I started this nearly a year ago for the ebony-silks challenge theme "Vibrations," got very, very stuck, and recently managed to finish it to the theme "Proposition" (where it tied for first). It reads like a very silly, very elaborate dirty joke, which is pretty much what it is. I'll say now that it's intended as a oneshot, but I had so much fun that there might, maybe eventually be a second part. No guarentees.

I love embarassing Kagome.

Kagome groped through the grass, swearing under her breath. The sun was already setting, casting everything in dusky shadows, and she'd already been looking for half an hour, and oh god, where the hell was it?!

"Please don't let anyone find it," she prayed, "please, please, please, please don't let anybody find it."

She'd been having such a great birthday, too; there hadn't been a demon attack in days, she'd found three shards earlier that week, putting the whole group in a fantastic mood, and she had gotten to spend the whole day today at home having a party with her family and friends.

Her ex-friends. Her soon to be ex-living ex-friends, because when Kagome found the godforsaken thing, she was going to go back through the well and beat them to death with it.

The mental image made her giggle despite herself.

What the hell kind of friends gave a gift like that anyway? She knew Eri and Yuka were into giving gag gifts—every time they had a birthday party, they gave out condoms as party favors, for gods sake—but this was way too far.

They'd been very sneaky about it, too. They'd given her regular presents at the party, but somehow, one of them must have snuck upstairs, because when they all went home and she returned to her room, there was an extra present on the bed.

She'd picked it up, and noticed there was a tag. The tag read:

Dear Kagome:

Ditch the deadbeat boyfriend and get laid. Some heart-healthy wholesome sex would cure what ails you!

In the meantime, enjoy this. Happy Birthday!

Love, Eri, Ayumi, and Yuka.

Filled with dread, she'd opened the package and found an honest-to-god, real-life, batteries-all-included…vibrator.

Oh good god.

Before she could do anything but blush (and make a series of choking noises), a certain hanyou had chosen that moment to arrive at her window, and in a panic she'd jammed the vibrator, box and all, into her yellow backpack.

And she didn't get the chance to take it out again before they left.

It had burned a hole in the back of her mind the whole day, until half an hour ago when she'd excused herself for a bath and slipped away with her bag, preparing to bury it in the woods and rid herself of the accursed thing once and for all.

Only to open her pack and find it must've burned a hole in her bag, too, because it was already gone.

Which was how she'd ended up where she was now: crawling in the dirt, cursing the gods, her friends, herself, and anyone else she could think of. She just had to find it—it must've fallen out somewhere near the well, and she couldn't leave something like that lying out in the open where anyone could find it! She'd never live it down.

What if Inuyasha found it? Or Miroku? (Good lord, the man was perverted enough already). Or what if it was Sango?

Or—dear gods—what if Shippo found it?!

Just then her hands closed on smooth cardboard. The box.

Yes! She cheered inside her head, snatching it up. Wait…no! Clutching the box in her hands, she let out a small moan of dismay. It was empty.

Then, as she sat in silence in the cool twilight, she heard the sound.

A faint, steady buzzing noise.

Kagome quickly scrambled through the underbrush on all fours—she had to be close if she could hear it! Emerging from the foliage, she entered a small clearing and came to a dead stop.

It was then, as she stared at the black boots in front of her, that she realized that there was one more possibility she hadn't taken into account.

What if Sesshoumaru found it?

In slow motion, like a horror movie, her eyes moved up his towering form.

He stood there, in the twilight, his eyes lit up with eyeshine. The light of the emerging moon made his face all pale skin and shadows, and she could see his brows drawn in a look of profound puzzlement.

And in his hand, held daintily by two clawed fingers, was Kagome's new vibrator.

Kagome's heart tried to spontaneously combust.

As she watched, too stricken to move, the demon lifted the thing up, still buzzing, and gave it a delicate sniff. Blinked slowly. Then, he looked down at the girl at his feet.

"Miko," he said, in his smooth, dark voice, "this is yours?"

"No," she said. Then she decided it would be easier to face him if she weren't lying in the dirt, and scrambled to her feet.

He waited while she dusted herself off, the thing in his hand still humming accusingly, and god, she wished she could turn it off!

"Indeed," he said, giving her a cool look. "Then for what reason are you crawling on the ground, by yourself, in the dark? Unless you are getting dirty merely for the sake of it?"

"Um," Kagome said, grasping at the air. "I was…I was looking for my box! See?" She held up the cardboard box proudly, then let out a tiny squeak.

There was a picture of the vibrator on the box.

Sesshoumaru stared at her in silence.

"Um…I guess that that might be mine too," she said in a tiny voice. She made to take it from him, but he held it out of her reach.

"What is it?" he said, his eyes shining with curiosity as he turned it over again. Just then he finally found the little twisting cap on the end and turned it off, creating blessed silence.

"Nothing," she said, a little too quickly. "It's just…a massager!" Oh, good one, Kagome.

"A massager?" Sesshoumaru lifted an eyebrow.

"Er, yes, a massager," she said. For one's naughty places. The giddy urge to just grab the thing and run for it sent adrenalin pumping through her, even though she knew she'd never make it. But the longer he had it, the greater the chance that he would figure out what it was. Fortunately for her, her friends hadn't gotten her a very realistic model: it was smooth, plastic and purple.

But it was still very, ah…phallic in shape.

"It, um, helps me relax," Kagome added, babbling. "Stress relief for when I, ah…get stressed?" Shut up, shut up! The sound of the vibrator had obviously scrambled something in her brain, because words seemed to be going straight to her mouth without any kind of internal processing whatsoever.

Sesshoumaru seemed to consider this, inspecting the vibrator again, and Kagome thought it was a sin that he looked so damn innocent—the man was the holy grail of hotness, and here he was holding a vibrator, but the entire thing was totally nonsexual.

Of course, he didn't know what it was, but still. He was always like that—it was just the way he carried himself. He was the most physically attractive creature she'd ever met, but he had such a cool, pristine, untouchable air about him that she had to wonder if he'd ever had a sexual thought in his life. Perhaps he was simply so perfect that no living thing was worthy of his attentions.

Gilded silver in the moonlight as he was right now, like some sort of unearthly god, she could certainly believe that. She felt like some kind of ugly insect beside him.

A small hn brought her out of her thoughts, and as she watched he gave a small nod, appearing to come to a decision about something.

He then held the vibrator out to her hilt-first like a sword.

"Demonstrate."

Something inside her skull imploded.

"W-w-what?" she said, her voice cracking.

"You will demonstrate how you use this device." He pressed the vibrator forward again and by reflex she took it from him.

Kagome stared at the thing in her hands like it was a live grenade. If only it really was a massager, because she sure could use a little stress relief! Heck, if only it was really a grenade, then she could just, like, blow up and die right now.

Sesshoumaru made a small impatient noise, and she looked up to see him reaching towards her.

"I believe you activate the device like this," he said, his warm hand closing over hers and turning the knob. He then stepped back and stared at her, expectant, his eyes aglow.

The vibrator hummed pleasantly in her hands, like a little baby rattlesnake.

She made a strangled sound in the back of her throat.

"W-w-well, um, you see," Kagome said, swallowing, "you just turn it on—like you just d-did, and then you hold it against you wherever you are tense, and you let it relax you. Like t-this." She made a big show of reaching back with it and rubbing it on her shoulders, like a backscratcher. It buzzed against her shoulder blades. "See?"

Sesshoumaru blinked at her.

Kagome plastered a smile on her face.

He continued staring at her for a long, agonizing moment, and then shook his head and let out a sigh.

"It is no wonder that you appear so stressed, miko," he said, taking out a folded piece of paper and flipping it open, "you are using it incorrectly."

Kagome's jaw fell open. The vibrator dropped from her hands.

"In order to—relieve yourself," he said, lifting his eyes from the paper and letting them run up and down her, "these instructions clearly state that stimulation is best achieved by inserting the device—"

"You," Kagome spluttered, "you had the instructions all along?!"

"Furthermore," he continued, catching her gaze with a wicked little smile, "to achieve maximum pleasure, the woman must—"

"Nonononono!" she squeaked, clapping her hands over her ears. Dizzily she tried to keep up as her personal universe spiraled wildly out of control.

He had the instructions, right there, in his hand (covered in explicit little diagrams, no less), and he was grinning at her with a look in his eyes that had her stomach doing back flips. What happened to cold and distant Sesshoumaru? What happened to immaculate god too-perfect-to-even-look-at-her Sesshoumaru?

She felt his low chuckle run right through her bones. Bending smoothly, he retrieved the vibrator from the ground and switched it off again.

"However," he murmured, "this seems too small to be very effective. Is this normal for a human?"

Kagome reeled.

This isn't happening! she thought, blushing so hard she thought she might catch fire.

He made that low, rumbling laugh again, and his half-hooded eyes raked over her. The heat of them was so strong that a new fire lit up inside her, and her limbs trembled. She wondered, for the first time, just what he'd been doing wandering around Inuyasha's forest anyway, so far from his territory and so close to the village. Why did he come here? Why was he looking at her like that? Where did all the heat in his eyes come from?

"Stop making fun of me," she said miserably, unable to keep the waver out of her voice.

Sesshoumaru stopped laughing at once.

"You misunderstand. This Sesshoumaru is not mocking you."

"Then what?" she said, her knees feeling weak under his smoky gaze. "You knew exactly what it was the entire time but you went through that whole charade anyway!" And he kept giving her that look, the one she knew he couldn't really be serious about. Not with lowly insect Kagome. "What else could you possibly be doing?"

He smiled a slow, dangerous smile. "I am helping you."

He held up the vibrator again, at eye-level with her, gripping it lightly in his claws. He moved his fingers and for a second she thought he was turning it on, but instead of a buzz there was a…hissing noise.

The plastic smoked and sizzled, and Kagome watched, dumbfounded, as the vibrator melted away and puddled in the grass.

He brushed his claws off on his haori.

"I may not be a benevolent demon, but how could I not offer to aid a damsel in such distress? If you are truly in need of relief, I will happily assist. This Sesshoumaru does not believe a young lady such as you should have to service herself." His lips tugged up at the corner, showing white fang. "I assure you, I provide an excellent massage."

With that he turned away, his hair brushing past her as he spun on his heel. The silky touch of it made her shiver.

"And with this Sesshoumaru, maximum pleasure is a given," he tossed over his shoulder. His voice dropped a delicious octave. "Always."

He then stalked off into the night, his pale, luminescent figure etched sharply against the dark trees. She watched him, transfixed, her heart pounding. It wasn't until he had almost vanished from sight that he spoke again one more time, voice drifting back out of the darkness.

"No instructions required. Unless you wish to give them. Think about my offer, miko."

And then she was alone.

Kagome sank to her knees and clutched the grass with her fingers. She could hardly breathe.

She felt strangely electric. Bizarrely, wildly, thrillingly alive. She had never felt like this before—no one had ever looked at her like that before. With eyes like a sultry summer night, filled with promises.

If all men looked at women like that, she thought, flushing, the world wouldn't need vibrators anymore.

But obviously, she could never—she couldn't possibly take him up on those promises. She wasn't that kind of girl. She was…a good girl, the kind of girl who…

Who got sex toys on their birthday as a pity-present.

Kagome squeezed her eyes shut. That doesn't matter. She just couldn't.

It was impossible. Inconceivable. Unfathomable.

Just like the look in his eyes.

But as the hours slid by and she still sat there, staring at the place where he'd stood, Kagome came to a horrible realization: She'd gone insane. Completely nuts. Certifiable. The whole humiliating fiasco had finally pushed her right over the edge.

Because she didn't have control over her own mind anymore.

The words he had delivered as a suggestion had entered her mind with all the force of a command, and her thoughts were tripping over themselves to obey.

Think about my offer, he had said.

And she was.

And she couldn't stop.

"Oh lord," Kagome whispered, trembling. "I'm doomed!"