Categories > Anime/Manga > Inuyasha > Boy of the Future, Girl of the Past
The Best Part Of Waking Up Is Not Having Broken Bones. So Much for That.
1 reviewAn exposition heavy chapter, with a little fluff to supplement.
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Hi, everyone. I’m back. So it’s a Sunday night as I write this intro, and I have one book and 2 plays to read, and then one research paper preliminary copy and research articles to hand in and or get tested on in the next two days. So, naturally, I am sitting here and writing fan fiction because I am irresponsible idiot. How I got into college in the first place, I will never know.
I have no ownership, nor even a deluded belief of ownership, of Inuyasha. I don’t even get to be like one of those crazy people who is thoroughly convinced she is the queen of England. Instead I have to sit here knowing that Rumiko Takahashi is awesome and just feeling dumb about it.
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Boy of the Future, Girl of the Past
Chapter 4
The Best Part of Waking Up Is Not Having Broken Bones. So Much For That.
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Inuyasha woke slowly, in more pain then he could remember experiencing in his entire life. He became aware of the sounds around him long before he could will his eyes to open. Instead of fighting it, he lay quietly, allowing the world to wash over him unacknowledged. As he did so, he heard the conversation going on around him.
It was much quieter now then it had been when he had collapsed. He mentally kicked himself for passing out like that, and hoped vaguely that he had been hurt badly enough for that to be an acceptable response. He knew it was a stupid thing to hope for, but he couldn’t help himself. The idea of looking weak made him want to grind his teeth together. He might have if he had been able to move a muscle, but he was still too exhausted and heavy to try. Instead he listened to the two voices talking around him. He recognized them now, as Kagome, the young priestess, and Kaede, her older mentor. At first, he couldn’t figure out what they were on about, and didn’t try to hard to understand.
“…all my fault,” Kagome was saying, sounding tearful. Her voice was thick with emotion, some combination of guilt and indignation. “He’s just a human. I should never have allowed him anywhere near that thing. It’s my job to protect people here, not let some visitor get hurt just because he has no clue what’s going on. I should have…”
“What should ye have done?” the older priestess interrupted her. “What could ye have done? Ye didn’t ask him to come running or to help. He decided that on his own. There was nothing ye could have done to stop him. And besides, if he hadn’t acted, foolish though it was, then ye might not have been able to protect the jewel, and that would have been devastating. Worse yet, ye might have been hurt in his stead.”
“Better me then an innocent guy who has nothing to do with this world,” he heard Kagome counter. He slowly began to realize that he was being discussed, but still couldn’t muster the energy to make his consciousness known.
“Kagome, I am not sure how to tell ye this, but I do not believe the assumption that he has nothing to do with this world.”
When Kagome spoke again, she sounded confused. “But, you said yourself, he…”
“He is not from this world, yes. Clearly this child grew up somewhere or sometime far from our own. That does not mean, though, that he does not in some way belong here.”
“I don’t understand, Kaede.”
“Nor do I quite yet, child. But I will endeavor to explain more thoroughly when I do. For now, we should content ourselves to attend to the boy and make sure he is healing.”
“How bad is it?” Kagome asked, the guilt rushing back into her voice. Inuyasha, growing more aware by the second, suddenly felt a pang of guilt of his own for making her feel bad about him jumping in like an idiot. It not like she could have done anything about it.
“I am not certain. Several ribs were badly broken and bruised, and there must have been some internal bleeding, for he coughed too much blood for any other possibility. I feared at first that the bone might have pierced his lung, which there is nothing we could do for at this point. However, since he is still breathing, I do not believe that is the case. Unless…well, there is something I am considering,” the priestess trailed off vaguely. Inuyasha had a feeling she was hiding something, that he seriously doubted was related to his health. Kagome completely missed the subtle thought.
“What do you mean? Is he going to be all right?”
“It is difficult to say, Kagome. That will depend on how he is doing when he wakes.” Kaede paused for a second, and the silence felt heavier then any before it. “If he wakes at all,” she finished her voice weary. Inuyasha became more sharply aware as the guilt nipped at him like a whole other wound.
“…Oh,” answered Kagome, understanding, sounding unreasonably hurt for someone who didn’t seem to like him very much.
This was going too far, Inuyasha thought. Yes, he was in pain. And certainly, if that monster hadn’t been dead already, he would have gone and given it a few kicks for good measure, but he definitely felt alive, enough. He was even waking up fully, his limbs feeling lighter and his eye lids finally willing to raise when he so chose to make them. He wouldn’t be feeling very well for a week or so, he knew, but he certainly wasn’t on the brink of death. No where near it. With a slight edge of pleasure, he realized he was probably hurt enough to buy him a week or so off from school, though. That almost made getting tail whipped by a giant bug worth it, he laughed to himself. Not aloud though. He wouldn’t be trying that for a while. He was deciding how to make his mental presence known, when the women began to speak again.
“When do you think he will be waking up?” Kagome asked, her voice full of resolve as though she was determined to believe he would, in fact, wake up.
“Not for a while yet, even if he is to survive,” Kaede said. Inuyasha resisted the urge to snort. “His injury was quite serious. I had to give him herbs that induce sleep so he wouldn’t move around and further his injuries. Ye shouldn’t expect him to regain consciousness for several hours yet.”
Inuyasha detected an opening. “Guess again,” he said, his voice coming weaker then he wanted it to. “I’m up,” he added, this time forcing more air into the words and sounding almost normal. He opened his eyes to see two shocked pairs watching him, two mouths hanging open slightly.
“What are you two gaping at?” he demanded irritably, trying to sit up. Kagome snapped out of it soon enough to put a hand on his shoulder to stop the movement. It was unnecessary, however, as pain flared in his right side as he attempted it and he gave up thoughts of rising momentarily, laying back down as slowly as he could manage.”
“Inu…Inuyasha?” Kagome asked him curiously, as though she didn’t quite believe her eyes.
“No, it’s the tooth fairy. This is how I dress when I’m off duty. Who the hell did you think it was?” he answered edgily. Kagome’s face cleared slightly, and she looked heartened by his irritable reply.
“Relax, don’t try to sit up. You’re hurt,” she told him unnecessarily, smiling at him despite his attitude.
“Really? Well that explains a lot,” he snapped back sarcastically. Kagome’s face fell slightly into hurt for a moment, and Inuyasha felt guilt snap at him. “It’s really not as bad as it looks,” he said, his voice kinder. “I’m pretty durable. Just give me a few days.”
To demonstrate his point, Inuyasha sat up again, slowly an very carefully this time, but managed to get into a sitting position without too much pain, and he slid back gently to lean on a wall so he didn’t have to support his weight, which helped a lot. Kagome looked like she wanted to stop him, but was too scared of hurting him to touch him at all. Once he was settled, he said “See? No big deal. I’m a good healer. Damn bug just caught me by surprise, is all.”
“Well, at least let me bind it for you, so you don’t make it any worse moving around,” Kagome implored him. He felt like saying no, but he took too deep a breath and winced against the pain, and she looked very guilty again. He didn’t have the heart to turn her down. He settled for saying “feh” knowing she would take it as assent. Heartened, she turned and reached for bandages.
“Ye say you heal quickly, do you?” Kaede asked him, and he felt like there was more to the question then she was saying.
“Yeah, always have. What of it?”
“Just a theory, child.”
“Care to share?” Inuyasha asked, annoyed by the cryptic answer. He was getting really tired of Kaede’s style of beating around the bush. She looked at him but didn’t answer. He feh’d again, irritated.
“Um, Inuyasha?” Kagome spoke tentatively, her face a bright pink color and her eyes avoiding his. It made him nervous, in a way that him suddenly wondering if there was something in his teeth.
“Yeah?” he asked just as gingerly, picking up on her tension.
“Well, I need you to…um….well, the thing of it is…” she tried, but didn’t seem to be able to say what she wanted to. Kaede sighed, smiling slightly.
“She needs ye to undress, child, so she can treat ye.”
“Oh,” said Inuyasha, understanding, a blush rising to his own face now.
“Just your strange kimono, though,” Kagome assured him. “Your hakama are low enough that it’s…um…not necessary to remove them.” She blushed again at the thought. So did Inuyasha.
“Right,” said Inuyasha, as he awkwardly reached for the hem of his shirt. However, his embarrassment was somewhat forgotten as the pain set in when he moved to pull it off. He sucked his breath through his teeth and Kaede reached over to help him, managing to help him remove the garment without brushing his bruised and swollen right side. Once it was discarded, he sat up as straight as pain would allow, and Kagome approached with bandages.
“Lift your arms up, please,” she said.
“I don’t think I’m going to stay up for long if I do,” Inuyasha told her honestly. Without being asked, Kaede moved behind him and placed her hands gently against his shoulders to hold him straight and still without him needing to attempt to engage any abdominal muscles which he was certain would protest. Viciously.
“Thank you, Kaede,” said Kagome, whose blushed embarrassment had faded to guilt again and grew more pronounced every time he winced. She began to wind bandages gently around Inuyasha’s lower chest, trying hard not to cause him any pain. She failed as often as she succeeded, and was biting her lip by the second time around, hard enough she looked about to draw blood. Inuyasha decided to be distracting.
“T-shirt,” he told her, knowing her confusion would make her forget her guilt. He hoped it wouldn’t make her forget to be gentle, though.
“Huh?” she asked, clearly not understanding.
“That thing,” she gestured toward the red shirt on the floor, “is not a kimono. It’s a shirt. A tee shirt.”
“A tee shirt?”
“Yeah, that’s what it’s called.”
“I see.” She didn’t look like she saw anything. But she was distracted, and still moving her hands with the bandages very carefully as she reached around him.
“And those,” he gestured vaguely to his pants, “aren’t hakama. They’re jeans.”
“Jeans,” Kagome repeated, nodding as she tried to memorize the unfamiliar word.
“Yup.”
“And does everyone in your time wear these tee shirts and jeans?” Kaede asked him.
“Pretty much, yeah.”
“Men and women?”
“Yup. Not the same ones though. I mean, we each have our own sizes and styles and stuff. But basically the same, yeah.”
“I see. And how can you tell people apart that way?” Kagome asked, as she wrapped the last few times, still gently, but sounding genuinely distracted by now.
“What do you mean, tell them apart?” Inuyasha asked, confused.
“How can you tell a warrior from a priestess, or a monk from a villager?”
“Oh. Well, we don’t actually have a lot of those around. Everyone is basically a regular person. No priestesses or monks or demons around. I mean, there are still monks and priestesses in places, but not really places like Tokyo. We are the people of the jeans and tee shirts.”
Kagome nodded, trying to understand, as she ended the bandage and gently stuck the edge into an earlier layer, and sealed the binding. It was tight enough to restrict his movement considerably by then. “Is that what your people are called, then? People of the jeans and tee shirts?” she asked him. He snorted.
“Not quite.”
Kagome nodded, but he seemed to have lost her again. He made up his mind to give up.
“All finished,” Kagome told him, apparently having decided not to pursue the subject. Kaede reached over for Inuyasha’s shirt and handed it back to him. He put it on carefully, and found that he didn’t have to be nearly as cautious now that he couldn’t move as freely and hurt himself of brush the wounds. It helped a lot.
“Thanks,” he told Kagome, and she looked sad again.
“It shouldn’t have happened in the first place. I should never have let you anywhere near that centipede demon.”
Inuyasha snorted again. “Oh yeah, and how were you gonna stop me, cornered by the giant bug like that? Don’t worry about it. It’s not your fault I did something stupid. It’s sort of my m.o. of late. First I cut school, then decided to explore the shrine, get pulled into that well, and now I’m stuck in a retarded version of Back To The Future. None of those were the exactly the brightest ideas.”
“Back to the future?” Kagome asked, confused again. Inuyasha suppressed a sigh.
“Nevermind.”
Inuyasha made himself as comfortable as possible sitting with his back against the wall of the hut, and the three passed the afternoon discussing how Inuyasha had arrived and ways in which he could get home. By nightfall, they had agreed that the best course of action was probably for him to jump back down the well, and hope that he was transported through it like he had been the first time around. However, both Kagome and Kaede argued with Inuyasha that he shouldn’t even attempt the journey until he was at least somewhat healed from his ordeal. If it didn’t work, they said, the force of the jump could further his injuries, which the assured him were rather nasty. He argued that, if it did work, then the people in his time would be totally qualified to deal with something as simple as a few broken ribs, or anything worse that the trip caused. Medicine was much better in his time. This distracted Kaede completely, and she began asking about medical treatments in his time in great detail. Inuyasha didn’t know much, and got rather annoyed with the constant questions. Shortly after dark, he had had enough, and insisted on going for a walk, storming out the door. He was flustered enough that it took him several minutes to notice that Kagome was following him.
“Hey, wait up!” she called from behind him. He sped up in response, but it caused his side to protest, so he surrendered and slowed to a stop, waiting for Kagome to catch up.
“What do you want?”
“I don’t want anything. I just don’t think you should go wandering around right now. Its dark and you don’t know the way. Besides, there are demons in the woods, and if you get attacked, hurt as you are, and your alone…well, I don’t….It would be wrong to let something happen to you,” she said, changing her mind at the last moment. She had almost said ‘I don’t want anything to happen to you’ but had caught herself just in time. She didn’t want him to go reading too much into things.
He laughed at her coldly. “Well, the last time I was wondering in those woods, the only thing that attacked me was you. And since you are here, I think I would be pretty safe.”
“I’m sorry about that, but that doesn’t mean you need to go and be stupid about it! There are more things out there, Inuyasha, things like what you saw today. Things that could kill you.”
“I’ll be fine.”
“You could get lost.”
“I have a good sense of direction. I wasn’t paying attention earlier, but I will find my way back just fine.” He started walking away from her, intent on reaching the woods.
“Inuyasha, please!” Kagome called behind him, so desperately that he had to stop and turn to her, that he didn’t have a choice in the matter at all. “Please, Inuyasha. You’re already hurt. If you got attacked now, you could get killed. And even if you can fight, like you did earlier, you won’t be able to do it hurt like that. And you are just hurt because of me and-then-if-you-died-it-would-be-like-I-killed-you-and-I-don’t-want-to-kill you-Inuyasha-so-please-stay-here!” She said the last part so fast that Inuyasha had a hard time making out the words as she spoke them.
“Jeez,” said Inuyasha, taken aback by her emotional display of panic. “Fine, I’ll stay here, ok? Calm down before you give yourself a hemorrhage or something.” Inuyasha turned and walked back to her feeling extremely uncomfortable. The pair stood together for a minute, trying to avoid each others eyes.
“Sorry,” said Kagome after a minute. “I just…I didn’t like the idea of…I just didn’t want you to go, okay?”
“Okay, whatever. But I’m not going back in that hut right now. I swear if that old hag says one more cryptic ‘beware the ides of march’ thing, someone is gonna lose a limb and it ain’t gonna be me.” Kagome stared at him, clearly not getting it.
Rather than ask, she said “How about we go down to the bridge a little further in the village and sit there for a bit?”
Inuyasha shrugged noncommittally, and let Kagome lead the way. The bridge was short, made of rope and wooden slats, the likes of which he had never seen outside shows set in the middle ages. It was short, and crossed over the small valley were a river ran gently, barely seeming to move at all on the calm night. For several minutes, neither of them spoke.
Eventually, Kagome cleared her throat softly and turned toward Inuyasha. “Tomorrow, if you like, we could go and look around a bit. It’s safer during the day. I could show you around the village and close by. You know, just if you want.”
“We could do that,” Inuyasha said slowly. “I mean, I guess we could.”
They resumed sitting in silence. After a few moments, Inuyasha noticed Kagome’s hand as it traveled to her neckline and fumbled beneath her kimono for a second, pulling out the jewel that had started the trouble earlier in the morning. It was hard to believe that, all in one day, Inuyasha had time traveled, helped kill a giant monster (demon, he mentally corrected, coming to terms with the lingo), gotten hurt, and ended up wandering around a medieval village among medieval people. It was like the twilight zone episode that wouldn’t end. Suddenly, a thought occurred to Inuyasha and he groaned loudly, dropping his head to his hands.
“What’s the matter, are you in pain?” Kagome asked worriedly, turning toward Inuyasha, her expression full of concern.
“No, I’m fine. I’m dead, but I’m fine.”
“I’m lost,” Kagome admitted.
Inuyasha sighed heavily. “I have parents, you know. I have a mother, and a father, and they are probably having panic attacks right about now. And when I don’t come home tonight, or tomorrow, they are going to have the cops out looking for me. It’s going to be a disaster! By the time I get home, they are going to ground me till… the rest of my life probably.”
“So, it’s you and your parents in your time? And you all live together?”
Inuyasha sighed again, knowing it was useless to worry about something he couldn’t change at all. “Yeah, us and my brother.”
“Will he be worrying about you, too?’
Inuyasha laughed at that. “Yeah, right. He’s probably checking with the morgue to make sure I’m dead. And then, the second he confirms it, he’s gonna knock out the wall between our rooms, and use the extra space to throw a ‘he’s gone away’ party.”
Kagome gave him a strange look. “We don’t get along. At all. Ever. In our lives,” he explained. She just nodded.
“I’m sorry, you are probably right. I bet they are really worried about you. I forget sometimes what that’s like for other people.” She sighed sadly. Inuyasha looked curiously at her.
“What do you mean, You forget what what’s like?”
She shrugged. “Having parents. Having people worried about you if you aren’t around. I forget.”
“What do you mean? You don’t have parents?”
“I did, of course, when I was small. But I left them when they found out I had spiritual powers to begin my training as a priestess. I came from another village near here. But they brought me to Kaede because our village had no shrine or priestess to teach me. My home village was attacked a little bit after, and they both got killed. Everyone got killed. So I guess this is my home village now.” She sighed heavily, seeming wearied by the idea.
“What attacked your village,” Inuyasha asked, deliberately trying to keep his voice softer then normal.
“A demon did. It’s usually a demon. One sort or another. That’s why I was so quick to attack you in the woods. I’m sorry about it, now. But when I see a stranger who is so very…well, strange as you are, I get nervous. I remember what happened, and I just can’t let it happen again.”
They were quiet for a minute.
“You don’t have to feel bad about that anymore,” Inuyasha said at last, breaking the silence. Kagome turned to look at him slowly. “About attacking me I mean. At first, I totally thought you were a whack-job, to be honest, but after that thing that came here today, I sort of get why you guys would be a little overly defensive. So, you are officially forgiven. Don’t worry about it anymore.”
He met Kagome’s eyes, and she smiled at him slowly. He smiled back, and then looked away.
“See?” he asked, trying to lighten the mood. “I am capable of not acting like a total asshole when nothing is attempting to kill me or drag me through magic portals. In case you were wondering about it.”
She laughed, and silence fell between them again.
“I’m really sorry about your parents,” Inuyasha told her sincerely, and she looked sad again.
“I had a brother too. Younger. I never met him, but my parents sent word when he was born. He would have been almost nine now. But he died too, there, so…” She trailed off.
“Wow,” said Inuyasha, feeling older then he ever had before. “This world really sucks, huh?”
Kagome laughed again, and turned a sweet smile toward him. “It’s really not all bad. Terrible things happen everywhere. But there are good things here too. There are the villagers, many of whom are very nice. You met a few of the worse ones earlier, but a lot of them are very sweet. And there’s Kaede, too. She’s as good as a mother any day. I don’t know what I would do without her. And there’s my duty. It’s not always easy, but protecting people feels really good. It feels like I have a real purpose in the world. I’m glad to have that.” Her hand move to hold the jewel at her neck once more, and she clutched it tightly. Inuyasha noticed.
“What is the deal with that thing, anyway?” He asked her, gesturing toward the jewel. She clutched it closer instinctively, but he tried to ignore that. “If it’s so terribly dangerous, why don’t you just destroy it?”
Kagome laughed lightly, although there was an edge of sadness to the sound. “It’s not that simple. It’s not like I can just smash it with a big rock. It’s more complicated then that. It’s magic!”
“I had figured as much. So how exactly did you end up with this thing? What are you supposed to do with it?”
“It was brought here by a village of slayers a long time ago, and given to the priestess who was here before me, Lady Kaede’s older sister Lady Kikyo. She died a long time ago, and Kaede looked after it as best she could but she couldn’t purify it. Then I came here, and I can, so it’s been in my care ever since.”
“And about getting rid of it?”
“That’s just the thing, though. It has to be purified out of existence. I have to make it pure enough that the battle within ends on the side of good, and it can pass from this world. I have to purify it as completely as I can, and then make a wish on it that is truly selfless to force it out of existence.”
Inuyasha looked blankly at her. “The battle within? Like, within the jewel? What, are dust mites having a go at each other?”
Kagome quirked an eyebrow at him. “Well, it’s kinda small,” he defended.
“Maybe, if you hang out here long enough, I can explain it. But not tonight. It’s late, and I think I should sleep. And I know you should. You need to heal, and you aren’t going to wandering around with me. We can talk about it tomorrow.”
“I’m fine,” he scoffed, ignoring the way the pain in his damaged right side flared at being brought abruptly to his attention. He clutched gently at it as he shifted and sent a stronger wave of agony through him.
“But sleeping couldn’t hurt,” he added, trying to keep his voice cool. Kagome wasn’t fooled, and she got to her feet, and offered him a hand to help him up, which he ignored. With an exasperated sigh, she gently grabbed his arm and helped anyway as he got carefully to his feet.
She led him to a smaller hut beside the one he had woken up in. “You can stay here. I will come in the morning with medicinal herbs for you. Sleep well, Inuyasha.”
“Goodnight, Kagome,” he responded, saying the name for the first time and analyzing the taste of it. It felt strangely familiar, but he wrote it off assuming he had heard it somewhere before.
Inside the hut, with no other clothes and not a toothbrush in sight, he sighed and gave up. Lowering himself gingerly onto the bedroll already spread out in the center of the small room almost painlessly, he lay on his back thinking about the day that had passed. With a twinge of guilt, he imagined his mother calling everyone she knew looking for him, crying into his father’s shoulder wondering where he was when he didn’t come back from school. Had they called to tell her he had never showed up? Probably. She would be even more worried then. She probably thought he’d been kidnapped en route and was ‘lying dead in a ditch somewhere’ as she always insisted she did when he was late. Sighing, knowing there wasn’t a single thing he could do about that, he let himself drift off, half expecting to wake up in his own bed. His side throbbed, eating away at his conviction in the idea. He wondered idly what would happen if he died there, hundreds of years before he was born. Would he pop back before he had left and have it be like it never happened, live the same life he would have had anyway had he not gotten overly curious? Or would he just be dead? With that last, unsettling train of thought, he fell asleep. He dreamed of demons he had seen in various books and paintings in history class, running around and attacking each other, and himself, and the other people he recognized from the past, all the while yelling incoherently about funny hats and pie, and bling.
It was a confusing night.
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I have no ownership, nor even a deluded belief of ownership, of Inuyasha. I don’t even get to be like one of those crazy people who is thoroughly convinced she is the queen of England. Instead I have to sit here knowing that Rumiko Takahashi is awesome and just feeling dumb about it.
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Boy of the Future, Girl of the Past
Chapter 4
The Best Part of Waking Up Is Not Having Broken Bones. So Much For That.
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Inuyasha woke slowly, in more pain then he could remember experiencing in his entire life. He became aware of the sounds around him long before he could will his eyes to open. Instead of fighting it, he lay quietly, allowing the world to wash over him unacknowledged. As he did so, he heard the conversation going on around him.
It was much quieter now then it had been when he had collapsed. He mentally kicked himself for passing out like that, and hoped vaguely that he had been hurt badly enough for that to be an acceptable response. He knew it was a stupid thing to hope for, but he couldn’t help himself. The idea of looking weak made him want to grind his teeth together. He might have if he had been able to move a muscle, but he was still too exhausted and heavy to try. Instead he listened to the two voices talking around him. He recognized them now, as Kagome, the young priestess, and Kaede, her older mentor. At first, he couldn’t figure out what they were on about, and didn’t try to hard to understand.
“…all my fault,” Kagome was saying, sounding tearful. Her voice was thick with emotion, some combination of guilt and indignation. “He’s just a human. I should never have allowed him anywhere near that thing. It’s my job to protect people here, not let some visitor get hurt just because he has no clue what’s going on. I should have…”
“What should ye have done?” the older priestess interrupted her. “What could ye have done? Ye didn’t ask him to come running or to help. He decided that on his own. There was nothing ye could have done to stop him. And besides, if he hadn’t acted, foolish though it was, then ye might not have been able to protect the jewel, and that would have been devastating. Worse yet, ye might have been hurt in his stead.”
“Better me then an innocent guy who has nothing to do with this world,” he heard Kagome counter. He slowly began to realize that he was being discussed, but still couldn’t muster the energy to make his consciousness known.
“Kagome, I am not sure how to tell ye this, but I do not believe the assumption that he has nothing to do with this world.”
When Kagome spoke again, she sounded confused. “But, you said yourself, he…”
“He is not from this world, yes. Clearly this child grew up somewhere or sometime far from our own. That does not mean, though, that he does not in some way belong here.”
“I don’t understand, Kaede.”
“Nor do I quite yet, child. But I will endeavor to explain more thoroughly when I do. For now, we should content ourselves to attend to the boy and make sure he is healing.”
“How bad is it?” Kagome asked, the guilt rushing back into her voice. Inuyasha, growing more aware by the second, suddenly felt a pang of guilt of his own for making her feel bad about him jumping in like an idiot. It not like she could have done anything about it.
“I am not certain. Several ribs were badly broken and bruised, and there must have been some internal bleeding, for he coughed too much blood for any other possibility. I feared at first that the bone might have pierced his lung, which there is nothing we could do for at this point. However, since he is still breathing, I do not believe that is the case. Unless…well, there is something I am considering,” the priestess trailed off vaguely. Inuyasha had a feeling she was hiding something, that he seriously doubted was related to his health. Kagome completely missed the subtle thought.
“What do you mean? Is he going to be all right?”
“It is difficult to say, Kagome. That will depend on how he is doing when he wakes.” Kaede paused for a second, and the silence felt heavier then any before it. “If he wakes at all,” she finished her voice weary. Inuyasha became more sharply aware as the guilt nipped at him like a whole other wound.
“…Oh,” answered Kagome, understanding, sounding unreasonably hurt for someone who didn’t seem to like him very much.
This was going too far, Inuyasha thought. Yes, he was in pain. And certainly, if that monster hadn’t been dead already, he would have gone and given it a few kicks for good measure, but he definitely felt alive, enough. He was even waking up fully, his limbs feeling lighter and his eye lids finally willing to raise when he so chose to make them. He wouldn’t be feeling very well for a week or so, he knew, but he certainly wasn’t on the brink of death. No where near it. With a slight edge of pleasure, he realized he was probably hurt enough to buy him a week or so off from school, though. That almost made getting tail whipped by a giant bug worth it, he laughed to himself. Not aloud though. He wouldn’t be trying that for a while. He was deciding how to make his mental presence known, when the women began to speak again.
“When do you think he will be waking up?” Kagome asked, her voice full of resolve as though she was determined to believe he would, in fact, wake up.
“Not for a while yet, even if he is to survive,” Kaede said. Inuyasha resisted the urge to snort. “His injury was quite serious. I had to give him herbs that induce sleep so he wouldn’t move around and further his injuries. Ye shouldn’t expect him to regain consciousness for several hours yet.”
Inuyasha detected an opening. “Guess again,” he said, his voice coming weaker then he wanted it to. “I’m up,” he added, this time forcing more air into the words and sounding almost normal. He opened his eyes to see two shocked pairs watching him, two mouths hanging open slightly.
“What are you two gaping at?” he demanded irritably, trying to sit up. Kagome snapped out of it soon enough to put a hand on his shoulder to stop the movement. It was unnecessary, however, as pain flared in his right side as he attempted it and he gave up thoughts of rising momentarily, laying back down as slowly as he could manage.”
“Inu…Inuyasha?” Kagome asked him curiously, as though she didn’t quite believe her eyes.
“No, it’s the tooth fairy. This is how I dress when I’m off duty. Who the hell did you think it was?” he answered edgily. Kagome’s face cleared slightly, and she looked heartened by his irritable reply.
“Relax, don’t try to sit up. You’re hurt,” she told him unnecessarily, smiling at him despite his attitude.
“Really? Well that explains a lot,” he snapped back sarcastically. Kagome’s face fell slightly into hurt for a moment, and Inuyasha felt guilt snap at him. “It’s really not as bad as it looks,” he said, his voice kinder. “I’m pretty durable. Just give me a few days.”
To demonstrate his point, Inuyasha sat up again, slowly an very carefully this time, but managed to get into a sitting position without too much pain, and he slid back gently to lean on a wall so he didn’t have to support his weight, which helped a lot. Kagome looked like she wanted to stop him, but was too scared of hurting him to touch him at all. Once he was settled, he said “See? No big deal. I’m a good healer. Damn bug just caught me by surprise, is all.”
“Well, at least let me bind it for you, so you don’t make it any worse moving around,” Kagome implored him. He felt like saying no, but he took too deep a breath and winced against the pain, and she looked very guilty again. He didn’t have the heart to turn her down. He settled for saying “feh” knowing she would take it as assent. Heartened, she turned and reached for bandages.
“Ye say you heal quickly, do you?” Kaede asked him, and he felt like there was more to the question then she was saying.
“Yeah, always have. What of it?”
“Just a theory, child.”
“Care to share?” Inuyasha asked, annoyed by the cryptic answer. He was getting really tired of Kaede’s style of beating around the bush. She looked at him but didn’t answer. He feh’d again, irritated.
“Um, Inuyasha?” Kagome spoke tentatively, her face a bright pink color and her eyes avoiding his. It made him nervous, in a way that him suddenly wondering if there was something in his teeth.
“Yeah?” he asked just as gingerly, picking up on her tension.
“Well, I need you to…um….well, the thing of it is…” she tried, but didn’t seem to be able to say what she wanted to. Kaede sighed, smiling slightly.
“She needs ye to undress, child, so she can treat ye.”
“Oh,” said Inuyasha, understanding, a blush rising to his own face now.
“Just your strange kimono, though,” Kagome assured him. “Your hakama are low enough that it’s…um…not necessary to remove them.” She blushed again at the thought. So did Inuyasha.
“Right,” said Inuyasha, as he awkwardly reached for the hem of his shirt. However, his embarrassment was somewhat forgotten as the pain set in when he moved to pull it off. He sucked his breath through his teeth and Kaede reached over to help him, managing to help him remove the garment without brushing his bruised and swollen right side. Once it was discarded, he sat up as straight as pain would allow, and Kagome approached with bandages.
“Lift your arms up, please,” she said.
“I don’t think I’m going to stay up for long if I do,” Inuyasha told her honestly. Without being asked, Kaede moved behind him and placed her hands gently against his shoulders to hold him straight and still without him needing to attempt to engage any abdominal muscles which he was certain would protest. Viciously.
“Thank you, Kaede,” said Kagome, whose blushed embarrassment had faded to guilt again and grew more pronounced every time he winced. She began to wind bandages gently around Inuyasha’s lower chest, trying hard not to cause him any pain. She failed as often as she succeeded, and was biting her lip by the second time around, hard enough she looked about to draw blood. Inuyasha decided to be distracting.
“T-shirt,” he told her, knowing her confusion would make her forget her guilt. He hoped it wouldn’t make her forget to be gentle, though.
“Huh?” she asked, clearly not understanding.
“That thing,” she gestured toward the red shirt on the floor, “is not a kimono. It’s a shirt. A tee shirt.”
“A tee shirt?”
“Yeah, that’s what it’s called.”
“I see.” She didn’t look like she saw anything. But she was distracted, and still moving her hands with the bandages very carefully as she reached around him.
“And those,” he gestured vaguely to his pants, “aren’t hakama. They’re jeans.”
“Jeans,” Kagome repeated, nodding as she tried to memorize the unfamiliar word.
“Yup.”
“And does everyone in your time wear these tee shirts and jeans?” Kaede asked him.
“Pretty much, yeah.”
“Men and women?”
“Yup. Not the same ones though. I mean, we each have our own sizes and styles and stuff. But basically the same, yeah.”
“I see. And how can you tell people apart that way?” Kagome asked, as she wrapped the last few times, still gently, but sounding genuinely distracted by now.
“What do you mean, tell them apart?” Inuyasha asked, confused.
“How can you tell a warrior from a priestess, or a monk from a villager?”
“Oh. Well, we don’t actually have a lot of those around. Everyone is basically a regular person. No priestesses or monks or demons around. I mean, there are still monks and priestesses in places, but not really places like Tokyo. We are the people of the jeans and tee shirts.”
Kagome nodded, trying to understand, as she ended the bandage and gently stuck the edge into an earlier layer, and sealed the binding. It was tight enough to restrict his movement considerably by then. “Is that what your people are called, then? People of the jeans and tee shirts?” she asked him. He snorted.
“Not quite.”
Kagome nodded, but he seemed to have lost her again. He made up his mind to give up.
“All finished,” Kagome told him, apparently having decided not to pursue the subject. Kaede reached over for Inuyasha’s shirt and handed it back to him. He put it on carefully, and found that he didn’t have to be nearly as cautious now that he couldn’t move as freely and hurt himself of brush the wounds. It helped a lot.
“Thanks,” he told Kagome, and she looked sad again.
“It shouldn’t have happened in the first place. I should never have let you anywhere near that centipede demon.”
Inuyasha snorted again. “Oh yeah, and how were you gonna stop me, cornered by the giant bug like that? Don’t worry about it. It’s not your fault I did something stupid. It’s sort of my m.o. of late. First I cut school, then decided to explore the shrine, get pulled into that well, and now I’m stuck in a retarded version of Back To The Future. None of those were the exactly the brightest ideas.”
“Back to the future?” Kagome asked, confused again. Inuyasha suppressed a sigh.
“Nevermind.”
Inuyasha made himself as comfortable as possible sitting with his back against the wall of the hut, and the three passed the afternoon discussing how Inuyasha had arrived and ways in which he could get home. By nightfall, they had agreed that the best course of action was probably for him to jump back down the well, and hope that he was transported through it like he had been the first time around. However, both Kagome and Kaede argued with Inuyasha that he shouldn’t even attempt the journey until he was at least somewhat healed from his ordeal. If it didn’t work, they said, the force of the jump could further his injuries, which the assured him were rather nasty. He argued that, if it did work, then the people in his time would be totally qualified to deal with something as simple as a few broken ribs, or anything worse that the trip caused. Medicine was much better in his time. This distracted Kaede completely, and she began asking about medical treatments in his time in great detail. Inuyasha didn’t know much, and got rather annoyed with the constant questions. Shortly after dark, he had had enough, and insisted on going for a walk, storming out the door. He was flustered enough that it took him several minutes to notice that Kagome was following him.
“Hey, wait up!” she called from behind him. He sped up in response, but it caused his side to protest, so he surrendered and slowed to a stop, waiting for Kagome to catch up.
“What do you want?”
“I don’t want anything. I just don’t think you should go wandering around right now. Its dark and you don’t know the way. Besides, there are demons in the woods, and if you get attacked, hurt as you are, and your alone…well, I don’t….It would be wrong to let something happen to you,” she said, changing her mind at the last moment. She had almost said ‘I don’t want anything to happen to you’ but had caught herself just in time. She didn’t want him to go reading too much into things.
He laughed at her coldly. “Well, the last time I was wondering in those woods, the only thing that attacked me was you. And since you are here, I think I would be pretty safe.”
“I’m sorry about that, but that doesn’t mean you need to go and be stupid about it! There are more things out there, Inuyasha, things like what you saw today. Things that could kill you.”
“I’ll be fine.”
“You could get lost.”
“I have a good sense of direction. I wasn’t paying attention earlier, but I will find my way back just fine.” He started walking away from her, intent on reaching the woods.
“Inuyasha, please!” Kagome called behind him, so desperately that he had to stop and turn to her, that he didn’t have a choice in the matter at all. “Please, Inuyasha. You’re already hurt. If you got attacked now, you could get killed. And even if you can fight, like you did earlier, you won’t be able to do it hurt like that. And you are just hurt because of me and-then-if-you-died-it-would-be-like-I-killed-you-and-I-don’t-want-to-kill you-Inuyasha-so-please-stay-here!” She said the last part so fast that Inuyasha had a hard time making out the words as she spoke them.
“Jeez,” said Inuyasha, taken aback by her emotional display of panic. “Fine, I’ll stay here, ok? Calm down before you give yourself a hemorrhage or something.” Inuyasha turned and walked back to her feeling extremely uncomfortable. The pair stood together for a minute, trying to avoid each others eyes.
“Sorry,” said Kagome after a minute. “I just…I didn’t like the idea of…I just didn’t want you to go, okay?”
“Okay, whatever. But I’m not going back in that hut right now. I swear if that old hag says one more cryptic ‘beware the ides of march’ thing, someone is gonna lose a limb and it ain’t gonna be me.” Kagome stared at him, clearly not getting it.
Rather than ask, she said “How about we go down to the bridge a little further in the village and sit there for a bit?”
Inuyasha shrugged noncommittally, and let Kagome lead the way. The bridge was short, made of rope and wooden slats, the likes of which he had never seen outside shows set in the middle ages. It was short, and crossed over the small valley were a river ran gently, barely seeming to move at all on the calm night. For several minutes, neither of them spoke.
Eventually, Kagome cleared her throat softly and turned toward Inuyasha. “Tomorrow, if you like, we could go and look around a bit. It’s safer during the day. I could show you around the village and close by. You know, just if you want.”
“We could do that,” Inuyasha said slowly. “I mean, I guess we could.”
They resumed sitting in silence. After a few moments, Inuyasha noticed Kagome’s hand as it traveled to her neckline and fumbled beneath her kimono for a second, pulling out the jewel that had started the trouble earlier in the morning. It was hard to believe that, all in one day, Inuyasha had time traveled, helped kill a giant monster (demon, he mentally corrected, coming to terms with the lingo), gotten hurt, and ended up wandering around a medieval village among medieval people. It was like the twilight zone episode that wouldn’t end. Suddenly, a thought occurred to Inuyasha and he groaned loudly, dropping his head to his hands.
“What’s the matter, are you in pain?” Kagome asked worriedly, turning toward Inuyasha, her expression full of concern.
“No, I’m fine. I’m dead, but I’m fine.”
“I’m lost,” Kagome admitted.
Inuyasha sighed heavily. “I have parents, you know. I have a mother, and a father, and they are probably having panic attacks right about now. And when I don’t come home tonight, or tomorrow, they are going to have the cops out looking for me. It’s going to be a disaster! By the time I get home, they are going to ground me till… the rest of my life probably.”
“So, it’s you and your parents in your time? And you all live together?”
Inuyasha sighed again, knowing it was useless to worry about something he couldn’t change at all. “Yeah, us and my brother.”
“Will he be worrying about you, too?’
Inuyasha laughed at that. “Yeah, right. He’s probably checking with the morgue to make sure I’m dead. And then, the second he confirms it, he’s gonna knock out the wall between our rooms, and use the extra space to throw a ‘he’s gone away’ party.”
Kagome gave him a strange look. “We don’t get along. At all. Ever. In our lives,” he explained. She just nodded.
“I’m sorry, you are probably right. I bet they are really worried about you. I forget sometimes what that’s like for other people.” She sighed sadly. Inuyasha looked curiously at her.
“What do you mean, You forget what what’s like?”
She shrugged. “Having parents. Having people worried about you if you aren’t around. I forget.”
“What do you mean? You don’t have parents?”
“I did, of course, when I was small. But I left them when they found out I had spiritual powers to begin my training as a priestess. I came from another village near here. But they brought me to Kaede because our village had no shrine or priestess to teach me. My home village was attacked a little bit after, and they both got killed. Everyone got killed. So I guess this is my home village now.” She sighed heavily, seeming wearied by the idea.
“What attacked your village,” Inuyasha asked, deliberately trying to keep his voice softer then normal.
“A demon did. It’s usually a demon. One sort or another. That’s why I was so quick to attack you in the woods. I’m sorry about it, now. But when I see a stranger who is so very…well, strange as you are, I get nervous. I remember what happened, and I just can’t let it happen again.”
They were quiet for a minute.
“You don’t have to feel bad about that anymore,” Inuyasha said at last, breaking the silence. Kagome turned to look at him slowly. “About attacking me I mean. At first, I totally thought you were a whack-job, to be honest, but after that thing that came here today, I sort of get why you guys would be a little overly defensive. So, you are officially forgiven. Don’t worry about it anymore.”
He met Kagome’s eyes, and she smiled at him slowly. He smiled back, and then looked away.
“See?” he asked, trying to lighten the mood. “I am capable of not acting like a total asshole when nothing is attempting to kill me or drag me through magic portals. In case you were wondering about it.”
She laughed, and silence fell between them again.
“I’m really sorry about your parents,” Inuyasha told her sincerely, and she looked sad again.
“I had a brother too. Younger. I never met him, but my parents sent word when he was born. He would have been almost nine now. But he died too, there, so…” She trailed off.
“Wow,” said Inuyasha, feeling older then he ever had before. “This world really sucks, huh?”
Kagome laughed again, and turned a sweet smile toward him. “It’s really not all bad. Terrible things happen everywhere. But there are good things here too. There are the villagers, many of whom are very nice. You met a few of the worse ones earlier, but a lot of them are very sweet. And there’s Kaede, too. She’s as good as a mother any day. I don’t know what I would do without her. And there’s my duty. It’s not always easy, but protecting people feels really good. It feels like I have a real purpose in the world. I’m glad to have that.” Her hand move to hold the jewel at her neck once more, and she clutched it tightly. Inuyasha noticed.
“What is the deal with that thing, anyway?” He asked her, gesturing toward the jewel. She clutched it closer instinctively, but he tried to ignore that. “If it’s so terribly dangerous, why don’t you just destroy it?”
Kagome laughed lightly, although there was an edge of sadness to the sound. “It’s not that simple. It’s not like I can just smash it with a big rock. It’s more complicated then that. It’s magic!”
“I had figured as much. So how exactly did you end up with this thing? What are you supposed to do with it?”
“It was brought here by a village of slayers a long time ago, and given to the priestess who was here before me, Lady Kaede’s older sister Lady Kikyo. She died a long time ago, and Kaede looked after it as best she could but she couldn’t purify it. Then I came here, and I can, so it’s been in my care ever since.”
“And about getting rid of it?”
“That’s just the thing, though. It has to be purified out of existence. I have to make it pure enough that the battle within ends on the side of good, and it can pass from this world. I have to purify it as completely as I can, and then make a wish on it that is truly selfless to force it out of existence.”
Inuyasha looked blankly at her. “The battle within? Like, within the jewel? What, are dust mites having a go at each other?”
Kagome quirked an eyebrow at him. “Well, it’s kinda small,” he defended.
“Maybe, if you hang out here long enough, I can explain it. But not tonight. It’s late, and I think I should sleep. And I know you should. You need to heal, and you aren’t going to wandering around with me. We can talk about it tomorrow.”
“I’m fine,” he scoffed, ignoring the way the pain in his damaged right side flared at being brought abruptly to his attention. He clutched gently at it as he shifted and sent a stronger wave of agony through him.
“But sleeping couldn’t hurt,” he added, trying to keep his voice cool. Kagome wasn’t fooled, and she got to her feet, and offered him a hand to help him up, which he ignored. With an exasperated sigh, she gently grabbed his arm and helped anyway as he got carefully to his feet.
She led him to a smaller hut beside the one he had woken up in. “You can stay here. I will come in the morning with medicinal herbs for you. Sleep well, Inuyasha.”
“Goodnight, Kagome,” he responded, saying the name for the first time and analyzing the taste of it. It felt strangely familiar, but he wrote it off assuming he had heard it somewhere before.
Inside the hut, with no other clothes and not a toothbrush in sight, he sighed and gave up. Lowering himself gingerly onto the bedroll already spread out in the center of the small room almost painlessly, he lay on his back thinking about the day that had passed. With a twinge of guilt, he imagined his mother calling everyone she knew looking for him, crying into his father’s shoulder wondering where he was when he didn’t come back from school. Had they called to tell her he had never showed up? Probably. She would be even more worried then. She probably thought he’d been kidnapped en route and was ‘lying dead in a ditch somewhere’ as she always insisted she did when he was late. Sighing, knowing there wasn’t a single thing he could do about that, he let himself drift off, half expecting to wake up in his own bed. His side throbbed, eating away at his conviction in the idea. He wondered idly what would happen if he died there, hundreds of years before he was born. Would he pop back before he had left and have it be like it never happened, live the same life he would have had anyway had he not gotten overly curious? Or would he just be dead? With that last, unsettling train of thought, he fell asleep. He dreamed of demons he had seen in various books and paintings in history class, running around and attacking each other, and himself, and the other people he recognized from the past, all the while yelling incoherently about funny hats and pie, and bling.
It was a confusing night.
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