InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Present Perfect ❯ Chapter 21 ( Chapter 21 )

Inuyasha belongs to Rumiko Takahashi

 

 

Chapter 21:

 

 

“Phew, you stink!” Shippo waved his free hand in front of his face as if trying to get rid of the bad smell. His other hand gripped the steering wheel as he guided his little car through switchbacks down the mountain road.

 

Inuyasha had his head out of the passenger window. “I know, I know,” he yelled against the wind. “It's the beer smell.”

 

“Still? I wonder how long that's going to last,” said Shippo. He and Inuyasha had been following Sesshomaru's big car up and down mountain roads all morning. They used the time to talk frankly, while Kagome rode in comfort in the air-conditioned vehicle presently in front of them.

 

Inuyasha pulled his head back inside the car, but left the window open to catch the breeze. He reached behind him into the back seat and pulled out two bottles of water. He handed one to Shippo, and gulped the other one down thirstily.

 

“When are you going to tell Kagome?” asked Shippo.

 

“I'm not,” Inuyasha replied. Shippo just raised his eyebrows.

 

“She has enough to worry about right now,” Inuyasha continued. “Maybe she won't even find out until I'm back.”

 

“If you come back.”

 

“Even if I don't, at least she won't worry about it ahead of time.”

 

“You're just scared she wouldn't let you go either,” said Shippo.

 

“Kagome's not like that. Of course she would want me to still go. I doubt it would even stop her from trying to go, too. But she'd be even more worried, and that can't be good for her health.”

 

Shippo had to agree. He had more or less promised Inuyasha that he'd stay close to Kagome after Inuyasha left for the feudal era. As someone she knew and trusted, she would be more likely to confide in him than in Inuyasha's brother or even Kouga. He didn't like what Inuyasha had planned, but he saw the logic in it.

 

“Tell me again what you remember,” Inuyasha demanded. He needed to get everything straight in his mind. Now that he was committed to this, he wanted to repeat his actions from that day, so that nothing would change and jeopardize his future with Kagome. That didn't mean to say that he didn't intend to do a few small things differently, things that wouldn't necessarily change history, but would make his life a lot easier. One, he needed to convince Miroku to stay in his damn village and not follow Inuyasha to the well. Why that damned monk ever followed him in the first place, after being told how dangerous it was, he would never understand! The second thing Inuyasha intended to change, if he could, was his own death. No one from that time actually saw him die. They only saw him fall into the well as he released the meidou zangetsuha from inside the well at the hordes of youkai who had followed him in. If he knew himself, and he did, he would have figured that the time warp would grab him before the youkai did, and he'd be back in the present, er. . . future, without a scratch. It still gave him a headache, thinking of all this time stuff.

 

Shippo began his account. “I knew you and Kagome were going to try to come back in the summer, so I waited by the well. I waited for weeks. Sango had just had her baby, and it was getting more and more dangerous to travel, so I was the only one who came. I was youkai after all, even if I was still small then. I could protect myself. Besides, I wanted to be the first one to see you when you came.

 

“And I was. It was a hot summer day, just like today. The solstice had just passed, so it was a long time before it got completely dark. Just as the last light faded, you jumped out of the well. I remember thinking, `Where's Kagome?' I also remember you smelled funny then, too.”

 

“Funny how? Like a full youkai? Like now?” asked Inuyasha.

 

“No, not like a full youkai, but. . .” Shippo sniffed, then waved his hand in front of his nose again, “kind of like now, you know, kind of stinky. I could tell it was you, but the weird smell was over everything.” Shippo thought of something. “Hey, you don't think it could have still been from the beer, do you?”

 

Inuyasha didn't think so, but it gave him an idea. The youkai in the Sengoku Jidai didn't know he was full youkai when he went back. Sesshomaru had been completely surprised when he found out, so had Kouga. So they hadn't known back then. But Inuyasha didn't have the restraining beads. He and Kagome had both agreed that he might need all his powers to fight the rampaging youkai, and so they had left the beads behind. Now, thanks to the accident with the beer, Inuyasha thought he knew a way to disguise his new scent from the youkai in the past.

 

“Go on,” he said to Shippo instead. “Then what happened?”

 

“Well, I took you to Sango's village. I knew they were planning on having the baby's naming ceremony soon. You even asked me about it. I didn't think anything of it at the time since I was still mad at you because Kagome didn't come. You wouldn't answer me about that, either. Now I know why you already knew about the naming ceremony.”

 

Thanks to Shippo, Inuyasha also had a much clearer idea of the time he must go back. Solstice was in about a week. “I don't want you to tell Kagome what you just told me,” he said. Shippo reluctantly nodded.

 

They stopped for lunch at a small mountain town about half-way between Kouga's place and Sesshomaru's. As far as Kagome could tell, it was purely human. They had noodles at a little shop, and walked around the town for a while before getting back into the cars for the last leg of the trip. Kagome yawned. “I can't believe I'm still sleepy,” she murmured. “I must really be having a hard time shaking that jet lag.” She leaned her head on Inuyasha's shoulder. How many more moments like this would they share? She wanted every one to last forever.

 

Inuyasha rode with Kagome and Sesshomaru on the way back. Shippo didn't wait for them, but took off first. He had to go home and clear his schedule for the next few weeks. He told Kagome he had some business in Tokyo and would probably be seeing her around. Sesshomaru turned and gave Inuyasha a hard stare. Inuyasha nodded his head imperceptibly. Things were falling into place.

 

Sesshomaru's house wasn't in the town he wanted them to see, but it was close by. They stopped there first to freshen up and get something to eat. Kagome called her mother, who told her that her school friends had stopped by looking for her. Kagome grimaced. She both wanted to and didn't want to see them. Maybe Inuyasha could go with her to visit them this time. She told her mother that they would be home tomorrow, and she'd call the girls then.

 

The town right below Sesshomaru's place was youkai. Kagome and Inuyasha walked down the main street to stares from the local shopkeepers. The whole area was off the beaten tourist track, although every now and then a load of tourists would drive through. The youkai were good at disguising themselves, but to Kagome's eyes, it was perfectly obvious what they were. They had a certain beauty, a certain stillness about them that marked them apart, for those who knew to look.

 

Inuyasha held one arm around Kagome's waist, ignoring the stares as he always did, no matter who was doing the staring—human or youkai. He had been stared at by one or the other for most of his life. Kagome felt the slight tension in his arm. She knew it bothered him. So she dragged him into the nearest shop, and engaged the shopkeeper in small talk, while Inuyasha fidgeted by her side, seemingly uninterested.

 

It turned out that the shopkeeper had heard about Inuyasha and Kagome. Apparently they were quite famous. Everybody in town wanted a glimpse of the pair who had taken down Naraku, and they were especially curious about the hanyou who was no longer a hanyou although he chose to appear as one. Inuyasha raised his eyebrows at that remark.

 

 

The mountains around Sesshomaru's home were every bit as rugged as those up north. Many of them still showed signs of their volcanic beginnings, with deep fissures that hissed steam and several hot springs. Far below, glassy lakes mirrored the surrounding mountains until there was no distinction between reality and its reflection. The land was lush and green with the coming summer.

 

Inuyasha walked hand in hand with Kagome along an outcrop which jutted over the valley below. It was a tourist spot, but then again, they were tourists right now. Inuyasha gauged the distance from the fenced edge to the next jumble of broken rocks fifty feet below. Kagome shook her head. “No, don't even think about it,” she told him with a soft smile. “There are too many people around.”

 

They had taken the bus from the youkai village near Sesshomaru's place to this scenic outlook halfway up the mountain. Sesshomaru warned Inuyasha not to use his youkai abilities anywhere near the village, and so put their careful anonymity at risk. Inuyasha grumbled about it, but he listened. “I'm not stupid,” he said. “Why does everyone assume I'm just gonna do youkai stuff in front of humans? I know how to be careful.”

 

Kagome smiled again, thinking back on that conversation, as she steered Inuyasha away from the edge and back towards the bus. They continued on to the top of the mountain, then got off again in yet another small village. Inuyasha knew he must have been in this area before, but he couldn't match up his memories of the landscape with these tourist spots and twisty black roads. He thought that by coming to the top of the mountain, he would be able to recognize the area. The general shape of the mountains was familiar, but that was it. He didn't know if he would ever get used to this modern Japan.

 

It was cooler up here. A constant breeze blew over the hilltop village. Every now and then Kagome would get a frisson of unfamiliar youki. She knew Inuyasha felt it, too. She spotted them occasionally, as the youkai moved in and around the human crowds. She marveled again that nobody noticed how truly different they were, with their perfect faces, their youth, and their silent vitality. Kagome leaned into Inuyasha as they walked. She was surprised that more humans weren't drawn to these eldritch creatures. She certainly was. She reached up and pulled Inuyasha's face to hers for a quick kiss.

 

“What was that for?” he asked in surprise.

 

“Just because,” answered Kagome.

 

A few of the local youkai spotted them as well. Kagome felt the tingle on the back of her neck at the rising youki each time one of them approached Inuyasha. But he was good, and left his hand off his hip where Tetsusaiga would be if it were visible. He nodded politely at the strange youkai, letting his own aura subside. No problem here, he broadcast. Sesshomaru would have been proud.

 

 

Sesshomaru brought them back to Kagome's house the next day. He still wanted to bring them to some of the hidden youkai enclaves around Tokyo, but he told them that could wait.

 

Inuyasha planned to meet up with Shippo and Kouga again in about a week to go over the final details for his trip back to the past. So he and Kagome were on their own for a few days.

 

Kagome wanted to spend some time with her mother so she sent Inuyasha outside to help Grandpa around the shrine. Every time he passed the well house, Inuyasha wondered how he was going to pull this off without alerting Kagome. He already knew when he needed to go back, and Shippo would be here in less than a week to stay with Kagome while he was gone. He needed to sneak back without Kagome's knowledge, at least until Shippo arrived to prevent her from following him. Now, how to go about it. . . .

 

 

Kagome poured her mother some more tea. “And that's the whole story,” she finished. “I can't let him do this alone.”

 

Her mother stared into her cup without speaking. So much had happened to her daughter in her short life. No, that wasn't quite true. Her daughter was a part of something much bigger. As much as it pained her to think of Kagome in danger, she understood that it was her daughter's destiny. But maybe it was also destiny that Kagome was not in the past when Inuyasha disappeared.

 

“Do you trust him?” she asked her daughter.

 

“Of course I do, but . . .”

 

“Then maybe you should let him go. He promised he would come back, didn't he?”

 

“Yes, but how can he promise something that's out of his control? I'd rather die with him than live without him.”

 

Her mother sighed heavily on hearing that overly dramatic but heartfelt sentiment. Despite whatever past lives she may have lived, her daughter was currently a teen-ager. She'd have to be blunt. “Didn't you already do that once?” she asked sharply.

 

Kagome wasn't ready to hear that yet. “I don't know, Mama, I just know I don't want to lose him.”

 

Mama knew firsthand what it was like to lose someone. She also knew life went on despite it. And when push came to shove, she didn't want to lose her daughter too. “You will do what's right,” she murmured, as she came to put her arm around Kagome.

 

Kagome refused to let Inuyasha be shy because they were in her mother's house. They tossed and turned on her little bed, and didn't fall asleep until nearly morning. Even in her sleep, she wrapped her hands around his long hair, holding him close.

 

She couldn't just let him go. It wasn't like before, with Kikyou. She wasn't being noble or self-sacrificing. She was being selfish, and she knew it. He was just trying to protect her, but she didn't want protecting. She wanted to be with him, no matter what.