Maternal Instinct

Some Miro-San WAFF

Edit Fixed some typos.

Another day, another twenty miles, another evening in the endless search. Sometimes Sango just wanted it all to be overwith. Forget about avenging her brother. Forget about defeating Naraku. Just let her start over, wipe the slate clean, and forget about everything . . . everything at all, because if she forgot then nothing would matter. She could live her own life the way she wanted.

She never thought like that for long. She'd been granted another chance at life by whatever gods had favored her, and she couldn't selfishly waste it on her own desires. This existance, this life, belonged to those who had saved her, and now her sole being had to be devoted to that cause. She owed them for granting her the chance to avenge her family. Any thinking beyond that was more than she deserved.

Oh, Kohaku, she thought, pushing down the familiar pain and wishing she could see his face, see that Naraku hadn't decided he'd outlived his usefulness and taken the Shikon shard that preserved his body and soul. Without that shikon shard, he would die. She didn't know what would happen after they defeated Naraku, but she wanted to believe that Kohaku would still live somehow. Could the Shikon no Tama be used to grant him his life? Could she even ask for something like that from Kagome?

Twilight fell. The group was setting up camp now, as the sun set and the stars began to shine. Inuyasha was out hunting dinner, and Miroku began to start a fire to cook whatever he would catch. Kagome set up a cooking pot for the ramen she carried. They lived off the land as best they could, supplementing Kagome's rations with vegetables and wild game. They were all lucky that Inuyasha was a natural hunter and netted several catches within minutes of going off to hunt.

Sango sat there, feeling slightly useless, and decided to go out vegetable hunting herself. The moon was bright enough already so that she could see easily, and the familiar work would give her something to do besides thinking.

"I'll be back in a bit," she told the others, and rose gracefully. Her eyes met Miroku's for a moment, and she could have sworn that they twinkled before he nodded in acknowledgement as she turned to go. Miroku understood, deep down, she knew. He wanted it all to be overwith as well, for good or for bad. Still, in the meantime, their little family was comforting . . . without the others, she'd probably have wasted her second chance at life long ago.

She sighed again and looked up at the imperfect sky, freckled as it was with the creamy splash overhead of stars. Kagome had explained that the streak was the galaxy; that their own world was just a ball of rock orbiting around the sun, and the sun orbited around a giant black hole (whatever that was) in the center of that milky splash. It didn't make a lot of sense to Sango, nor anyone else in the group, but it must be nice that in Kagome's world people had enough time to figure out those sort of things.

Sango's world, this feudal Japan, left no time for contemplation of the stars as the fight for survival continued. Preservation of the self and preservation of the family was the most important thing. War and famine left little time for philosophy.

She reached a small clearing and began gathering wild onions and wild leeks when she saw a small bloody stain on the ground. She tensed for a moment before noticing the tell-tale gouge marks on the ground. Inuyasha had caught dinner here, more likely as not.

The weight of vegetables in her skirt grew heavy before she turned back, and only then did she notice the hole in the ground. In the starlight and moonlight, it appeared as a black spot on the wild grasses. Curious, she leaned her head close. Her nose twitched. It was a rabbit form. There were baby bunnies inside.

Sango smiled. She'd better leave the place alone; rabbits knew the smell of humans, and she didn't want the mother to reject her babies. The poor things had enough against them already, like hungry humans and other predators.

She returned to the camp. "I've got leeks," she offered to the others, and then smelled a familiar, gamey scent. Roasted rabbit.

"Hi Sango-chan. Inuyasha caught a rabbit and a few fish. Dinner will be very tasty tonight," Kagome offered with a smile. Inuyasha had already skinned the rabbit, and Sango's eyes watered at the sight of the pathetic dead flesh in his hands.

She dropped the vegetables onto the ground, and ran back toward the rabbit hole. She knew. She just knew. Life would always be that cruel . . .

"Sango . . . chan?" Kagome called, confused. Miroku stared after her, and without a word rose to follow her.

The babies, Sango kept repeating. They'll die without their mother. It's the way of things, but I can't bear to let them die just so I can live . . .

She found the rabbit hole again and knelt down beside it, digging frantically around the edge with her hands so she could reach in all the way. The form was lined with the soft down and leaves that the mother had left to protect them, but any number of predators could find them easily by scent, just like Inuyasha had found their mother.

"Sango!" Miroku cried across the grassy field.

She ignored him and her torn and bleeding hands, and kept digging until her hands closed around something soft and warm. The form was deep. She breathed a sigh of relief. The bunnies were safe.

"Thank kami-sama," she whispered, and pulled out the three baby rabbits just as Miroku came up.

His eyebrows shot up as he took in the situation.

"Inuyasha killed their mother," she explained, suddenly embarassed. "I didn't want to let them die. They're not that old, perhaps a week at most, but they can still live on."

She clutched the baby bunnies to her chest, trying to preserve as much warmth in the cool night air as she could. They squirmed underneath her hands. They were cute and fuzzy and brown. One of them started to climb up her shoulder to hands, probably smelling the leeks she had picked earlier.

"Sango . . ."

"Yes, houshi-sama?" She clucked at the bunnies. One tried to suck on her finger.

"You were the type of child who put baby birds back in their nests, weren't you?"

"Yes. What of it?"

Miroku looked for a long time at Sango, who was already feeding the baby bunnies grass, one blade at a time. The bunnies fit easily in the crook of her arm.

"Let's go back to the camp," he said after a while. Sango didn't even look at him, so engrossed in her new children was she.

It probably would bring bad karma to eat the mother while its children were present, Miroku thought, which is why Sango didn't eat anything that evening except Kagome's ramen. Sango had also begged a can of condensed goat's milk off of Kagome, and had diluted it to mix it with stewed herbs. The bunnies were almost weaned, but still needed some sort of regular feeding.

One was smaller than the other. It was probably the runt of the litter; odd considering it was a small litter to begin with. Perhaps some of its family had already been killed.

Kagome and Shippou were also fawning over the baby bunnies, in the way that girls and small children fawn over any cute fuzzy thing.

"This one is going to be named Genki, because he looks the healthiest of them," Sango was explaining. "And this one will be Usagi."

Kagome caught herself humming Moonlight Densetsu from Sailor Moon, but stopped before anyone but Inuyasha noticed. She cleared her throat, slightly embarassed.

"What about the little one?" Shippou asked.

"I think . . . I think he looks like a Hiyoko," Sango said, with a tiny motherly smile as little Hiyoko tried to hop across her lap.

"Chick?" Kagome said with a giggle.

"Why not? He's too small to be a bunny baby." She held the ball of fuzz in her hand, eyeing him critically. "He has a chicken-like look to him, too."

"Ohhh, that's so kawaii," Kagome said, almost swooning as she closed her eyes.

"Feh," Inuyasha chimed in. He resented the fact that everyone considered him the villain now for killing the mother rabbit, when before they learned she had been a mother they had considered him a hero for bringing in dinner.

Miroku remained silent as the evening wound down as it always did after dinner. Sango had the baby bunnies tucked up against her stomach on the ground, in her apron, so they would be cozy and warm. Rabbits matured very quickly, and it would be only another week before the baby bunnies could hop off on their own and fend for themselves as best they could.

Everyone else soon fell asleep, but only Miroku stayed up, staring at Sango pensively.