The following morning they headed out. Shippo sat, to Kagome's surprise, on her shoulder as they made their way through the forest. She felt better, now that she had a bow, and a quiver of arrows, in case they ran into any more unexpected encounters.
"He smells the same," Shippo whispered quietly in her ear. His comment caught her off guard, and she felt her pulse quicken slightly.
"Huh?"
"He smells the exact same, as InuYasha in his human form." Shippo explained.
"That's not possible," she countered. He stole his scent too?!
"It's hard to trick the nose of a youkai Kagome," Shippo replied, almost annoyed.
"I should have just stayed in bed, rather than go to school," she murmured.
"Speaking of, how's your ankle?" Shoji spoke up from a little ways behind them.
"It's just fine. Keep up, or you'll get picked off by a youkai," she ordered him. He sighed slightly…again.
"Yes Ma'am," he said, halfheartedly.
"So, Shippo, any news from the wolf youkai tribe?" Kagome asked, desperate to change the subject. She could have sworn she heard Shippo snicker.
"Why? Do you think if Kouga came for you it might make InuYasha remember or something?"
"What? Remember? What are you talking about?" she asked, flushing.
"Curious, do tell." Shoji spoke up.
"Quiet you!" she shot back at him, with a glare. The anger that crossed his features was so abrupt, and familiar, that she flinched.
"What?! First you kidnap me, and now I cant talk?! You stupid girl!! You're not my keeper!" he snapped back.
Shippo's tiny claws dug into her shoulder. "Sometimes, I could swear that's him coming to the surface. His scent changes and everything!" he squeaked.
"Its…not possible Shippo. InuYasha died, remember?"
"Stranger things have happened,"
Kagome could hear Shippo's words echo over and over in her mind. "His scent changes and everything." What did it all mean? Was there some sort of connection between InuYasha and Shoji, beyond reincarnation?
"You brought me here, you've forced me on this little field trip to god knows where, and on top of that, you're being a b-" Shoji continued. Kagome didn't know where it came from, or why, all she knew was it was like instinct.
"SIT!!" she screeched angrily.
The necklace was bound to InuYasha's soul, so in actuality, the spell wouldn't have any effect on anyone else, when the word was spoken. Shoji had a sudden look of fear on his face, as the beads began to glow, and before she could let what was happening register in her mind, Shoji was doing a face plant in the soft ground.
She fell to her knees on the soft grass, staring wide eyed. It shouldn't have done that at all. The beads should have remained silent. They should never have acted ever again.
Then she felt it. It was very faint, but she felt it. There was no mistaking it at all. The familiar aura washed around them, and it was coming from Shoji.
"Oi…that wasn't very nice," he grumbled. He lifted his head ever so slightly, and as he did, his dark hair shifted, and changed until it was that familiar silvery white hue. Two white triangles now rested atop of his head as well, and one twitched slightly. He looked at her, and his violet eyes were now that warm amber shade she knew so well.
"…you promised never to do that again," he said softly. Tears welled in her eyes, and something inside her seemed to heal itself in an instant.
"InuYasha?" she whispered.
The world had gone black.
His last memory, had been pain. Intense, excruciating pain, before everything was swallowed up by darkness. Then there was nothing left but memory. And that's where he stayed.
There was no hell, no heaven, or any sort of afterlife at all. He simply drifted in nothingness, with only his thoughts to keep him company. No sound, nothing.
Except, of course, for her voice.
It was the only thing he could hear. The one, single thing that he remembered. Her voice, and her face. Even though he could not see, he could see her. Always there, always smiling.
She always HAD been there by him, no matter what was transpiring. Whether they were simply walking casually down a road, or fighting an enemy. Between time itself, or when he broke her heart, she was always there. Always reminding him that someone was there beside him.
Yet, despite that, somewhere along the ages, he began to forget things. Small things at first.
Then memory became dreams, until the dreams faded too…
He couldn't remember anymore. Memory began again, the day that light returned, and life seemed to begin all over again. But it was all new, and the darkness was like a bad dream from long ago. He grew, learned, lived life carefree, and unknowing.
Until the dreams began again.
And with the dreams came the pain in his heart, with images flashing before his eyes too quickly to see clearly. Voices mostly, calling for him, but a name strange to him.
Then one day, on the first day of high school, he met a pretty, yet very sad girl, whose sadness struck at his very soul. And with reasons he couldn't explain, he was drawn to her. He knew her somehow, but where, or how, he couldn't remember.
He helped her home. He remembered that. He remembered having another episode in her bedroom while getting her a book, and saw the strange glow from under her bed. Her room smelled so familiar somehow…
Before he knew it, he was thrust into a strange, yet familiar world, against his will at first, but he followed the girl again, as if he'd done it before. Something inside of him told him to stay beside her.
In all his confusion, he began to get angry. There was so much he didn't know, and he knew there were things that he SHOULD know, that he had forgotten. He wasn't an angry person, that he knew of anyways, but he just felt so angry with her, and he told her so.
And one moment, he's standing on his own two feet, the next…he was eating dirt.
Then he remembered that he was always eating dirt whenever he made her mad. Then again, hadn't she promised him that she wouldn't do that anymore? He knew she had said that, back before darkness obscured the light.
Memory.
Memory flooded back to him. All the way back to an arrow, and a frightened girl setting him free…and everything in between. All the way to…
He lifted his head slowly, feeling the familiar rush of power that was lost to him for five hundred years. By the scent in the air, he knew where he was, and who was nearby, and his first thoughts…
"InuYasha?" a voice asked quietly.
That voice. That sweet voice, that maybe he never forgot, but kept so close to him, that he couldn't see or hear anything at all.
"Kagome," he said softly. The young woman before him looked at him with wide eyes, full of tears. He'd never seen her in such a state. Her eyes held a deep sadness to them he'd never saw before.
Then he remembered. That fateful night, when time stopped, and he…died. It all came back to him so clearly, that it felt as it just happened.
He had been sitting alone with Kagome, during the night of the new moon. And while he was in his human state, they were attacked. He could see the evil malice that poured from the lesser demons that surrounded them. Kagome told him to run, while she lifted her bow, but he had refused.
That was when the pain came, pain unlike any he had ever felt. It tore the breath from his chest, and he could feel himself being lifted into the air, followed by a sinister laugh.
HIS laugh.
"Ku ku ku, It would seem that fate has decided to smile upon me at long last!" he said. With each word he spoke, his voice got more and more distant, as did Kagome's cries. He was trapped in Naraku's claw, each shoulder impaled completely through, immobilizing him above the area where Kagome fought.
He could feel his life draining away, as his blood ran down his pierced body. How could he have not seen this coming? This is exactly why he remained hidden on this night, but no…
He could have shouted, cursed him. He knew he was about to die, but offering the bastard his last words was something he would never give. He felt the pressure on his spine, as another claw prepared to pierce his heart from behind, and he affixed his gaze on Kagome.
There was one last thing he could give her before death took him. And he managed to say the words with all his heart, just as his heart was torn to nothingness.
"I love you!"
He didn't hear her scream, and run towards him, her entire body glowing from a power she had never before been able to tap into, nor did he feel his body hit the ground as his enemy dropped him from his claws.
By then, InuYasha was gone.
And now…he understood. Why he had the pain where there was no wound. He felt echoes of the past. His heart had been torn from his chest once. And now, it beat once more within his body. Naraku had declared fate smiled on him, when in fact, despite the sorrow, and pain, it smiled on InuYasha instead.
Still, he would rather die a thousand deaths than to see the pain he now saw in her eyes.
Raising himself to his hands and knees, he slowly crawled over to her. As he went, he wondered how in the world his school uniform had lasted THIS long. Not only that, he thought how unusual that he would be knowledgeable about stuff now, that he wasn't back then. He grew up in the modern era, as a human for seventeen years, yet he was still InuYasha, of the feudal era.
Then he realized, he had a place in the modern era now, he EXISTED there. Before, he was worried about leaving his era to live in hers, because he didn't exactly have a way to exist there, without someone realizing he didn't belong, but now…pieces began to fall into place. The sudden move from New York to Tokyo, the strange visits from his adoptive fathers acquaintance.
Sesshoumaru!
During his entire life in the Modern Era, Sesshomaru had been close by. Why?
Those thoughts seemed insignificant though, as he pulled her into his embrace without hesitation. After all, he had waited over five hundred years to hold her, to smell her…to tell her…
She held on so tight that she trembled, and he could feel her crying against his chest. He could almost feel the pain of what she must have gone through after he had died. He wished he could give her some of his strength, though at the moment, he was breaking too. He didn't care. It felt so right, and he was so relieved, and happy that he cried too.
"Uh…InuYasha?" a small voice asked. He opened his eyes slightly, to see the small redheaded kitsune child he now remembered so well, and missed dearly too. He couldn't help but smile, and offer the kit a spot in the embrace, which he took happily.
"I missed you too, Shippo." he said quietly.