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Blood is the New Black	By : QueenoftheDream Category: InuYasha > Het - Male/Female > Sessh?maru/Kagome > Sessh?maru/Kagome Views: 5749 -:- Recommendations : 1 -:- Currently Reading : 3
Disclaimer: I do not own Inuyasha, nor the characters from it. I made no money in writing this fiction.

Chapter List
- 9
- 10
- 11
Kagome awoke the following night with a question on her lips. Shuffling out into her dark living room, she expected to see Sesshomaru in his customary slouch at her plastic kitchen table. To her surprise, he wasn't there, and she could tell by the silence around her that he wasn't in her apartment unit at all. She retreated into her bedroom to peel the grungy grey t-shirt from her skin. She winced as the dried blood pulled at the tender flesh around her wounds, but they were mostly healed. After shrugging into a clean blouse and capris, she walked four feet out into the hallway to knock on Sesshomaru's front door. She saw that there was some big mention of a shooting on the front page of the newspaper lying on his doormat, but she wasn't able to investigate further as Sesshomaru answered the door before she had the opportunity to knock.
Grey, well-worn sweatpants hung low on his hips, and the bottoms pooled around his ankles almost childishly. He was anything but childlike, however. Her eyes raked upward, over his toned abdomen to the corded arm that reached up to scratch at his temple sleepily. His hair was disheveled, but not in an unattractive way. It was more like an "I just rolled out of bed after a wild night of sexcapades" sort of way. Her cheeks tingled as they threatened to flush. Kagome was gawking, though a little voice in the back of her head was screaming to run and hide from shame since she probably looked like she'd gotten shit-faced drunk, engaged in a bar fight, and had to run back home in time for curfew. Really, that wasn't too far off when she thought of it, and she gave a wry internal chuckle.
Sesshomaru grumbled, "Are you going to just stand there and stare like an imbecile? You woke me up for this?" Kagome nearly recoiled, but he continued. "Next time, ask to ogle and I'll be happy to oblige, provided I'm awake," he drawled sarcastically.
Okay. Definitely not a morning, er, evening person. Kagome suddenly felt very self-conscious and guilty for waking him after his rough night. After all, how often did he have to dig a bullet out of his neighbor in the wee hours of the morning? The more she thought about that, she didn't want to know.
"Er, um, I just had a question-" she began but was cut off.
"Just come inside. You can imagine how lingering in an open doorway might work out poorly for me, yes?" Oh, that. Blood hunt and all. She cringed at her thoughtlessness. He ushered her inside and pulled the door shut behind them.
Kagome was surprised when she stepped into his home. She had whole heartedly expected it to be a miniature bachelor pad filled with the latest electronics and newest posh furniture styles with an edgy paint scheme on the walls. Maybe some tasteful female nudes would hang on the walls, accentuated by the smooth crooning of a high-dollar stereo system. Instead, his humble abode was rather… humble. The walls were white-washed, punctuated only by the sheets of metal riveted over the windows and the shabby curtains hanging pitifully over them. The furniture was minimal, and the carpet was clean. Overall, the apartment looked like nobody lived there.
The only thing signifying that a human, dead or otherwise, was living there was the enormous bookshelf taking up the main wall that would otherwise have held a large television or entertainment center. There were easily over two hundred books, and there were some short stacks of books and magazines on the floor next to the shelves. She wondered how he was able to transport all of these books from his previous haven into this apartment without being completely conspicuous.
He cleared his throat behind her, and she snapped out of her inner thoughts to face him. He ran his hand through his hair and pursed his lips.
"Well," Kagome began lamely, "I just wanted to know what I'm supposed to do now. I mean, I think I have a pretty good handle on the Camarilla and Anarchs, and I have some first-hand experience with the Sabbat guys. I was just thinking: now that I've got this information, what do I do with it?"
"I don't follow," Sesshomaru stated, one eyebrow perched high on his forehead in a quizzical look.
"What do I do next?" Kagome asked as she raised her shoulders in a shrug.
"Survive? Drink blood?" We've been over this already-"
"No!" Kagome cut him off, earning a disdainful look from her sire. "No, I mean, what's the next step?"
He barked out a wry laugh. "There isn't one. This isn't a game for fun. There's no formula to any of this. These are major power players. I've simply given you a crash course about all of the people that can kill you now. You just survive and try not to step on too many toes. That's just a thing you do now," he explained, and Kagome felt her confidence deflate like an old flan.
"There has to be more than that," she pleaded as Sesshomaru sat down on his plain sofa.
He looked up at her witheringly. "And why would that be? How is this any different than being in the living world? You know to pick out the people in charge around you, and you try not to screw up and get yourself killed or fired from your job." Kagome scoffed. He did have a point in a roundabout way, but it didn't help her feeling of growing unease.
"Whatever. Have you penciled anything into my 'Itinerary of the Undead' today, O Wonderful Master?" she intoned sarcastically, and Sesshomaru shot a condescending and cold glare that pierced her.
"No, but having a shit attitude, same as when you were still living, will not earn you any friends."
She averted her eyes. He was right, but dammit! She wanted answers. Her pride wouldn't let her apologize, so she walked back to the door of the undecorated apartment. "I'll be at the bar tonight," she said over her shoulder as she stepped through the doorway. Not that he cared, she thought with a mental "hmph."
"Don't kill anyone," he called out. "You don't have to kill when you feed, you kno-" he was cut off when she shut his apartment door, shuffling into the hallway.
Kagome ran her fingers through her hair and stepped into her bathroom to fix herself up. She was horrified and put out by the fact that her foundation no longer matched her skin tone and looked like stage makeup or tempera paint when she laid it on her skin. Translucent powder it is, then. With a simple t-shirt and capris matched with a pair of flats, she left her apartment to head to her bar.
Her hangout was a little hole in the wall bar that had had so many names, she forgot what it was now. It was on the route home from her university campus, and was a quiet little haven from college life. A haven that smelled like booze and old wood-paneled walls, but a haven all the same.
As she entered the establishment, she felt a pang of panic. What if some of her students or friends or, heaven forbid, her boss, saw her there and recognized her? She was supposed to be dead. With cold, wide-eyed precision, she looked around the room, and when she was satisfied that she didn't know anyone, she took a seat two spots away from a slumped over gentleman at the bar.
"Er, water," she said to the barkeep, who raised a slender eyebrow in questioning but handed her a cold glass all the same. Way to go, Kagome. You couldn't have ordered a Bloody Mary or something? She couldn't stop the small smirk that curved her lips at her secret internal pun. Honestly, though, she was feeling a bit peckish; she figured that all of her, ahem, extra-curricular activities with Vince combined with the gaping bullet wound had drained some of the blood she'd accrued.
As she looked around the room to the little clusters of humans, she wondered why she even showed up in the first place. She had no place here. This was a sanctuary where people, living humans could run away from their problems for a night. Her problems were of an entirely different breed, and they were the kind that couldn't be solved or temporarily numbed by alcohol consumption. She wondered how many people here were intoxicated enough that she could sneak in a little snack.
It was while contemplating if she was indeed a different breed or species from normal human beings that the man sitting a few seats to her right turned. She recognized him as the guy that met her in the secret cave up by Sunset Cliffs when Kikyou had her pick up the manila package. Matthew? Mathias? Something similar to that. For whatever reason, her spirits lifted immensely upon seeing him.
It was immediately detectable that he was a few drinks in. His eyes were glazed and drooping as he sluggishly brought a green bottle of Carlsberg to his lips. He seemed to have trouble focusing on her, but she could tell that he thought her familiar. In all honesty, he looked absolutely terrible.
"Ka… Ke… Girl under the cave. I'm sorry, I'm terrible with names," he mumbled, shaking his head as if to clear it. His accent was thicker than she remembered.
"Kagome," she gently corrected. She stood and went to stand by the stool next to him. Her mouth lifted in a slight smile as she raised her eyebrows and gestured to the seat with a nonverbal question: Can I sit here? He shrugged, and she sat down next to him. "What are you doing here, um, Mathias? Is that right?" He nodded slowly, setting his bottle on the bar. Upon closer inspection, he had dark bags under his bloodshot eyes, and he looked like he hadn't slept in several days. His face was covered in stubble that would have made him look almost rugged if he didn't already look as if he'd been hit by a truck.
"My world has crumbled around my feet," he drawled, and he gave her an intense look as if he was trying to commit her image to memory but was having trouble getting the rest of the room to stop moving around.
"Maybe we should get you some fresh air, Mister…?"
"Lauritsen. Mathias Lauritsen. Call me Mathias." Lauritsen. The name was terribly familiar, and she racked her brain as she helped him to stand and place some cash on the bar before walking him out the door where there was a bench just outside.
He sank down onto the bench with a sigh, and Kagome sat a respectable distance from him, waiting to see if he would open up. When she'd seen him just a few nights previously, he seemed like such a gentle, happy man, but this version of him was simply broken. The cool evening wind washed over their faces, and he rubbed his cheeks vigorously.
"I feel better already. Thank you, really. I'm afraid I've made a terrible impression on you."
Kagome chuckled. "Not at all. I'm just surprised; I've never seen you here before."
Mathias shrugged with one shoulder. "I don't usually come here. Just happened to be in the neighborhood and figured I'd, um, drop in for a while." His gaze sharpened on Kagome's face. "Here you're worried about me, but you look pale. Are you alright?"
Shit. "Eh, no, I'm fine. Just a little bit cold, I guess," Kagome lied, and instantly felt like smacking herself in the forehead. Without a hesitation, he shrugged off his jacket and put it over her shoulders despite her weak protests, so she meekly stuck her arms through the warm sleeves and turned to face him, tucking her legs up under her. "Thanks," she softly said, wrapping her arms around her middle. She felt like a cat that had found the perfectly warm sunny patch on the carpet and was soaking up the heat.
He said nothing in return, but once more shrugged one sad shoulder with a shake of his head. The two sat in a strange silence for a while, just listening to the distant nighttime traffic.
Without warning, he blurted, "My wife was killed a few nights ago." Kagome's jaw fell as his face tightened. She laid a hand on his shoulder, careful to tuck it into the sleeve so she wouldn't deter him with her lukewarm flesh.
"I'm so sorry to hear that. Really, I am." He stared straight ahead.
"She was murdered up in Ocean Beach. Sunset Cliffs neighborhood is where they found her. She was sprawled out a ways off the road next to the cliff with a bullet in the back of her head." Kagome felt her world go icy.
Lauritsen.
"…was your wife by any chance Vera Lauritsen?" He turned to look at her with a strange expression on his face as he nodded in confirmation. Of course, the woman who tried to kill her and ended up dead at Sesshomaru's hands was his wife.
Wait. Did that make him part of the Society of Leopold? At that thought, she involuntarily yanked her hand off of his shoulder.
"Yes, why? How do you know about that?" he asked with suspicion and disbelief lacing his tone.
Kagome's thoughts raced a mile a minute. The murder was still new, so odds are that it wouldn't be released in the newspaper or local news stations in full detail. "I was visiting my aunt in that neighborhood yesterday actually. She told me all about it. Her house is only half a block away from the crime scene," she lied, hoping that she sounded genuine. The ruse seemed to work because he just pressed his lips together and nodded.
"I really am sorry that this has happened. I don't know what to say to you to help you," Kagome floundered for words as she nervously picked at her fingernails. Honestly, she wasn't sad that Vera was dead; after all, the bitch had tried to blow her damned brains out. For some reason, though, it really ate at her that because of this, it had hurt this man. She barely knew him but felt a strange sadness and longing to end his pain. The compulsion to soothe his hurt warmed her dead heart for some reason.
To her surprise, his warm hand covered her fingers and lifted her right hand. She attributed it to the alcohol, but the action made her eyes go wide and heat diffuse into her cheeks all the same. "I can't stand it when people pick at their fingers," he said with a sad chuckle and let his head fall back so that it rested against the brick of the building.
"You want to know the horrible thing about this?" he asked. Kagome was unable to answer him, as he launched straight into his explanation. "The horrible thing about it, what's eating me up, is that I'm not very sad that she's gone."
Wow. Kagome fought to keep her eyebrows from flying up to her hairline and schooled her face into what she hoped was a supportive expression.
"I am upset that she is killed, yes, but it feels more like when a distant cousin or coworker dies. It is sad that her life had to end in such a bad way, but my heart tells me that it is okay." Mathias stared unblinkingly at the light pole in front of them with hard determination. "My wife is dead, and I'm not as affected as I should be. I feel like a monster." His mouth twisted in a self-loathing frown, and Kagome twisted her hand to grip his tightly, feeling the warm roughness of the skin under her own.
"Trust me, you're not a monster. I would know," she automatically said, but back-tracked immediately when she realized that she had practically started to tell him that she herself was a true monster, something that should legitimately be feared. "What I mean is that you are not a bad person for not ripping your hair out in grief. Some people process it differently, and different, um, circumstances might make it so that your grief is lessened."
Mathias looked at her out of the corner of his eye. "It's okay, you can say it. Vera and I were not on very good terms. We didn't despise each other, but for the past few years, our marriage has been, how do you say, rocky."
Kagome nodded. She'd guessed as much once he'd admitted his lack of empathy for her death. "The police aren't investigating you, are they?"
He shook his head. "No. I was at work; I work road construction, so my hours are a little hectic. It's all been verified by my employer and the police, so I'm basically cleared. That is the one positive in this situation it seems." Kagome quietly murmured her agreement, and the conversation fell into a lull. They both pretended to forget that they held the other's hand.
Meanwhile, Kagome felt her veins start to tingle and itch. It would probably be in her best interests to feed soon, but she couldn't bear to tear herself away from this man, this stranger that had so captivated her with his sadness and warmth.
She was pulled out of her strange train of thought when he tugged on her hand, and she looked up to face him, startled. He looked down at her seriously, his dark grey eyes surprisingly clear and bright. "I hope you won't think me a bad man for this." Without preamble, he bowed his head and laid a gentle kiss upon her lips. Kagome was startled and went stiff before relaxing her arm to grip the front of his shirt in a loose fist. His hand shook slightly in hers. He was warm and sweet and tasted like beer and sadness and forbidden territories. He pulled away for breath, and she consciously moved her chest up and down to mimic breathing. Luckily, her natural predisposition to flush had already covered the "maidenly blush" portion.
His pupils were wide, and his breath sharpened when she boldly scooted toward him, pushing him against the side of the bench. She pressed her mouth against his with a slightly greater degree of urgency and placed her fingertips just barely upon his face. One leg hooked up over his lap, and within a few moments, she was perched on his thighs, his large hands holding her in place.
Kagome broke the kiss so he could breathe, and she laid tiny butterfly kisses down his jaw and onto his neck. She knew that she should be feeling guilty for using him in such a way, but her hunger was growing. Her tongue flicked out to lick his skin, and he shuddered under her. With as much care as she could manage, she sank her teeth into his flesh. He moaned and jerked under her before going limp, and his blood flowed sweetly into her mouth. She heard Sesshomaru's words from earlier.
"You don't have to kill when you feed." Surfacing from the misty haze, she retracted her fangs and was horrified to see blood leaking from twin holes in his neck. How the hell was she supposed to not kill him if the guy bleeds out?! With quivering hands, she placed her mouth back over the wound and lathed her tongue over the punctures, trying to buy time in order to save him.
She was pleasantly surprised to find the blood flow quickly staunched, and when she pulled away, the holes were fading to small pinpricks. After a few moments, Mathias drifted back into consciousness, Kagome sitting next to him feeling thoroughly embarrassed and sheepish. Here he was, trying to get over the death of his wife, and she had entertained the thought of killing him simply to sate her appetite so that she didn't have to do it the next day.
A slight smile grew on his lips, and she was strangely relieved to see that he didn't seem to remember the vampiric nature of their encounter. It pleased her on some odd level that he thought of her as a normal woman. The two sat in awkward, giddy silence before Kagome broke the silence. For whatever reason, she felt a little bit drunk herself, so she blurted rather than politely asked, "Where are you from? You have an accent, but I can't place it."
"Er, I'm from Denmark. Been here for 6 years." His face was still sad, but there was a small light behind his eyes that made Kagome's rotting heart leap. After a moment of more embarrassed silence, they said their goodbyes, and Kagome removed his jacket to hand it back to him. Accepting it, he also took her hand and laid a gentle, drunken kiss on the cool skin of her hand after promising to call a cab so he could get home.
Kagome left him, walking for a while before she called her own taxi. She couldn't get rid of the excited giddiness racing through her veins. Perhaps it was because she was dallying with a fresh widow, or perhaps it was because he was human and she was… not. Either way, she knew Sesshomaru would probably shit a brick if he found out, so it would be her little secret for now.

This chapter was inspired by the song "Wrap Your Troubles in Dreams" by The 69 Eyes.
Not much to say here. I started this chapter a while back and then completely forgot that it existed. My bad. It's a pretty meh chapter by itself, but its setting up a whole plot arc. Cross my heart and hope to die.
For those who are still with me, thank you so very much for your continued support! We'll be hearing from Kikyou again in the next chapter, so who knows what she's got in store for Kagome.
- 9
- 10
- 11
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Blood is the New Black