InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Purity 8: Vendetta ❯ Futility ( Chapter 9 )

~~Chapter 9~~

~Futility~

 

-=0=-

 

 

He couldn't believe it, and he wouldn't have if he hadn't seen it with his own eyes. Okay, sure, he'd dealt with enough of those beasts to know that they possessed an uncanny ability to heal, but . . .

 

The gunshot wound was completely healed over. It wasn't scabbed over or anything; it was gone. A trace amount of pinkness remained along with a slight indentation in its flesh, but the wound, itself, was gone.

 

`Three days to heal a wound that would have taken a human months to recover from . . . months and a few reconstructive surgeries, and even then, they probably wouldn't be able to regain full mobility in that limb . . .'

 

Kurt gritted his teeth. Those things were damn near indestructible, weren't they? Maybe guns could kill them, and maybe there were other ways of bringing them down, but if they were left to their own devices . . .

 

Leaning back in the squeaky metal office chair with a loud sigh, he found himself staring thoughtfully at the cage yet again. He'd done that a lot the last few nights since he'd unwittingly found himself employed: staring at it, trying to figure out just what was going through its head . . .

 

And growing more and more irritated at the fact that it wouldn't speak now. It ticked him off more than he cared to admit, actually. That damn Harlan, staring at him as though he thought that Kurt had managed to sprout two heads, Kurt could understand exactly what the bastard was thinking, that Kurt was just as freakish as the demon was . . . He'd heard it speak, hadn't he? So why was it refusing to now?

 

And why did it stare at him as though it were trying to make him understand something . . .?

 

Just now, though, it was facing away from him, slumped against the bars of the cage. It never raised a fuss at night, never tried to escape. Whether it heard and remembered the threat he'd muttered in its ear the day he'd delivered it was debatable. He was inclined to believe that it was probably trying to formulate another plan to get away, that maybe it was simply attempting to lull him into a false sense of security, just waiting for him to lower his guard. Too bad that would never, ever happen . . .

 

`You're thinking about it too much,' he told himself sternly. He was letting it become something akin to an obsession. The overwhelming sense of anger that he felt whenever he stopped to consider that the little demon refused to talk, coupled with the indulgent looks he'd intercepted from the good doctor and his damn cronies . . . They thought he was crazy, didn't they? They thought that he was a bare step above those monsters on the proverbial food chain . . .

 

Already preoccupied by the strange aura that he'd felt when he'd stopped at a corner newsstand on his way to the facility, he'd been late to work since he had turned around to follow it.

 

He'd lost track of it, though—another thing to irritate him, he supposed. The most puzzling aspect of it had been that it had felt so much different—so much stronger—than that of the little demon. Was that really possible? The strength evident in its aura had, quite frankly, stunned him. Common logic told him that the aura he'd felt earlier couldn't have come from just one of those creatures. Still . . .

 

Shaking his head, he snatched up the newspaper and snorted inwardly.

 

It was just one of them. How he knew that, he wasn't sure. It might have had something to do with the uniformity of it, but the thing that had drawn the most thought from him was the conflicting sense of agitation in the aura, a restlessness that seemed sorely out of place . . .

 

`Like it was . . . looking for something . . .'

 

Brushing that stupid thought aside with a mental shrug, Kurt scanned the headlines. The city was still working to recover from the storm that had taken out the power in some sectors the night he'd captured the little demon. There was an updated report on a missing five-year-old boy that said that there were no new leads . . . a shoot-out between inner city gang members and the local authorities had resulted in three deaths . . . If those monsters didn't destroy humanity, it was a safe bet that they'd manage it, on their own, anyway, he figured.

 

By the time he'd made it to the facility, Dr. Harlan had been in quite a snit. “I thought you'd backed out on our deal,” he'd growled in a completely mulish tone.

 

Kurt offered no apologies. “I'm here now,” he pointed out.

 

“Yes, well, I had plans and didn't really want to sit around here to wait for you,” he remarked in an accusing tone.

 

“I didn't realize that you had to wait for me to get here before you could leave,” Kurt said, carefully tugging off his black leather gloves and stowing them in his pockets.

 

“Ordinarily, no,” Harlan went on with a long sigh. “I wanted to ask if you wouldn't mind doing something for us, though.”

 

Kurt almost refused on general principle. Wasn't it enough that he was spending his time, babysitting the little demon since no one else was adept enough to do it? “What?” he asked instead, inflicting just enough boredom into his tone to let Harlan know that he wasn't really committing himself, one way or another.

 

Harlan shook his head, obviously not quite as stupid as Kurt had figured. “She's losing weight,” he stated flatly. “We weren't entirely certain the other day when we had her under observation since we hadn't actually gotten her weight, to start with, but, well, look at her . . .”

 

Kurt reluctantly followed Harlan's gaze through the one way mirror that looked into the holding block. He personally didn't see any real difference. Huddled as tiny as it could be inside the small cage that was its prison, he glanced back at the doctor and shrugged. “It looks fine,” he remarked, adding extra emphasis on the `it'.

 

Dr. Harlan stared at him for several moments before he shrugged. “If you say so, Doc . . . It'd be a shame if it got sick, though. It's not good business to keep making payments for dead merchandise.”

 

No doubt about it, Kurt loathed that man . . .

 

Tossing the newspaper down, he stood abruptly, sending the metal chair scraping across the floor as he stomped over to the chart that they'd been keeping on it. Frowning at what he read, though, he wasn't entirely sure what to think. According to the charts, it was eating well enough. Okay, so maybe it could stand to eat a little more, but then, maybe it didn't need to. After all, kept in the cage as it was, it certainly didn't get any decent amount of exercise. Harlan had made it sound like the beast was losing mass amounts of weight, didn't he?

 

But no, the food was weighed before it was put into the cage, and it was weighed again when they brought it out again in the morning. According to the reports, it was eating about six to ten ounces of food every night—not a lot, but enough . . . Water readings were nearly always inconclusive, but that didn't really concern him. It was a rule of nature that animals behaved instinctively when it came to the basic needs of food and the like. Hunger was hunger, wasn't it? It'd be a strong enough impetus to break even the strongest of wills.

 

And just what did he care whether or not the damn thing starved itself? If it were really stupid enough to do that, then it would just mean one less demon in the world, and that, in Kurt's opinion, was more than a little all right . . .

 

`Yeah, except for one minor detail, genius . . .'

 

Wrinkling his nose at the not-so-gentle barb, Kurt rolled his eyes and tossed the chart onto the high workstation.

 

`Even if you don't care if it dies, maybe you should consider that if it does, they'll stop paying you. Harlan said as much, didn't he?'

 

Head jerking up as his eyes flared wide, Kurt couldn't contain the hostile snort that slipped out of him. “The hell . . .” he muttered, stomping across the floor. He knelt beside the cage, glaring at the huddled form within. It didn't turn or even acknowledge that it had heard his approach, but those strange ears atop its head twitched and turned to listen to the sound of his movements, no doubt.

 

He didn't say anything as he stared into the darkened cage. The layer of notes that he'd plastered all over the top of it had only served to lend to the darkness that lingered within. The creature didn't move, but even from his vantage point, he could tell that it really did seem a little smaller—not an easy feat, considering it was never what he'd have considered `large', anyway.

 

“Quit trying to starve yourself and eat your damn food,” he muttered, knowing full well that the demon could hear him.

 

Its movement was little more than a whisper of sound, a flutter in the dark that he almost didn't see. He couldn't miss the brightness behind those eyes, though—those fathomless eyes that were entirely too human despite the unusual oblong pupils. It was trying to tell him something, he could feel it. Narrowing his gaze, he tried to understand. “What? You'd prefer a different brand?” he growled.

 

Its eyes blinked quietly, and it shook its head, ears flattening slightly—almost drooping.

 

Those ears, though, were a reminder—a blunt statement that shot through to his core. It was trying to garner his sympathy, wasn't it? Too bad he didn't have any; not for the likes of a demon. A hot and putrid anger roiled within him—anger at himself for deigning to try to communicate with that thing. In the half light, it was almost easy to forget that those eyes belonged to a monster. With a mental snort, Kurt pushed himself to his feet and turned on his heel to stalk away again.

 

`As if that would ever—ever—happen!' he scoffed. `Forget what that thing is . . .? I'd sooner forget to breathe . . .'

 

It pissed him off, no doubt about it. He knew damn well what those vile monsters were capable of. He'd seen it, first hand. The carnage and destruction—the encompassing hatred, and he'd always understood that there was no rhyme or reason, that they simply despised him because he could see what they were: because they could not hide from his eyes. That one might look less intimidating on the outside. That meant nothing when it came right down to it. If anything, maybe that made it a much tougher adversary, one that could hide behind the guise of an unsettling face.

 

He could feel its eyes like a physical thing. Not a sound had come from the cage, and he knew that it hadn't turned around, but it was watching him—studying him. Well, it could study him all it wanted. There wasn't a damn thing that it could do about the situation, after all . . .

 

Snatching up the newspaper once more, Kurt dropped back into the chair and propped up his feet, set to ignore the monster, even if it killed him.

 

 

-OoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoO-

 

 

Kichiro stopped, draping his hands on his hips as he stared at the dingy alleyway that he'd already surveyed a thousand times, and while he knew deep down that there was nothing else to find here, he couldn't help but look anyway.

 

There was no rhyme or reason behind his logic. He wasn't entirely certain why he kept feeling like he needed to check this place over and over again. Maybe it was the inner knowledge that this was the last known place where his daughter had been, and though he knew that the area had been looked over many, many times, he couldn't help but feel compelled to check it over just one last time.

 

There was a certain measure of comfort in knowing that those who loved Samantha were dispatched all over the unfamiliar city, and common sense told him that the ones who were here were the undisputed best of the best, as far as tracking went. If anyone could find her, they could. That had become his mantra over the last few days since he'd gotten the news. It was a father's worst nightmare, wasn't it? A missing daughter—a daughter whom he loved—and no one knew where she was . . .

 

“The old man said you were out here.”

 

Kichiro turned at the familiar sound of that voice, the familiar brush of that youki. He knew it almost as well as he knew his own. Unable to summon even the smallest fragment of a smile as his twin brother slowly got to his feet—he'd dropped from the buildings above to land in a crouch behind him, Kichiro nodded and turned his attention back to the cold brick and mortar of the alley. “She was here,” he murmured, his eyes scanning the surroundings, searching, searching for just a sign—a hint—something . . . anything . . .

 

“Sorry I couldn't get here sooner,” he said.

 

Kichiro nodded. He knew that Ryomaru had been out on a hunt when the call had come. It had probably frustrated him almost as much as it had frustrated Kichiro that he hadn't been able to drop everything. “It's all right,” Kichiro heard himself saying in a quiet tone that just didn't sound like him. Raw, rough, almost ragged, it sounded almost as broken down as he felt.

 

Ryomaru sighed, stepping over to touch the walls. He was searching for any lingering traces of her youki, wasn't he? The same thing that Kichiro had done only moments before . . . “Cain briefed me on the flight over. Said she, uh . . . she took a scent tab.”

 

That comment drew a wince from Kichiro. If he'd beaten himself up once, he'd done it a million times already. Those scent tabs . . . those were his creation, weren't they? Designed to protect the twin brother who stood next to him, the very last thing that he'd thought at the time was that those very same things would mean the difference between tracking his daughter through the streets of Chicago and not being able to find her at all. He knew her scent. He knew every nuance of it. The sweet little girl who smiled at him and blushed when her mama asked her about boys at school . . . the little girl who had come to him, her mother's eyes staring at him out of the face that reminded him of the baby sister whom he loved . . . She'd had such an air of determination around her, as if she'd known that he wasn't going to like what she wanted to tell him.

 

And, kami, he hadn't. The words she'd said that fateful day had struck a fear in him so deep, so dark, and while he'd never discourage his children from doing what they felt in their hearts was the right path, how desperately had he wanted to tell her that she just wasn't old enough, big enough, tough enough? How desperately had he wanted to tell her that it . . . It scared the hell out of him, didn't it?

 

“Papa . . . I've decided. I want to be a . . . a hunter.”

 

And he'd prayed that it was just a phase, hoped beyond hope that she would realize that the life of a hunter wasn't really what she wanted at all. But he'd said nothing as she'd progressed, had held his own council as his baby had grown up, training harder than any of the boy ever could, working harder than she needed to, driven by the inner knowledge that girls weren't supposed to want to be what she wanted to be.

 

“Morio took off to join up with Bas and Evan,” Ryomaru went on, letting his hand drop away from the walls with an irritated expression on his face.

 

“Morio came, too,” Kichiro mused as he turned around to re-examine the area where the remains of Benoit had been found along with one of Samantha's shuriken.

 

Ryomaru followed along. “Insisted,” he ventured. “He's a better tracker than he was a hunter, anyway.”

 

Kichiro nodded, hunkering down in the slightly paler outline where the youkai's body had exploded. The impact had, in essence, sandblasted the dingy sidewalk beneath him. Touching the area, he gritted his teeth. Even the lingering traces of Benoit's youki had been swept away—or washed clean in the rains that had hammered Chicago . . .

 

“Toga had a fit. Sesshoumaru said that it'd be better if he stayed where he was since they don't want to draw too much attention here. You heard from anyone?”

 

Kichiro shook his head as he stared at the surroundings once more. What was it about this area that brought about such an understated sense of foreboding? “Nope,” he replied absently, still glancing around. The common thought was that somehow, Samantha might have been taken by someone who knew who she was, at least in a broad sense. Though they might not have realized that she was a hunter, there was certainly no mistaking her looks. The silver hair and hanyou ears were enough to proclaim who she was, even if they didn't know exactly how she was connected in the family. If anyone wanted to get to Sesshoumaru or InuYasha or even Ryomaru, what would be better than getting their hands on one of their own? Even then, the theory had been suggested that maybe someone had mistaken he girl for Gin. After all, the wife of the North American tai-youkai would make a hell of a bargaining chip, wouldn't she?

 

But to him, Samantha was none of those things. She wasn't his sister; she certainly wasn't a bargaining chip. She was his daughter—his baby girl. How the hell would he find her . . .?

 

“This place is weird,” Ryomaru remarked at length, stating the thing that Kichiro had thought, himself.

 

Kichiro nodded. The layout of the area was . . . well, unsettling. He'd seen streets in different old European cities that reminded him of this one: a broad street square with buildings curving around it like an old town square or something. The buildings here were as dilapidated and tired as the ones in Europe had been quaint and warm—what was it that he couldn't put his finger on?

 

Ryomaru sighed and pushed himself to his feet, venturing around as his critical eye took in the area.

 

Kichiro stood, too, heading in the opposite direction, hoping against hope that he could find something—anything—that might help to at least shed a little more light on the situation.

 

And yet he couldn't understand just who would want to hurt her, either. The precious little girl with the brightest eyes and happiest smile . . . everyone loved her, didn't they? She was the daughter that he'd never had to Ryomaru, the little girl who never, ever got tired of listening to InuYasha and Kagome's stories . . . the sensitive young woman who'd worn black to her sister's wedding as a form of protest since she'd developed a huge crush on the groom . . . Whenever he turned his head, the fading peals of her laughter reached him, and every single sound dug a little deeper into his heart . . .

 

“Oi,” Ryomaru called, snapping Kichiro out of his reverie. “Kich . . .”

 

Standing up, he loped over to where Ryomaru stood just inside the opening of an alley on the far side of the square. He was holding a soggy slip of paper—it looked like a yellow Post-It note, and when Kichiro drew closer, Ryomaru shook his head. “Damn it . . .”

 

“What's that?” Kichiro asked, holding out his hand.

 

Ryomaru turned the bit of paper over, examining the backside, then held it out to him.

 

Kichiro's eyes widened, and only sheer will kept him from jerking his hand away. The ink on the page had faded and smudged, but the lingering pulse of spiritual power was still contained in the document. Narrowing his eyes, he could make out the slightly misprinted kanji. “What is this?” he muttered, more to himself than to his brother.

 

Ryomaru grunted. He was staring around at the other entrances into the square—there were three others. “I'm not sure,” he admitted. “If it's what I think it is . . .”

 

“What do you think it is?” Kichiro demanded a bit harsher than he'd intended.

 

“We need to take it to the old man,” Ryomaru stated. “I think . . . I think it might be a barrier marker.”

 

“A barrier?” Kichiro repeated, shaking his head in confusion. “No . . . only a really powerful miko or monk could construct something like that. Someone like Mama or . . .”

 

Ryomaru was slow to look at him, and when he did, Kichiro blinked. He'd never seen Ryomaru look so serious, had he? “The old man will know if that's what it is,” he said.

 

Kichiro nodded as Ryomaru dug his cell phone out of his pocket. It still didn't make sense, though. As far as he knew, there wasn't another who possessed the holy power necessary to construct a barrier, and even if then, it couldn't possibly be any ordinary person, anyway. The ability to contract a barrier like that took training—years of it. `Still,' he thought, staring at the scrap of paper. `What else could this possibly be?'

 

 

-OoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoO-

 

 

Samantha stared at the form huddled on the small metal cot not unlike the one she'd found herself on a few days ago in that tiny room without windows. The holy man—she'd come to understand that the white coats called him `Doc'—hadn't moved in awhile. Even from where she was in the center of the room, she could make out the light, even sound of his breathing, and she knew that he was sleeping.

 

In fact, he'd been sleeping for awhile. Still, she wasn't sure how heavy of a sleeper he was since this was actually the first time she'd seen him doing that.

 

But he'd been watching her fairly closely tonight, and while she wasn't entirely sure why, she knew that it had something to do with his earlier irritation when he'd come to hunker down beside the cage. For a dizzying few moments, she'd honestly thought that he'd understood what she was trying to tell him. If he had, though, he hadn't remarked on it, and then he'd gotten so angry . . .

 

She didn't understand his anger, either. She'd already sensed the underlying emptiness inside him, and she could tell that there was a lot of pain deep down that he was trying to hide. She wasn't entirely sure how she knew that, but somehow, she did . . .

 

Shaking her head, she licked her lips, grimacing at the sting of her cracked lips brought on by the trace moisture provided by her tongue. She'd almost broken down and drank some of that tainted water earlier. Kami, she was thirsty—and hungry: so hungry. Recalling the times over her life when she'd thought that she was hungry, she slowly shook her head. She hadn't understood then what it meant to truly be hungry. She'd never felt the cramps that were so bad that the felt as though her entire being were being twisted in half, the ones that were so bad that she had to bite down on the inside of her cheek, her mouth flooding with blood as she struggled to keep herself from crying out. She wasn't entirely sure how long she'd be able to refrain from eating the food they provided. She could feel her strength ebbing away. It was a gradual thing, and maybe that horrified her more than anything. She wasn't allowed any sort of exercise, confined for most of the day and all of the night in a three foot wide, four foot long, three foot tall cage that she barely had room to turn around in . . . She was filthy, she was exhausted, and she was sore.

 

Carefully scooping up a handful of the dog kibble, she brought her hand up and stared at it. Her hand was shaking when she lifted one off her palm, holding it in front of her face as she considered what it would mean to eat it.

 

With a marked grimace, she dropped the kibble down the drain under the cage, frustrated with her own perceived weaknesses. If she gave in, they'd win, wouldn't they? If she gave in and went along with their perceived ideas, would it really help her situation?

 

Still there wasn't a doubt in her mind that her family was out there looking for her. They'd find her, wouldn't they? They wouldn't give up until they did. They'd take her home where she was safe, where she was loved.

 

But it seemed so far away, the warmth and laughter of home. For the first time since she'd been taken, she allowed herself to think about that place, about the faces and the voices of those she called family. Stubbornly refusing to dwell on them before, afraid that the memories would somehow break her, she'd pushed thoughts of them aside, focusing instead on surviving.

 

And maybe she was just too weak to stave them back. Maybe she couldn't help the overwhelming desire to see them again, she smiled vaguely, remembering how often she sat beside her mother on the sofa in her father's study, her eyelids growing heavier by the second as she tried to stay awake, to hear the comforting sounds of her parents' voices as they conversed about their days, as they joked and teased each other. She'd fallen asleep with her head in her mama's lap so many times, only to wake in the morning, safe in her own bed . . .

 

Dropping the kibble down the drain, one at a time, Samantha let her temple fall against the cool bars of the cage.

 

`Don't let them break you, Samantha . . . You're stronger than that . . .'

 

Smiling vaguely at the encouraging words of her youkai blood, Samantha let her eyes drift closed as the last kibble slipped through her fingers and down the drain. `Yes,' she thought as the fuzziness of sleep crept up on her. `Stronger . . .'

 

 

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A/N:

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Kuramas gurl:

I was wondering, because she's a hanyou, shouldn't being purified not kill her, just turn her into her human form like the barrier around Mt. Hakurei did to InuYasha? Also, didn't you at one point in one of the other purity stories mention that because of Kagome's blood they wouldn't go into the rage giving into their youkai blood? Just a little curious.

 

She would not be killed, no, but given the circumstances and their rather secretive nature, they wouldn't necessarily want it to be known that they were human once a month, either, so the answer to your first question is yes, she'd be purified into human form, just like her grandfather. Samantha didn't go into a full rage; her temper just snapped. No one mentions that she changed in appearance, right? She didn't. She just got really, really ticked off.

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Final Thought from Kichiro:

An … ofuda …?

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Blanket disclaimer for this fanfic (will apply to this and all other chapters in Vendetta): I do not claim any rights to InuYasha or the characters associated with the anime/manga. Those rights belong to Rumiko Takahashi, et al. I do offer my thanks to her for creating such vivid characters for me to terrorize.

 

~Sue~