Angel of the Jaded One: Chapter VII

The closing credits of the romantic comedy were rolling. Kagome yawned as she rewound the dvd, not wanting Kouga to know she watched the ending while he had gone out to the convenient store for emergency supplies of cookies and milk. She would simply have to act surprised when the guy returned the girl's missing dog and won over her heart in the process. Maybe she should go practice her surprised face in the bathroom mirror.

She was contemplating her surprised face when there was a sharp rap on the front door. Kagome glanced at the seldom used VCR clock. She should probably ask Kouga to fix the time, she was pretty sure the time was not repetitively blinking twelve o'clock. "Who in their right mind would be knocking at this time of night?" She tossed aside the blanket she was huddling under to go and answer the door. Maybe it was Kouga and his hands were full so he couldn't unlock the door himself. He might have found a sale on chocolate chip cookies!

"I'm coming," Kagome called, eagerly running towards the door. She peeked through the eyehole but could only make out the long dark hair. It must have been Kouga. She didn't know anyone else with hair like that. She unlocked the door and opened it with a wide grin. "I hope you brought chocolate chip!" Her smile faded, "Can I help you?"

Standing on the doorstep was a man with long dark hair and eyes. He was rather handsome, but there was something about him that made her feel uneasy. He casually rested the palm of his hand on the doorframe and grinned at her leisurely. "Yes my darling there is something you can do for me."

"Were you looking for Kouga?" Kagome asked, thinking the man looked strangely familiar.

"Yes, Kouga and I are old friends." He peered past her shoulder and frowned. "Is he not here?"

"He'll be back shortly, he went to the store for some emergency cookies and milk," she explained with a friendly smile. The stranger's face fell and he looked extremely disappointed at the news.

"I'm sorry, I'm being rude," Kagome apologized. "Come in and wait inside out of the cold night." She opened the door a little wider for him.

"Thank you, I am particularly sensitive to extremes in temperature." He extended his hand. "My name is Naraku. And what is a beautiful desert flower such as you named?"

Kagome blushed at his compliment, "Kagome." She shook his hand feeling an odd sort of electrical charge pulse between their connected flesh. "Come in," she offered, pulling her hand out of his grasp. "I'm sure that Kouga will be home soon."

"I'm sure he will be returning to his home very soon," Naraku agreed following her inside. She led him towards the kitchen and where they sat at the table across from one another. "Lovely place," he commented staring at the blank walls. "I see he has put forth great efforts into decorating."

"He's a simple man," Kagome defended. Naraku only crossed his arms over his chest and raised his brow. "Have we met before?" She finally asked, the feeling of familiarity nagging at her conscious.

"It is a small world," Naraku mused. The tones of a cellular phone ringer broke up the tension growing between them. He answered his flip phone. "Yes?" He was quiet as he obviously was listening to the other end of the conversation. "Actually, I'm here. Yeah, well I'm not the one who was foolish enough to leave such a lovely young woman alone." He winked at Kagome. "Uh huh. Sure, we can meet you." He laughed. "Right near the court we used to play at." He closed his phone and stood.

"That was Kouga, he wanted to know if we might meet him near the old basketball courts at the local park." Naraku smiled invitingly and offered his hand to help her to her feet.

Kagome bit her bottom lip. Why would Kouga call Naraku? Wouldn't he tell her if he was expecting a friend? "I don't know…" She looked directly into Naraku's dark eyes and felt herself becoming lost to their depth. "I suppose," she reluctantly agreed accepting his hand.

oooooOOOOOooooo

Inuyasha leapt out of the backseat, thanking Geeves for a picking him up from the café. He reached his apartment just in time to see Kagome and whom he assumed was Kouga walking away from him down the alley.

He stood with his hand raised at Kouga's door unsure of what to do. It was pointless to knock if no one was home. Should he return to his home or follow them? He didn't like the idea of Kagome walking off into the night with Kouga. Naturally he decided to follow them at a distance.

"I'm surprised that Kouga didn't tell me that he was expecting company," Kagome remarked, her voice carrying towards Inuyasha. His attention was intensified at the realization that Kagome was walking with someone else. From the sound of things he didn't think it was someone she knew either.

"He does sometimes become preoccupied," Naraku answered her calmly. "You look a bit cold," he told her, looking down with a concerned expression upon his face. Kagome shivered involuntarily and was about to protest when Naraku slipped off his jacket and placed it over her shoulders, and the hood placed over her head. "You'll be much warmer now," he whispered softly.

"Hey!" Inuyasha shouted, running to catch up with them. "Kagome!"

Naraku turned and glared at Inuyasha. "May I help you?" Naraku asked coldly. He had his arm wrapped loosely around the woman's shoulders and turned her to face Inuyasha.

The doctor did a double take. He could have sworn that it was Kagome's voice he had heard earlier and that it was she that was walking with this man. The woman before him was slightly taller than Kagome, her hair shorter and darker, her ears pointier, and her eyes were not a vibrant blue but more akin to amber or perhaps even red, but he had never seen someone with red eyes before. "Excuse me, I thought you were someone else," Inuyasha reluctantly apologized.

"Come Kagura, we have a long night ahead of us," Naraku led the woman away from a dumbfounded Inuyasha.

"I need to back off all that caffeine," Inuyasha declared, angry at himself for over-reacting. He hurried to his apartment and slammed open the door, cringing when his college diploma came crashing off the wall onto the floor. What he needed was a long, hot shower. Obviously he was over-worked and needed to relax. He couldn't just walk around and continue with his hallucinations. Heck, even that man from the streets reminded him of the burn patient at the hospital, but that was utterly ridiculous.

He walked over the fallen frame of his diploma; he'd secure it to the wall later. He kicked his shoes off and headed straight to his bathroom. There was a hot shower with his name all over it.

Inuyasha had just stepped out of the steamy shower and slipped on his boxers when he heard a fierce pounding on his front door. "I'm coming," he called, wrapping his long hair into a towel. He opened his door to reveal his neighbor.

Kouga's words seemed to have escaped him at the sight of Inuyasha wearing a large towel around his hair like a turban. He couldn't help but laugh. "It's almost worth all the stress I was under to see you look like that," he managed to say amongst his chuckling.

"Yeah, ha ha, what do you want?" Inuyasha asked, bending at his waist to unwrap his hair and rub the moisture out with the damp towel.

Kouga's humor was lost at the question and he turned stone-cold sober. "I don't suppose Kagome is over here is she?"

Inuyasha's towel hung limply in his hand and he straightened up. "No." The edgy feeling he had earlier was returning upon seeing Kouga's agitation.

"I don't know where she could be then," Kouga said to himself, looking down the street that ran in front of their homes into the alley. "I was only gone for a short while and I would think she'd have left a note if she was going to leave. That's why I thought she might be over here."

"Why don't you come in?" Inuyasha invited. He closed the door behind Kouga and gestured him towards his recliner. "Something odd happened about a half hour ago. I was just coming home and thought I saw Kagome and you walking down the street. I needed to speak to her so I followed for a short while, until she said something to you, or at least to the man I thought was you, about meeting you."

Kouga held up his hand for him to stop. "Say again?"

Inuyasha growled in annoyance. "I'm saying I saw two people walking together and I followed them, thinking it was you and Kagome. Then I called out her name, but when I caught up, I saw that it was neither you nor Kagome."

"Why did you think it was Kagome and myself?"

"Because it looked like the two had come out of your apartment and I could have sworn that it was Kagome's voice that I had heard earlier," Inuyasha explained.

"That's very suspicious," Kouga agreed as he began to drum his fingertips on the arm rests. "And without controversy great is the mystery of godliness," Kouga muttered under his breath.

"What did you say?" Inuyasha asked, with a raised brow.

"Ah, I was just reminded of a scripture verse," Kouga answered. Inuyasha shifted uncomfortably at the mention of religion, not wanting to be preached to at the moment. Kouga noticed his discomfort and smiled disarmingly. He leaned forward in the recliner. "What if the woman you saw was Kagome?"

Inuyasha shook his head. "She wasn't," he assured him. "She looked nothing like her up close."

"Did this man do anything to this woman between the time you heard her voice and the time you saw her face?"

"He put a coat around her." Inuyasha began to laugh. "You aren't implying that he used some sort of magic trick to switch the women, are you?" Kouga frowned and Inuyasha gave a bitter laugh. "Kagome made you watch too many magic shows on television."

"Kagome certainly has seemed to disappear and I do not see you offering any more viable explanations."

"Don't get testy."

Kouga rose to his feet angrily and towered over Inuyasha. "I am not getting testy," he snarled, his blue eyes flashing.

"Maybe we should call her friend Sango. It could be that she called with one of those girly emergencies," Inuyasha suggested with a shrug.

"Possibly, but that does not explain the lack of a note. Where were the two headed when you saw them last?"

"That was at least a half-hour ago, they are long gone by now," Inuyasha argued. Kouga simply glared at him stubbornly. "Fine, I'll go with you, just let me get dressed." He grinned, trying to lighten the atmosphere, "It is cold outside."

"Hurry, I do not like waiting on slow people," Kouga tossed over his shoulder as he slammed the front door behind him. He sat on the front steps staring down the empty street, smirking at the sound of Inuyasha cursing at him for calling him slow.

Things were not sitting right with Kouga, instinct dictated that something was terribly wrong. He knew that he should not worry because in God's hands he was to rest his troubles and woes. However, he was having a hard time at the moment. There was a sharp pain near his shoulder blades. He had meant to ask Kagome about what sort of medical ailments might result in pain there. He couldn't remember pulling a muscle, plus it felt deeper than a muscle ache.

It was almost as if something was trying to pop out of his back. Inuyasha opened his front door and Kouga lost his trail of thought. "Let's go then."

oooooOOOOOooooo

'Stupid.' Kagome knew that was the perfect adjective to describe herself for her latest actions. Only someone who was stupid would have left the safety of her apartment with a complete stranger that slightly gave her the creeps. She strained against the chains that were binding her wrists together behind her back.

"Comfortable?" Kagura asked standing in front of her.

"Who are you?" Kagome demanded, her eyes looking past the mysterious red-eyed woman towards the man leaning against the wall, watching her. "I should have known you weren't really friends with Kouga," she told him.

"Really? Well then I guess it's a good thing you are so gullible then," Naraku returned with a smirk. He pointed vaguely towards her while talking to Kagura, "I promise she is smart. I'd have died at that hospital if it wasn't for her."

"You'd have died if I hadn't intervened," Kagura countered. "You probably would have committed suicide and I'd have had possession of you sooner." She walked towards him and trailed her finger down his jaw-line. "We both know how conceited you are about your looks."

Kagome cleared her throat. "If you two would like to be alone, you can just release me and I'll give you all the privacy you want." She flashed them a winning smile that faltered when Kagura turned back towards her. The look the other woman sent her was enough to make the strongest of people want to break down into tears.

"I have other plans," Kagura assured her.

Kagome felt her mouth go dry and she swallowed thickly. "What sort of plans?" She asked in a small voice.

Kagura sashayed towards her, rolled her shoulders back, and then two black feathered wings seemed to pop out of her shoulder blades. The sight make Kagome wonder if she was hallucinating. "Nothing much, I just want to corrupt your soul and condemn you to eternal damnation."

The young woman's jaw dropped at the declaration. Kagura laughed at her distress. "Don't be silly!" She cried, coming over and ruffling Kagome's hair, scraping her sharp fingernails across her scalp in the process. "Human, your soul is worth very little to me." She kneeled in front of Kagome, placing a hand on each of the woman's knees and digging in her nails until blood was drawn. "You're only the bait."

"Bait?" Kagome echoed, gritting her teeth, refusing to cry out from the sharp pain.

"Why the soul I never thought I'd have a chance to capture. One that didn't exist before and soon won't exist later. But it exists now." Kagura stood and turned back to Naraku. "Do what you want with her."

Naraku looked towards the bound human and licked his lips. "There might be a problem with that other doctor."

Kagura laughed at his statement. "Honestly, a human being a problem? You over-estimate the worth of your species."

Kagome watched the strange creature leave her alone with Naraku. "You're Onigumo," she whispered, hardly believing the possibility.

He moved away from the wall and stalked towards her chair. "I'm afraid your medical therapy wasn't quite good enough when compared to other options."

"I can see that," Kagome answered. "What exactly was this option that you took?"

Naraku gently massaged her bruised knees and bent his face close to hers. "I chose you."

oooooOOOOOooooo

Kouga stood silently, the wind tossing his hair as he stared out into the woods. "She's not here," Inuyasha tugged hard on Kouga's sleeve. "We need to head back and start calling people."

"It doesn't make sense, something I should know but don't know," Kouga spoke to himself. He abruptly faced Inuyasha. "It was Kagome that you saw."

Inuyasha let go of his sleeve and quirked his brow. "And how is that you explain her switching bodies with some other woman?"

Kouga ignored the question and began to walk back in the direction they came. "I need you to check with the hospital to be certain she's not there."

"Maybe this has nothing to do with Kagome," Inuyasha voiced his suspicion. He grabbed hold of Kouga's shoulder. "Do you have enemies?"

Kouga shrugged out of his grasp, "Do you?" He countered.

"Look, I don't know anything about you. I swear that if I discover you have a dirty past that lead to Kagome being endangered then I'll…"he trailed off.

"First off, do not swear. It is disrespectful. And secondly, I don't have a dirty past," his voice dropped several degrees. "At least I don't think I do."

"What was that last part?"

"Nothing."

"No, you said 'At least I don't think I do,'" Inuyasha repeated. "Do you not remember? Do you have amnesia or something?"

"Maybe," Kouga admitted. He scratched his head; his face bore a puzzled expression.

"You know, I didn't really pay attention before, but I don't remember anyone living next door to me before Kagome moved in with you." They continued to walk alongside one another back towards their apartments. "Where were you before that?"

"I don't know." Kouga answered with gritted teeth, the pain near his shoulder blades was intensifying.

"Fine," Inuyasha relented. "I'll go by the hospital. Why don't you check with Kagome's family and other friends?"

"They won't know where she is," Kouga said, his voice sounded oddly flat.

"You know more than you are telling me!" Inuyasha shouted. He punched his fist into Kouga's shoulder, causing him to stumble slightly. "You're just going to walk away like nothing happened after I punched you?" Inuyasha raged.

"I'm turning the other cheek," Kouga answered calmly.

"What is it with you and all this Bible toting stuff? If I wanted to be preached to I'd go to church!" Inuyasha hit Kouga again in mid-section. "You just going to turn your cheek again?"

"Yes," Kouga hissed. "And perhaps I wouldn't preach to you if I didn't give a damn about you."

"Well you preach to everyone!" Inuyasha punched him in the lower back in a kidney shot. "How many times are you going to ignore me?"

He aimed his fist for another hit when Kouga whirled on him and caught it by wrapping his fingers around Inuyasha's wrist. "I preach to everyone because I give a damn about everyone. Your abuse is not helping in the location of Kagome." He released his wrist and kept walking.

Inuyasha stared after him dumbfounded. Who was this guy?