Hope everyone's doing alright during the quarantine! I'm already trying to power through (that is to say, procrastinating a lot) on my thesis so with the year of the rat turning into the year of the plague…well. At least there's the internet?

Kagome already lost track of time a while ago, and she would've reached the end of her tether had she not been transferred to a proper holding cell with that awful blindfold taken off for the moment.

'Holding cell' seemed like the most appropriate term: a small bed mounted to the wall jostled for space with a tiny white sink and toilet. Raw concrete and buzzing white fluorescent light painted a picture of kidnappers who not only had the time to plan out her abduction, but also the space to keep prisoners in. That meant either yakuza, a triad with Japanese connections, or some criminal hotshot who had the money and resources for these sorts of things. All pros. All people who certainly had, or might have had, a bone to pick with her in the past.

But why now? The newspaper club was old news at this point, much as Kagome missed it. She and the others hadn't picked up a case in years, with Yuka and Ayame being the only ones who actually decided to stick to journalism. A pang squeezed her chest. When was the last time she called Yuka and Ayame, anyways? Eri? Ayumi? Kōga and Ginta and Hakkaku and everyone else? Her family knew about her going missing at this point, but it was thoughts of her friends that got Kagome's waterworks going again. She missed them all so much.

When would Inuyasha come to get her?

Kagome counted minutes, seconds, days, real and imagined; she tried going over the same logic puzzles and grocery lists from before. She wanted to be back in her mother's kitchen with a steaming pot of oden waiting to be enjoyed while her smiling family sat beside her. Buyō, their fat, ancient calico, would be dozing under the kotatsu like always until Inuyasha decided on pulling him out by the scruff for some light-hearted torment. And Kagome would scold him, and Inuyasha would scowl, and Sōta would laugh over his tough brother-in-law pouting over such silly mundanities.

A clatter at the door prompted her knees and shoulders to curl in protectively, but she relaxed at the sight of a tray wrapped in plastic. The meals came twice a day through a slot that could only be pushed in from the outside: lukewarm tea, a small bowl of rice, and miso soup. Kagome's stomach growled. Who knew what kind of poison they—because it was obviously a team she was dealing with, no one had energy to manage a holding cell without some kind of backup, in her experience—might have been slipping into it. The fact that they were feeding her at all meant they wanted or needed her alive. But why?

She tried to resist the food. Too many unknowns made it too dangerous to touch. It was how Ayame fell violently sick, once, at the hands of some goons who'd locked them up in their musty basement for half a day.

In the end, Kagome knew she wouldn't. Couldn't. Not in her current state.

Tears burnt her scratchy skin as she picked up the tray and settled on the thin mattress to eat; the taste of salt running into the corner of her mouth added a little flavour to the bland innocence of the rice, soft and congealed, in its plastic bowl. Kagome sniffled into her soup and started crying fully into her tea.

How could she have been so stupid? Why had her first thought been to attack a knife-wielding intruder in her pyjamas of all things, after having spent the previous day glued to the toilet? Kagome didn't even know where she was in the first place. She didn't have a plan. She wasn't a highschooler anymore, full of gung-ho energy and a righteous fury kicking her into action, ready and raring for a day of taking down bad guys. With her twenties came the exhaustion of adult responsibilities: regretfully letting injustices slide while she tried to balance a budget, a home, a job and a marriage.

Kagome pushed the tray away and settled down on the mattress in a tight little ball to stroke her stomach and stew in her regrets.

Inuyasha didn't drink or smoke, contrary to the image of the hardened Yankee unceremoniously dumped on him years ago. His vices were strictly of the more restless kind—he'd seen what alcohol and drugs did to a man. Punching out a dummy in the gym, wandering the streets after dark, and stealing away to brood in some quiet place would always be far more preferable than dulling his senses through substances. Lately though, he could've really used some numbness for a change.

The hostel was only temporary. Only as long as the police needed to keep combing over his apartment for clues, they said. Inuyasha's fist clenched. How was five days not enough? How was there no lead yet, no possible motive explored? Kagome's mother called to let him know that she gave the police her daughter's newspaper club files, and Ayame did the same with some of her own documents, with that annoying expectant little tone of hers that underpinned the promise of a future lecture. Inuyasha couldn't keep blowing everyone off forever, but Ayame was a stubborn nag who would chase him to hell and back for answers. He eyed the telephone warily.

If anything, experience taught him that the police were not to be trusted, especially not with cases of this kind. Ironically enough, the most harmless of their lot were the types who liked to get handsy with their batons; true danger lay in the rank-and-file bureaucrats. They would scrape and bow and utter their bullshit "we're doing all we can," "please understand that these things take time," or "the law will take care of things," while they sat behind their desks and twiddled their thumbs placidly. Reports would pile up and be sent to stony-faced higher-ups who couldn't give two shits unless their reputations were on the line. Nobody cared about some random victim unless the news decided a slow day needed spicing up, and only then would the apologies come rolling in.

They should care regardless.

Inuyasha thought back to the blood staining the apartment—Kagome's blood. Her small handprints dragging through the floor, then stark against the wall's pallor. The broken fruit bowl her mother sent over. The words they exchanged the previous night were spoken in anger and hurt, and he'd spent work quietly simmering over them, not wanting to be the one to say sorry first. But now?

His eyes flickered to the phone, and not for the first time, he wondered if he should call Kikyō.

Describing his ambitions as those of a chessmaster would not only be grossly inaccurate, but downright insulting. His wants and needs lay outside the confines of some musty old board game. No amount of analogies to chess or go or whatever other similar nonsense could encompass the enormity of what he had planned…and games at least lay at the complete mercy of the players. Their pieces were merely simple, mindless little bits of wood or plastic, made solely for the whims of the hands that moved them.

Unthinking pawns, unfortunately, remained a fantasy belonging to science fiction. He had to make do with people: stupid, emotional people with agendas of their own, beholden to their own biases and creeds. He couldn't care less if that meant attempts of betrayal—as many had done so in the past—but it was that lack of control that really grated on his nerves. God, he fucking hated them all so much. Life would be so much easier if he only had his own mistakes to account for.

And so he'd spent the better part of the past four days trying to find a way to plan around his subordinates' latest fuck-up.

That whingeing idiot Jakotsu would obviously have to be punished. There was only so much incompetence allowed in the organisation—that is to say, none. A single slip could topple an entire house of cards in one fell swoop, something that a measly apology wasn't able to fix. He'd spent too long on building that up just for some tittering metrosexual to come along and ruin it. He'd have to remind Bankotsu that his own position and privileges came with responsibilities, which included keeping his dunces in line.

However. He was nothing if not pragmatic. His cards were still safe. Their front remained quietly intact. The girl's rude intrusion into the cogs of his plan could now be called a wrench, not a wrecking ball, and all he needed to do was engineer some careful decision making to see where he could best put her to use. A little optimism never hurt.

Perhaps he could be called a sort of weaver, picking out the threads that led to the best prizes, feeling out the silver linings amidst the complicated tangle of his schemes.

By the morning of the fifth day, however, he'd been feeling much, much better. He already had her in his sights for a very long time now. Having her enter his plans a little earlier than expected changed them, but not by much, to be honest. Some minor adjustments here and there were enough to smooth the kinks out and have everything running again. The biggest question was were to start from: he could play it safe, keep her tucked away until he needed a trump card, or he could organise his plays around her. The latter was a far riskier option…but the pay-off it promised made him positively salivate.

By nightfall, his answer came in the form of Renkotsu wordlessly showing him a live streamed video of a woman with mascara dripping down her cheeks, and the spidery smile that stretched his lips into a grin was the most delicious thing he'd tasted in a long, long time.

Funny how angst physically hurts me…yet this is easily my angstiest fic by far, and going to get even darker! I apologise to everyone! Next chapter is going back to the gang's pov at least!