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Curiosity - Chapter 20 - "Three, Four, Oh No Not More."

*Modern Era ~ Higurashi Living Room*

It had been about two hours since everyone had arrived from the Feudal Era and Suki had joined them for the night. Throughout the entire time many questions had popped up about the various things in the living room, which Kagome tried to answer to answer to the best of her ability so that they could understand what all of the modern conveniences did.

The real problem came up though when Gramps had turned the television on in an attempt to take his mind off of certain things. Immediately Kagome was cornered by Kikyo, being accused of holding humans hostage, shrinking them to such a small size, and holding them hostage for her family's entertainment. Even Touga had attempted to slice open the television to "free" all of the people trapped inside. It took Kagome almost half an hour to get them calmed down enough to believe that there weren't actually people trapped in her house and the people were in fact normal size so there was nothing to worry about. But it did take another thirty minutes to explain how much humans had advanced so much that pictures could be sent through the air and end up right on the screen. Even Kaede had to help with some of the descriptions for things that the group didn't quite comprehend. Although they said they understood, Kagome didn't think they got the gist of exactly what she meant after her long winded explanation.

Kagome hadn't even realized how late it had gotten until she looked outside and saw the sun begin to set. Had it really been that long since she had brought everyone here? She figured she would have a lot to put up with tonight, considering Inuyasha should be coming back to get her by now.

"Come to think of it, I did spend two days at Kaede's hut dealing with Kikyo. Normally he would have been back by the second day I was gone. I wonder why he didn't show up yet. Is he okay?" Kagome thought a she turned to gaze into the kitchen.

"He's gonna be mad enough as it is with me spending so much time here. Maybe I could cushion the blow with a nice big bowl of ramen." She thought to herself as she rose to head into the kitchen.

"What are you doing?" Kikyo asked from her spot in the corner of the room.

"I figured I should start on dinner. Knowing Inuyasha he is usually here to try and collect me before my third day home and I thought that it would be nice to have something for him to eat when he gets here." Kagome replied as she continued towards the kitchen.

A hand grasping her shoulder stopped her in her tracks. "That will not be necessary; he won't be here tonight so I will be making dinner."

Turning to face Kikyo, Kagome shrugged her hand off before looking at her confusingly, "What do you mean he won't be coming? And how can you make dinner?" She asked while she followed Kikyo into the kitchen only to have the one thing she thought they were done with come back to bite her.

Everyone in the room was startled out of their fascination with the television when they heard a loud boom come from the other side of the room. And what did they find?

Kagome,

once again,

thrown into a wall.

All were silent as footsteps could be heard frantically running down the stairs.

"Hey is everything alright? It sounded like something exploded down here. Oh my gosh Kagome are you okay?" Souta spoke quickly before running over to his sister to help her up.

"Stupid Kikyo and her stupid sutras throwing me into walls." Kagome muttered under her breath.

Souta's eye grew wide at that moment. Had this woman done this to his sister before? Was that why her arm was broken now? He grit his teeth angrily at that thought; now fighting the urge not to run over to the cold dead shell that was standing in the kitchen doorway grinning like the cat who caught the mouse. He couldn't hold off the feeling for long though, hearing his sister groan in pain (even if it was only a little) broke him.

Gramps watched as his grandson started to stalk his way over towards Kikyo and he could tell what he was going to do, recognizing the look upon his face from one of memories past.

"Don't do that Souta, who's to say that she can't throw you into a wall as well? Besides, what good will it do to hurt someone who can't feel anything?" He asked while looking over the top of his newspaper towards the woman that claimed to be his granddaughter's incarnation.

"I guess you're right Gramps, but that still doesn't mean that I'm not angry at her for roughing up sis. If anyone messes with her, they have to deal with me when their through." He declared while taking on a very Inuyasha like pose.

Giggling brought everyone's attention back to the little girl still playing with the dogs on the floor.

"Soda silly. You no act like Ya-ya." Suki giggled out, before getting distracted by the design on Izayoi's kimono.

"Suki is right Souta, quit acting like Inuyasha." His sister said.

"But sis, Inuyasha told me to protect you when he isn't around! I'm just doing what he said!"

"That doesn't mean you should go after Kikyo stupid. If you did that and Inuyasha found out you would have Tessaiga through you so fast that you wouldn't have been able to see it coming." Kagome replied. She really needed to get this idea out of his head before he did something rash that would get him on Inuyasha's bad side. That certainly wasn't a place that her brother wanted to be.

While Kagome, Gramps, and even Kaede were trying to convince Sota not to go in and beat up Kikyo, Suki silently stood up and made her way closer to Izayoi to get a better look.

Izayoi noticed Suki at her feet delicately touching the butterflies upon her kimono as if she were petting them. A small smile appeared on her face as she got stuck in a memory; the world around her slowly faded away and Suki's form turned into that of a young Inuyasha. He had always loved to pet the butterflies on her kimono, even went as far as to try and catch one for a pet.

No one noticed how Izayoi's eyes had glazed over or that she was petting Suki's head lovingly. Nor did they notice the lone tear that flowed down her cheek, that is, all except her mate. A hand grazing her arm brought her out of her reverie and the soothing purr-like sound from Touga eased her oncoming sadness of the son she missed so much.

Giving a small nod to her mate to show that she was okay, Izayoi reached down and pulled Suki into her lap.

"I like buwerfies, they pretty. You pretty too Ya-ya's mommy!" Suki smiled brightly at Izayoi before yet another thing distracted her young mind. This time though, it was the long pieces of fur that covered both of Touga's shoulders. Curiosity getting the better of her, she was about to touch the soft looking fur but thought better. Her mother always taught her to ask before petting an animal. So she climbed up further onto Izayoi's lap and whispered something into her ear that not even Touga could hear.

Quirking an eyebrow in interest as to why a beaming smile had broken out on his mate's face, he wondered why she was suddenly so entertained before barely catching her telling the small child that she would have to ask him herself.

Wide blue eyes stared into the calm amber ones of the demon Lord before looking down and mumbling out her question.

"I am sorry young one, but you will have to speak up so that I may hear you."

Blue eyes turned to him again, only this time filled with nervousness and just a hint of fear. Was she afraid that he would yell at her? Touga certainly didn't know; he hardly had any experience with children, especially little girls.

"Can I please pet you?" Suki whispered out, still appearing nervous at what his answer would be.

A hearty laugh erupted throughout the room startling everyone from their conversations. To Touga, this was the cutest question he had ever heard come from such a young one's mouth. It was certainly entertaining him, he never knew children could be so….carefree with their questioning. Then again not many children had asked him questions either; he usually scared him off because of how fearsome he appeared, so this little one intrigued him earnestly.

"Perhaps her being around Inuyasha has caused her not to be so weary of me."

Seeing Suki begin to leave his mate's lap, apparently thinking that she had been denied, Touga quickly scooped her up and deposited her in his lap.

Taking her tiny hands into his huge clawed ones Touga answered her seemingly simple question.

"You may 'pet' me as you say, but you have to answer a question for me first. How old are you?" He was, after all, genuinely intrigued by this girl, and she was so small he wondered how old she actually was. Because in demon society, a demon child of this size would be about twenty-five years old and he knew humans didn't age that slowly.

Pulling her hands out of Touga's, Suki gazed at them for a moment before tilting her head back to smile at the inu youkai.

"I'm this many!" She stated proudly as she held up both of her hands showing all ten of her fingers.

Touga was about to voice his amazement at how slow humans grow but he was stopped when Kagome came over and put Suki's left hand down and turned down her thumb and pinky finger on her right.

"Now how old are you?" Kagome asked.

"This many!" The young girl stated proudly again before having the urge to pet Touga's tails took over once again.

Letting out an airy laugh, Kagome turned away and checked on Kikyo in the kitchen, mindful of keeping plenty of space between her and the door before turning to face her family and guests.

"Well, since Kikyo seems to be handling herself with making dinner, I think I'll go and have a bath."

"Kagome are you sure you don't want me to go in there and beat her up? Cause if not you must be crazy." Her brother huffed out.

"Yes I'm sure. And if I'm crazy then you are annoying."

"I am not!"

"Are too!" She yelled as she headed upstairs.

"Yeah right, you're more annoying than I am. It wouldn't be like this if you were a boy."

"No way! And if you were a girl we wouldn't be having this conversation either!" Kagome yelled out of the bathroom before closing the door and beginning to figure out how to work around her bandaged arm.

About an hour later Kagome was done with her bath and dinner was ready. Kagome was amazed that Kikyo had known how to use the stove and other modern appliances, but then she remembered that Kikyo retained some of the memories from Kagome's life so it all made some sort of sense.

The resurrected priestess had decided to make a traditional stew along with a couple of other modern delicacies. Once everyone had their share, they began to eat their dinner in silence, enjoying the meal that Kikyo cooked for them.

While Kagome was eating though, she noticed the taste of a spice that they normally didn't put in the stew.

"Kikyo, did you put curry in this?"

Not even bothering to look away from her plate Kikyo answered her. "Of course I did. Who wouldn't put it in a stew stupid girl?"

Ignoring the demeaning comment, Kagome got up from her seat and began pulling boxes and containers out of the cabinet just to the left of the stove.

"What are you doing child?" Kaede asked.

"I figure I should get some ramen ready for when Inuyasha comes. He won't eat the stew because he REALLY doesn't like curry and I figure the ramen will somehow cushion the blow when he finds out about his parents being alive again."

"He doesn't like curry anymore? He used to love it when he was little, wouldn't even eat his food unless it had some on it." Izayoi thought to herself as picked at her food.

"That will not be necessary girl for he will not be here tonight as you assume. He will not make it here until tomorrow night at the latest." Kikyo informed the group.

Stopping what she was doing, Kagome finally realized what Kikyo was up to.

"You had this planned the entire time didn't you? You've been keeping Inuyasha occupied the entire time so that you could get me to break and tell you what you wanted to know. I'd even wager that you're keeping him occupied with demons right now to delay him."

"You're not as stupid as I thought girl." The elder girl spat out only to find her face suddenly covered in stew. She discovered that it had come from none other than her reincarnation's little brother.

"Don't call my sister stupid!" Souta shouted he was promptly shoved back into his chair by Gramps. He was really started to not like Kikyo.

Sniffling brought his attention to Suki, who was sitting beside him.

"No, no Ya-ya today?" She whimpered out to no one in particular.

Seeing that if no one did something they would have a crying three year old on their hands, Kagome promptly gathered Suki up in her good arm and made her way to the staircase.

"Oh, someone looks like their tired. I think it's time for a certain someone to go beddy-bye." She cooed.

"Suki sleep in Gooey's room?" She asked sleepily.

Laughing again and nodding to confirm that she could indeed sleep in her room, Kagome made her way upstairs to put Suki to bed, noticing that Kaede was following behind her.

"Ya-ya be here morrow Gooey? Can he play with me?" The tired girl yawned out.

"Yes he'll be here tomorrow and I'm positive that he would love to play with you."

Another yawn escaped the child upon Kagome's hip. "Ma-maw play too?" Suki mumbled out.

"Aye child, I'll play with ye as well." Kaede replied while lovingly patting her head.

By time they made their way to her room, Suki was already asleep so Kagome, with the help of Kaede, changed Suki into her pajamas and laid her in Kagome's bed.

After tucking her in and kissing her goodnight, the two priestesses made their way out the door and back to the others.

"Ye brother seems to be very protective of thee child."

"Yeah, sometimes I wish he was a girl though that way he wouldn't do that. And so I would have someone to go shopping with. But I don't think he is magically going to turn into one anytime soon." Kagome responded.

Kaede let out a chuckle as a memory swept through her mind. "Did ye know that Kikyo used to wish that I was a boy?"

Kagome stopped in her tracks and looked at her incredulously. "Seriously? Why would she want that?"

"So that I could do the hunting, she never did like to kill innocent animals. She would often recruit one of the village men to do our hunting for us."

An idea popped into Kagome's head then and she put her good arm around Kaede's shoulders.

"Well, I vote that we switch siblings. Kikyo can have Souta and I'll take you. Besides, you are so much more behaved than he is anyway. Plus I get along with you so much better." Kagome giggled out.

Chuckling along with her as they reached the bottom of the stairs, Kaede took Kagome's hand in hers and led her back into the dining room.

"I believe that is a plan child."

Chapter End Notes:

A/N ~ Lol, hope you enjoyed this chapter. Tried to make it longer to make up for the slowness in updating lately. PLEASE REMEMBER I will finish this story and update when I can, but 4-H is rapidly approaching and I really have to get my projects done and make sure the dog and poultry shows are in order.

Before anyone asks ~ Yes, I did spell some things differently when Suki talked because she is three and there are just some words that she can't say.

And yes – she does call Souta "Soda" and Kagome "Gooey".

Has anyone noticed that in the search on FF there is not a "Gramps" character option yet there is a "Kagome's Mom" option? I found this odd, they should have a Gramps option too.

QUESTION ~ This is totally unrelated but where am I supposed to go to ask for help finding a story I can't remember the name of? I know I can't create a new story and just ask or I can get reported. Message me or comment if you can answer.

PLEASE LEAVE COMMENTS/REVIEWS ~ FLAMES WELCOMED!

COOKIES MAKE ME TYPE MORE!

PROUD TO BE A KAEDE/GRAMPS SUPPORTER! ~ ARE YOU?

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