InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Reminisce ❯ Fragmented ( Chapter 6 )

Disclaimer I only take credit for this story. None of the Inuyasha cast belongs to me... I am a poor middle school student who loves to write. Thank you =3

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A disgruntled groan interrupted the silent night as a small furry figure dashed about like mad, throwing different objects about in his mad search. As he tossed yet another object over his head, the small ears protruding from his chestnut hair perked up at a faint ringing. He sniffed once and a pleased smile quirked his lips as he made a mad dash to the proclaimed area of interest, taking no time to shuffle through the debris and picking up that same small necklace that a certain girl once held.

"This is it!", he cried happily as he examined it more thoroughly. "I finally found it! Now all that's left is to find Kagome... Finally, we'll be reunited again... after all those years of searching, I'll finally be back with her..." Stuffing the small jewel into his pocket, the kitsune turned to the open doorway, the swinging door itself off the hinges and flapping around loosely. Without a moment to loose, he hurried off and into the dark hallway... or what was left of it... He had no time to be dawdling now. The house was it tatters and what little remnants that were left were nothing more than walls and a roof. He jumped easily across the gaps in the floor and landed with ease on the single broken planks of wood jutting from the cracked ground as he made his way to the exit quickly. His bounds came to a sudden halt however as a small sound caught his attention. Perking his ears as he turned around, Shippou saw a small movement under the boards and his eyes widened. Someone's still here...?

Attentively creeping to the shifted board, he scanned the lower area with his eyes carefully, using his keen kitsune senses to smell around as well... He smelled nothing... "That's weird...", he mumbled to himself quietly. "I could've sworn I heard something..." He sniffed the air once more to search for any lingering smell... and once again found nothing. Shippou frowned at that but turned around again and scurried out, making sure to leave no trace of his scent as he did. Nothing could make him stop now... Now that he had the Shikon Fragment again... All that was left was to find Kagome... and he knew just where to look... "I have to hurry... It's already begun..."

Little did he know that the supposedly normal board was now gone, leaving quite a large gap in place for something quite large to get out...

*~<>~*

Aki awoke with a start, grabbing any close object she could find and throwing it in front of her... but once she heard an irritated "ow", she realized she was in no immediate danger and opened her eyes... to find herself looking straight into the eyes of a very angry person... a very angry person with golden eyes... She stopped right there, her heart clinched, and gulped, snapping her eyes shut. She opened them again and screamed when he was still there, glaring at her angrily.

"Geez," he began in an annoyed yet mocking tone. "What the hell's wrong with you!?"

"I-I-I-I-I", she stuttered, unable to even speak as the shocking realization came to her. It was him... It was him... "I...Inu...yasha...?"

"Yeah. Somethin' wrong with me?"

Her jaw dropped, her back stiffened, and her eyes just stared at him in utter shock. She shook her head unbelievingly, opening her mouth to speak, but quickly closing it when she found no words. It really was him...? But... how was that possible...? He looks so much... older now... How long... has it really been...? "Inuyasha... It's really you, isn't it...?"

Inuyasha raised an eyebrow at her question. "Yeah... And who did you expect anyway? Houjo?!"

Not knowing exactly what he meant, she shook her head slowly and continued to stare, never moving... and, unknowing to her, keeping her mouth gaped. He stared at her more with that annoyed face he always put on.

"Shut'cher damn mouth! What the hell's wrong with you today, Kagome!?"

Aki was startled. She gaped at him for a moment before coming to her senses and sitting up, straightening out the wrinkles of her skirt before looking back up at him, the pain in her face surprising him for a moment. "Ka--Kagome...?"

"Yeah! Kagome!! Ka-go-me! Remember?", he simply said, mocked her on how they had first met.

Blinking once, Aki looked down at herself to find that she was wearing a... green skirt...!? WHAT!? Last time I checked, I was wearing that navy blue fleece skirt that mother had given me... What... what am I wearing now...? Where... am I now...? Wait!! Grappling Inuyasha's shoulders, Aki shook them fiercely, shocking him enough to make him trip over his own feet and fall to the ground. She blinked at him... He really was real... He was there... He was solid... He was... alive... She shook her head... This was a dream... This had to be a dream... He wasn't real... She remembered how... how he died that day... It couldn't be real... how could he stand there... She stepped away, frightened of what was happening.

"Stop it... stop torturing me... This can't be real... You aren't real...", she quietly told herself, putting one hand to her head, doing her best to get a grip on her emotions before she did something stupid... Inuyasha couldn't be here.. and yet he was... How was that possible...? How was... How was he able to be there when he died so long ago...?

Inuyasha stood up and stared at the girl, his worry clearly showing in his voice when he spoke in jagged cracks. "Kagome...? What's wrong with you!? Are you okay?!"

"Stay away from me..."

"What...? Ka... Kagome...?"

"Kagome... Kagome... I... I'm Kagome... I'm... Aki... which one am I...?"

"...Aki..." Inuyasha continued to stare at her, the girl he only knew as Kagome, and watched her as she fell to the ground, her hands clinging to her tangled black hair. Now he was lost... Kagome was loosing her mind... and for reasons unknown to him... She had seemed fine before, but now... she had snapped... Not knowing what else to do, the hanyou boy knelt to her side and tried his best to soothe her, brushing the bangs from her face to look her straight in the eyes. "Kagome. What's wrong?" She shook her head again, tears welling up in her saddened eyes as she spoke through the choked sobs. "Why do you call me Kagome?"

He was taken aback at that and released her, falling from his crouch flat on his rear end. He blinked at her for a moment, trying to comprehend whatever it was she just babbled out.

"What do you mean?", came his sharp reply.

She gazed back up at him. "This isn't an illusion anymore is it? This is the real thing... But it can't be... I remember it... that image is still there... So if it is...", she paused and looked him dead in the eyes, her deadly icy ones glaring at his very soul. "... then you're dead."

Inuyasha's mouth went agape at that. "What the--" He shot up from his fallen position, his voice raised to a panicked yell. "--HELL ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT!!??!?!" Aki flinched at the tone of his voice, but didn't move from her seat on the ground and stared blankly past him, her gaze averted to the road laying ahead. "You're not real..." She repeated in a lower voice, "You can't be real... It's all another dream... another twisted dream of the time I couldn't spend with you... Of the pain I feel in my heart because I miss you... That's all it is and ever was..." Mentally concluding that was a satisfactory answer, she stood up and glanced back at Inuyasha once more before turning and making a slow and quite unsteady trek down the dirt road. The hanyou merely stared after her, dumbfoundedly silenced by the shock. The insults and rejections died in his throat as he puzzled through all she had said... He wasn't real? Illusions? WHAT was this girl talking about!?

"Kagome! W-Wait!", he yelled after her desperately. She turned to look at him over her shoulder waiting silently for him to continue. Stumbling around his mind for the words, Inuyasha tried his best to find something that would get her to her senses. Finding nothing that satisfied him, he sighed and chose the best thing to come to him at the moment. "Where are you going?"

Aki turned back around and continued walking, tossing her answer over her shoulder as she had done her gaze to him only a moment before. The sentence was simple yet complex to his mind as it echoed to him throughout the depths of his confused yet strangely fascinated thoughts. In the few words it was composed of, it held the most meaning he had ever heard in one jumbled up mix of words...

"To find myself."

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Shippou stared over the lip of the Bone Eater's Well, the single Shikon Shard still in his grasp. He took a deep breath and readied himself for an attempt he hoped not to try again... Closing his eyes for a moment, he studied the blurry face he saw in his memory. That one face he recognized only as the girl named Kagome... the girl who was a mother to him... Looking over the Shikon no Kakera again, Shippou glanced around him to the different scenery scattered about. So this is Kagome's time, huh... This is where she used to be when she wasn't there... with us...

Slowly, Shippou's gaze traveled up to the open door of the shrine and a smile appeared on his face. I remember...

"I wonder if it's still there..."

A brightened eagerness filled the kitsune as he gracefully hopped back up the stairs, shard in hand, and peered over the grassy underbrush on the shrine's edge to find that familiar house still resting on its worn wooden floors. The Higurashi Shrine... And there it was indeed. The Higurashi Shrine still visible... Though the once happy family that lived there was no more... He grimaced at the thought that Kagome might be dead. She couldn't be. He smelled her scent everywhere... and not the scent of a lingering smell.. a fresh scent... she had to be alive. He turned back to the well, the silence around it brining his thoughts back to that time in history when he had shared his life with that very stubborn hanyou... that hanyou named Inuyasha...

Shaking his head of any oncoming thoughts, Shippou crawled back down the short staircase, and jumped to the edge of the well again, looking down into its darkened depths once more before taking a leap into it. He closed his eyes and tightened his grip on the shard, preparing himself for that feeling again... and it hit him... hard... the feeling of solid ground. Throwing a curse to the wind at his misfortune, he steadily climbed out of the well, mumbling incoherent curses to himself, stopping altogether as the noise of rushed footsteps sounded somewhere in front of him. Looking up from the well, he scanned the area carefully with his green eyes, twitching his ears for any random movements. Nothing...

Wonder what's wrong with me today... I know I heard something... But... I don't smell or sense anything...

Shrugging it off, he turned back to the well, contemplating his next move as those same thudding footsteps echoed behind him. Pausing in fear, a small 'eep' was the only thing he got to say before a large clawed hand swept down on him, missing him by mere inches. Scampering to the side as it attempted another attack, Shippou hurriedly pulled out his small spinning top and hurled it at him in a mad rush. In seconds, it transformed itself into the large image of a spinning top on the monster's head. As it fell to the ground, thinking it was being injured, Shippou made a made dash for the exit, leaving it to figure out his trickery when he was MILES away.

But as soon as he reached the doorway, a cold monstrous voice shot into his mind, sending shivers up his spine like a bolt of lightening.

~"Go back..."

He stopped cold, his body seeming to freeze before his brain ordered it to, and turned around to that same creature as before. It looked at him, its pitiful blood eyes staring at him, begging him not to leave... and so he stared, unsure of whether to stay or to flee... Unfortunately for his screaming intuition, he stayed... Slowly, but surely, the small furry fox youkai backed back down the stairs and came face to face with it. He gulped at the contrast in size, his small fingers shaking beneath him as he stared up at it and it stared back down at him with that same look in its eyes... He heard it again...

~"Go back..."

His eyes widened as he realized what exactly was talking... the creature right before him, its low demonic voice befitting its large horrifying appearance. Shippou continued to stare, dumbfounded and lost for words. What... exactly... was it telling him...? It looked back down at him again before making a rather bad attempt at standing, using its large arms to prop its upper body up, and pushed up with its other arm, ending up hitting the ceiling of the small wooden shrine. Shippou simply gaped at it, astonished at its massive size, and backed away. It's... touching the ceiling with its head... This thing is HUGE!!

A strange foam-like substance began forming in its mouth, dripping down its chin and seeping into the small patch of fur on its chest. Once again, it spoke, only a noticeable difference could be made; it sounded strained... as if struggling to even speak at all...

~"Go back... she awaits you there..."

A brief silence blanketed the whole area, the silence building like a thickening fog, and the tension tightening Shippou's muscles. He readied himself for anything... anything at all that might come next. He wasn't sure what was going on or what this thing even was, but his innate intuition told him to be on the lookout. And, without warning, the large beast fell forward. Shippou, desperate for his life, stumbled out of the way, leaping to miss being crushed under its immense weight as it hit the ground, causing the entire perimeter of the shrine to tremble with the force.

Not sure what move to make next, Shippou stood there, staring at it wide-eyed, and unknowingly holding his breath. Exhaling deeply and mentally thanking the kami that he survived, the fox boy closed his eyes as his heart slowed, reopening them to give one last glance to the now dead creature before him. Its once deadly glowing red eyes were now a dulled crimson, the black slit pupils barely visible and staring blankly ahead.

"What... just happened...?" Just then, it hit him. "Ah! What about what he said... She's waiting for me? Who's waiting for me?" And then, for a second time, the realization hit him. It hit him hard, like a freight train slamming into his brain. Sorting through his thoughts frantically, he was able to recollect the pieces... the small pieces of a jigsaw puzzle... a jigsaw puzzle that connected itself to a much larger piece. In that instant, the whole thing made sense... Everything was bringing itself to a standstill as Shippou fearfully turned his head to the direction of the Bone Eater's Well, the fear in his eyes dulling out the brightness of the bright forest green. Frantically scampering to the edge of the well, he peered inside of it and almost fainted on the spot.

There, where the dirt bottom of the Bone Eater's Well normally should have been, was that same universal light he had come to know as the entrance to the Sengoku Jidai... Feudal Japan. His eyes stayed glued to that same scene, the image never once flickering. It was there. It was real. It was the hole in time that had led one girl to their era so long ago in his foggy memory, and in that moment he continued to stare, one word caught his lips as he spoke out quietly, whispering the words as a beckon more than a thought,

"Kagome..."

The... The seal's been broken?!

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A/N: And that's all for this chapter folks! I realized what's gotten so hard for me to write now... Typing this was getting boring without putting in some more characters and plot... *sweatdrops* Eh.. So what if it was my own fault >.O;; lol X); So, yeah. Expect more updates now because I now know where I wanna go with this and what I'm gonna do with it! Sorry Reminisce started out very slowly from the beginning to this point, but this has to be my first fic where I set standards for myself to do the best to have it updated soon (which often turns out to make them late because I try to write them before I really get any inspiration). But now that that's all settled, I'm gonna have fun with this fic^^;; Please R&R! *hint hint* XP Mori... TWO CHAPTERS AND STILL CLIFFHANGERS!!! MWUAHAHAHAHA!! *cough* AHEM...