InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ The Heart Within ❯ Chapter Twenty-Seven ( Chapter 28 )

[ X - Adult: No readers under 18. Contains Graphic Adult Themes/Extreme violence. ]

Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters, etc., of Inuyasha or Yu Yu Hakusho. This story is for entertainment purposes only, and not for profit.THE HEART WITHINSummary: She has carried vengeance in her shadowed heart for 500 years, sacrificing her self for that dream. Now, Sango just might get her chance… (IY/YYH crossover) A/N: Thank you everyone for your wonderful reviews, especially those who’ve hung with the story for so long. It really warms the heart. ^_^ So I leave you with a cliffy, mwahaha! And a promise that the next chapter is already written and should be out very soon. =)
WARNING! SPOILERS FOR YYH CHAPTER BLACK AND THE THREE KINGS SAGA

Chapter Twenty-Six

Her eyes, even enhanced by her demon heart, could not penetrate the stygian darkness of the tunnel, so she closed them to better use her other senses. She could almost taste the fetid damp of the underground warren---it was humid, and reeked of death and rot and dirt. Loathing the poignant reminder of being under the earth, her jaw hardened as her fingers tightened on the comforting hilt of her sword. She heard things skittering in the dark that made her skin crawl, but was comforted by the familiar auras, both fore and aft, of her friends. Hiei was a cold fire sharp in its intensity and light; Kurama a warmth that somehow reminded her of green forests and still pools. Their reassuring presence kept the icy fear at bay, though anticipation knotted her insides.

*This is it.* She was certain of that, for only a despicable bug like Naraku could feel at home in a creepy place like this. Shaped in the form of some huge spider-beetle, she had the uneasy feeling that it wasn’t just a fortress. There was a faint pulse, hard to pin down, in the jyaki around them. The air moved almost rhythmically, and the dirt walls slowly changed to some type of fleshy covering. The water that seeped down the walls turned the mud under their feet to splashing squish as they crossed some barrier. It tingled across her skin, distracting her, just as they were attacked.

“Behind you!” Kurama shouted as Sango felt something slither over her legs. She tried to leap free, but was too late, for the tentacle had already wrapped itself around her calves, drawing her knees together. She drew her sword with an angry cry, hacking at the thick tentacle with mindless fury, the memory of Naraku’s many puppets sickening her. The tentacle loosened, and savagely calling the wind so that her free fist glowed with it, she punched the leathery skin, burning them both with the intense energy. Hissing in anger at her own foolishness, Sango ignored the pain in her raw knuckles as she gripped her sword in both hands. Swinging it in an overhand arc, she slashed through a second tentacle that reached for her from above.

“No! You won’t trap me again, you bastard!” she defiantly cried, becoming a whirlwind of whipping fury, eyes narrowed to mere slits. Although she could not see in the fetid darkness, she could feel the jyaki in the tentacles surrounding her. Dozens and dozens attacked, still more coming from the walls and ground and ceiling. The tentacles tried to separate them, but Naraku had tried that tactic before. She fought her way to Hiei’s side, throwing knives and balls of wind with equal abandon, literally chopping her way through.

Hiei glanced at her as she joined him, his eyes glowing bloodily in the darkness. He disappeared from her side, to reappear on the other, his sword easily splitting through the thicker length of the tentacle encircling them. Sango threw one of her longer knives, pinning a tentacle to the roof. The end whipped frantically about, until it was chopped off by Kurama’s Rose Whip, which quickly cleared a free space as he leapt down to stand between them.

“They know we’re here,” he said unnecessarily. “Let’s go, before they send reinforcements.”

His whip snapped forward, elongating to an impossible length and clearing a path before them. They ran, panting, Sango and Hiei slashing at the sides to keep the writhing tentacles at bay.The ground abruptly convulsed beneath them, and Sango sprawled ungracefully against it as Hiei leapt free and Kurama slammed a glowing fist into the fluctuating floor. Suddenly surrounded by a fuchsia glow of demonic energy, Sango winced as tiny flashes exploded across her vision. Her eyes, unused to the light, could not adjust in time to see what happened next. Something grabbed her foot, picking her up off the ground as she cried out, swinging upside down from one caught ankle.

She slashed with her sword, but the thick tentacle she expected was not what trapped her sword in sticky tangles. The sticky mesh was all around her, like a vast web, and she froze for a second as her heart turned to ice. But she had fought demon-spiders before, and knew metal weapons would be of little use. So she called the wind, hissing as the power sang across her singed knuckles. She forced her fingers open, sweeping her flat palm in a wide arc around her. The sticky web tore in the fierce blade of wind, and she fell in an undignified heap, half-landing on Kurama. He quickly wrapped an arm around her, hauling her to his side as he used his thorn whip to cut through the sticky tatters that hung everywhere.

“The spiders---where are the spiders!” Sango shouted, sheathing her sword and doing the complicated hand-over-hand gesture to summon one of her wind-balls.It spun with a whistling shriek as she glanced wildly about for both Hiei and the spiders she knew were hiding somewhere.

Hiei abruptly appeared, crushing something between two claws with a look of disgust. “They’re coming,” he spat.

“Not for long---” Sango snarled, wriggling out from under Kurama’s arm and diving forward. Ruthlessly summoning her jyaki, she hurled the spinning ball of whipping wind with all her might. The white glow that accompanied it lit up the dank tunnel, exposing thousands of spiders in a ghostly aura before its swirling winds caught them up like so many leaves. They disintegrated as the wind exploded in a final, dying shriek.

The tunnel was suddenly silent and empty, the darkness returning as Sango sank to her knees in exhaustion. Her skin felt too thin, her limbs like lead. Her mind reeled, numb from using so much of her jyaki all at once.

“Sango…” Kurama lightly touched her shoulder. “Are you all right?”

She nodded, and tried to get back up on her feet. She swayed, and had to hold on to Kurama as her mind spun dizzily.

“You little fool.” Hiei was suddenly there, on her other side, lending an arm as well. She sagged between them, cursing her weakness, before her head came up and she stiffened.

“Youkai---”

“How nauseatingly typical,” Hiei spat as a horde of writhing wyrms emerged from the tunnel’s depths. Hiei could not know how right he was---for Naraku had used that lame tactic too many times attacking the Inu-gumi.

“Damn him, he’s just playing with us!” Sango screamed, the pain of memories adding an edge of near-hysteria to the tortured cry. She bared her teeth in a snarl as she yanked her sword free.

“Sango, you’re too drained; let us---” Kurama coaxed, his fingers tightening on the shoulder of her cloak as Hiei darted forward.

“No!” She jerked the snaps at her neck open so she could leap free of the cloak’s entangling folds, leaving Kurama behind as she followed Hiei’s disappearing form. She met the flying wyrms head-on, her sword flashing and stabbing with a vicious fury unequaled to their low-class power.

“I won’t let him! I won’t---I won’t---I won’t!” She used the words like a mantra, the thrust and slash of her sword accompanying each shriek of long-buried pain and denial as her eyes bled with unrestrained rage and bitterness. The darkness that had lain seeping inside her tortured soul for half a millennia beat back the weary exhaustion as the thunder of her heart rose up in a windstorm of howling fury.

“You won’t win! Not this time, you bastard! I won’t let you!”


The taiji-ya’s screams made the surgeon smile. His dark eyes glittered as he demanded, “Is it not entertaining, my lord Mukuro?”

The slighter demon, eyes riveted to the scene unfolding on the wall before them, said mildly, “You find her pain amusing, don’t you, Shigure?”

There was something in the harsh dualities of the king’s voice that made Shigure pause. He was careful to act casual as he replied probingly, “Certainly, sire. It was that fierce determination and inherent hatred that allowed this human girl to survive a demon heart transplant. Why should I not take delight in her skill and fury? The ironic futility of it all is just too delicious.”

Mukuro made a moue of distaste. “This grows tedious. Watching them slaughter lesser demons palls. Your delight in such gauche entertainment shows you’re lack of taste, Shigure. I’m truly disappointed. Leave me. Now.”

Shigure was no fool. Bowing his head, and wondering how he had insulted his king---though it could be anything, really, lesser youkai than he had failed to discern the enigma that was the Lord Mukuro---he took his leave. He was in the king’s disfavor, perhaps for some time. But the King was mercurial, and the surgeon was certain that he would eventually be forgiven whatever it was that made his presence objectionable. So he strode with his head up, faintly smirking as his bell tinkled and the doors boomed shut behind him.

Kirin studied his king thoughtfully. “You do not like this, my lord.”

Mukuro’s lip curled. “End it, Kirin. Now.”

“As you command, my lord.” Kirin’s husky voice betrayed something akin to approval.

“Bring the girl to me. I will be in my rooms. I don’t care how you dispose of the others---though don’t kill them, just keep them busy. Test them, maybe. I would see what worth they have, especially the fox. I want to know why he warrants such interest in Lord Yomi.”

“As you will, my lord.” Kirin bowed as the king airily dismissed the view-screen along the wall and left without once looking back.


The trap was easily laid. Too easily. Kurama was disgusted that he had fallen for it, but he had been so distracted by Sango’s sudden defection that he’d ignored everything save the need to follow after. Her boiling rage left no room for sense, and she could be taken unawares.

It was ironic, really, that it was his singular need to get to her side and protect her from her own foolishness that was what blinded him to the danger he was in. Dragging her cloak over one arm, he curled his rose whip up in his other hand to go after them, ignoring the tiny points of jyaki converging all around him. There was so much jyaki in this damn tunnel---from the wryms, the tattered webs, the shredded tentacles that lay behind them. Even the fleshy walls gave off a faint, ominous glimmer, threading through the sparks of life crawling all over its surface.

The King was unimaginative---for it was spiders, again, who attacked him. But the King was not a fool, for the spiders sent to surround him and tangle him up in their webs were not the poisonous arachnids of before, but the gleaming white spiders of the icy northern wastes. Larger than their tiny cousins, they came pouring out of the very walls and ceiling to surround him. Their fine threads were as hard as frost-riddled metal, an unbreakable wire that cut through his thorn whip with ease. The cloud of jyaki that the ice spiders collectively exuded killed warmth and life with its icy breath. Kurama found himself battling in earnest as each of the seeds he sprouted wilted and died even before he could summon more of his own energy to fight it. He could not divide his demonic power between the defensive moves to keep the spiders off of him---for their touch was deadly---and the offensive weapons he tried to grow to fight his way past them.

He cursed, ruthlessly realizing that he was truly caught. He could feel the icy air numbing his extremities, and frost dampened his hair as his breath condensed in frigid white clouds. The spiders rung him all around, effectively pinning him, and he did not have enough power in his human form to kill them all. That left him an option he did not care to exert---that of summoning the fox spirit who ever waited for him to let down his guard just enough that he might break free.

The way the spiders baited him---Kurama suddenly knew that was their true goal, to make him summon Youko for some unknown reason that could not be to his benefit. Now knowing their true aim, Kurama refused to give in to them. Ruthlessly ignoring all other concerns for his battling friends and his aching need to use any means necessary to help them, he deliberately thrust his hand into the ice forming along the floor. He poured all of his jyaki into the ground, summoning the shielding spell that would protect him at all costs. He felt his mind slipping, and welcomed the darkness as regret tinged his fading awareness…


“How interesting. Rather than summoning the spirit’s aid, the fox has put himself in hibernation, protecting himself from the spiders’ attack but leaving his friends without his help.” Kirin watched with thoughtful detachment from the king’s throne-room.

“Not that it would have helped them much, Commander,” the short green imp beside him hissed with amused relish.

“True, Mosa,” the tall commander admitted. He watched idly as the other two were similarly separated, though the fire apparition fought viciously to remain by the girl’s side. His blade, quick as it was, could not keep the hordes of demons at bay, for there were too many of them.

Green fire danced along his katana, splattering those closest to him with sparks that blazed up into mortal torches no matter how desperately the burning youkai tried to douse the flames. The demons, at Kirin’s mental command, deliberately piled themselves on top of the short youkai, literally using the weight of their numbers to immobilize him just long enough for the floor to open up beneath them all. They slid out of sight, into one of the oubliettes that riddled the fortress’s inner dungeons. The flying, insectoid camera-spies weren’t able to follow, thus they were caught by surprise as the whole fortress rocked and shuddered in a muffled explosion.

Hurriedly calling up a view of the dungeon, Kirin cursed the length of time necessary for the living demon who was their sanctum to form the eyeballs along its inner flesh. When at last he gained sight of the apparition, he found the short youkai alone, all traces of his attackers gone. Sinking to his knees, the fire youkai panted, his scarlet eyes hardening as he braced his sword against the revealed dragon tattoo wrapped around his other arm. His third eye glowed with an ominous light, and Kirin frowned.

“Send more demons to distract him. Send enough to keep him busy, but none strong enough to kill or maim. The Lord Mukuro might have need of him later.”

“For all his appearance, the fire elemental is formidable. We will sacrifice many of our men to keep him occupied,” the imp cautioned.

“Life is cheap,” Kirin answered carelessly. “Do as you are told, Mosa, or I will send you in personally to see that my orders are carried out.”

“Your will, Commander,” the imp hastily replied, summoning up the necessary cannon-fodder.


Sango knew, even through her blinding rage and fury, when she stood once more to face the howling darkness alone. Hiei, Kurama---their auras were gone, and she did not know if they were alive or dead. Her anger at that bled into her fury for all the wrongs that evil bastard Naraku had ever done to her, and she knew that no matter what the cost, she would find him and finish it. No longer would that baboon’s mocking laughter haunt her nightmares, no longer would those crimson eyes taunt her from the darkness. No longer would she bend beneath the cringing shame and sorrow of having failed everyone she had ever loved.
`
She refused to be buried alive in this disgusting warren, surrounded by mindless youkai screaming for her blood. Refused to let this be the end of all her struggle, all her heartache, all her bitter rage and tears. Her father, her village, her people, her brother---*Kohaku!*---deserved more from her than this wretched battle.

“Come out and face me, you bastard!” she screamed, her sword whirling around her with sickening results. Blood splattered across her face and body, the grisly remains of her countless foes clinging to her arms and legs, making the knives still left to her slick with slime. Her hair was plastered to her head, her ponytail dripping bloody splats across the stone floor beneath her feet as she whipped around to face yet another demon.

She did not care that the evil hanyou might now recognize her, that she might scant her last bit of honor by leaving her concealing cloak behind with Kurama and thus forsaking her promise to Shigure. She could not take the pain and rage and bitterness again. She had caught a fleeting glimpse of what life might be like beyond it, and she couldn’t spend another five minutes, let alone another five-hundred years with the burden of it on her shoulders. She refused to let Naraku do that to her. Refused to let him get away and keep the never-ending agony screaming inside her skull that she was not good enough, would never be good enough. Weak, pathetic, all her efforts futile, all her pain and sacrifice and the bitter loneliness of untold centuries a waste. She would not let him escape her, not again, never again. It would all end, here and now.

She screamed, summoning all that was within her, both human and demonic, and prepared to throw it out, sacrificing herself and all others if she must in order to see it done. She burned with the power, and her heartbeat faltered as her eyes glowed with the crimson tears of a thousand nights spent silently screaming her agony to the uncaring world. Her body rose, her sword dropping unnoticed from her hand as her heart slowed, the pulse of her life-energy mixed up with the fire of her hatred. She could feel the silent screams of the wyrms and youkai who disintegrated at the merest touch of her raging aura. The flickering, wind-lashed energy burned through her clothing, freeing her body as her skin stretched thin around the glowing nova of her determination. Her hair whipped free, rising up behind her like a snaking torch as she summoned every ounce of air inside the tunnel. Her lungs faltered as her summons sucked the very air from them as well, but she was beyond caring. She would blast this bastard right into hell with her!

She felt, distantly, a sudden ripple in the rising energy fields as a disturbing presence split through them to materialize in front of her. The power behind that dimensional split was daunting, the enormous waves of jyaki lashing across her own. She wrestled with that awesome power, clinging to her own and refusing to relinquish it beneath the relentless weight of the other demon’s strength. She knew it was not Naraku---the bastard had just sent yet another incarnation to kill her, rather than dirtying his own hands. Something he had done countless times in the past.

With the heightened senses of her building aura, she could faintly feel the evil hanyou hiding somewhere above her by many stories in this ugly maze of a castle. The explosion of her death would take him with her---she was beyond caring who else might go as a result, for it was the darkest rage that now fueled her beyond caring what she did.

The new youkai’s power tried to trap her inside a deadening barrier of dense fog, but she refused to be contained. She would end it all, for once and for all!

“Such theatrics,” the youkai spoke with biting scorn, its bound hands moving in a wide circle. Sango could feel the swirl of the youkai’s powerful jyaki spinning around her, lashing her own winds with its smothering fog. Something was trying to pierce through her skull, invade her mind as Hiei had done when first they met. She tried to elude the terrible grasp of the other youkai’s thoughts, and snarled in hot rage, meeting the youkai’s bugling blue eye with pure hatred as she shrieked, “NO MORE!”

And then all was darkness as the world exploded.