InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Left Unsaid ❯ One-Shot

InuYasha sat in the Goshinboku, his red eyes staring down at the destroyed village. It had been years since he had revisited this place, ever since that girl had left this world. The weeds and brambles were well on their way to covering Kaede's hut.

That girl…he sometimes remembered her, in his dreams she haunted him. Her death continued to play out in his head, that bastard's tentacles stabbing through her chest. She had died instantly, and he had never had the chance to say goodbye…never.
That had been nearly fifty years ago. He scoffed lightly to himself. What is it with the fifty years between my visits to the Goshinboku?

He still remembered those past two times, when he had been trapped there by his first love, Kaede's older sister Kikyou, and then freed fifty years later by Kikyou's reincarnation, Kagome.

—Flashback—

He had loved her. Loved her…and never told her. It was the hardest thing in the world to go back to her era and bring her bloody and broken body back to her family so she could be buried next to the Higurashis who had passed on before her. He was unable to look Mrs. Higurashi in the eye as he silently walked past her and placed Kagome softly on the sofa, being careful to not get her blood on it.

He had smoothed her hair back from her eternally closed eyes, his clawed fingers raking gently over her cold forehead. He bent his head down next to hers, his choked voice whispering in her unhearing ear the words he had never had the chance to say.

“I love you, Kagome. I'm sorry I never told you.”

He had then stood up, his bangs covering his gold eyes. He bit his lower lip, the fangs digging into his soft skin, trying not to let the tears fall. Zombie-like, he walked past Mrs. Higurashi once more, never once acknowledging her. As if in a trance, he walked back to the well house and leapt down into the black depths, his only wish being to escape his memories.

—End Flashback—

The following years had passed by in a sort of haze to InuYasha. Naraku had vanished again for a time after Kagome's death, only to turn up twenty years following it floating facedown in the river near Kaede's village, three arrows sticking out of his back and neck. When InuYasha had moved to touch them, he had been forced to recoil his hand at a sudden shock. They were sacred arrows, fired by a strong miko, perhaps even stronger than Kagome or Kikyou. They would have to be, to kill Naraku with only their arrows.

The jewel…is it still there? He had wondered, If not, then Kagome's death has been in vain. He searched Naraku's corpse, his clawed fingers digging angrily through the murderous hanyou's rotting flesh. Finally, he found it, the nearly-completed jewel, located just under one of the arrows. That was close…a little lower and the jewel would have shattered again.

He had the jewel at last, after seventy years. What choice would he make? He knew what happened when a being was brought back to life after years of being dead. They would have no memory…Kagome would not remember him if he used the jewel to return her to life. She would reappear in her own time, and would never be able to pass through the well. Nor would he, for the jewel would be purified with her return to life. But if I'm in her time…no. No, I would never belong there, never. She wouldn't remember me, no matter what I did. I couldn't live with that pain, knowing that she was once the girl who traveled with me, who used to laugh…who held ultimate control over me. She would never remember that. I couldn't live with that.

He could become human, live out the rest of his few remaining years. A pitiful, pathetic, weak human. One that could die with the slightest injury, just like she had.

His choice was clear. He knew that becoming a demon would make him forget his past. He would forget her. It wouldn't matter to her, she was dead anyway. She would never know, never know that he had chosen this fate.

A demon form is my desire. Grant it for me, please. I must forget her. I must forget that I loved she who is gone from this world.

The jewel glowed red, its aura circling him. He felt himself begin to transform. His teeth and claws lengthened, his hair grew slightly and fanned out like an angry dog's fur. Although he was unable to see it, he knew that two jagged purple stripes had appeared on his cheeks and that his eyes had become a blood-red. He felt an insurmountable urge to destroy, and his red eyes focused on the village.

An evil grin grew on his face as he ran his claws through the buildings and the people, not even bothering to unsheathe Tetsusaiga. He needed to destroy, he needed to kill, to silence all those that may in some way remind him of that which he had lost. All their faces were hers, and he had to rid his memory of it. He had been in a frenzy, killing all the humans, destroying their village. After the last villager was slaughtered, the last home razed to the ground, he ran from the ruins, never once looking back on the land he once knew.

The time had passed once more. InuYasha had left a bloody trail behind him, becoming feared throughout the lands. They called him terrible, a monster, spurred on by revenge for that girl. He rarely remembered her name, except for in his dreams, his deepest and darkest nightmares where his hanyou days replayed themselves.

He stared out over his first carnage as a full demon, and for the first time he felt a twinge of regret. He stared down at his clawed fingers, still covered with the blood of his last killing. He placed them on his neck, hoping it would not hurt for too long. His claws dug in slightly, a trickle of blood falling from the cuts they made. Red eyes closed, he began to tear at his flesh.

“InuYasha! No!” The voice that had not met his ears in nigh on fifty years now echoed all around him. Her voice.

“Ka…go…me…” He choked out, his blood pooling on his clawed fingers, “I'm…I never…told you…. Never had the chance…to say that…I love you. Ka…Kagome…No, don't leave me! I need you…need…I love you, Kagome.”

It was no use. Her face, her voice, everything…was gone. InuYasha gurgled, blood now spilling from his mouth as well as his throat. He fell into the darkness of Hell, falling as well from the Goshinboku.

A cracking noise resounded from the top of the tree. Jagged lines appeared in the bark, splitting the top of the tree, raining its branches down upon InuYasha's bloodied body.

With his death, so came about the end of the Spirit Tree, for without the hanyou, it had lost its powers.

—Fin