InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Present Perfect ❯ Chapter 30: ( Chapter 30 )

Inuyasha belongs to Rumiko Takahashi

 

 

Chapter 30:

 

 

Sesshomaru turned the crinkled paper map over and ran one claw over the scribbled writing on the reverse side. “Eiji,” he read. Kagome, peeking over his shoulder, couldn't make head nor tail of it. He reached into an inner pocket and withdrew another paper, this one carefully folded. “Eiji,” he said again, as if that answered some unvoiced question. Kagome tried to read that paper, too, without success. It looked like a list of some sort—names? Who was Eiji?

 

Abruptly Sesshomaru stood. “I have some business with your grandfather,” he told Kagome. “You stay here.”

 

Kagome worried a little about Grandpa. Sesshomaru was a formidable youkai after all. Would he hurt her grandfather? No, he wasn't like that anymore. Was he? She watched anxiously as Sesshomaru glided across the shrine grounds, stalking her grandfather. Maybe she should go and make sure neither one of them did anything they would regret. Although she didn't think Sesshomaru was one to regret anything, she didn't want to lose her Grandpa if he said the wrong thing to the powerful youkai. She half rose, when Sesshomaru stopped in his tracks.

 

“I said `stay,'” he cautioned her. “Kitsune, keep an eye on her.”

 

Shippo nodded, even though Sesshomaru hadn't turned around. “He'll be all right,” he said to Kagome. “Why don't you go inside and wash? I'll watch the well.”

 

By the time Kagome had finished her bath, dried her hair, and rejoined Shippo, Sesshomaru was back. Her grandfather was nowhere in sight, so she asked, a little sharply, “Is my grandfather still alive?”

 

Sesshomaru didn't reply, and after a few moments she saw the reason why. Grandpa was coming across the grounds with a box of `ancient treasures.' He put them down in front of Sesshomaru and said, quite cheerily, “Here you are. These are the family records for as far back as I could find.” Kagome wondered what Sesshomaru had said to her grandfather to make him so cooperative.

 

Sesshomaru spent a good part of the day poring over the old records. Kagome did, too, finding photographs and snippets of news clippings from some of the more recent relatives much more interesting. “I didn't know you kept all this stuff,” she said to her grandfather.

 

There was an Eiji among their ancestors, but in the old days, villagers didn't use family names, so it was hard to tell if their Eiji was the same as the Eiji Sesshomaru had found on his paper. He was being very secretive about that paper, and refused to tell them where it had come from or what it meant. He seemed very satisfied, however, when Grandpa found the name again in a few other documents. Before he left for the night, he did a very unhumanlike thing: he sniffed Grandpa, then he grasped Kagome's face between his two hands, very gently, and sniffed her thoroughly, much to her embarrassment. He finally let her go, with a shake of his head. “You smell too much like him now,” he said. “It must be because of—“

 

Kagome made a chopping motion across her neck. She didn't know what he was talking about, but she knew what he had almost said in front of her grandfather! She didn't want to tell her family about the baby yet. Sesshomaru realized it, too, and with another slight quirk of his lips, he bowed, and left for the night.

 

Another day and still no Inuyasha. Shippo was staying over again, even though she told him he didn't have to. And she was staying right here by the well house too. Tomorrow would be exactly one week. He had to come back tomorrow. She wouldn't consider any other possibility.

 

 

 

Sesshomaru had gone to Midoriko's cave. In the old days, the extended families, including Rin and Kohaku's, had kept up the tradition of naming their children and keeping a record of the name in the cave. Who would have thought that Inuyasha's miko would have been descended from one of them? Of course, when he did stop to consider it, it made perfect sense. The miko had come from the same area where it all started. If only he had known about the time slip earlier, he could have paid more attention to that branch of the family. The unfortunate truth was, over the years, he had lost touch with the purely human branches, and concentrated mostly on the mixes. Perhaps that was because he was more comfortable with them, or maybe simply that they had needed him more. Nevertheless, now that he knew, he regretted it.

 

Rin had completed her miko training in Kaede's village, and had married Kohaku shortly after. They traveled for most of their lives from village to village, and their children eventually accompanied them. As they grew, their children settled in various villages and took on the roles for which they were best suited. Some became slayers, but always with the added knowledge that not all youkai were enemies, some married ordinary villagers and blended in to the daily life of the times. Some married youkai, or hanyou as time went on. Eiji, if he remembered correctly, remained in the old miko's village and tended the shrines. He eventually married a village woman. That was as far as Sesshomaru remembered.

 

After Rin died, Sesshomaru was drawn to those descendants of hers that resembled her in appearance and power. He set Jaken the task of following those families. Over time, he forgot about the human branches. But blood would always tell. He had sniffed Kagome and her grandfather to see if he could find some small trace of his Rin in them, but it had been too long. He thought about the series of coincidences—were they coincidences?—that had caused Kagome and his Rin to cross paths all those centuries ago. They each had saved the other on occasion, as he had saved the miko from the future and Inuyasha had saved his Rin.

 

Now Kagome's child was doubly precious. It would carry the blood of the inu-youkai and it was part of Rin, also, which made it his as well. Even if his brother didn't make it back, he would protect Kagome and her child, and see to it that they never wanted for anything.

 

 

 

Where was he? This place wasn't like anything he'd ever been in before—not the meidou, not the time slip, not even the jewel. It was featureless, empty except for him. He spotted Tetsusaiga floating in the distance. He must have dropped it when the backlash from his meidou zangetsuha hit him. He couldn't hear anything. He sniffed. He couldn't smell anything, either. Was he dead?

 

He tried to move his body to retrieve Tetsusaiga with little success. It was hard to gain momentum here with no spot to anchor him. Finally, with a swimming motion he was able to propel himself a few feet in Tetsusaiga's general direction. He felt naked without his sword. He struggled for what seemed like hours but never got any closer to Tetsusuaiga. He couldn't tell if he was really moving at all or whether Tetsusaiga was moving farther away from him. His heart sped up at that thought.

 

Got to get out of here. Kagome is waiting for me. He remembered his dream of the future, his future with Kagome and their child. Slowly his eyes closed again, and he fell back into unconsciousness with a faint smile on his lips. Tetsusaiga pulsed once, and drifted a little farther away. It had sensed the child, too. There was still a connection to the sleeping youkai, enough so that Tetsusaiga caught random thoughts and dreams, including the one of the woman and unborn child. If one would not wield him perhaps the other would.

 

Inuyasha dreamed. This time, the dream brought him back to his childhood. He sat with his mother as she coughed and coughed. The smell of sickness was thick in his nostrils, and he would have fled, except that this was his mother and she needed him. He brought her water, but she wouldn't drink it. He didn't know what else to do, so he lay down beside her, pressing his small body against her back, and slept. Some time during the night her tortured breathing ceased, and for a second or two he was relieved, before he realized that she was gone. A tear escaped his eye, and he didn't move for a long time.

 

In the void, a tear rolled down Inuyasha's cheek and he woke once more.

 

No, not dead. Stuck in time. Somehow Inuyasha had managed to get himself stuck in time itself, not going backward, not going forward. How long had he been here? Was Kagome still waiting for him, back in her time? Inuyasha had no idea how to get to that place from where he was. He glanced around for Tetsusaiga, only to see it had moved even farther away from him.

 

He had to get Tetsusaiga back; then he could concentrate on getting out of here. He thrust himself forward with great sweeping motions of his arms and legs. “Tetsusaiga!” he shouted, as if that would help. The sword pulsed, and Inuyasha felt it through the void. There was hope. Again he struggled forward.

 

 

 

Slowly the days passed by, and Inuyasha still didn't return. Kagome maintained her vigil by the well house door, with Shippo as her constant companion. After the first few days past the time he had been expected to return, Kouga and Ayame had tried to convince her to come away, for the baby's sake. Ayame even scheduled a visit to the doctor, which Kagome only agreed to because Shippo volunteered to watch the well while she was gone.

 

Her baby was fine, the youkai doctor told her. A strong hanyou. It was too early yet for an ultrasound but Kagome had a feeling this would be a boy. Sooner or later she would have to tell her mother about the baby, but she wanted to try one last thing. No one, not even her mother, would let her do it if she knew she was pregnant. Therefore, she wouldn't tell her family yet.

 

The other youkai, especially Sesshomaru, made up for it. They were solicitous of her every need, and showered her with little delicacies that supposedly were good for her growing baby. Kagome's mother began to wonder, especially when Kouga brought her daughter raw meat.

 

Grandpa's eyes followed Sesshomaru whenever the youkai was near with an avid interest. He knew something, Kagome was sure. She just didn't know what it was. Surely Sesshomaru hadn't told her grandfather about the baby? To get her mind off the well, she confronted her grandfather about it.

 

“What did Sesshomaru say to you that day?” She half-expected him to evade her question, since he hadn't volunteered any information on his own. Usually, he couldn't hold a secret if his life depended on it. Oops—poor choice of words. Maybe it did. She wouldn't put it past Sesshomaru to threaten her grandfather to gain his cooperation.

 

But her grandfather was more than willing to speak, now that Kagome had brought it up herself. That had been the stipulation the youkai lord had made—wait for Kagome to ask. Don't say anything unless she asks directly. “He gave me more information for our archives—names, family trees, things like that. He had records, reaching farther back than our own, and he compared them to records in the shrine. He says our family is directly related to his, through, through. . .” Grandpa thought about it for a minute. He couldn't remember the names exactly, but he had it written down now in the family records. “Ah, Ko—koha—“

 

“Kohaku?” Kagome asked. It couldn't be. Didn't the beads prove she was related to Miroku and Sango?

 

“Yes, that's it. Kohaku and, and and Rin!” Grandpa was happy that he finally remembered the names. “Eiji, our ancestor, was descended from them.” He eyed his granddaughter thoughtfully. “That means we have some youkai blood, doesn't it?” After all his years of preaching about evil youkai, the old man actually sounded excited to be part-youkai himself!

 

“No, Grandpa, it doesn't. Rin was Sesshomaru's adopted daughter. So we don't have youkai blood.” But my child will, she thought. He'll have Inuyasha and Sesshomaru's blood as well as Rin's. No wonder Sesshomaru has been treating me so nicely!

 

Grandpa seemed disappointed. “Oh,” was all he said.

 

So Miroku wasn't her ancestor after all. In a way she was glad. And being related to Kohaku still gave her a connection to Sango. It would take some getting used to, but she didn't mind the idea of being a descendant of Rin and Kohaku. That meant she was somehow distantly related to the hanyou miko, Mariko, too.

 

Kagome would have to set Sesshomaru straight on just whose baby this was, as soon as she finished one little task. She didn't mind him helping; after all, he would be the child's uncle. But she wanted to make it clear that this was her baby, hers and Inuyasha's, and she would be raising it according to her rules, not his. Hers and Inuyasha's, that is, once he got back. She never doubted that he would come back, even if, as Kouga had put it, he had to take the long way around. He would find her.

 

But maybe she could help. It had been long enough, far past the time when he should have returned. She needed to take matters into her own hands now. That night, after her bath, she retrieved her bow and arrows from her bedroom and brought them down to the campsite wrapped in an extra blanket. They had settled into a routine of sorts. The older youkai would sit with her during the day, in shifts, as they had before the well-watching, and Shippo would stay at night. She hated to fool Shippo again, but there was no other way.

 

When she was sure he was asleep, Kagome slowly pushed aside her extra blanket and slid out of the sleeping bag. She'd taken to sleeping in sweats, waiting for this day, so she was ready to go. She slipped her shoes on, forgoing socks for once, slung the bow and arrows over her shoulder, and tiptoed over to the well house door. She glanced at Shippo, but he had his head turned away from her, wrapped in his own sleeping bag. With any luck, she could do this before he woke up.

 

She carefully felt her way down the steps in the dark, not daring to use a flashlight. She hadn't thought much about what would happen when she got to the other side, but she had to try. As she prepared to jump, a blur of movement shot past her and grabbed her away from the well.

 

“What the hell do you think you're doing?” asked Shippo, anger seeping through his voice. “I thought we were past all this.” He gestured towards the well. “What did you think would happen? The well was destroyed on the other side. There is no place for you to come out anymore.”

 

“I don't care, I don't care!” Kagome shouted. “If that's so, then where is Inuyasha? Answer me that!”

 

Shippo just looked at her sadly.

 

He was not dead. He was not. She felt it in her bones. “Inuyasha,” she whispered, broken. What point was there to anything if he was gone? She had to know, one way or the other. With a mighty wrench, she tore free of Shippo's grasp, leaving pieces of her sweatshirt behind. She jumped into the well, and Shippo jumped right behind her, catching her when she hit bottom and taking the force of the impact. Kagome sobbed. It was true. The time slip no longer worked. She turned and buried her face in Shippo's shoulder, letting all her anguish and pain pour out of her with her tears.

 

 

 

Tetsusaiga pulsed again. She was near, the woman with the unborn child. It began to move again, slowly, surely, towards the place of life, where the woman dwelled.

 

Inuyasha gave a cry of frustration, and chased after his sword. It was like swimming in quicksand, but he wasn't about to give up.