InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Pack Law ❯ Reflections ( Chapter 10 )

Pack Law

 

Chapter 10: Reflections

 

Five hundred, twenty-five thousand, six hundred minutes…

Five hundred, twenty-five thousand moments so dear.

Five hundred, twenty-five thousand, six hundred minutes…

How do you measure, measure a year…

 

Kagome sighed, lowering her head as the music repeated. The groups in her chorus class were allowed to choose what American musical they chose songs from. As the “real American”, Sarah had made an executive decision to use music from “Rent.” Kagome had never seen the musical, but Sarah had a copy of a version her older sister had done in high school several years ago.

 

`Not exactly my type of story,' Kagome wrinkled her nose. She was more of a “happily ever after” person; she had bawled when Angel died. Nonetheless, the music was haunting. The four of them made a great quartet, though Sarah had giggled at the very heavily Japanese-accented music they created. Now she just had to get the words right.

 

`And the emotion,' she reminded herself. Johnson-sensei had stressed he wanted to “really feel the music.” Kagome had settled back to focus on the words, playing the first song on repeat again and again and again.

 

Five hundred, twenty-five thousand, six hundred minutes…

Five hundred, twenty-five thousand moments so dear.

Five hundred, twenty-five thousand, six hundred minutes…

How do you measure, measure a year…

 

`How do you measure a year?' she mused. One year ago, she would never have guessed she would have friends like she did now; hanyou and youkai she once believed to be myths were her classmates, her battle companions… `And the love of my life.'

 

Kagome's eyes darkened at the thought of InuYasha. Just why was he so mad at her? Why did he insist she had abandoned him? `I'd never willingly leave his side!' Yet he had been so angry, so hurtful, so… `Hurting. He was hurting. Why?'

 

In daylights, in sunsets, in midnights, in cups of coffee…

In inches, in miles, in laughter, in strife.

In five hundred, twenty-five thousand, six hundred minutes…

How do you measure a year in the life?

 

She chewed thoughtfully on her lower lip, thinking back to what Miroku had told her while they were taking a break from practice.

 

“You must remember. While it's only been a few days since you've last seen us, we haven't seen you in five hundred years. If you go back now, you'll change the present.” Miroku had been unable to look her straight-on. “You promised to come back if you had any problems, and then just left. A week later, when InuYasha went to pick you up, he couldn't get through the well. But that day shaped who he is now.”

 

And now she was back to the one issue she couldn't wrap her mind around. `Why wouldn't he be able to get through the well? I haven't done anything to it! I wouldn't even know how!' She was tempted to go hop through the well right then and there, if only to prove them wrong. But would it really change the present so much? Would she even know? Would her memories of meeting her friends change with her actions? Ugh, thinking about it hurt her head again. `Time paradoxes. Whenever Souta goes on about them, he never lets on how confusing they are.' If she hadn't promised her Mama a full week of school before going back…

 

Reflecting on Miroku's comments again, she wondered if he'd come over himself to make sure she couldn't, didn't go through. He was incredibly obstinate on the point that she couldn't go back, since she hadn't. She snorted, looking around quickly; glad nobody had caught her in such an InuYasha-like moment. `He can say what he wants. I'll prove it to them, I'm not a flake. I'm not a bad person! I won't abandon InuYasha!'

 

`But you already did…' Kagome groaned. Great, now she was arguing with herself! `You may not have yet, but InuYasha thinks you have, and that's what matters. He spent so much of his life alone. Then you left him.'

 

`I didn't leave him!' She rolled over. She realized she had lost the track of the music; she stared down at the words, trying to catch up.

 

In truths that she learned…

Or in times that he cried.

In bridges he burned…

Or the way that she died.

 

`Five hundred years. That's a long time to develop a grudge. How did InuYasha measure the time? Days away from me? Minutes to when he'd see me again?' She rolled her eyes as she realized how selfish that sounded… but still… ` Kami, five hundred years. It's almost like I died, to him, maybe?'

 

Kagome bit her lip, tears coming to her eyes. The worst part wasn't that she didn't quite understand InuYasha's hurt feelings; if she thought hard enough about it, she could almost figure it out. It wasn't his anger. It wasn't even the way he so easily referred to her as “non-pack” (though it stung, now that Miroku had explained what they'd been up to for the past five centuries).

 

She bit back a sob. What hurt the most was the fact that he didn't trust her not to leave him. Just when they'd been getting so close…

 

**********

 

“Damn it!” InuYasha slammed his hand down on his mahogany desk. The wood splintered, cracked under the blow. Sighing deeply, running his claws through his hair, idly scratching his scalp, the hanyou didn't even realize he'd been growling until a cup of pens vibrated off the desk.

 

`It's all her fault! Fuck!' InuYasha pounded the desk again. Fucking bitch! What right did she have to come back after leaving him all alone for so long? What in all the hells could have compelled his pack to invite her to the den without warning him?

 

`She belongs in the den where we can keep her safe. She is pack,' his youkai rumbled. The annoying grumble had been fairly silent throughout the years, allowing the pain to fester in his human heart. The only times he had heard his feral, untamed youkai side were matters of instinct and the few times he had thought about opening his heart back up. His youkai was adamant; no woman, be she hanyou, youkai or human, could match Kagome.

 

`She's not pack. Kagome left us of her own free will.' A whinier voice, feeling much abused, piped up from somewhere lower. InuYasha bit back a snarl. For a while his two sides had been in harmony.

 

`Yes, when our mate was with us, we were one. She brought us together, healed the hurts.' His youkai knew exactly what it wanted: Kagome. `The miko is strong, wanted us, and wants us now. We could smell it in her scent as she stared at us, even through the anger and the sadness. Our miko wants us. We must protect her. She is unclaimed… power… she is still a target.'

 

Her sadness… InuYasha's human heart may have broken that day in the feudal era when he learned he could no longer pass through the well, but damn it, he was still compelled to rush to her side, to kiss away her tears. Like her aura, her scent had permeated his home, huge as it was. As the pups had watched Sarah's movie, Kagome had begun to cry. He had been shocked at the thoughts racing through his head as his youkai insisted they investigate. He had thought himself well past those emotions by now.

 

`Bitch, what you do to me… and you don't even know it!' His youkai and human halves were in complete agreement, though on opposite sides of the argument. Kagome had torn his heart apart with her apparent rejection; she pissed him off with her continued insistence that she hadn't done anything. `Like I wouldn't fucking know! As if I wouldn't have tested the well again and again… almost begging it to take me through. Hell, I would have rather been stuck with her on this side than had to get here the long way…'

 

On the other hand, the miko called to his feral side, enticed him through scent, sight and sound. Her aura crackled with power, even without wearing that damned ring. Kagome's scent soothed his youkai as it pissed off his hardened heart. The tang of her tears nearly sent him into a frenzy, determined to stop them, even when he knew he'd been the cause in the driveway. InuYasha was familiar with unfamiliar emotions; one drawback to the talismans was how strong emotions seeped through the connection. He hadn't anticipated the feeling being reciprocated through the ring he'd had forged for the miko. He'd never hated his fucking heightened senses until he was forced to recall just how pervasive she could be. Like a fog (`like Naraku's fucking miasma,' he corrected childishly, drawing complaints from both of his other sides), Kagome worked her way through every crack in his shell, winding around every corner of his mind until he ate, breathed, and slept only thoughts of her.

 

InuYasha had retreated to a far side of the giant mansion they called “the den”, determined to sleep while the bitch (`our bitch,' his youkai had growled possessively, rebelling against the angry thoughts of just throwing her back out to the street) was here. He found himself drifting into dreams he hadn't suffered through in hundreds of years: dreams of her delicious scent, bodies wrapped so tightly around each other it was unclear where miko ended and hanyou began… dreams of having her, more than kisses and caresses bolder by the day, but really having Kagome, possessing her mind, body and soul with the same power she seemed to have over him. He woke up panting, shaking, digging his claws into his hands so he wouldn't give in to his wholly human need to see her feel the same pain and suffering she had put him through, and was putting him through yet again.

 

His youkai grumbled a counterpoint, `Not human. Our bitch did leave us, and must be punished properly. But we could smell her; the only other true scent on her was us. She is loyal; faithful… she is a good bitch. She fought back when we angered her; she is a good alpha female.'

 

More commentary in his head - now the voice of the human echoed, `It's not completely a human emotion to want her to be in pain. I may be sad that she left, but I don't want to see her cry. I hate to see her sad. I'd die for her; I'd give my life to see her smile.'

 

Finally something the true InuYasha could respond to, he sighed, lowering his head to the cracked wood. `She didn't want me to die. She wanted me to live.' Anger flared irrationally. `And I did, damn it! I lived five hundred fucking years without her! She should have been with me, with Miroku and Sango, mothering the runt…'

 

Shippou… InuYasha growled at the thought of the kit. Shippou had steadfastly stayed in Kaede's village, even after the old woman had passed on. In InuYasha's place, the young youkai had made a name of himself as the village's protector. Eventually taking the name “Inoue”, he had guarded the well viciously. The kitsune had only joined back with the pack two hundred years ago. Miroku had eventually appealed to the youkai, pointing out that there was no way Kagome could come through the well at that time: on the parallel timeline, she would have died a mortal death without InuYasha's youki supporting her, and in fact wouldn't be born for hundreds of years. The kit had a mate by that time, a silver kitsune youkai named Shinju with pearlescent green eyes. Eventually, the two had moved to the States, to have litters of kits and grand-kits of their own. Shippou and Shinju were back in Japan now, doing work for him and Sesshomaru.

 

InuYasha looked around his office. It was filled with various treasures, pieces of art and weaponry from the years his pack had lived in the west. He and his friends had helped Sesshomaru build and consolidate his empire, eventually enticing Shippou into helping them create concealments. InuYasha had never forgotten how he never really felt youki when he had visited Kagome; eventually, they had figured out that he had to introduce the idea to youkai himself. Most believed themselves so far above humans that they wouldn't go into hiding on their own.

 

The inu-hanyou's eyes fell on Sango's Hiraikotsu, suspended above the doorway. She had continued in the tradition of the taijya for years with Kohaku, working as hunters for Sesshomaru. There was always a rogue youkai or two that needed to be taken down a peg, if not taken completely off the face of the world. Only those on a “need-to-know” basis were aware of the continued existence of youkai, hanyou and various other “mythical” creatures - a rampaging oni in Tokyo would sent people into a panic and blow their cover. Eventually, however, the taijya had moved on to new weaponry: guns and stealth weapons, developed by a friend of Shippou's.

 

A/N:

 

Not much action here, I know, but I felt we needed to get a bit more background on InuYasha's side of things!

 

Again (from Chapter 7): Inoue - “Above the Well”

Shinju - “Pearl”

 

Whoa, what a slew of reviews for the last chapter! Shout-outs go to everybody who's reviewed so far. For the last chapter, specifically -

kodiaqkitten, inuyashaloverr, HayleyM425, lockedincar, catbaker, pokiepal (thanks for pointing out the error! I completely missed it in my haste to post the chapter!), Kryptoinuyasha, DragonKitsune, CatLover260 (Fluffy-sama's mate should appear in the next few chapters), angel-up-above-heaven, cubangreekchik, Ichigohime, Mela9898, youkaineko, loretta537, sakuralovesinuyasha, Sovereignty, Inu_Dragon (I promise not to stop! I hate it when authors just leave you hanging…), kokoronagomu

 

Disclaimer: I do not own InuYasha or any other characters from the anime/manga. They all belong to Rumiko Takahashi.

 

I do, however, own the original characters in this story. Please don't steal them! (I may let you borrow them if you ask politely.)

 

Speaking of borrowing, I haven't mentioned her by name yet, a favorite OC of mine is referenced in this chapter. Shippou's friend - her name is Misery, from “Darkness Fades to Dawn” by kodiaqkitten. If you're looking for a GREAT story with our beloved InuTachi set in the present, I whole-heartedly suggest you take a look (and while you're over there, poke her and tell her to update more! I'm still on the edge of my seat from her last chapter). Misery may pop up here and there to waggle her fingers and say “hi”; but I repeat: I do not own her. She belongs to kodiaqkitten, who is kindly letting her make an appearance or two here :)

 

“Seasons of Love” is from the musical “Rent” - music and lyrics were written by Jonathan Larson. Other than the DVD and music, I don't own “Rent”, either.