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Worth Waiting For
By : inumom
Category: InuYasha > General
Views: 6484 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own InuYasha, nor make money from this story.
Chapter List
- 24
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Disclaimer: Nope. Still not mine.

25. Life�s Blood

The family scrambled for the entrance, leaving the remains of the meal behind. Since they had been expecting an attack for some time now, they had started to leave their weapons in the home�s main room near the doorway so that they would be easily accessible should they be needed. Even though they had been planning and even rehearsing for this event, they each experienced a new, almost unfamiliar kind of fear. Now that Naraku knew where they lived, they could no longer be willing to allow their enemy to escape--they had no choice but to destroy Naraku utterly, or die in the attempt.
The group deployed according to the plan Inuyasha and Sango worked out based on their past experiences with Naraku and with fighting youkai in general. Not surprisingly, this plan had, in fact, been the cause of the first serious fight between the hanyou and his mate.
Kagome had always been a little unhappy with the others� tendency to push her aside when things became dangerous. Granted, she didn�t really like fighting--she would prefer not to do it at all if possible--but she had the same responsibility to the safety of the others as they had to her. Of course, she realized that she lacked the years of hard training that had made Sango such a spectacularly effective fighter, but she knew that her skills with the bow had improved greatly so that she could justify being more than a little hurt at being left out of the final battle with Naraku.
Inuyasha was adamant, however. She could indeed fight, but she would do so from inside the cave entrance, behind the barrier she would erect to protect herself and Nozomi. When she protested, he explained that he was not trying to cheat her out of her revenge against the monster that had caused so much pain to those she loved. He knew, he said, that she would be one of Naraku�s primary targets, because the bastard understood how much the others depended on her, so he would do whatever it took to keep her alive, not only for her sake and his own, but also for the sake of Nozomi and the rest of their odd little family, the pup she was carrying, and the other pups they would one day create together. Although the argument had been vocal and extremely loud, she had agreed immediately once she understood his motives.
Still, she was worried about the fighting to come, even more so now that the time had finally arrived. Placing her daughter in her room, she returned to her position by the cave entrance. Pulling her sword from its sheath, she jammed the blade into the packed earth of the entryway, concentrating her developing miko abilities on erecting the exact kind of barrier she required. Retrieving her bow from its place next to the entrance, she slung the quiver of arrows over her shoulder, standing just inside the barrier so that she could watch the events unfolding in the clearing.
Naraku stood at the upstream end of the clearing in his familiar baboon skin robe. The woman scanned the scene, trying to determine the exact situation. At the prickly, hair-raising sensation of a large piece of the Shikon no Tama, Kagome�s eyes opened wide. �This isn�t just another of his puppets, Inuyasha! This is the real Naraku!�
The hanyou made no indication that he had heard the warning save for the slightest twitch of one ear. From his place in the center of the line of defenders, he watched the self-created hanyou approach slowly, wondering vaguely where the bastard�s minions were--it was not like Naraku to attack alone. �What do you want here, you bastard?� His voice was a low growl.
The white-clad figure moved smoothly closer, his voice a silky hiss. �You will give me the rest of the Shikon no Tama,� he said, focusing his attention on the raging hanyou, �And you will give me my Kikyou.�
Seething at being confused with the dead miko yet again, Kagome fired three arrows in quick succession. While it seemed that none of them reached their target, this was not the case. The first of them, glowing with a fiery white light, soared high overhead, splitting the shaft of the giant feather that was carrying Kagura, dropping the wind youkai to the ground. The second, which was directed into the trees to the right of their enemy, hit some target that none of them could identify, creating a sharp tinkling sound. The third, directed at where Kagura stood on the ground, never reached its destination--with a wave of her fan, the youkai diverted the glowing shaft from its intended target, sending it harmlessly into the forest.
The hanyou smirked. �There is no more Kikyou--I killed her.� The smirk widened into a cold smile. �Just like I�m going to kill you.�
Naraku shot an army of tentacles at the defenders. Sango�s Hiraikotsu severed a dozen or so, the pieces dropping to the ground where they writhed around in an attempt to return to the mass from which they had been created. The Buddhist monk grabbed at the strand of jade beads sealing his kazaana so that he could dispose of the fragments, preventing them from rejoining with Naraku. At a low humming all around them, he stopped: the poisonous insects Naraku commanded would be sucked into the hole in his hand along with the pieces of their master, poisoning him. He dropped his hand, instead reaching into his robes for a fistful of exorcising charms--although he would be able to eliminate the pieces by using the weapon that Naraku himself had given him when he had cursed his family, doing so would kill him as surely as a sword through the heart and would not guarantee their victory. One of the pieces of Naraku brushed by his leg and he threw one of the charms at it, muttering the incantation that would activate the power in the symbols written on the paper. The severed appendage quivered briefly, then vanished in a puff of foul-smelling, purple-black smoke. Great, he thought, only a couple thousand to go�.
The little kitsune had been perched on top of the rocky mass that formed the family�s home. Despite his youth and relative inexperience, he was being allowed to use his illusion-generating powers to try to distract Naraku form the main part of the battle. Throwing a handful of leaves into the air, Shippou created a flock of illusionary bat youkai that dove at Naraku�s head. This tactic was successful for several minutes, until one of Naraku�s appendages speared one of the flying nuisances, causing it to disappear in a tiny puff of smoke.
A deathly silence fell over the clearing, and a sudden breeze seemed to spring up from nowhere, ruffling the hair of the group waiting for another attack from Naraku. A deep rumbling growl that started quietly and grew slowly until the very air seemed to vibrate with the sound filled the clearing. While the attention of all was focused on the white-haired figure that seemed to be the focus of the crackling energy that filled the clearing, Sango threw her Hiraikotsu, severing Kagura�s head neatly from her shoulders. Naraku turned to the youkai taijiya with a smirk. �I should thank you for that, bitch--Kagura had grown willful and defiant. I would have had to kill her soon in any case.�
Sango took no notice of this, as the creature before them parted his robe, revealing a small figure crouched at his feet. �Rise,� he commanded, and the young boy stood before him placidly. Focusing his attention once again on the Taijiya, he continued, �It is my understanding that you would like your little brother returned to you. So be it.� In a move almost too fast for human eyes to see, he deftly plucked the shard of the Shikon no Tama from Kohaku�s back before throwing the boy�s lifeless body at his sister.
She darted forward to catch her brother�s corpse, falling to the ground as the weight hit her in the chest. After a brief check to make certain that the boy was indeed dead she stood, trembling in rage. �I no longer have any reason to hold back,� she said, her voice toneless and cold. �It�s time for you to die.�
Naraku stared at the young woman in silence. It seemed that he had miscalculated. He had expected that the death of her brother would paralyze the taijiya with grief. It had, instead, made her an even fiercer adversary than before.
Two more arrows flew overhead, shining with that same eerie pure white brilliance. They tore through the swarm of poisonous insects, purifying them into nothingness. Miroku, freed from the threat of a slow, agonizing death from poisoning, grabbed at the beads sealing his kazaana. �Wait!�
Turning to the mouth of their cave home, he saw Kagome, shimmering slightly from the barrier between her and the rest of the group, fitting another arrow into her bow. �He still has most of the Shikon no Tama. If you seal him into your kazaana we�ll never be able to recover the pieces.�
Naraku didn�t think too much about these pitiful humans in front of him--not when the pathetic hanyou he could somehow never seem to defeat had suddenly become a real youkai. He only flinched for a moment when the purifying arrow lodged into his shoulder, rendering his left arm useless. No matter--he could always create another.
By now almost none of the defenders had escaped injury. Sango lay on the ground where she had fallen after her attempt to save her brother. Miroku was limping from an injured--possibly broken--ankle and bleeding from a long cut above his left eye. Her mate, however, seemed to have received the worst of it, having been pierced by at least a dozen of Naraku�s tentacles. At this point, though, he was beyond caring: he could not feel the pain of his wounds now, although they would probably hurt like hell when he returned to his hanyou form.
The youkai Inuyasha and Naraku squared off. As the energy began to build in the clearing, the woman watching from the cave remembered something from the first real battle they had been in. Even though Inuyasha had been badly hurt and nearly immobilized by Yura�s web of hair, he had managed to create a weapon from his own blood. She distinctly remembered the flashing red blades that had cut the youkai to pieces. Obviously, there was a certain power to be found in blood in this world. That gave her an idea.
As her youkai mate stood before Naraku with the Tetsusaiga unsheathed in its full strength, she took one of the last few arrows from her quiver. Biting her lip, she jabbed the sharp metal into her thigh. As she allowed her miko powers to flare up, she pulled the arrow from her leg, whimpering a little at the burning pain.
As she had expected, Naraku released nearly all of his available energy into the attack on Inuyasha. The youkai waited patiently for a fraction of a second, then swung his Tetsusaiga, releasing his own power into the ultimate attack designed into the weapon by its maker--the Bakuryuuha. The streaks of energy flowed away from the weapon, colliding with Naraku�s own. As she released her arrow, she saw her mate�s energy trapping that of his adversary, forcing it back to its source. The combined energy of Inuyasha�s youkai self and Naraku himself hit the monster at the same time as the arrow which burned with a brilliant red light.
Naraku�s monstrous form exploded into thousands of fragments, splattering the once-beautiful clearing with foul-smelling fluids. Dropping the barrier, Kagome raced out onto the battlefield. �The Shikon fragment--it�s in his back!�
Digging through the smoking remains of what had once been their worst enemy, Kagome retrieved a nearly complete sphere of blackened stone as well as the single sliver that had been taken from Kohaku. At her touch, both of the pieces returned to the pale rosy pink of the purified Shikon no Tama. �This,� the young miko said, wrinkling her nose at the carnage around her, �Is disgusting.� A sudden thought came to her, and she removed the last arrow from her quiver. Standing in the center of the clearing, she shot the arrow straight up over her head. As the arrow returned to its point of origin, burying itself in the ground, a brilliant white light suddenly filled the clearing. When it disappeared, it had taken with it the remains of Naraku.
With a loud yelp, Miroku dropped to the ground, clutching at his right wrist. The pain seemed to subside as quickly as it had come, and he sat on the ground, staring in silence at his covered right hand. Moving slowly, almost as though he didn�t really want to know the outcome, he carefully removed the seal over his hand. Dropping the cloth that covered his kazaana, he stared in silence at a smooth, unblemished palm, something he could not remember ever seeing before.
A quiet sound slightly away from the scene of the fighting caught their attention. Turning, the entire group was surprised to see Kohaku getting shakily to his feet, a look of absolute confusion on his face. A soft rumbling came from the forest behind the garden, and they looked up in shock to see the large Kirara emerging from the trees, bearing a small white figure on her back. The little youkai held the mirror that had been completely shattered by Kagome�s arrow at the beginning of the battle.
Suddenly dizzy from a combination of the stress of the past weeks spent simply waiting for Naraku�s attack, the battle itself, the sudden exercise of her so far unused miko abilities, blood loss from her self-inflicted wound, and shock at both the appearance of Kanna and Kohaku�s revival, Kagome stepped forward slowly. Darkness began to encroach on her field of vision, and sounds seemed to recede into the distance. Shaking her head slowly in an attempt to clear it, Kagome slumped silently to the ground. Fortunately, her mate was a youkai, and caught her easily despite his own wounds before she came anywhere near the soft earth of the clearing.
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Worth Waiting For	By : inumom Category: InuYasha > General Views: 6484 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own InuYasha, nor make money from this story.

Worth Waiting For