InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Returning Home ❯ Perchance to … Sleep? ( Chapter 8 )

Disclaimer: I don't own InuYasha or any characters there in.

Chapter 8: Perchance to … Sleep?

Late the next morning InuYasha grudgingly allowed consciousness to drag him back to the real world. Sango was tending the fire, preparing lunch. Miroku was meditating. Shippo was lying on his stomach near the fire, completely bored.

Kagome was sitting up, leaning against a tree. She looked like she was thinking, hard. And she didn't look pleased.

"InuYasha!" Shippo jumped on him as soon as his eyes finished opening, "Kagome's injuries are gone!" he chattered happily.

"Shut up!" InuYasha scowled at the bouncy child, "You talk too loud… How is Kagome?"

Shippo stopped bouncing and sat on InuYasha's knee to think, "Um, she's not happy. She didn't want me around, she said she had to think. She's acting kind of weird actually. She is going to return to normal, right InuYasha?"

Shippo look up at him with a worried expression. InuYasha didn't have an answer to that. Before she was injured he had hoped that she would, but after she survived that wound…. Then again she hadn't been wounded before so…. But she had been acting so strange and getting more… detached?

Suddenly Kagome stood. She looked around, moving her head in a jerky, unnatural way, then walked into the woods behind her, gliding coolly.

The others looked up from their chores.

"Where the hell does she think she's going?" InuYasha stood, knocking Shippo to the ground absently.

"Leave her alone, InuYasha." Sango spoke to the fire, "She… needs some time alone."

InuYasha looked at each of his friends, they all seemed to think he should stay away from her.

"Keh, like I'm listening to you." InuYasha turned and followed Kagome. After what happened yesterday, he couldn't let her go alone.

InuYasha found Kagome in the woods not too far from the camp. Her back was to him but the heavy scent of tears hung in the air around her, and her arms were folded to her chest. She was crying.

"Kagome..." He called uncertainly.

"Do you care for me?" She asked in a steady voice, her back still to him.

"What?" he stepped back at the unexpected question.

"Do you care for me at all, InuYasha?" she asked again, slightly louder.

"Of course I care for you Kagome! What kind of-"

He was cut off by her abruptly turning about to shout angrily, "then why didn't you let me die?"

"What?" he stood back, shocked.

"I wanted to die InuYasha." Kagome's voice grew sad as she looked at the ground in front of her. "I was so close to dying and you wouldn't let me. I don't want to be this… this thing I'm becoming." She looked up, into his eyes, pleading, "How can you not hate me? I feed off of the life force of young men. How can you still… care about me?"

"I could never hate you Kagome." InuYasha stated softly, ignoring the strange feeling that he had this discussion before.

Kagome looked at him, confused for a second before understanding swept across her face. "…What do you care about InuYasha? Is it my face? My hair? My eyes? My scent? All those things that remind you of that cold undead bitch!" Kagome started and put her hand over her mouth, "Is that all you see in me? In us? A shadow? A figure? Did you even know me? Do you miss me like I do? …This isn't me InuYasha. I don't say things like that! I don't think things like that! Not for long anyway. I-I'm dying InuYasha. I'm fading away, turning into something and someone else and you can't see it!"

InuYasha remained silent, just staring at Kagome, "Kagome… I…"

"I did a lot of thinking last night InuYasha, my mind is so clear now." Kagome crossed her arms and assumed a stance of casual business. "Do you remember when I begged you to let me stay? I knew you chose Kikyo, you didn't say that but I knew, and I begged you to let me stay, to let me be your friend and help you. But that's not what we were, was it InuYasha? Every time you went to Kikyo, I felt betrayed, even though I knew I didn't have the right. I felt like you were running around on me. And you only made things worse. It may have been a strange courtship but, in your twisted misguided way, you tried to court me. And prevent others from courting me. I can't even be nice to any other male without you getting into a fight with them and yelling at me, doubting me. I never gave you any real reason to doubt me, or my feelings, I, I begged you InuYasha! How could you doubt me after that?"

InuYasha just stood silently, how was he supposed to answer her? What could he say to any of that that wouldn't make things worse?

Kagome turned her back on him, unwilling to look at his face anymore, "It hurt InuYasha. It would hurt when you doubted me for no reason and then acted like it was nothing for you to run off to Kikyo-"

"You know why I do that!" InuYasha shouted, unable to stay quiet on this, "I always come back don't I?"

"No InuYasha," Kagome said meticulously and poisonously, "Kikyo always leaves, I always come back. I always took you back. Last night I realized that we are not a couple InuYasha. I am not the wronged girlfriend or the wife of an unfaithful man. You chose Kikyo! I AM the other woman in you and Kikyo's relationship. I don't want to be the other woman InuYasha. I won't be. From this point on you're on your own. We are nothing more than traveling companions, since you can't seem to grasp the concept of friends. I will still help you to gather the shards, that is my responsibility after all."

"You're not healed yet Kagome," InuYasha reasoned, "you don't know what you're saying."

So, he didn't get it, huh? Kagome turned she wanted to see his reaction to what she was about to say, "Don't you get it InuYasha? You are nothing to me now. I don't need or want you anymore. You have nothing to offer me but your energy. Go, away."

She watched as his expression closed in. She couldn't tell what he was thinking, whether or not he believed her. If he understood what she was saying. He just turned away wearing his closed off hostile expression and returned to camp.

Kagome stood where she was, just within screaming distance of the camp but far enough away to feel really alone. It was beautiful here. Surrounded by life, the sounds of life. The deep wet smell of the leaves rotting under the thin cover of the freshly fallen.

"Kagome?" Sango interrupted her stillness, "What did you say to InuYasha? I haven't seen him look like that since… actually I've never seen him look like… that."

"I set some things straight. What are you doing here Sango?" Kagome gave her a cool look.

Sango stood there, in her daily wear, gripping her hiraikotsu

tightly with one hand, "InuYasha told me where you were. He doesn't think it's safe for us, any of us, to be alone right now."

"I think, we should start traveling again." Kagome turned her back to Sango, "we're all healthy again so I think we should continue. I think… we should go this way."

Sango looked in the direction Kagome indicated, "Kagome, that would take us away from the road that Sorrell-"

"I'm traveling this way." Kagome interrupted, "You can do what you like."

"… I'll tell the others, wait for us Ok?" Sango turned to leave but changed her mind, "You'll get better Kagome. You wouldn't have been pulled through the well, and allowed to travel back and forth, go through what you've been through, to end up being turned into a youkai. I can't believe fate would be so cruel."

She walked back to camp to get the others and left Kagome thinking in the quiet woods.

*

Late the next day it started to rain, hard. It was enough to push them on through the woods in search of better cover then leaves. And they did find it, eventually, in the middle of nowhere, a small farm appeared in the woods. The group approached cautiously, Sango and Miroku in the lead the rest a few steps behind.

Miroku knocked on the doorframe and a stern looking man moved the reed covering to greet them.

"Good evening sir, I was wondering-"

"It's raining really hard and you travelers have nowhere to stay right?" the man scowled.

"Uh, yes-"

"Well, come in." The man stepped back to let them enter, "Can't leave people standing in the rain."

The room they walked into was just over half the size of the hut. Six children of various ages, from twelve to five, were huddled around a tired looking woman who was tending a pot of stew that was simmering over the cook fire in the center of the room.

"We don't have much to offer but we'll share what we have." The woman spoke, "The stew is almost ready."

"We have supplies," Miroku stated in a warm manner, "We would like to supplement the meal. I am Miroku; this young lady is Sango, Kagome, InuYasha and Shippo. Thank you for inviting us into your home, I realize we are an unusual group."

One of the children walked up to Miroku and tugged on his robe, "Sir monk? Why do you travel with youkai?" he looked at InuYasha, Kagome and Shippo.

"Ah, they are our friends and we are on a quest together." Miroku answered, casually.

Kagome closed her green starburst eyes and took a deep breath, "I'm tired, may I lay down somewhere?"

"… Yes," the lady stood and led her into the dimly lit back room. It was almost full of futons. There was a shelf that ran around the room just above head level with many different jars and baskets, "We get more visitors then you would think out here. Don't mind Shina," she looked at a young adolescent girl sitting on one of the futons, leaning against the wall with at vacant expression, "She hit her head a few years ago, she won't bother you. You can sleep here."

The woman unrolled a futon for Kagome, near the opposite wall.

"Thank you." Kagome said as the woman left her alone, somewhat hesitantly. Kagome put her pack at the head of her bed and took up a position that nearly mirrored the catatonic girl across from her.

*

"Is it alright to leave her alone with our daughter?" The man asked, not unkindly.

"Kagome's… type prays on other victims." Sango explained haltingly, "Your daughter is perfectly safe with her."

Shippo, who was perched on InuYasha's shoulder, whispered to him, "Why are they calling Kagome a youkai?"

"They don't want them to be afraid of Kagome." InuYasha whispered back, "What should we say, she's sick? Under a spell? It's too hard to explain."

Shippo nodded to show his understanding. But he knew that had to hurt Kagome, she never liked it when people thought she was a kitsune.

Even if she should consider it a compliment.

*

Kagome listened to the murmurings of the happy family and her tired friends through the wall she was leaning on. She didn't belong there anymore. She had tried to tell InuYasha that earlier but… it came out all wrong.

Or right.

Did she really think that way? She couldn't tell any more. All she was sure of was she had wanted to hurt him, she wanted to see him hurt. She wanted to get away from him, she hated him so much. But she still loved him.

She wasn't herself anymore. She shouldn't be capable of talking like she had back there. Was that a part of the transformation? She just went along, just… being and doing and talking, and everything seemed fine. But then, when she had time to calm down, or think, when she found herself content again, she would realize what she had said, or done, or thought, and she realized how much she was changing. And how much she hated who she was becoming. And there wasn't anything anyone could do about it.

She didn't want any part of it. She didn't want to be so cold. That's why she was ready to welcome the death that was brought on by her own carelessness, but he wouldn't let her. She wanted to die, and he forced her to live. Now what would she do?

Kagome was so lost in her thoughts that she didn't notice her roommate get up and start to grab things from the shelf above her. She only noticed when the girl put a tray, including a lit candle, down in front of her.

Kagome blinked at the girl, "Hello. I hope I didn't disturb you. I was just…. Are you alright?"

The girls' expression was just as blank as it had been before as she knelt on the other side of the tray, "Choose." She whispered in a hoarse voice.

Kagome looked down at the tray, on one side was a dark cup with a dark liquid inside. On the other side was a leaf shaped, black bladed dagger with a hilt made of dark wood, "Choose what?"

"One of three paths before you. Choose now." the girl answered.

"I only see two… things." Kagome looked at the girl curiously.

"Continue, oblivion, rebirth. Choose." The girl recited.

Kagome looked around. `Continue? …Continue as I am, I could just lay back on the futon and ignore her. Oblivion? Stop the whole thing, for good. The dagger. I am awfully tired of … everything. Rebirth? That must be the poison. I drink that and start over, better luck next time. How did I know that it's poison?'

Kagome leaned forward and considered the objects on the tray.

*

InuYasha watched as Shippo and Kirara fell asleep with the youngest of the farmers children, all curled up in a strange ball of fur and youth.

Suddenly there was a loud clatter in the back room. Everyone, well, the adults, ran to see what was going on.

InuYasha reached the room first, he saw the farmers' oldest daughter was slumping over where she knelt before an upturned tray. Kagome was laying on a futon, her body jerking unnaturally as her eyes stared blankly into space. A thick, dark liquid was on her lips, a small cup lay next to one of her hands. By the time he reached her side she was already dead.