InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Buried Alive ❯ Pointing the Blame ( Chapter 5 )

[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]

Chapter 5: Chapter 5

Disclaimer I don't own INUYASHA, not even in my dreams

Hope you like it, sorry it took so long, and the next one will be up faster I promise! I’ve already got it half way done! Hope this one isn't too confusing! Heh!

Chapter 5 Pointing the Blame

I awoke to a searing pain in the back of my skull. I was going to assess the damage but found my arms were immobile at my sides. I couldn't move more than a few inches from left to right. I opened my eyes and glanced about me but all I could register was a small thin strip of light in front of my eyes. Next came sound, someone was speaking. It was a language I didn't understand and it made me nervous. It sounded close, too close.

Could it possibly be talking to me? I tried blinking my eyes several times to get a better grip on the reality I was living but all was blank. I stared long and hard at the thin strip of light. It was my sanctuary, the only light I had in the darkness around me. I just wished I knew what was happening. What kind of mess had I gotten myself into now? Would InuYasha come rescue me again? Did he even know where I was? I didn't even know where I was.

I sat, or stood–I couldn't really tell since my legs had gone numb–and listened to the voice that made no sense. It was a long time before I finally grasped some reality. I had some sort of blind fold on, I knew for sure. I recalled the harsh crack to my skull that I'd received upon resisting against the person who kidnapped me. All of my logical thinking was thrown out the window due to a lapse in all memory past that last moment of consciousness.

InuYasha was the main subject on my mind. He would come for me, wouldn't he? Not that I wanted, or needed, his help. I just had to figure this out for myself. If only my head wasn't spinning. I debated many plans of action hoping my natural instincts would tell me what to do, to no avail. I was pointlessly working at freeing my hands from the ropes that held them tight. It was only causing me more pain. I was also trying to move my toes and regain feelings in my feet. By now I knew that I was sitting on my own legs and that the weight of my body had cut off circulation making them go numb.

I felt someone move near and instantly I went still. I didn't move for a long time trying to find out what was going on in the world around me. Suddenly, and without warning, I was unceremoniously yanked to my feet. However, due to the still-numbness of my lower limbs I merely stumbled, lost my footing and fell to the ground again. This time when I was pulled off the ground I was given a harsh kick in the side to get me moving. I let out a string of cuss words as I rolled her ankle and instantly feeling returned to my legs. How convenient.

I was pushed along a gravel path–I knew because my feet kept sliding in the loose rocks–at a pace faster than my ankle could bear. I did my best to slow their progress when I could. Any chance I had to fall to the ground I took. After all the few kicks I received would be well worth my life if they were taking me somewhere to die. I was dissecting the past few days in my head, trying to figure out the sudden popularity I'd been receiving. First Naraku, then InuYasha, and now whoever these people were.

They all had reasons for kidnapping me, but were they all for the same reasons? InuYasha claimed to be an ally, someone I should trust. Naraku didn't say what side of the table he was on, but by the way he'd kidnapped me I was going to guess he was out for self gain. These people had to have a reason for kidnapping me, and if they weren't on InuYasha's team then they must be bad. Unless, InuYasha was the bad guy, and I had it all wrong. But how could someone so nice be evil? Or was that just his ploy?

I had thought myself into an endless circle of what if’s, and knew that there was only one way to find out. If I could just get out of my current predicament then I would go back to InuYasha and make a deal with him. Just as I was going to ‘slip’ to the ground again–by accident of course–I was picked up off my feet. Shocked and scared I let out a scream and tried kicking out with my legs hoping to hit some important body parts, but my resistance was futile. Whoever had me locked in a death grip wasn't planning on letting go. What made everything worse was that I couldn't see a single thing. There was a moment of blind confusion as I was moved sporadically around and then I could see.

I was hit with a strong rush of pain to my skull as the brilliance of the world around me came into view. I blinked furiously trying to take in the shapes and colors. When I could finally focus on my surroundings I noticed right away that not only was I outside but I was in Chicago. Very few things in the great city I used to call home still stood. I would have taken a moment to see just what all had changed in my absence but my attention was drawn elsewhere. “Kagome, if you promise to behave I’ll release you.” I looked to the man who stood before me. He was old, well past fifty years, and he looked strangely familiar. His shock of grey hair was cropped short, his brown eyes seemed sincere, and there was something about his smile that seemed reassuring.

“What do you want from me?” I was more frustrated now that I was again for the third time in a short time held captive. “Why am I so important?” The old man nodded his head at the man behind me and he released me from the death grip he’d had on me. I glared back at him but he seemed un-phased. I watched the old man walk towards me and then stop at my side. He pulled a knife from his pocket. I have to admit at first I was a bit worried. I realized a little too late that I could be arguing with someone who wasn’t actually interested in me. I soon found out though that I was partly wrong. He used the knife to cut the ropes binding my wrists. As soon as they were free I pulled them around and looked at the raw, red skin. There were a few places where the rope had cut through that were now bleeding. The old man handed me a wet rag and I slowly tended to my wounds.

“Kagome, do you want to know why you’re so important?” I looked up at the man, not entirely sure he could answer the thousands of questions racing through my mind.

“If you think that would help.” I wasn’t sure how confidant I was but my voice hadn’t wavered so that was a plus.

“Before I tell you there are some things you have to know, some history you need to catch up on.” I felt my face contort into pure confusion but I didn’t interrupt him. “Kagome in the past 63 years the world you knew changed. 63 years ago the Germans were experimenting with a chemical compound they wanted to use to create a better cloning process. Something went wrong and the chemical morphed into something more powerful. The US government found a parasite that could kill the chemical compound and it was released in Germany to fight off the chemical. But the parasite was taken over by the chemical and then started attacking people.

“Before we knew what was happening half of the German population was dead, the other half was infected. The parasite only took an hour to kill its host and in that time the host was being forced to spread the parasite. We didn’t have time to fight it off. Soon it spread throughout Europe and the devastation was on its way here.” He paused for a moment to let the information sink in and I found my list of questions doubling. I stayed silent and let him continue.

“Scientists here were working on a cure but they weren’t fast enough, so they started working on a new idea. They wanted to build a bomb that would destroy the parasite for good. They completed their project but it was too powerful. They knew there was no way for them to control this masterpiece they’d created. They had outdone themselves. So instead they decided to cryogenically freeze as much of the population still alive as possible. And it worked, for the most part.” He stopped to indicate the city around them. “As the parasites ran out of human bodies to feed on they became panicked. They started destroying everything in their paths.” I almost raised my hand, as if I was back in high school and I wanted to ask the teacher a question. I resisted the urge to blurt out the couple thousand of questions hammering my brain, but I could tell the story wasn’t over yet.

“Two years after the last person was frozen the first was released from his icy prison. The man was Dr. Sential he had come up with the idea for the bomb and was now responsible for finding out if the parasite was gone. When he was positive that it was he began thawing out others. Soon everyone was free, except for one person. You.” He paused for a moment and I could tell he was trying to figure out was I was thinking.

“Why wasn’t I released?” I felt myself growing unsure, I mean really, did this mean I was 82 years old? That was outrageous! Wasn’t it?

“That’s the thing Kagome, that was what made you special. You weren’t released because you were the bomb.” He was clearly making this entire story up. If I was the bomb then why hadn’t I gone off yet? “Look I know what you’re thinking and the reason you are the bomb is because they needed a human to be the bomb. The parasite wasn’t killing any other animal, and they didn’t have time to make a giant missile. You were the bomb because the parasites would come find you, they were after humans. It made perfect sense to make a human the bomb.”

“But why me?” I didn’t like this story, I didn’t like anything about this place, and all I wanted was to go home.

“Do you remember anything of your life before you woke up a few days ago?”

“Sure, I was a con artist; I had a mother and grandfather, and brother. I had friends and I had enemies. I don’t understand though, what was it about me?” I was growing frustrated.

“You agreed with the entire procedure because you were the one who created the parasite. It was all your fault.” He noticed the denial in my eyes and quickly continued on. “You were brought in by Dr. Sential to help create the parasite. It was one you were familiar with, because you dealt with it on a day to day basis. This parasite originated from the idea you gave Dr. Sential when you told him about the computer viruses you uploaded to eat away at another program.”

“Cancer X, which was what I called the program. It was harmless unless mixed with an anti-virus scan. Then it basically killed every file it could get a hold of.” I was starting to remember a little, but I still didn’t like the truth.

“Kagome you know me, just think back.” I looked into the eyes of the old man looking for something I would recognize.

“Hojo?” It clicked as he gave me another smile and offered a fresh rag. The one I had been using had been soaked through with blood and was no longer cleaning my skin but merely moving the grim and dirt around.

“Yes Kagome, very good.” I quirked an eyebrow. Now the questions I was going to ask took a back seat to the one I needed to know now.

“Where is my family?” That was the first thing on my mind.

“They are gone, and have been for a while now.”

I was almost too afraid to ask but I had to know. “What do you mean by gone?” I knew by the dark look that crossed his face that it wasn’t good. “Did they know about what I’d done?”

“No, they knew nothing about the parasite or the bomb, at least nothing intricate, just what the news was telling them. Your mother and grandfather died of old age. Souta was killed by the parasite, I’m sorry Kagome.” I felt the tears come hard and fast. There was nothing I could do to stop the onslaught of tears that were pouring down my cheeks. They were gone and now I was all alone. I was all alone and I was a walking time bomb. That was my next question.

“Hojo, this bomb, will it go off if I get hurt, or fall down?” He looked away after handing me a hanky from his pocket. I looked at it questionably but decided I would look better without snot running down my face.

“I’m not sure about that. We have to find Dr. Sential. He will know everything. There is one thing you need to know.” Hojo’s face grew serious and the old man who I was remembering as an overly helpful guy was actually looking ancient. “Kagome you’re a walking time bomb. There is a time limit on the bomb that you are walking around with.”

There was always a catch. It couldn’t be bad enough that I was a bomb, but to learn that I had a limited amount of time to live made it worse. Knowing that I would also kill everyone still alive on the planet if I did go off, only added to the pain I was feeling. My brain was instantly working overtime trying to come up with a solution. “Hojo, can you send me away? Like off this planet. Wait; hold on, how much time till I go off?”

“When you were finished being built into a time bomb it was a month till your birthday so they made that the detonation date.”

I was temporarily confused but my mind caught up with the endless list of questions I was harboring. “Wait so I have till my birthday? What is today?”

He shook his head in disdain. “No, you have a month, or less than that, do you know exactly how long you’ve been awake?”

“Naraku had me held captive for at least two days, maybe four.” I started doing a little math in my head, “And it took a day to get back here with InuYasha, wait is he a bad guy too? Or is he trying to help me? Or are you the bad guy? Or is it Naraku?” I found out that in asking all my questions I was only making myself more confused. Who was the bad guy? I found myself leaning towards Naraku, but InuYasha had wanted to run tests on me. Did that mean he didn’t know exactly what I was? Or was he trying to confirm that I was the bomb so he could eliminate me.

“I can’t answer all of your questions because I don’t know all of the answers, all I do know is that you have 25 days to find Dr. Sential and get him to reverse this bomb thing, or show you how to disable it. If there isn’t a way then you need to make a decision. Will you let yourself explode or will you go back into the freezer?”

I didn’t want to think about not succeeding at the moment. I wanted to lie down and sort out my thoughts. “Can you tell me where to find Dr. Sential?”

“I have no clue; last I heard he was working in New York.” Hojo must have caught the annoyed look on my face, because he quickly went on. “You know him very well Kagome, you would know his face in any crowd, and he hasn’t changed much in the 63 years that you’ve been gone. I’m sure if you found him you’d know it.”

I wanted to give in to the frustration and just have Hojo put me back into the freezer but I had to try. “Do you really have to be cryptic, wait, don’t answer that, I think I have a plan, and a way to find Dr. Sential.”

He seemed to be okay with me leaving. “Just be careful Kagome, especially be cautious of injury. Oh and in case you hadn’t remembered you never called Dr. Sential by his last name. To you he was Koga.” I nodded, the name wasn’t familiar to me, but that was probably because my brain had been frozen for over fifty years. Hojo pointed me in the direction of the building InuYasha had been at, I was headed back to see him. If I could work out a deal with InuYasha them maybe I could get access to information on Dr. Sential.

End Chapter

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