InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Long Awaited Reunion ❯ Guilty Conscience ( Chapter 8 )

Disclaimer: I don't own Inuyasha, God I'm sick of saying it.

Chapter 8: Guilty Conscience

"Inukigo!" everyone screamed as they ran to her. They were shocked by the amount of blood that had already collected around her on the ground.

"Inuyasha, we have to treat her now. We're too far from Kaede's to just run there with her like this. We have to clean and bandage her wounds first. Do you think that you can find a big river nearby?" Kagome said.

"Aa, give me a second," Inuyasha said as he sniffed the air, "There's a pretty big river that's only a few minutes away if I run to it."

"Good, you and I will go on ahead and get Inukigo taken care of," she then turned to Sango and Miroku, "Does that sound okay?" They both nodded, "Alright, Shippou-chan, you go with Sango-chan and Miroku-sama and make sure they find the river."

"Okay Kagome," Shippou said.

With that all taken care of, Inuyasha picked up the new sword and placed it at his hip with Tetsusaiga, then carefully rolled Inukigo over onto her back and gently lifted her into his arms. He grimaced at the amount of blood that she was losing. Kagome then carefully climbed onto his back with her backpack in tow.

"You're gonna have to hang on tighter than usual Kagome since I can't hold onto your legs."

"Okay," she replied as she wrapped her arms around his neck and locked her knees to his sides. When he felt that she was hanging on tightly enough Inuyasha took off through the trees towards the river.

"Do you think that Inukigo will be okay?" Shippou asked quietly as he watched Inuyasha run away.

"I'm sure that she will Shippou," Miroku replied.

"Yeah, she's Inuyasha's sister after all. If she's anything like him she'll be up and moving around in no time, despite the injuries," Sango said, "And besides, she's got Inuyasha and Kagome to take care of her."

"Yeah, you're right," Shippou said.

"Well should we be heading off then?" Miroku asked.

"Yeah, since we'll have to walk. Kirara's too hurt to fly, and I don't think that either of us will be doing any running at the moment," Sango replied.

"Is your back alright Sango?" Miroku asked worriedly.

"Hai. The cuts aren't that deep. I'll be fine in a little while," Sango replied, "Well lets get going Houshi-sama."

"Alright, lead the way Shippou."

"Hai!"

And with that, all four travellers proceeded into the forest in the same direction that Inuyasha had ran off in a few moments before.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~* ~*~*~

Inuyasha was right, the river was only a few minutes away. However, in that short amount of time his clothes were drenched with Inukigo's blood.

"Kagome, it seems like she's bleeding way too much. It should have stopped by now."

"I guess it's because of all the moving she was doing when she was attacking us. It probably widened the wounds and kept them from beginning to heal."

"Okay, well what do we have to do first?"

"You go and sit her up in the river while I get my supplies ready."

"Okay."

Inuyasha did as he was told, and found a large flat rock that was completely submerged in the water and sat Inukigo down on it. He then took off his blood-soaked haori and under kimono and sat on the rock behind her to keep her upright. He grimaced as the water slowly started to turn crimson with Inukigo's blood. He heard Kagome coming towards them and turned his head to see her approaching with her first aid kit and some cloths from her bag. She walked over and laid the things on the shore, took off her shoes and socks, then stepped into the water and walked out in front of Inukigo. It was then that Inuyasha noticed the five deep puncture wounds on Kagome's right shoulder.

"Do those hurt?" he asked her as he reached out to touch her shoulder. Kagome winced at his touch, confirming that they did indeed hurt.

"A little. Don't worry, I'll take care of them once we finish with Inukigo. I'll take care of the cuts on your arms and legs too."

"These aren't serious. They'll be fine when I wash them."

"Alright, if you say so," Kagome said as she moved to take off Inukigo's kimono top. She stopped when she got the second clasp undone, "Ano, Inuyasha, will Inukigo mind if you see her like this?"

"See her like what?"

"Without her shirt on?"

"There isn't really much of a choice is there? You need me to hold her up while you clean and bandage her. Besides, I ain't no pervert like Miroku, and she's my sister. I'm not gonna look at her like that. I don't think she'd mind anyways."

"Well, if she does than I guess you'll be the one in trouble," Kagome said as she began to pull the kimono open, being careful of the wound in Inukigo's stomach, "Can you raise her arms up please?" Inuyasha complied and then took the shirt and laid it on the shore when Kagome got it off. He then grabbed for the two cloths that lay next to the first aid kit and handed them to Kagome. She took one and left the other to him.

"You clean her back, I'll clean the front. We'll get it done faster that way. Just don't scrub too hard or you'll hurt her more."

Inuyasha didn't reply, just nodded his head, and proceeded to dip the cloth into the cool water and carefully wash the blood off of Inukigo's back. He was relieved to see that the bleeding was beginning to stop. It didn't take long to clean Inukigo off with both Inuyasha and Kagome working on her, and the river cleaned the blood out of her pants. Kagome had Inuyasha lift Inukigo out of the river and sit her up on the grass while she went about applying medicine to her wounds. She then bandaged Inukigo's wounds while Inuyasha rolled out her sleeping bag. When Kagome was finished Inuyasha carefully picked Inukigo up and carried her to the sleeping bag, laying her inside of it and wrapping it around her. When he turned around, Kagome was back at the river with a clean cloth tending to her own injuries. He saw that she was having a hard time with them because she would wince every time she tried to touch her shoulder.

"Let me help you with that," he said as he came to crouch beside her.

"No, it's okay. I can do it myself. You don't have to help me."

"Baka, I want to help. It'll be done faster if you let me do it."

"Alright then," she said handing him the cloth, "You didn't have to call me baka."

"Keh."

Inuyasha then proceeded to wipe over Kagome's shoulder with the cloth. She whimpered whenever he pressed the cloth against her skin.

"Ooi, these hurt a lot more than you were lettin' on, don't they?"

She gave a small smile, letting him know that he was right.

"Hai, they do. Each of them are about half an inch deep, judging from the length of

Inukigo's claws when she grabbed me. I just didn't want you to worry about it while we had something more important to take care of."

Inuyasha nodded as he finished cleaning of her wounds. He then went about applying medicine to them and bandaging them in the same way she had treated Inukigo's wounds. As soon as he was done, Kagome grabbed the bottle of ointment from the ground and started to apply it to the cuts on his arms.

"Ooi! I told you these are fine!"

"And I'm telling you that they hurt more then you're letting on," Her point was proven when he winced at her touch, "See?" All Inuyasha did was glare at her, "Don't worry, I'm not going to bandage them. I'll just put some of this on them so they don't bother you so much while you wait for them to heal."

Inuyasha huffed and turned his head, allowing Kagome to finish what she was doing, not wanting to admit that the ointment did make his cuts feel better. When she was finished she took his clothes, Inukigo's, and her own, put them into the river and began to wash the blood out of them. She then laid them out on a rock to dry.

"Hey, Inuyasha, what are we gonna do about Inukigo's clothes? Her shirt has two big holes in it."

"Don't worry, it's made from fire rat fur just like my kimono. It'll repair itself in a little while."

"Oh, okay," she replied. She walked over to her bag, pulling out a clean change of clothes, and went into the bushes to put them on. She stepped out wearing a pair of comfy jeans and a loose blue sweater. She then joined Inuyasha where he sat not far from Inukigo.

"Inuyasha, how long do you think it will take for Miroku-sama, Sango-chan, and Shippou-chan to get here?"

"Not sure. It only took a few minutes for us to get here, but I was running at top speed. Since Kirara was hurt they'll have to walk, so I'd say it'll probably take them a few hours."

Kagome nodded, then looked at Inuyasha to see that he was fingering the hilt of the new sword that hung from his waist.

"Hey, where did that come from?" Kagome asked as she pointed at the sword.

"This? I don't really know. When that bright light came from Tetsusaiga, I ended up pulling it away and Inukigo was holding this sword. It looked just like Tetsusaiga when Inukigo was holding it."

"Hmm...maybe this sword was hidden inside the Tetsusaiga, and the bright light was it trying to get out," Kagome suggested.

"I guess. There's really no other way to explain a sword magically appearing out of nowhere. Oh well, it's Inukigo's sword regardless."

"How do you figure that."

"Well, Tetsusaiga didn't start to give off that light until it was in Inukigo's hand, so her touching it somehow made this sword come out. And this sword started to contain her youkai blood the second that it was in hand. Tetsusaiga wasn't doin' a very good job of that when I gave it to her."

"Oh, so I guess that means that this is her guardian sword. At least we don't have to worry about her turning youkai again, so long as she holds on to it."

"Yeah, but..." Inuyasha turned slightly to regard his sister, who had not moved since they had placed her in Kagome's sleeping bag. She was so pale from the loss of blood and so still, that if Inuyasha hadn't been able to hear her light breathing, he would have thought she was dead.

"But what?" Kagome asked, wondering why he cut himself off, and why he all of a sudden looked so sullen.

"Remember the second time that I turned youkai? When I...well you know."

"Hai."

"Well, do you remember how I felt about it afterwards?"

"Yeah I remember," Kagome replied, not wanting to go into detail, since he himself had

never openly admitted how he felt when he had killed those humans, but she knew.

"Well, imagine how Inukigo felt when she got her senses back. Sure, she didn't kill anyone, but look who she attacked - the only people in the entire world that she has come to care for. I don't know if I could live with myself if I had attacked you or the others when I changed instead of those bandits."

Kagome let it sink in and put herself in Inukigo's place. Inuyasha was right. She didn't think that she would have been able to live with herself either if she had attacked the only friends that she had in the entire world.

"She's gonna be really upset when she wakes up, isn't she Inuyasha."

"Yeah, you saw how she reacted right after she woke up. The look she had on her face...she was absolutely horrified by what she had done. And then she tried to run away. My best guess about that is that she was afraid she would start attacking us again. I don't even know how I would handle guilt like that."

"I guess the only thing we can do is try to reassure her that it wasn't her fault, that she had no control over what she was doing. Hopefully, we'll be able to get her to forgive herself."

"It's definitely not going to be easy. I tried telling her that when we were back at the clearing, but she didn't even seem to hear me once she realized what she did."

"Maybe when she wakes up she'll have a clearer mind and we'll be able to get through to her."

"Hopefully."

As if she knew that she was being talked about, Inukigo started to stir. Inuyasha and Kagome heard her groan as she started to wake up, and they were by her side in an instant.

Inukigo's eyelids fluttered open slowly, and she was greeted by the worried faces of her brother and Kagome. It took her a minute for her brain to start working again, then she quickly recalled what had happened in the clearing with Naraku, and what she had done to her friends. Inuyasha and Kagome both saw the same horrified look come across Inukigo's face as before. In a matter of seconds Inukigo was attempting to get up and make her escape, but she was failing. Not only was it next to impossible to move because of the wound in her stomach, but she also quickly found Inuyasha's hand on her chest, pushing her back down to the ground.

"Ooi, I know what you're trying to do, and don't even think about it. You're also hurt really badly, and you're not getting up until those wounds heal."

Inukigo looked up at her brother, slightly perturbed that he was bossing her around like he was.

"Leave me alone Inuyasha. These are nothing. Now let me up."

"No way! You're not moving from that spot until you're healed and I say so."

Kagome would have starting laughing at the sight before her if the situation hadn't been so serious.

'Inuyasha is acting just like I do when he gets hurt like this, and Inukigo's acting just like him. This is certainly ironic.'

"Inuyasha, I said let me up!"

"And I said no. You should learn to listen to your older brother," Inuyasha said with a smug look on his face, which made Inukigo look even more annoyed.

"I would hardly think that two and a half minutes makes much difference."

"Well, it's enough for me. Besides, I'm not letting you up just so you can try to run off and end up hurting yourself more. Now I wouldn't be a very good big brother would if I let that happen, ne?"

Inukigo huffed at the 'big brother' comment, she still didn't think that being born only two and a half minutes before her qualified him to be a big brother. She was also peeved that he wanted to stop her from running from them. She only felt that it was something that she should do, out of fear that she would hurt everyone again.

"Inukigo-chan, why do you want to run away from us?" Kagome asked softly, hoping to get the female hanyou to make her feelings known, rather than bottle them up, as Inuyasha often did.

"Why shouldn't I want to run away?" Inukigo retorted, sounding as if Kagome had asked her a stupid question, "After what I did to all of you, I don't deserve to be around you. And, if you don't mind, could you stop referring to me that way?"

"Why?"

"Because I also don't deserve to be spoken to familiarly."

"Inukigo, stop beating yourself up about it," Inuyasha said, removing his hand and getting as close to Inukigo's face as he could, "What's done is done, and there's nothing that can be done to change it. Besides, you didn't know what you were doing, and you couldn't control yourself."

"That doesn't matter!" Inukigo yelled at him, as she forced herself to sit up, despite the protests of pain that flared though her stomach. She glared at him for a moment then let her head drop forward, her bangs covering her eyes. She then continued in a more silent, solemn tone.

"Saying that is no excuse for what I did. It was still my body, still ME, that did it. I have every right to beat myself up about it, you do to for that matter."

Inuyasha was shocked. He could plainly see that she was quickly becoming depressed. Not only that, but she also felt that she deserved a beating for what she had done. And to top it all off, she looked like she was getting ready to cry. Needless to say, he was getting rather pissed at how fast she was going downhill.

"Now listen here," he said sternly as he forcefully grabbed her arms in order to make her face him, "You're stronger than this, so stop talking that way. I am not going to let you beat yourself into the dirt, understand? I know that you're upset because of what you did, and I can relate because I did almost the same thing once, but you have to realize, it wasn't your fault. You didn't know what you were doing, you didn't know who we were. Hell, you didn't even know who you were. So you can't go blaming yourself for something that was out of your control. We don't, so you shouldn't either."

Inukigo didn't move. She just stared Inuyasha straight in the eye, trying to find some reason as to why she should be forgiven. She tried to hold back the tears that threatened to fall from her eyes, but to no avail.

"Ooi, don't go crying over this!"

"Inuyasha!" Kagome said sternly.

"What am I supposed to do Inuyasha? Laugh? Sure, I'll just laugh it all off. It's no big deal, I only attacked and hurt the only people who were ever kind to me and I cared about since our mother died."

Inuyasha froze. She had a point. When she put it that way, it almost made him want to cry, not that he ever would. The hard stare that he was receiving from Kagome about telling his sister not to cry over what she had done almost made him want to crawl under a rock somewhere. He sighed and gave in to both women, favouring wrapping his arms around his sister rather than hold her shoulders.

"Alright, I'll let you cry as much as you want, but only on two conditions," Inukigo nodded in agreement against his chest, "Okay, first you have to forgive yourself for what you did while you were youkai. I know that it might take awhile for you to do that, but I don't want you beating yourself up or getting yourself depressed over it. Got it?" she nodded again to tell him that she agreed, "Good, now, second you have to promise me that you won't try to run off on me and the others, especially right now because you could hurt yourself."

Inukigo pulled back from him so she could look him in the eyes.

"I don't think that I can promise the second one Inuyasha."

"Why not?"

"I-I'm afraid that I might change again and you won't be able to stop me. I should leave so

I'm not a danger to everyone."

Inuyasha gave her a cocky smile that had her somewhat confused.

"Is that all you were worried about?"

"Well, yeah. Why shouldn't I be worried about something like that happening again?"

"Because it won't happen again."

"What do you mean? How do you know that..." Inukigo was cut off by Inuyasha as he pulled the new sword from it's place at his hip and slipped it through her obi.

"What's this?"

"That is your guardian sword."

"My what?"

Inuyasha looked slightly frustrated.

"Your guardian sword. It seals your youkai blood so you won't lose control anymore."

"Well that's certainly a relief," Inukigo said as she looked curiously at the sword on her hip.

"So does this mean that you'll be staying Inukigo-chan?" Kagome asked with a huge smile

on her face.

"Yeah, it does, Kagome. I guess I can promise you both things Inuyasha, but I don't even feel like crying anymore."

"Thank God, I don't know how much crying I could take before I started getting a headache."

Inukigo was slightly annoyed by her brother's quick character change.

'Well, he'll pay for that,' she thought.

She then lunged at him, preparing to launch another tickle assault on him like she had done that morning. Problem was, she forgot that she now had a large wound in her stomach.

"Shimatta!"

"What? What is it?" Inuyasha asked with a concerned tone in his voice from his position on the ground with his sister crouching over him.

"I really shouldn't have done that," Inukigo replied as she struggled to lift herself away from Inuyasha.

"Huh? Why..."

"I felt something tear," she said as she winced in pain and began to clutch at her stomach.

Kagome caught on a lot faster than Inuyasha did when she noticed a faint hint of red beginning to show on Inukigo's white bandages.

"Inukigo, your bandages. You're bleeding again."

Inuyasha saw now too, as Inukigo moved her now blood covered hand away from her stomach.

"Kuso, you reopened your wounds. As if you didn't lose enough blood already," Inuyasha cursed as he carefully slid his way out from underneath his sister and then gently sat her upright, "I told you that you shouldn't have gotten up."

"Well I didn't see you try to push me back down a second time. Man, this hurts."

Inuyasha looked at her sympathetically. He knew how much those kind of wounds hurt, he'd certainly had enough of them to know. He was just never one to say how much it hurt. While he was feeling sorry for his sister, Kagome had gone over to her bag and retrieved her medical supplies again.

"I'll have to change your bandages Inukigo-chan, now that they're all covered in blood."

"Go ahead," Inukigo replied as she carefully raised her arms to allow Kagome full access to her midsection.

Kagome started to unwrap the bandages from Inukigo's stomach and lower back, but stopped just before she reached her chest.

"Do you care that Inuyasha is watching? I can tell him to turn around if you want."

"I don't care," Inukigo replied.

"There, see, I told you before that she wouldn't mind," Inuyasha said to Kagome.

"I don't have a reason to mind. I figured that you would be a mature brother and not think about me that way. It's not like you're some sick pervert that would get thrills from seeing his sister naked from the waist up. You're not, right?"

"NO! The monk is the pervert, NOT me!" he yelled at her.

"Calm down baka, I'm just messing with ya."

"Okay, you two, that's enough," Kagome said in a motherly tone, "I have to finish changing these bandages so stop bickering for a few minutes."

"Keh!" was the reply she got from both hanyous and she start to giggle. When she was done re-wrapping Inukigo's wounds, Inuyasha picked her up so she wouldn't risk opening them again, and laid her down gently on Kagome's sleeping bag.

"Now, just lie still and get some sleep, and give those wounds enough time to heal properly before you decide to move again."

"Hai, big brother," Inukigo replied tiredly as she yawned and drifted off to sleep.

Inuyasha smirked and Kagome giggled at Inukigo's sleepy comment. When they were certain that Inukigo was asleep, Inuyasha and Kagome got up and moved to sit together next to a nearby tree for a greatly needed rest. Both had the same thought on their minds, that hopefully now things would settle down for awhile.