Blix: Wow. Long time no see Fanfic land. Really, I have missed writing fanfiction. And now I'm back to stay for at least a few more years.
As I am known to do, this is another song inspired fanfic. And as per usual, this song is from the 90's. Really, I am a 90's kid. Always have been always will be. This is for the newest obsession, The Wallflowers. Look up The Beautiful Side Of Somewhere. Really pretty song. But yeah, this song is based off that. Annnnnnnnnyways, hope you guys enjoy the latest bit of Kag/Sess ficcy goodness. I want to write something different, so I'm just gonna go with what comes along and hopefully make some people happy.
The Beautiful Side of Somewhere
Chapter 1-Tomorrow Is Gonna Make You Cry
Disclaimer:I don't own Inuyasha, the wallflowers, or their lyrics, or Jakob Dylan... -censored-
Kagome walked down the street towards her home ignoring the odd looks strangers gave her. She was tired, so tired, of pretending everything was okay. Every day at school was another battle to pretend to be happy. Every night was an even worse nightmare. After school every day, when she split apart from her friends, she let the façade fall and stopped forcing all of her energy into smiling.
Her steps took up her the stairs of the shrine to her home. Souta wasn't back yet, so she didn't have to force herself to smile again. Her grandfather was talking to someone in the temple. And her mother knew. As humiliating as it had been to admit to her mother, she knew the whole story.
The past seven months hadn't changed her feelings hadn't dulled the pain she felt at all. Instead she felt more and more detached. She had tried not to dwell, but each night brought the memories back, every single moment that she wished she could forget.
"Kagome, how are you doing sweetie?" Mrs. Higurashi asked. Kagome gave a faint smile and sat her book bag down on the table.
"Same old, same old momma. I passed my English test today. My professor says he's surprised at how quickly I've caught up," She told her mother. The older woman smiled sadly at her daughter.
"You never seem to get your nose out of those books anymore. How about a break. I know you don't have school tomorrow. How about you and I have a girls day?" Mrs. Higurashi asked. Kagome smiled.
"Okay mom." Kagome knew it was easier to give in these days. Her mother would keep persisting, all in the name of trying to make her mother happy. Kagome knew her mother was worried and it tore her apart to see how her depression was making her mother feel, but she couldn't tear herself out of it, no matter how hard she tried.
"We can go see a movie and grab some lunch. How's that sound?"
"Perfect momma," Kagome smiled cheerily. Inwardly she was groaning. Her mother loved chick flicks, but Kagome had grown to despise them for their impossibly situations and fairy tale endings. She had come to hate how at the end of so many movies, a couple ran off into the sunset, happily ever after.
Even in fantasy worlds that didn't happen. She was walking, talking proof that it didn't.
"Kagome, could you please come here for a moment?" Her grandfather's voice filtered into the house. Kagome smiled, glad for the escape. She left her mother planning in the living room and walked outside to where her grandfather stood with a man much shorter than he was.
"Yes grandpa?" Kagome asked the old man. The older man smiled and gestured to the short, rather ugly old man standing in front of him.
"Mr. Hikigaeru needs an amulet from the storage building, but is insistent that he pick it out. I was wondering if you could take him and help him so that I might see to the others here," Grandpa said. Kagome nodded, somewhat creped out by the short, fat man.
"Thank you Kagome."
With that old man Higurashi was walking away and Kagome not wanting to make small talk with such a creepy stranger, kept silent and walked towards the small store house of religious miscellanea. As she opened the door she thought she heard him mumble something in a scratchy hoarse voice, but chose to ignore it.
"The amulets are over here sir. There are some on the upper shelves. Would you like me to get them down for you?" Kagome asked. He nodded in the affirmative and Kagome grabbed a small step stool and quickly got on top of it. It didn't occur to her till she got to the top step that she was in a skirt. She sent a small prayer to the gods to keep him from looking up it and fumbled quickly for the boxes.
In her haste to get the boxes down from the shelves, she tripped backwards off the stool and took the heavy wooden boxes down with her.
"Damn it girl, look at what you've done to my clothes! They're covered in dust!" Hikigaeru shouted. Kagome pulled her skirt down and shot up off the floor, refusing to rub her sore back and show the man exactly how much pain she was in at the moment. After all, he was being an ungrateful ass in his complaining.
'Kill them with kindness.' Her mother's voice rang through her head and although she didn't want to admit it, this might be the best way of avoiding confrontation.
"I'm sorry sir. Please forgive my clumsiness. If there's anything I can do to help," She began.
"No," He cut her off. "I just want to get the amulet and get out of here," He snapped.
'Scratch that,' She thought. She quickly took the wooden boxes on the table in the center of the room and removed the lids one at a time, leaving the cases open to the old man's perusal. As she got the last box from the floor, she noticed a book had fallen from the shelves as well.
Odd, but she hadn't noticed it before. And unlike everything else, it was devoid of dust and shows of age.
'The Rise And Fall Of The Youkai Empire' It read. Kagome started a little at the title and set it down on the table by the door, resolving to read it later. Maybe she would find out what happened to Inu Yasha and the others.
Minutes passed by and the watched the old man go through each box and continue to feel each amulet. Finally his hand clutched a heavy bronze medallion that hung from a rosary of heavy red beads.
"I've found it," He said with a smile. Kagome nodded and put the lids back on the boxes quickly, wanting to get out of the old man's presence as quickly as possible. He barely gave her a nod before he left the store house, waddling quickly away. Kagome hugged and decided against trying to put the boxes back on the shelf. There was virtually no point in trying to put them back up there. He back was still hurting from the fall and she doubted she could lift the boxes back up to the high shelves. She'd just see if her grandpa could ask the guy helping at the shrine to do it later.
She grabbed the book and closed the door behind her, forgetting to lock it. She walked past her grandpa and smiled as he gave her a nod of thanks. His expression seemed to show that he too was ready to see the old man leave.
She quickly walked into the house and past the kitchen where she heard her mother cooking. She knew Souta would be home soon and wanted to avoid talking to him for a little while. Like her mother, he seemed to sense how sad she was, and strove to be nice and kind, when in reality she just wanted him to pull a prank on her instead of giving her so much pity.
Instead of socializing with her family today, she just wanted to begin reading the book she had found in the store room.
"The Rise and Fall of the Youkai Empire, by Zenken Omura. Hmm, I wonder if he wrote this to seem real or mythological," Kagome wondered aloud. She glossed over the index, searching for something she knew something about. Oddly there was quite a bit about some demons she had fought, including the band of seven and other minor demons. She didn't see Inu Yasha's name though. But she did see a promising chapter entitled 'The Hanyou That Destroyed The Youkai'. It sounded like what Inu Yasha did.
"Page 175. Okay,' Kagome said with a smile. She flipped through the pages and came to the chapter, ready to read about Inu Yasha.
But as she read into the chapter, she realized that it was about two hanyou. And one of them was Inu Yasha. The other was Naraku.
And the more she read the more it scared the hell out of her.
'The hanyou Naraku was absorbing youkai into himself after his servant, the half inu youkai whose name has been lost, beat and captured them. It is still not understood why the hanyou worked for the other. The myths indicate that at first they were enemies. But after several months almost all the youkai had been absorbed by the hanyou Naraku. For those that believe in the old myths of the youkai, it is said that the rest went into hiding and died out.
'However, the two hanyou that had brought about the extinction of the youkai race are said to have quarreled over a woman and ultimately destroyed one another.'
Kagome didn't try to read on wasn't sure if she could. She knew the woman spoken of in the book was Kikyo. But it was just a book, right? The guy wrote it like it was a bunch of myths. And there were different ways of telling myths, different ideas, different endings.
Weren't there?
Kagome quickly flipped through the book, searching for some other story she might know the truth of, to see if maybe the book was nothing but tales blown out of proportion, or even outright lies of history. She stopped when she noticed Sesshoumaru's name and began to read the middle of the page.
'Sesshoumaru was the Lord of Western Japan, and inu youkai that ruthlessly killed all of his enemies. He carried two swords, one that brought nothing but death to his opponents, and one used to restore life to the newly dead. It is said he used the latter sword on only three occasions, though stories have not survived about who or why.'
Kagome left that paragraph and skipped to the next page, hoping for an outright lie.
'It is said that once Sesshoumaru tried to capture the sword of his father and was thwarted by his brother and a human girl. He lost his arm in the battle after having transformed into his true form a huge dog.'
Kagome felt like giving up hope as she read those lines. Then something occurred to her. She jumped up from her bed and to her computer and logged onto the internet, quickly pulling up a search engine.
She typed in 'the rise and fall of the youkai empire' and waited for the results. She found nothing but book review sites and quickly clicked on one.
'The book, while an entertaining read, deviates from normal mythology, even going so far as to create new ones. While Zenken Omura creates a wonderful world, he has no evidence to substantiate that half of these stories are even myths.'
Kagome's eyes widened and she clicked onto another page, looking over the details.
And another.
And another.
All of the reviews said the same thing. Most of the stories in the book were not considered Japanese myths by any stretch of the imagination. Several professors suggested that the book would sell better as a fantasy book instead of a reference text because there were so few references to the traditional youkai myths and eve those deviated from the normal stories.
Kagome sat back, trying to absorb all of this information and what it meant.
Someone had intimate knowledge of Sesshoumaru and she assumed Inu Yasha and Naraku. Whoever Zenken Omura was, he knew about youkai that no one else knew about, that most professors called fiction even to mythology.
Her mind was racing and trying to find some other answer, something that would disprove the horrible text written in the book. She knew that it could all be just stories. She knew that some of it could be made up.
But why?
As she tried to calm her heart and mind down, she entered a new search, 'Author Zenken Omura', and prayed for something useful to show up.
After looking through five or six pages of useless text about different books he had written, Kagome stumbled across a page that had information about the man's education, where he went to school, and the general area of where he grew up, and even contact information. She quickly wrote down the address and resolved to go see him the next day. There were no pictures of him that she could find, so she shut down her computer and put the address inside the cover of the book and set it aside for the moment.
After giving a quick glance at the clock, she realized she should probably go downstairs for dinner.
"Mom, is there any way we can reschedule our girl's day for next weekend?" Kagome asked conversationally. She saw the wounded look in her mother's eyes and quickly tried to think of some excuse that would take a little bit of that pain away.
"I was reading this book I found today and it talked about a shrine dedicated to a demon exterminating village in Chiba and read some of the history on it. I think it's Sango's old village," Kagome said. God how she hated lying to her mother, but at this point it was probably better than telling her mother the truth.
"Oh," Her mother said, her eyes losing the hurt and turning more sympathetic.
"Yeah, I was just thinking I could go there and say a prayer. I should be back in time for us to go see that movie and grab some dinner, if you want to leave the guys to fend for themselves," Kagome joked. Her mother looked…Happy?
'Has it really been so long since I cracked a joke?' Kagome wondered to herself silently.
"That sounds alright dear. Do you have fare for the train?" Her mother asked.
"Yes mama," Kagome sighed playfully. Inwardly she was tying herself in knots with mental acrobatics. It was amazing how many possibilities the human brain could come up with when given a situation that included many unknown factors. What was more amazing was the bad to good ratio when it came to the possibilities.
"Kagome, could you help me with my writing project tomorrow night? It's due next Friday and I need to have a really good story, so I figured I could just write about something you did in the past," Souta mumbled.
"Souta I thought we talked about this earlier," Mrs. Higurashi began.
"No, it's okay mama. Sure I'll help you Souta," Kagome told her brother with a smile. Inside she was hurt that her family had spoken about her without her present. Had she really sunk so low into depression? She looked at her mother's face again and noticed the surprise there.
A new self loathing sprouted in Kagome and she pushed back the urge to cry. She hadn't cried since the night she came out of the well and told her mother everything that had happened. She wasn't about to cry in front of her brother. He didn't know what Inu Yasha had done and she swore she'd let him keep his ideals about the person he thought Inu Yasha was.
"Kagome, I was wondering, which amulet did the old man grab today? He gave me a large sum of money. I'm pretty sure there weren't any in the store room worth that much," Grandpa began.
"I didn't see much of it to be honest. It was a big bronze medallion that was on a necklace of big red beads," Kagome told the old man.
"I don't think I remember there being something like that in there," Higurashi stated thoughtfully.
"Why do you ask father?" Kagome's mother asked, curious of the thoughtful look on the old man's face.
"Something just seemed off about that stranger. It was more than his rudeness. It seemed like he didn't even want to be here. And then that large sum of money. He gave me 6000 yen for it. And he didn't seem to be the religious type. I don't know," He finished.
"Six thousand yen, for that old thing? You're kidding!" Kagome choked on the piece of oden she had been eating.
"That's quite a bit father. Perhaps he was an antiques dealer," Kagome's mother suggested.
"Probably," The old man finished.
The rest of the meal was finished in relative quiet, Souta only talking about school. Kagome helped her mother clear the table and then walked back to her room ready to catch some sleep so she could get up early and catch the train when it wasn't crowded with all of the teenagers off school the next day.
She was thinking over Inu Yasha when she heard her door open and close quietly.
"Kagome, are you asleep?" A voice asked quietly. She smiled and sat up.
"No Souta. What do you need?" Kagome asked.
"Kagome, what happened? Mom told me not to talk about Inu Yasha anymore after you got back, but why? You're different now," Souta observed as he came and sat at the oot of her bed. Kagome let out a sigh and leaned against the wall her bed was against.
"It's a long story Souta, but Inu Yasha hurt my feelings. He couldn't really help it. He just didn't like me as much as I liked him I guess," Kagome said, leaving out major parts of the real story. But Souta idolized the hanyou, and she didn't want to disillusion her little brother.
"Oh. Is that why you don't go back anymore?" Souta asked.
"Yeah Souta. But I'm okay, I'm getting over it," Kagome said with a smile.
"Promise?" He asked suddenly. Kagome looked at him, startled and hurt.
How many times would she be shown today that in her depression, she had been hurting members of her family?
"I promise Souta," Kagome said with a smile. Souta smiled back.
"You know, he's not worth ti Kagome. If he can't see how cool you are, he's not worth being sad over," Souta said as he hopped off the bed and began to walk to the door.
"Oh no you don't! Not after a comment like that!" Kagome growled as she yanked her brother back into the bed and hugged him tightly. Souta tried to squirm away for a moment before deciding it was better to just give in and let his sister hug him.
"Things are going to get better Souta," Kagome promised. She felt Souta nod and he tugged himself out her embrace and quickly left the room with a final smile at her before he closed the door.
She sighed inwardly. Maybe it would get better. For the sake of her family she had to try and find some way to bring closure to her feelings for Inu Yasha, for everything that had happened.
She remembered how her mother had said everything gets easier to handle with time. Seven months had passed. She was a junior in high school. About to be a senior. And nothing had changed, except her grades were better than before she had dropped into the well in the first place.
With a sigh she threw the covers over her head and settled into the pillows and thought about the book she had found, about the author, about the implications.
But she hoped that maybe she'd talk to whoever the author was and maybe be able to put the past exactly where it belonged.
In the past.
Blix: Please reveiw, it does keep me going. No, Zenken is not who you think it is, really, trust me. And 6000 yen is somewhere around fifty american dollars btw. Hope you guys liked the chapter.