/a.n./ I'm so happy to finally find the time to update! It's a real relief to get some writing done.. Drop me a review and tell me what you think?

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Chapter 10

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Kagome's POV

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It had started to rain by the time the cab pulled up beside a clutter of shabby looking buildings, all strewn close together. Little droplets of water dotted the gray cobbled sidewalk in the twilight as I looked out the window and tried once more to deduce if this was a good idea. Not that it mattered much, now that we were already here, but it would still be a nice change to ease my mind.

Sango paid the cabbie from her somehow still overflowing wallet and bid him thanks. We stepped out of the cab in a hurry and trotted down the sidewalk, trying not to get soaked in the rain. It had started to pick up, and I had a feeling it would turn into a full-blown storm by the time we were done with…

What, exactly? Done with what?

The neighborhood wasn't exactly what one could call pleasant. Most of the store lights were out even though it was still relatively early, and the majority of the houses looked abandoned. No cars had passed by since our arrival, but every now and then I caught glimpses of people walking around in the rain, standing at corners – waiting for someone perhaps.

We walked silently down the road, splashing into gradually growing puddles every now and then, heading in the general direction of the street that was supposed to pop in front of us right away.

Big surprise – it didn't.

It had been a good ten minutes since we had started walking, and still – nothing. Sango huffed in annoyance and stopped in her tracks, thrusting her hand into her bag to search for the little piece of paper that had been left at our door. Pulling it out a moment later, she stared at it, apprehensive.

"We should have passed it already," she said, more to herself than to me. Before I could object in any way, she turned to a small alleyway to her right and started to walk. I hurried after her, cursing myself for not thinking of getting an umbrella.

"Where the hell are you going?!" I yelled, hoping my voice would reach her over the rain. She seemed to pause for a second, then craned her neck to look back at me.

"No idea."

I felt a smile tugging at my lips. She wasn't planning anything. A small, childish Kagome in my mind started to jump up and down, yelling I broke my sister! It wasn't a bad kind of break; it was the good kind. The kid in my head grinned widely as I broke into a light run to reach Sango. She had stopped at the end of the street – why, I didn't know. By the time I reached her, my jeans were soaked up to the knee and I was panting slightly. I looked up, only to come face to face with a grinning Sango.

Well then…

It took me a moment to understand the reason behind her grin. When I did, however, I had a feeling my face was a rounder replica of hers. There right in front of us, stood a bar. The bar; the one mentioned in the note.

Inadvertently, we had wordlessly agreed that we would stand under the pouring rain and simply gawk at the shabby building. Our reasons, unbeknownst even to us, resulted in Sango snapping out of her trance a moment later, just in time to notice that we were both soaking wet. She gestured towards the bar, and again wordlessly, I followed her across the road.

They had thought to place a mat at the entrance - its purpose defeated by the relentless onslaught of rain. The door set of a clutter of bells tied to the ceiling as Sango pushed it open, the sound of chiming metal following us as we stepped over the threshold and into the bar. It was a relief to be out of the rain, and the sudden waft of warm air emanating from a small furnace in the corner sufficed to calm my nerves a bit.

The place was small, and would have been stuffy if it were half full; the sole inhabitant of the bar was a man in his mid-seventies, sipping his drink quietly in the corner. Other than that, we were the only people there – courtesy of the weather, or perhaps the surrounding terrain. The bartender himself seemed to be absent; and that, of all things, managed to bring my semi-calmed nerves back to their peak. Almost expecting him to jump out from beneath the table, I walked a few short steps and situated myself on one of the booths, patting the seat next to me so Sango would sit down. She walked casually towards me and plopped down of the worn out dark red leather seat of the booth. Patches of yellow foam had started to show from under the red.

Sango seemed calm enough considering the fact that she had completely freaked out on me the previous night, but I had long before gotten used to her wavering personality. Calm and poised one moment, the next, she'll chop your head off while screaming like a manic, deranged ax murderer.

Yes, a wavering personality indeed.

We had sat there for more than forty five minutes when a back door – which I had failed to notice beforehand – opened with a metallic creak and a figure, clad in a black coat, stepped in and shook the rain out of his hair. I stared at the man as he took of his dripping coat and threw it on what I presumed to be a stool behind the bar. Then suddenly, he was looking at me, and I was looking at him, and Sango was clutching the edge of the leather booth, ripping it from its corners and digging her nails into the yellow foam.

Violet eyes pierced brown as fingernails pierced old leather.

Miroku took a tentative step towards our booth, eyeing his surrounding as he moved. I felt his eyes fix on me again, and an uncomfortable chill seemed to run down my spine at the notion.

You know how in a horror movie, the victim knows that something is going to go wrong but he/she has nothing to do but sit there and stare? No? Well, I do – it's not a particularly pleasant feeling.

As he neared the booth, I felt Sango cringe into her seat, though gradually she loosened her nails from the leather and foam. Miroku ended up sitting directly across from us, his eyes cast down, looking at his intertwined fingers.

I felt a small push against my leg, and realized that Sango was insinuating that I needed to go. A little pissed, I scooted off the edge of the booth and walked towards the door. Not that I was required to be that far away, but because the rain had subsided into a pleasant little drizzle in the time we had spent waiting; and I actually enjoyed the rain when it didn't pound into my skull.

A fine layer of mist had settled, sucking the color out of the surrounding area of the bar. What I could see from the few streetlamps scattered here and there was painted in the bleak grays. I felt a raindrop fall onto my nose and smiled a little, despite the nagging pang in my gut that probably wouldn't go away until we were safely tucked away in our hotel room. The wish of home seemed a bit too distant now.

No screams had issued from inside yet, so I guessed all was relatively well up 'till now. Then again, Sango had a tenancy to push herself to her limits before she gave out and exploded, but I was going to keep my hopes up this time. Maybe this little meet-up wouldn't turn out so bad, or at least it wouldn't be lethal.

Isn't it just lovely when you classify a situation based on its level of lethality? Isn't it?

There was of course, still the issue of being followed; however that issue was definitely not one that we could solve - at least not at this moment. It was one that I would simply have to throw into the back recesses of my brain until something (but hopefully not someone) brought it up again.

The absence of screams coming from the bar resulted in a soothing effect on my nerves, but also a tightening in my lungs. The all-encompassing silence of the street, save for the light pitter patter of the rain was starting to creep up on me. I had started to wish for raised voices.

A breeze had picked up. Leaning against the wooden paneling of the building, I closed my eyes and tried to concentrate on the raindrops hitting pavement. The breeze played with my hair, tangling it in my lashes. For a second, I thought to open my eyes.

I almost screamed.

A figure, shrouded from the thin layer of mist and sporting a long coat was walking directly towards me. I felt the pang return, full-force and my lungs squeezing tighter. My breaths were getting shorter and more frequent as he walked, unwavering towards my panic-stricken self. It's one of them, I though, thinking of the man who had chased us down the street back in Tokyo. Then another possibility dawned on me; one enforced by the recurring nightmares I still had - the ones where huge glass windows shattered, fragments flying in every direction, hitting people and pinning them to the ground. The ones were I drowned in a puddle of my own father's blood. The ones where bullets whizzed past, the fear of one hitting me more painful than the actual hit. The ones where the face of Sesshomaru swam before my eyes, then the face, the deliquescing memory of a friend with the same silver-white hair invaded my vision.

One of them, I thought.

The figure was getting closer, and from the way he walked I had managed to decipher him to be a man. Though a part of me wanted to scream and run into the building calling for help, another more curious (and more idiotic) part of me rooted me to my place. Back against the wall, hair flying into my eyes as I squinted through tiny raindrops and waited.

There was nothing openly antagonistic about his casual trot, nothing that screamed "I shall kill you," in the way his hand were stuffed deep in his pockets. Holding a gun? A knife?

He was close now, just a couple steps away, his boots splashing into the little puddles scattered on the street. He seemed to be taking no notice of me, which doubled the paranoia bubbling inside my stomach. For a moment, it looked as if he had stopped moving. My heart thumped in my eyes, making them ring.

Then he was in front of me, only a little to the left, still walking. For a moment I wondered if my worried were only paranoia-induced. He could have very well been just another man seeking a drink. He raised his head just a little bit, the way someone might raise their head to glance at a person standing at the entrance of a place they want to go into – which was exactly what I was doing. He stopped again, his chin rising up just a fraction.

The hood of his raincoat obscured a bigger portion of his face, so when I shot the same causally curious glance towards him, I couldn't much understand if he had noticed my looking.

He sidestepped into the bar, throwing his hood off and letting his long hair fall over his shoulders as I peeked from behind my shoulder. The atmosphere stirred a little, and in my peripheral vision, I saw Miroku turn towards the man from where he sat.

"Inuyasha you stupid fuck, you're late for your shift. Serve the lady a drink."

The ringing in my ears seemed to increase.

Then everything went black.