InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Puppet Without Strings ❯ Kagome's Solace ( Chapter 5 )

Puppet Without Strings

Disclaimer: I do not own Inuyasha.

Pairings: InuKag for now. I won't reveal the rest because that would be spoiling.

A special thank you goes to Sunshynesurfer. Your comment was definitely appreciated.

-Chapter 4 -

A tall figure in uniform knelt down on one knee to face a young child of six.

"Kagome, something's come up. I have to leave the country for a while."

"But its the eighteenth. We always visit mommy's grave on the eighteenth."

"I know, I'm sorry Kagome-chan. Please be understanding."

The scene changed. A man sat at the desk of his personal study. Light, approaching footsteps signaled someone's arrival through the room's double doors. The same child, older by a few years, dashed in and scrambled onto her father's lap.

"Dad! Our school's having a performance! Mrs. Kawamoto said she wants me to lead the junior choir!"

"What? With that squeaky voice?" Came the teasing reply.

"Hey! She said I was `musically inclined'," the child raised her hands in gesture. Her father ruffled her hair.

"So, so dad! Can you come? It's on the first of next month."

The man's smile drooped.

"I need to meet Arashi's Governor on that day. There's been trouble in that area."

"But its Children's Day!"

The child's eyes had lost their joyful glimmer.

"I know. I'm sorry Kagome-chan. I promise I'll make it up to you."

The reply was dejected.

"That's okay dad. It isn't important anyways."

The study dissipated. In its place appeared a lavishly furnished bedroom. The same girl, now a teenager, sat on her four-poster bed with her head bowed as a fuming father paced in front of her.

"What were you thinking Kagome?!"

"I'm sorry, dad. I-I wasn't thinking. I've stopped takin-"

"-Damn right you weren't!! I had more faith in your discretion than that! Do you know how badly this would reflect on our country's leadership?"

The girl felt her insides get hot.

"How badly it would reflect on you, you mean!"

The pacing stopped. Her father rounded on her.

"Is- is this…!? Oh, I get it now! It's hormones isn't it? This must be some sort of silly teenage phase! Because the Kagome I know would never be so imprudent!"

"The Kagome you know is OUT OF DATE!! Your chauffer has seen more of you than I have in the last four years!! Souta's practically been raised by his nanny! It's like- IT'S LIKE WE DON'T EVEN HAVE A FATHER ANYMORE!!"

Her voice was raised. She'd never raised her voice to her father before. All anger in the man's eyes dissipated the moment that last sentence left her lips. His mouth opened and closed several times as his mind tried to form a coherent reply. In the end, all he could do was sigh dejectedly.

"D-dad I- I didn't- I mean…"

"I know. I'm sorry Kagome-chan. Just- just be more careful next time."

The scene shifted again to the breakfast table of five days later as three members of the same family ate in silence. The father was the first to speak.

"I bought us a summer home in the Genrai Hills. I was thinking we should take a trip there. My schedule's been cleared for a week so… what do you say, kids?"

The boy cheered. The girl stared.

Their father turned to face her. His eyes were pleading. She could see apology in their depths.

She smiled at him.

Once more the scene shifted. The new room was dark and cold, but the stains of blood on the walls could be clearly seen.

The girl was crying.

"Dad… Daddy, hold on! People are coming. They'll help you!"

The man tried to smile. His eyes were dimming and he found it hard to focus on the daughter leaning over him. He knew what was coming. He could feel it.

"Daddy, please don't leave. I never meant what I said. You're the best father in the world. I love you daddy, please…"

"I-I know. I'm sorry…Kagome…chan……"

~

"-gome-san…"

"Higurashi Kagome-san…"

Kagome was shaken awake by the bony fingers of her English teacher. She looked up blearily only to realize that the entire class had been staring. She turned crimson and muttered a hasty apology to Professor Leonard. Rather than being annoyed like she would have expected, the man seemed instead… nervous. She found out why a few seconds later when she glanced down at her arms, which she had used to pillow her head.

They were damp with tears. Her dream! She'd been crying in her sleep and it showed. She hurriedly wiped at her eyes and offered her professor a small apologetic smile.

It had been like this for the three weeks since her father had died. People would be overly cautious and skittish around her, as if they were afraid she might have some sort of mental breakdown if they said or did something wrong. Students in the cafeteria would go out of their way to give her a seat. The halls would turn silent as she walked through them. She'd receive random inquiries as to her well being from absolute strangers. She was getting tired of it. She'd been in school no more than a week, and it was already starting to get on her nerves.

She knew what people said behind her back. She'd overheard a conversation from Kanzaki Naomi's group once. The school's resident gossip-queen had speculated that it had been Kagome that had caused her father's untimely demise. She'd stood just round the corner with fists clenched and eyes squeezed shut, as she'd listened to Naomi inform her friends about just how her `delinquent behaviour' must have caused the president to die from shock. That, she'd said, would perfectly explain why he had met his death of heart failure just a few days after Kagome's drug-abusing tendencies had been revealed by the media.

Yes. Kagome knew what they said behind her back.

Rhythmic chiming signaled the arrival of lunch and students filed into the hallways. Kagome followed the crowd and met up with her friends at their usual spot near the second floor east-wing lockers. She was aware of the presence of her female youkai bodyguard somewhere close by. Kagome remained pretty much quiet during their meal. Her friend Eri, never one for awkward silences, had filled in the time with pointless chatter to hide her nervousness. Kagome had never spoken to them of her feelings. Her friends danced around the topic of her father's death with so much carefulness that it was painful to watch. When Kagome excused herself to go to the bathroom, all three of them visibly relaxed, though they tried hard not to show it.

To get to the nearest restroom, Kagome had to pass the teacher's lounge. She stopped short when she caught her name in a conversation that filtered out from the slight crack in the open door.

"-actually cried?"

"Yes. I hardly knew what to do. I mean, I've never seen Higurashi Kagome so much as let out a sniffle before."

"I know what you mean. It was rather unsettling that she hadn't even shed a tear since that time. It's a relief to know that she does grieve for the man. I wonder if she feels guilty for… you know… causing the president to-"

"Indeed. I'm sure she does. But she hides it well."

Kagome had to get away before she broke down right then and there.

-Even the adults believe I caused dad to die-

Her brisk strides soon turned into a full on run as she pelted through hallways, ignoring inquiries from students and teachers about her well-being.

"Higurashi-san, are you all right?"

"Higurashi-san, are you okay?"

"Higurashi-san, you don't look too well."

"Higurashi-san, do you need me to call a teacher?"

"Higurashi-san!"

"Higurashi-san!"

Liars. Frauds. All of them.

She rounded another corner, nearly colliding into a startled group of seventh years and burst through the stairwell door, heading for the school roof. That place had always been her sanctuary. She took the steps two, even three at a time, wanting, needing to get away from everyone else as quickly as possible.

It wasn't so much that Kagome felt wronged by the rumours. Some part of her, a very large part, felt that they had in fact hit very close to the truth.

It had been her selfishness and immaturity that had made her father feel guilty about forsaking time with his kids to serve his country. It had been her hurtful words that had forced her father to try and make it up to her by taking the family out to the secluded Genrai Hills, far away from medical assistance. It had been her complaints about never having enough privacy that had made her father lessen security during their stay.

She heard her bodyguard, Kouran, ascending the stairs after her.

"Miss Kagome! Please stop!"

"Go away, Kouran. Just give me some time alone!"

"I can't comply with that request Miss Kagome. You are to be protected at all times."

Kagome was starting to panic. Weeks of having been made to hide the truth, when all she saw in her dreams was her father's blood spattered corpse in the dark of his room; Weeks of having surpressed her emotions: guilt, sorrow, pain, frustration, anger; Weeks of having had no one to pour her heart out to as she'd struggled with the loss of her most important person; all these finally took their toll on her. She could feel something pulse deep within her torso. Her heart thundered. The ringing in her ears had become deafening and Kouran's strong grip on her shoulder marked her breaking point. Kagome felt something burst from inside.

Kouran wasn't able to let out so much as a gasp before she was hurled down a flight of stairs by an immense, invisible force. She fell to the ground in pain and everything went black.

~

Inuyasha looked up from his laptop screen. He'd sensed a reasonably powerful surge of energy just then. It was like what he felt every time Kaede used her miko abilities to purify sector So54's weapons. It had come from somewhere close. Very close.

He glanced at his tracking screen to check on his charges' positions and nearly yelped in surprised when he realized the girl, Kagome, was no more than fifty feet from him.

The stairwell! She must be in the stairwell.

But that was the direction he'd felt that rush of energy from.

"Shit!"

He leapt away from his perch against the roof's protective railing and sprinted towards the door that connected the roof to the stairway. In his haste, he almost forgot to revert back to his human form. Almost.

~

Kagome stepped back in horror. She had done that again. She hadn't meant to. She just hadn't been able to control herself. Kouran was still breathing. She needed to get help!

Willing her frozen legs to start moving was difficult. Her frayed nerves refused to let her. She heard footsteps coming from the roof.

~

Inuyasha saw the girl at the last moment. He tried to bring his legs into a sudden stop but had been going so fast that he stumbled and nearly lost his balance. Rather than tumbling down an entire flight of steps to his possible death, Inuyasha chose to jump. The joints in his legs jarred painfully as he made a thunderous landing one floor down.

This placed him directly beside a distraught and hyperventilating Higurashi Kagome.

"Well, that was graceful," he muttered as he straightened his stance. The unmoving figure of Kouran caught his eye.

"What happened here?"

He tried to keep his voice as calm as possible. The Kagome girl seemed about ready to collapse.

"Please! You have to help me! Kouran's been hurt."

-No. Not just hurt. She's been purified. What the hell…?-

Inuyasha was already moving. He'd been in too many similar situations to be shocked by one unconscious female. His military training kicked in and he picked up the demoness to sling over his shoulder. This was done with a grunt.

-Damn this bitch is heavy-

His human form may have been weak, but for once, he was grateful for his mortal blood. Picking up the cat youkai, whose body still retained traces of purifying energy, would have been rather painful otherwise. He started towards the infirmary but realized after taking five steps that the Kagome girl was still rooted to the spot.

"Well?," he demanded, "You coming or what?!"

The boy's snappish question broke Kagome out of her reverie and she quickly followed after him. Amidst curious stares and whispered comments, the pair hurried through the school.

-So much for `inconspicuous'. Sesshoumaru's going to skin me alive-

A minute was all it took for the pair to reach the school's infirmary.

Now, parents didn't pay millions of yen a year to send their kids to SNIE for nothing. The institute had first-rate medical facilities and a resident doctor to go with it. The same doctor whose eyes were currently bulged at the sight of them. Teenage-boy-carrying-smoking-youkai-body must not have been a very common occurrence in Sengoku National.

"What on earth-"

"Help now, talk later, doc."

Inuyasha strode right past him.

"Right, right. Place her on the examination bench."

Inuyasha did so, then motioned for the doctor to set to work.

"Nurse Izumi! Report to the examination room at once. You two, please wait outside for now."

Doctor's orders. The pair left the room.

Inuyasha plonked himself down on one of the waiting area's many available seats and busied himself with looking indifferent. An awkward silence befell the room's two occupants, in which Inuyasha contented himself with studying the girl in the periphery of his vision.

She was shivering slightly. Most likely from shock, Inuyasha hypothesized.

He sighed. This was bad. Sesshoumaru had made it clear that contact with his protected should be kept to an absolute minimum. But the situation had been out of his control. Under current circumstances, the unavailability of her bodyguard meant that he was required to watch her until a replacement could arrive.

Plus, there was the whole issue of the energy blast.

Had the assassin entered school grounds and purified Kagome's bodyguard so he could get to her and her brother?

-No. That's not right-

Inuyasha would have known if there had been an intruder. The academy's security was top notch. He'd had every surveillance camera in the school linked up to his computer and his computer monitored almost constantly.

Plus, there was no way the intruder could have purified this Kouran, and just left Kagome standing there unharmed like that.

-So that would mean… -

Inuyasha frowned. That slip of a girl had done it? There hadn't been anyone else around. But that didn't make sense. Such abilities were only limited to people like Kaede and Miroku. Usually, miko were scouted at very young ages. Their powers had to be honed in order to have potent effect. This girl was way too old to be untrained. She couldn't have let loose so strong a surge of energy without having been properly taught to do so first. Yet, Inuyasha had his doubts. He remembered the time he'd watched Kaede purify the sector's weaponry. She'd been drained and exhausted afterward. Kagome looked somewhat like she did then, shivering and pale, albeit more so than the old lady had been.

-Gah! This is too annoying. I'll figure it out later with Sesshoumaru.-

He'd let his older brother do the thinking since that was what Sesshoumaru did best.

Inuyasha removed his blazer and chucked it at Kagome's quivering form five seats down. Her eyes met his in surprise.

"You look like you need it," was his curt explanation.

She hesitantly wrapped the too-large piece of clothing round her upper body. Her shivering abated slightly.

"Thank you."

"Yea, whatever."

-Minimal contact minimal contact minimal contact…-

Inuyasha repeated the chant mentally. Kagome was the one who broke the silence a few minutes later.

"I'm sorry, I must not be giving you the best of impressions right now. I assure you Kouran was meant no harm. She's my…bodyguard."

She let out a humourless chuckle, eyes staring bewilderedly at her shaking hands.

"That's strange. Why won't I stop shivering?"

Inuyasha shrugged. He figured the best way to maintain `minimal contact' was to minimize any interaction with the girl. And if that meant not talking then so be it.

The end-of-lunch chimes sounded and Kagome turned to him once more.

"You don't have to stay here, you know. You've already done enough."

"Hn. Calculus is one class I can miss without regret."

-Dammit!!-

Inuyasha was annoyed. He'd meant to stop talking, damn it! He shut his eyes. Maybe if he ignored her…

Kagome gave a small smile.

Who was this strange boy? She'd never seen him before but he'd come out of nowhere and just helped her without any question. He was a student at Sengoku National that much was certain.

It wasn't unusual for Kagome not to know a fellow schoolmate. After all, she wasn't a social butterfly like Eri. The boy was pretty easy on the eyes but no more so than some of the other males she'd met before. His hair may have been somewhat longer than most guys, but Kagome doubted if she would have paid him any notice otherwise. She chanced a question.

"Are you new?"

Inuyasha's eyebrow twitched. Why the hell did wenches always feel the need for conversation? He was in big enough trouble with his brother already.

-Minimal Contact Minimal contact…-

He offered small nod of his head, hoping she would be satisfied. As long as she didn't ask the dreaded question…

"So what's your name?"

-Dammit!-

Inuyasha pondered possible terms he could put into his will.

Let's see, he wanted to be buried, not cremated. His funeral was to be short but honourable. He wanted a simple headstone with something not too cheesy written across the top. Miroku was to deliver the eulogy. In normal circumstances, people usually passed on their assets to members of the family. But damn his luck if the only living family he had was a sibling who would probably be the one to end his life in the first place. Sesshoumaru's poison claws hurt, god damn it!

He resorted to desperate measures.

-Ha! I'm asleep! Take that noisy wench! -

However, Inuyasha found that shutting out the rest of the world by closing one's eyes only made one's concentration all the more focused.

The gears in his mind started their relentless churning again.

What if the girl truly did possess miko powers, his little mind got down to wondering. When he'd first seen her in the stairwell, she'd looked scared and bewildered, as if she herself had no idea what had just taken place. Judging from Kouran's wounds, the blast had been unfocused and haphazard.

-She can't control her powers -

Inuyasha's final conclusion made sense.

~

Kagome had given up trying to make conversation with the new kid. All she'd done was try to be friendly, as was custom, to the stranger who had done her a huge favour. But he seemed intent on ignoring her very existence. She wondered what was going through his mind.

-Not much, probably.-

He seemed like the type who didn't give a shit about the going-ons around him.

-With any luck, he won't make a big deal out of it. This is just a way for him to miss class, after all-

His blazer around her was warm and comforting. Kagome was grateful for that small fact. To her, the boy's cold behaviour was a breath of fresh air.

Most people kept their distance because they were uncertain of how to deal with her. For the past three weeks, inquiries about Kagome's well-being had been common. But offers to help her had not. By constantly going, `I'm sorry about your father' or `Are you alright?' people hoped to keep her at a safe distance from themselves, but at the same time wanted to prove that they were indeed concerned for her. To be sympathetic towards the grieving was, after all, a `morally correct' thing to do. Their goodwill mostly ended there, though.

Because by going so far as to ask something like, `Is there any way I can help?' would mean having to take a part of her burden upon themselves and neither Kagome's school mates nor her teachers nor anyone else she'd come into contact with since her father's death, had ever been willing to offer such a thing. After all, no one liked to have to deal with the sadness of others. Humans had a natural desire to protect themselves from negative emotions.

Kagome had accepted that fact a long time ago.

This boy, however, seemed to genuinely just…not care. He hadn't bothered with fake concern. He hadn't asked her if she was all right. Not once. He'd helped her with Kouran. He'd tossed her his blazer. He'd offered her what help he was willing to give. Nothing more. And to Kagome, that meant a lot.

After all, actions always did speak louder than words…

A rough hand shook her awake for the second time that day. She looked up blearily into the chiseled features of its owner's face. The gruff voice that accompanied this action sounded nonchalant, perhaps a little irritated.

"Hey. Wake up. Doctor told me to take you to your room."

The doctor had done no such thing. Inuyasha just needed an excuse to be following her around.

Kagome glanced at the wall clock and realized that it was already five in the evening. Dinner would be served in an hour. Had the nameless boy stayed the entire time? Kagome smiled.

-Lazy ass. Probably skipped the rest of his lessons too. -

He'd let her keep his blazer the whole time she'd been asleep. For all his coldness, the boy had been kind. More so than most people had been for a while now.

"What about Kouran," she inquired.

"She's fine. Sleeping like a kitten," came the curt reply.

Kagome sighed in relief. But she couldn't bring herself to see her bodyguard now, guilty as she was for putting her into that awful condition.

Not a word was exchanged the entire way back to Kagome's fifth storey dormitory. Inuyasha's stride was brisk. He was trying to get this over with as quickly as possible. He slowed occasionally when he felt that she was falling too far behind. His longer legs saw to it that he moved nearly twice as fast as she could.

A new bodyguard had already arrived and been stationed outside her room. Word sure got about fast.

Once the guard came into view, Inuyasha turned to leave.

"Wait!"

His shoulders slumped a little. Almost! He'd been that close to getting away! That close! He turned around guardedly. The girl was holding his blazer out to him.

"I - Um - You - I mean… Thank you."

The pure, unblemished gratitude in her eyes was unnerving. She wasn't supposed to react to him like this, god damn it! Hell, as far as she was concerned, he wasn't even supposed to exist. He had to say something to deter her. Anything!

"Go sleep. You look like hell."

There. That should do it. Oh, how floored she looked! Inuyasha praised himself for the smooth delivery of that statement. The coldness of it, the nonchalance, he so deserved an emmy. No female liked being told that they were visually unappealing in any way. Now she would think he was a rude bastard and want nothing to do with him.

It was good that he had turned to leave immediately after talking for he would have been sorely disappointed.

Because a few seconds later, unbeknownst to him, for the first time in three weeks, Higurashi Kagome's smile reached her eyes.

~