InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Present Perfect ❯ Chapter 10 ( Chapter 10 )

Inuyasha belongs to Rumiko Takahashi.

 

 

Chapter 10:

 

 

Inuyasha got off the phone with Sesshomaru no wiser than when he had first called. Sesshomaru carried the enigmatic thing a little too far in his opinion. Inuyasha suspected that his brother wasn't so much enigmatic as he was clueless. He also suspected that Sesshomaru had sent Kouga to do his dirty work for him.

 

How could he not remember when Inuyasha had supposedly `died?' Sesshomaru just didn't want to be the one to tell him, that's all. Which meant—which meant maybe he did die back in the Sengoku Jidai. Inuyasha sighed. At least Kagome wasn't with him.

 

Inuyasha shook his head angrily. He needed to get a grip on himself before he went back inside and faced her. One of them needed to be strong. What he really wanted to do was drag that stupid wolf aside and pump him for every bit of information about what had happened, so he could be prepared when he went back. Wait. Who said he needed to go back anyway? He and Kagome were starting a new life in this world. If he never went back again, then he wouldn't die. Simple.

 

Inuyasha leaped from the branch back onto the porch of their apartment. Inside he could see two heads close together on the sofa. Damn that Kagome! What had he told her about getting too close to Kouga? Now she was going to have wolf stench all over her!

 

He flung open the door just as Kagome looked up. “Oh, Inuyasha, come see!” She moved even closer to Kouga so that Inuyasha could sit beside her. On her lap she held a wallet opened to show several photos of young people who appeared to be in their late teens. Grudgingly, Inuyasha sat and looked at where she was pointing.

 

“This is Kouga's son,” she said, pointing to a picture of a handsome young man surrounded by three or four obviously hanyou kids. “and these are his grand-kids—his and Sango's daughter's grand-kids,” she emphasized.

 

“But I thought you said Sango had a boy,” Inuyasha said to Kouga.

 

“Yeah, then they had a girl, then another girl, then a couple more boys.” Kouga grinned. “We kept in touch. My son and their daughter eventually hit it off.”

 

“Who's this?” Inuyasha pointed to another photo. It showed a young human woman who looked remarkably like Rin. Of course that was impossible. Wasn't it?

 

Kouga solved the mystery. “You remember Kohaku, the slayer brat who married the miko?”

 

Inuyasha drummed his fingers impatiently on the arm of the sofa. How would he know if Kohaku had married Rin? He was supposed to be dead by then, wasn't he?

 

“Are you saying that's Rin?” asked Kagome incredulously. They didn't have photographs 500 years ago, except for the ones she had taken. Did that mean—?

 

“No, no, her descendant,” said Kouga. “Mine, too, if you want to get technical. Although she does have a lot of human in her, not that I'm saying that's a bad thing.” Kouga leaned his head back and sighed. “Who would have thought back then that we'd all be one big happy family now? And we have Inuyasha here to thank for it. I'm really glad to know you didn't die. It's been eating at me all these years. I should have been able to handle those youkai. I felt pretty useless back then.”

 

“Well, you should have!” Inuyasha blustered. “I had to step in and save your scrawny ass again, as usual!”

 

“So you do remember!” remarked Kouga. “And if it was just my ass you saved, I wouldn't be thanking you right now, you jerk!” His eyes softened. “It was the kids.”

 

Inuyasha didn't know what had prompted him to blurt out what he had said. Old habits. He had no idea what had happened back in the Sengoku Jidai, and he felt a little guilty about taking credit for something that hadn't happened yet. “Whatever,” he replied.

 

“By the way,” Kouga leaned forward again, taking his wallet back from Kagome and putting it in his back pocket. “How come you and Kagome never had kids?”

 

Kagome reddened. “You can tell?” she squeaked.

 

Kouga didn't bother replying. He was locked into a stare with Inuyasha.

 

“We weren't ready,” Inuyasha finally replied.

 

“In 500 years?”

 

“Well, er . . .”

 

“Yeah, I'll just bet that was the reason,” Kouga snickered. “Kagome, if ever you want a real man, you just call me, Ok? Ayame won't mind. It'd be for a good cause.”

 

Inuyasha fumed.

 

“Now, now,” Kagome patted his arm. “Kouga was just teasing, weren't you, Kouga?” She gave the smug wolf-youkai her best glare, which mollified Inuyasha somewhat. He had to remind himself that Kouga didn't know he and Kagome hadn't live the entire 500 years like he had. He was puzzled that Kouga automatically assumed Kagome, who was human, could have survived that long. Even he, as hanyou, had some questions as to how long his lifespan would last. Although if, in all other respects, he was proving to be more youkai than hanyou, maybe his lifespan would be indefinite like a pure youkai's, too. A pang of dread hit him. Kagome. She would die long before he did. He was going to lose her.

 

Kagome glanced up at him questioningly when he unconsciously tightened his grip around her. He made himself relax. “It's Ok,” he told her. “I won't hold his stupidity against him.”

 

Kouga had the audacity to grin. “Looks like we both have mellowed with age,” he said.

 

Inuyasha keh'd.

 

 

Kagome invited Kouga to stay with them, but he declined, saying he had a nearby hotel room. Inuyasha was relieved. He couldn't wait until the smelly wolf left so he could drag Kagome into the bathroom and wash the wolf stench off them both.

 

He turned on the shower and stepped under the running water with Kagome, fully clothed, in his arms.

 

“Inuyasha!” she sputtered. “What do you think you're doing?”

 

“Washing off the smell.”

 

“You could have at least let me take off my clothes!”

 

“They smell, too.” So did his, but luckily his fire rat clothes would dry almost immediately once he got out of the water. Kagome's clothes, on the other hand, were soaking wet and plastered to her skin. He took pity on her.

 

“You're right. The smell probably won't come out of your clothes anyway.” He used his claws to efficiently slice the offending garments off her until she lay quite naked in his arms. “Better?”

 

Kagome's face was red and Inuyasha could see the inner struggle going on between wanting to be angry at him, and wanting something else. He picked up the bar of soap and lathered her down.

 

“It's not fair!” she protested. “You still have all your clothes on!”

 

He set her down to remedy the situation, half-expecting her to storm out of the tub. But she merely stood under the running stream, arms crossed, and watched him undress. When he was done, she grabbed the soap and made him stand perfectly still while she washed every inch of him, not allowing him to touch her at all until she was through. Payback.

 

“Now it's better,” she said at last, turning him around so that he was under the shower and she was on the outside. That lasted all of three seconds before he pulled her back under with him, and they kissed, the warm water running in rivulets down their faces.

 

They clung to each other desperately, each thinking of the things Kouga had said. It looked like time was catching up with them.

 

 

Kouga had wanted to meet them for dinner and Inuyasha, being perverse, invited him to the school cafeteria. He told the girl at the entrance, with some pride in his voice, to swipe the card through twice, then he glanced at Kouga to see his reaction. Kouga wasn't that impressed with the card thing—after all, he had been living in the modern world far longer than Inuyasha had—but he did whistle in surprise at Inuyasha's command of English. It seemed that most of the Japanese youkai tended to stay close to home.

 

“Man, another youkai?” asked Peter. Either Peter was developing a knack for spotting youkai, or they really did have a `look.'

 

Kouga blinked, surprised, and glanced a little uneasily at Inuyasha, who smiled and shrugged. Let Kouga deal with Peter and his questions. That was one of the reasons he'd brought him here.

 

Noriko was immediately nervous. Kouga was obviously a Japanese youkai, and all her childhood fears rushed back. She glanced to Kagome for reassurance. Kagome introduced Kouga as an old friend and Kouga gave her a toothy smile, which didn't do much to reassure her at all.

 

The cafeteria was crowded and noisy but they had their usual table to themselves. Jen was off somewhere with Fenn, most likely, but Inuyasha could see Susan making her way unerringly towards their table. Damn. Then he remembered Fenn's glamour. It should still be all right.

 

“So what kind of youkai are you?” asked Peter.

 

“Eh?” Kouga stopped with a forkful of spaghetti halfway to his mouth. His eyes swiveled to Inuyasha and he looked almost panicked. Good.

 

“He's a wolf-youkai,” Inuyasha replied. “From Japan.”

 

“I didn't know they had wolves in Japan,” Peter said, more to himself than in reply to Inuyasha. “We still have some here, mostly up north. You should check it out.”

 

“Wolves, huh?” replied Kouga. “Maybe I will.” He gave Inuyasha a calculating look. “We're always looking for more open spaces.”

 

Inuyasha growled. This was his territory.

 

Just then Susan sat down. “Who's this?” she asked, interested.

 

They introduced Kouga to Susan, and to his relief, the rest of the table stopped talking about youkai altogether. What was with Inuyasha, anyway, wondered Kouga. He shouldn't be broadcasting what he was to all these humans. Times were different now, didn't he know that?

 

Inuyasha ate his dinner in silence, enjoying the conversation going around the table. Peter was still trying to get information from Kouga without tipping Susan off that something wasn't quite normal about him.

 

“Ok, what's going on?” asked Kouga in Japanese.

 

Noriko answered, “Susan doesn't know about youkai, so you should be careful what you say in front of her.”

 

At that point, Inuyasha decided to have some fun. “Susan,” he said sharply, causing the girl to look over. He reached across to her plate and used his claws to slice her chicken into neat little pieces. Kagome gaped at him, and Kouga half-stood up, not sure what he would be able to do to contain the damage. Even Peter and Noriko gasped. Susan merely smiled at Inuyasha, and said, “Thank you.” Then she calmly continued eating.

Everyone stared at him. “What?” he asked, before he relented, and with a small grin, he said in English, in front of Susan. “She doesn't notice anything like that about me.” He was right, Susan had no reaction whatsoever to his words.

 

That led into a discussion about Fenn, which Susan also ignored. Peter thought Fenn's power was cool, naturally. Kouga wondered out loud whether or not the glamour applied to him, too.

 

“Try it,” Inuyasha challenged him.

 

“I'll try!” volunteered Peter, who was dying to ask Kouga about his powers. If he said something in front of Susan and she looked at him like he was crazy, then he could just pretend it was a joke. “Do you have any special abilities like Sesshomaru's poison claws or Inuyasha's kaze no kizu?”

 

They all looked curiously at Susan, waiting for her reaction. She kept on eating; in fact, she was far less chatty than usual. As much as Kagome really didn't care for Susan, she wasn't sure she approved of this new Susan either. Very soon she was going to have a talk with Fenn. She didn't like the idea of her youkai manipulating unsuspecting humans. She gave Inuyasha a withering look, too. He was also somehow involved in this. Inuyasha caught her glance and realized he might have made a slight miscalculation. All he had meant to do was rile up Kouga.

 

Kouga, meanwhile, had anwered Peter. “Oh, I've got a few tricks up my sleeve that dog-boy doesn't know about. And I've always been faster than him.”

 

“Oh yeah?” Inuyasha couldn't help letting Kouga get to him. The worst part was, the wolf knew it. “Want to back that up?”

 

“Any time, any place,” replied Kouga. They both had stood up and faced each other across the table, mirroring their pose from 500 years ago at Kouga's table.

 

“Fine, let's go.”

 

“Fine, let's go.”

 

Inuyasha flung back over his shoulder, “I'm going for a run with the wolf. Don't wait up for me, Kagome.” Luckily he said it in Japanese. The rest of the cafeteria wasn't bespelled like Susan.

 

“Come on, Kagome, I'll drive you home,” offered Peter.