kagome. She knelt down and put the bucket of water on the bed. Sango dabbed at his face, and occasionally put it back in the bucket to refresh it. She watched him as she cleaned his wounds.
His eyes were closed, and his brows were furrowed in stress. Miroku sighed into the rag as the cool water ran down his neck and eased his burning flesh. His face relaxed as he released his stress.
“Take off your robe.”
Miroku’s eyes flung wide, and his mouth dropped centimeters, only to close again. He stared at Sango.
Realizing her words, she held up the newly refreshed rag, as a contained blush threatened to break through her skin, and pointed at the bleeding lines going down his neck onto his chest and across his back.
“Oh,” he laughed slightly. He shook his good arm out of the side of his robe. The other one was more of a hassle. He shut his eyes tight and hissed at the contact when the cloth rubbed against his open flesh. But in the same moment, it was completely off of him. He opened his eyes in relief and looked down. Sango’s hand was still on the sleeve, which was all the way off his arm. Miroku’s eyes followed her arm up to her face, and she was trying really hard not to laugh at him because it was rude, or just trying not to give herself even more pain by not laughing at him, he couldn’t decide. He mumbled his thanks and showed his neck to her, so that it would be easier to get to.
Sango began talking to him, “What happened with Herutatani? After Inuyasha left.” She was patting his neck down, washing off the caked on blood. Her other hand was on the other side of his neck, to keep him from moving as she cleaned him. It was a strange thing to think about, but he couldn’t help notice that her hands were very soft for a woman such as her…and he couldn’t have been sure about it…but it almost felt like her thumb was caressing his skin. He doubted she was.
“He didn’t try to go after Inuyasha. He just stood in the way of the Tetsusaiga’s wind scars, and let himself be enveloped by them. It was strange. Then, when the wind scar dissipated, he ran out of the dust surrounding the touchdown area heading straight for me. Unfortunately, the hut was right behind me, so I ran west of him, to get him away from the hut.”
Miroku grunted. He hadn’t noticed that Sango’s hands had begun kneading out the grass soil in his arms, and just now became aware of the pain in his arm.
“Sorry,” she said, glancing up with an apologetic look on her face. She was very surprised he hadn’t tried anything perverted yet. She had said something that so easily had been turned into a sexual innuendo, he was sitting there half-naked, and yet he was still civilized…how strange. The wounds were mostly clear of the clumps of dirt, so Sango grabbed the rag and instead of wringing it out over the bucket, she grabbed his wrist and gently held out his arm. It stayed there when she let go. Satisfied, she slowly wrung out the water over his arm, moving from his shoulder to his wrist. Sango noticed the wiry, strong muscles underneath the skin as the water washed over his arm. She couldn’t help but imagine what those arms would feel like wrapped around her.
Sango pushed the thought away, and grabbed his wrist again with more force than before. She saw his look, and lessened her grip. She needed to loosen up…
“And, when we finally met after running so far, his claws scraped my arm.” Miroku pointed to the spot Sango had just cleaned. Now she was cleaning off his back, which was also full of dirt, he could tell, only because he could feel both of her hands working his wounds. Once again, he thought of how soft those strong, protective hands of hers were, and that they were touching him and only him. “I returned his attack with 3 burning sutras of my own. He giggled…giggled! At the pain. All he did was pluck them off his skin, and they disappeared. I attacked him again with my staff and he parried it with only his claws, while the other hand swiped down at my feet. I was too late to stop that counter. Then, the claws the stopped my staff slithered their way around it and flung it out of my reach.” Miroku stopped talking as Sango tapped his shoulder.
“I need you to lie down. So that I can get to your…” she gulped and hesitated as she searched for the right word, “front.” She hoped Miroku hadn’t noticed the hesitation. She was already nervous enough, him being half-naked, wet, and her touching him like she was. Sango hadn’t been meaning to, but she had been touching him with more intention than just holding him steady, and kneading out the dirt. She turned around to put another log on the fire.
He did as he was told, with not a glimmer of knowing of her hesitation. Sango turned back to him, looked him up and down, gasped out loud and looked away. She had never really been near Miroku when he was unclothed in any way. But now, being this close to him, and in the dim light, shadows were cast across every hard line of his chest and stomach, accenting each curve. Miroku was extremely chiseled…and Sango could barely contain herself.
Miroku thought she had gasped at the ghastly wounds in his stomach. “Dear Sango, it’s ok! They do not hurt as bad as they look, I promise you.” He reached for her shoulder, but she turned around so fast he withdrew it just as fast, without her noticing. In truth, she hadn’t even noticed the wounds.
She flung her hands into the bucket and slowly pulled out the rag. She wrung it out so hard that she had to put it back into the bucket to soak up more water. She closed her eyes, took a deep breath, opened them, and turned back to Miroku. She almost gasped again as she glared at his body, cursing it for looking like this.
Her hand that wasn’t holding the rag reached out to rest on his stomach, next to the biggest gash.
Sango held in a whimper. How could a body have so much power over a person!
She squeezed the rag and water washed over the abrasion. Watered-down blood spilled over his exposed hipbone; he had to scoot up the bed to lie down, otherwise his ankle would have been pushed off the cushioning, and his robe had stayed where it was, instead of staying with his body. She put the rag back in the bucket, “Continue, please.”
“Oh, yes. He flung my staff too far away for me to reach it. And while he did this, his other hand came down, and he shoved his needlepoints into my ankle. I think his claws severed a muscle and punctured the side of a bone, which is probably why I can still walk on it, though I can’t put much pressure on it.”
Sango had closely been examining his wound, scowering the gash for any excess grime she may have missed. “Your ankle, I need to look at it.” She wiped down his chest one more time with the rag, and made her way over to the foot of the bed.
“And that’s when Yukitani called him back to the hut,” Miroku finished.
“I see.”
Miroku became silent. He watched Sango as she cleaned. She seemed so concentrated on what she was doing.
Sango worked in silence while cleaning up the wound. She finally started bandaging up the dried wounds. She wound random pieces of cloth around his neck, his arms, his back, and his chest. “Your ankle is going to be a problem. If it’s not broken, then we don’t need a splint, but if the muscle is torn, we probably need a brace or crutches or something. And I can’t make anything in the condition I’m in, so I don’t know what to do with it.”
“It’s quite all right dear Sango. I can live. I will just have to improvise, provided Kirara comes back some time soon,” Miroku laughed.
Sango smiled. “Can you turn on your side, or does it hurt too much?”
Miroku tried, and succeeded, “Yes, I can. Why?”
“Because I need to fix my ribs…” she said in a small voice. She put her hand on the side of the bed and pushed herself up. She stood up and turned around, too, as Miroku did, and was already un-strapping herself from her taijiya suit. She glanced behind her, only to see Miroku looking at her very seriously.
“What?” she asked, a blush spreading across her face.
“You can’t do that by yourself. I know you can’t.”
“Yes I can, I’ve done it before. Don’t worry about me, Miroku, I can do it.”
“Are you sure you don’t need help?”
“I’m positive houshi. Thank you. Now turn back around,” she ordered.
He did. She walked over to the opposite side of the hut, further from Miroku and the fire. It was much colder over there. Sango shivered, and rubbed her arms. She shrugged her arms out of their sleeves, and pushed the suit down to her waist, which made her grimace and suck in air.
“Are you alright?” Miroku asked.
Sango turned around to look at him, but he was still facing the wall. “I’m fine. Miroku, really, you don’t need to worry about me,” she assured him. He hmphed in answer.
She looked around her for the still-wet rag and the bandages. They weren’t anywhere near her. She hugged her body, and looked behind her. And of course, they were right next to Miroku. She looked back towards the wall she was standing in front of, and sighed. Suddenly, something hit her ankle. She looked down, and the bandages lay next to her feet. She looked behind her again, and Miroku’s hand was still in the air.
“I thought you might need that,” he smiled and turned back around.
“Thanks. But stay turned around, I need to get the rag too.” She crossed her arms around her exposed chest and slowly walked over to the bucket. She was inches from Miroku when she bent down to get the rag sitting in the bucket. Her breath eased out of her lungs and caressed the skin of his neck. He shivered at the feeling.
“Stay where you are…cause I’m still right here.” She breathed out again.
Sango wrung out the rag with one hand, the other still covering her chest. She was having trouble standing back up from her kneeling position, so she was forced to put her hand on the bed. It brushed Miroku’s back, and a shock passed between them. Miroku almost turned around, but stopped himself when he remembered that she didn’t have on a top. She quickly pushed herself up and held in a groan from the pain. “Sorry,” she said as she walked away.
She bent down to grab the bandages, and began wrapping her chest, starting at the side, ignoring the pain. Sango’s heart thumped dramatically in her chest and she was as nervous as a bird learning to fly.
Hands wrapped around her waist, and she gasped. They slid from the top of her hipbones to her naval, and rested there. Her hands stopped their movements, and the bandages dropped from her hands. The splayed hands on her stomach slid down her waist. One stopped at the edge of her folded suit, and the other fell off her hips, to the floor, to pick up the bandages. The hand brought the bandages back up to hers, and moved her hands to begin wrapping again.
A pair of lips whispered in her ear, “You don’t need to do this by yourself. I can help.” The lips nipped at her ear lobe, and she controlled her reaction. He had gotten to her so quietly, it surprised her.
“Mi-Miroku, go back to the bed. You n-need to rest,” she stuttered. The lips made her quite distracted. Her reactions may have been under control, but her voice…she couldn’t seem to keep it steady.
The lips moved from her ear to her neck, “No,” he whispered firmly against her neck.