Hour of the Tiger

An Inuyasha Fanfiction by Aino

Disclaimer: Inuyasha and all its characters belong to Takahashi Rumiko, Shogakukan, Bandai and Viz Communications. I am merely borrowing.
Rating: PG-13 for language and mature/dark themes
Category/Genre: alternative timeline (canon setting), drama, angst, horror, romance
Pairings Represented: InuyashaxKagome, past InuyashaxKikyou, "can be taken as" SangoxMiroku
Timeline: This fic starts at manga volume 13, chapters 123-124 (anime episode 33) and is quite strictly manga-verse. Terrible spoilers for the whole series up until this point.

o-O-o

Prologue: Spellbound

The white, insectoid youkai mesh and coil, holding her aloft in a deceptive embrace. Their bodies are bonelessly flexible against hers, soft and spongy like the surface of a fungus. Their slitted, dull crimson eyes are all turned on the figure standing a scant step in front of her, upon the rim of the chasm above which she hovers.

The face beholding her is a more placid, grimmer distortion of her own visage. She hears the faint swish of the wide, white sleeve as a hand is extended towards her. Were she able she would draw back, and, as it is, she flinches as the jewel shard upon her throat pulses, once, sharply. Its purple glow touches the nose and cheekbones of the other's face, an unnatural blush upon milky skin.

The hand closes around the shard of the Shikon jewel, and she feels the pressure of the chain before it snaps against the back of her neck.

"Ah!" The sound escapes her as her heart leaps into her throat. She knows that the youkai cradling her with their long bodies are a flimsy support; she knows that poisonous miasma smokes in the rift below; but somehow this, the barest brush of fingertips against her neck, is the trigger that sends her panic escalating. 'The shard -'

"H-hey! What -"

She is cut off before she can formulate a coherent sentence. The other's voice is calm, cold. "I am the original protector of the Shikon no Tama. It is not for the likes of you."

A pause, as if for effect. "You can let go now."

She has no time to scream as she plummets, the youkai spinning free of her in a rush of whispering bodies.

A splash of the miasma, liquid-vapoury, forms an exquisite, momentary crown beneath her.

The impact knocks her lungs empty as she slams into the brink of the chasm and immediately begins sliding downwards, the soil giving way under her weight. Seizing a root, she hauls her head above the edge, her legs kicking uselessly at emptiness.

'She's trying to kill me!' Looking upwards at the bare-footed figure, a vivid red and white against the backdrop of twisted, interlocking trees, she can no longer doubt. No matter what she thinks of this person, who - so they insist - once was her, she must accept that.

'Kikyou... is trying to kill me.'

"You are me." The voice has not changed; the same, deathly even tone. The root she is gripping gives way with a sigh of dirt, and she thrusts her fingers into the ground in despair.

However she tries, Kagome can not wrench her eyes away from the unreadable countenance of the undead miko. Her life depends on that she climb, and climb now, and still she listens, mesmerised, as Kikyou speaks on.

"In this world, one is enough."

The miasma swashes high, scorching the walls of the rift as it roils upward.

Dragging gouges into the dirt in their wake, her fingers slide against the crumbling edge of earth.

o-O-o

The trees crowd close together as he moves among them, their branches hanging low. The clotting sense of jaki permeates the very air, blurs the sunlight, bleeds the shadows into gnarled, inky monstrosities crouching at the edges of his vision.

There is a flash of colour, a patch of coral-patterned magenta among the umbra of the forest. Staggering on unwilling legs, Miroku weaves towards it, swatting aside a branch that threatens to tangle into his hair. His head still clouds with strange visions, and he cannot keep from squeezing his right hand shut until his nails would draw blood if not for the leathern glove, but he keeps moving. Inuyasha told him to find Sango.

'Concentrate, houshi, damn it. You can fucking meditate with the honoured mother of all hangovers on your head, a little illusion can't dazzle you.'

His ankle catches on a knot of vines, and he steps back, the sight of the thick, entwining vegetation snapping him into alertness. Even in the frail lighting, he would swear he sees them moving, like a creeping nest of tentacles. Picking his steps with care, Miroku advances towards a slumped form visible among the vines.

The bright hue of Sango's armour, highlighted by a ray of the sun from somewhere impossibly far above, lured his eye. Her arms shackled by the coiling vines, the huntress lies gasping and jerking; tears flow freely from her unseeing eyes. Miroku grimaces. He has nothing to cut the vines with, and they have a crushing grip on her arms. He has no idea what horrors Sango is experiencing, but if they are anything like his own nightmare in force and vivacity, he would not prolong her suffering by a single heartbeat.

'Rather a few bruises than a lost sanity,' he decides, bracing his feet on the pliant ground and wrapping his arms around her torso.

The vines creak out a grinding protest as he pulls, Sango whimpers, and with a last ripping tug, she is free. Miroku nearly tumbles backwards from her weight. Retreating a strategical twenty steps from the heap of shivering vines, he sets her down just as her eyes open stickily.

"Kohaku!" The word tears from her mouth, and her head shoots from side to side, her eyes still filmy with wetness.

'Of course,' Miroku concludes to himself. 'What else could it have been?

He continues aloud, attempting a reassuring tone, "It's not real. You were having a nightmare."

She turns at the sound of his voice, and wipes at her face with the heel of her palm. "What - who -"

Recognising that she needs to be soothed, Miroku lays a hand on her shoulder. "We were trapped by some sort of vines causing illusion. You're all right now - save for some bruises, perhaps. I apologise for the rough handling."

"So it wasn't real - he didn't - you -" She slumps, exhaling a great sigh.

Miroku perhaps is not privy to the details of her visions, but he can sympathise with her shaken relief now. She will need something on which to focus, to take her mind off of the nightmare. "It's all right, Sango. We're fine. Inuyasha went to find Kagome-sama. Can you stand?"

"My legs feel like rice dough," Sango groans in answer as she makes to get up, and promptly demonstrates her claim by collapsing into Miroku's lap.

He manages a rattling laugh. "As much as I like you there, Sango, now is hardly the time."

"On the other hand, my arms work just fine, houshi-sama." She crawls backwards over his legs, clumsily rolling into a sitting position away from him. Miroku averts his face to hide his worry: he still feels a little leaden himself, but if she really cannot stand, there might be more wrong with her than just the aftereffects of the illusion. The wrongness in the air burns in his throat; the evil influence, whatever its source, might well be potent enough to incapacitate Sango.

'She is the weakest of us against jaki, in any case. I have my training, and Kagome-sama her purifying power...'

Sango lets out a surprised sound. As if in sympathy, Miroku gasps, too, just as a shrill, rising scream pierces the forest. His head whips in the direction of the noise - and it dies in mid-pitch, a thread of sound raggedly severed.

Sango utters the name an eyeblink before him. "Kagome-chan."

"Come on. Now." Heedless of her complaint, Miroku hoists the taijiya onto his back and strides off towards the scream as quickly as his legs will carry him.

o-O-o

He comes rushing through the trees, as quickly as he can without tripping on every other step. Sango clutches at his shoulders, her messy ponytail dancing behind her head.

Miroku halts all of a sudden as the trees part at the edge of an open space in the forest: the ground has split for a length of many steps, a gaping rift. A spout of white fume archs from the gorge, splattering against the ground with a sizzle like water on hot stones, and he more feels than hears Sango smother a cry into his shoulder.

'Miasma... For the mercy of Buddha, what...'

Then he perceives the pair standing beside the chasm, at least one of them seemingly oblivious to the presence of the other. Surrounded by a mass of serpentine youkai glowing eerie and pallid under the tenebrous trees, a woman in the garb of a miko observes the other. Kikyou, he realises. Sango's grip on his shoulder hardens, but she stays silent.

Inuyasha stands and trembles, staring deep into the miasma. His closed hands bear black streaks where the flesh has been burnt, and the cuffs of his sleeves are in tatters. Blood dribbles gently from his fists, drop by drop.

He is repeating a litany of words like a sacred mantra, his eyes like frozen lanterns that burn but do not see.

"She fell. She fell. Kagome. She fell."

At his feet lies a bow of red, lacquered wood.

Kikyou watches.

"Inuyasha." And that is all Miroku can say. Sango buries her face into the back of his neck; he is consumed with counting her hitched breaths so that he would not have to consider the undead woman and the hanyou, who will not rage, will not cry, as blood wells from his palms down to the place where Kagome fell.

o-O-o

To be continued?

houshi: a low-ranked Buddhist monk, often with combat training; I am not terribly familiar with the hierarchy of the Buddhist sects of Warring States Japan, so I cannot be more specific. The original meaning of the word houshi is "teacher of the law".
jaki: evil aura or influence; in the Inuyasha series, very intense jaki can cause physical distortions in the landscape (suck as darkening the sky) and incapacitate humans
miko: Shinto priestess or shrine maiden; literally translated, this word means "god-child"
-sama: a very respectful, even reverent name suffix; roughly translates to "lord", "lady"
taijiya: exterminator, hunter
youkai: a creature of magical or occult nature and often malignant bent; the English word "demon" remains the most convenient translation

I have been writing Waters, I swear! Chapter Twelve is just acting up.

Welcome to my newest story, gentle reader. This is the one kind of alternative universe (other than "after the end" fics, which are a different story) fic I can see myself writing: the What If. Everyone remembers the cataclysmic events of manga chapters 123-124, in which Inu-tachi are trapped in Naraku's illusion and Kikyou, in her most evil moment throughout the series, steals the Shikon shard from Kagome and lets her fall into the chasm full of Naraku's miasma. Inuyasha arrives at the last moment and rescues his damsel in distress yet again - right?

What if Inuyasha had not made it in time? What if Kagome really had taken the fall?

That was the idea behind this fic. Of course, there is a catch, otherwise there would be no story. Also, just to be clear, this story is based on the manga version of these events. The anime significantly altered the material, and I don't want to know what the English dubbers did to it, so I am sticking to the manga canon.

You can read the manga chapters (text with descriptions) here: http : www . wot-club . org . uk / Inuyasha / (Remove all spaces!)

Feedback is very welcome, and even necessary. :P Thank you for reading.

First draft February 24, 2005
Originally published March 21, 2005
Aino
ricepaperdreams at yahoo . co . uk
groups . yahoo . com / group / ainofics /

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