InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Corrupted Thought ❯ Loss of Mind ( Chapter 3 )

If you were one of the reviewers who didn't know what the Japanese was, I wanted to leave it open in the last chapter so that you could kind of figure out what it meant on your own… because if I translated the Japanese flat out, it would have lost the suspense I wanted to create in adding the unknown phrases into the context of Inuyasha's 2nd person. In short, I'm not going to tell you what it means, for plot purposes. If you really want to know, go to Google, search Japanese-English dictionary, and look the words up (if you really want to know).

Well, here's chapter three, out much earlier than I had originally planned. Enjoy my kind of frequent update! ^^ Hopefully I'll be more consistent… *shoots self for readers*

**And remember, this is going to start getting pretty dark… and very adult. This chapter will be a glimpse of what is to come. Consider this your warning for future chapter content. ^^;

Disclaimer: Only in my fantasies do I own such a wonderfully syndicated anime…

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Corrupted Thought

Chapter 3: Loss of Mind

By: Kaji-chan

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Kagome eyes were wide with fear, the breath lodging in her throat.

Inuyasha had transformed.

She screamed.

The warm entity of his amber eyes, the striking gold that she lost herself in, was no longer such a striking shade of her adoration, but rather of the complete opposite. His pupils had contracted to almost slits; an ice blue which penetrated through her, piercing her within and sending a trembling roll of fear down the length of her spine, much different that the timid shiver of affection previously inhabiting her senses mere moments before. When she had fallen under the illusion of his returned affection. When she had naïvely believed that in his arms, he may somehow elude her to believing he may love her back.

Yet she was overcome by a conspicuous terror, alarmed by the loss of his familiarity within the swallowing depths of glowing red eyes. Her body had seized up in a panic-stricken tense, the fingers pressed against his gaping, bleeding wound stiffening as they pushed in opposition to the free-flowing gash on his front. She could feel the liquid ooze down the length of her arm, and her fear doubled.

She was afraid of him.

But she was more afraid for him.

Her eyes were torn away from his as she looked down to stare horrifically at the blood loss matted across the torn bottoms of what was left of his haori, most likely torn away from his body in the process of his violent renovation process from hanyou to full-blooded youkai. His wound was three profound lacerations across his abdomen, their full depth drowned within a never-ending flow of scarlet bereavement, as if he had plunged his claws into his stomach and ripped outwards, shredding his clothes along with his rage. She felt a sob wrack her chest, her breathing retracting to gasps as tears welled up in her eyes. Her forearms began to tremble, as if her crying was traveling throughout the entirety of her body, descending down her shoulders to tingle the very ends of her fingertips. "Inuyasha…" she whispered, choked.

The grip on her shoulders increased in intensity, and she felt the full length of his claws dig into the tender surface of her human flesh, warm blood dampening her school uniform and sticking uncomfortably to her skin as a sharp lance of discomfort pitch from her wound. Kagome winced, gasping in a small bout of pain with parted, frozen lips. Her gaze shakily rose to his, finding them locked with the sapphire intensity that burned through her core and unsettled her insides, as if she had consumed a plateful of poor repast that hadn't come to agree with her stomach. She felt weak at her knees, as if someone had torn her support from underneath her to render her unequipped with an active equilibrium prone to her use, wobbling on her frail support. Kagome's hands slipped on his abdomen through her loss of balance, feeling more blood blossom over the sides of her fingers to slope down the length of her elbow and pool on the ground, the clots of blood thickly coating her palms all the way down the length her fingers. She was going to throw up…

A small smirk grew on his features, his eyes narrowing in a malicious contempt, the purple slashes on his cheeks creating an opposing shadow that darkened his wicked expression with malicious contempt. A sob escaped her, and he raised an eyebrow in a cruel grin, as if drinking in her fear with a vicious thirst. His eyes sparkled with anything but hatred, however; the blue seemed to be tainted by a vindictive satisfaction, and also something else-a something else that sent an awkward tingle to roll down her spine and electricity to seize her stomach with an unsettling sensation of anxiety-which she could not place. His icicle pupils slithered across her face, finding every division of her expression a jolt of reparation to his nefarious mentality. He smirked, wild hair edging his expression of insanity, ruthlessness, and slaughtering hunger.

Yet there was something different in his eyes than his usual blood lust or psychosis. He stared through her, piercing into the very depths of her soul and causing a shudder to wrack her chest in a suffocating clench. Her clouded eyes slid in and out of focus under the scrutiny of his stare. He seemed to be searching her for something. And suddenly, Kagome came to a shocking realization, even as he smirked down on her, his claws forming scars on her upper arms and his deathly wound bleeding onto her crimson-stained hands. It wasn't insanity that she saw in his eyes.

It was a wicked sanity.

She could see, though nothing of his expression constituted any emotion remotely human or of human origin, that he was fully processing every thought, though through a filter of homicidal and purely instinctive exploit. Which meant that he was completely aware of elongated claws digging permanent abrasions in her shoulders, and that he was also aware of every shuddering, fearful breath she took in his grasp.

His eyes dropped from hers to slither down the length of her neck, staring at it with a fierce intensity, at which she froze and swallowed thickly. His hand retracted from her shoulder, sliding easily out of the blood-slick, open flesh in her arm to slither across towards her neck, resting his calloused hand to the soft curve of her throat. Kagome bit her lip as he ran his claws lightly over the flesh of her throat; feeling the nauseating sensation of her own blood smearing against her skin, flinching against the taunting circles he made with the incisive tip of his claws, knowing very well that with the slightest flick of his wrist, she would find herself fighting to breath.

His smirk only widened, his cold blue eyes boring into hers, and she felt as if her vision was suddenly swamped in a red glow. And then, the malformed Inuyasha did something Kagome had never suspected.

"Silly girl…"

He spoke.

His voice was haggard and rough, as if run over by sandpaper and calloused by decades of misuse. She tore her eyes from his, focusing widened pupils on the calloused surface of the ground in fear of seeing the true nadir of his eyes. "I wonder…" he rasped, his hand sliding back and forth over the arc of her throat, drawing a circle on the fragile flesh with the light touch of his claw. "…if you could still love such a corruption."

She gasped, finding herself unable to breathe. Was he insinuating…? Kagome raised her eyes to the small smirk of his lips, to the irony glittering in his eyes, horrifyingly puzzled by such an insinuation. His eyes slid closed, and he lowered his head to bury his nose in the crook of her neck, a harsh growl rumbling in his throat. She opened her mouth to respond with a hoarse whisper of question, not understanding such an insanely shrewd inquisition.

In place of an explanation, she found her confusion jerked back into the shocking reality of torn veracity, swirled around the rough sensation of a sultry warmth raking over the tender flesh of her throat. Her eyes widened as the muscles throughout her body seized in apprehension, her thought freezing from motion to come to a traumatized standstill.

Inuyasha's tongue was on her neck.

Kagome raised two violently shaking hands to his chest, as if to push him away. Her hands slid on his chest, slick from blood and trembling with fear. Her fingers brushed timidly against the exposed, damp surface of his flesh, pressing her shivering fingers against such burning contrast as if afraid of being burned. Kagome let a shuddering twist flow through her body as he ran his tongue hotly along curve of her neck, finding she comprehended with starling clarity-she couldn't push him away.

His elongated fang raked across the pulse in her throat, sending a jolt of panic through her body so powerful that her eyes flashed in alarm. "I-Inu… yasha…" she rasped, afraid that the slightest motion may influence him to sink his fang into her neck in a very vampire-like fashion.

He drew his fang away from her throat, but did not remove his lips from her paling skin. "Are you afraid?" he whispered, his lips brushing against her flesh, too gentle and subtle to constitute the monster he had become. She didn't respond. She didn't move. She didn't breathe.

Yes.

She was afraid.

His claws retracted from her flesh, slithering around her back to run their sharp points against the soft curve of her lower back, raising small welts in the small of her back. A wave pitched up her spine to tingle at her neck, and a powerful throb coursed through her center, whether of emanating fear or something beyond her own desire. "I like you scent…" he hissed as she tried to will herself to draw away, finding her legs frozen and immobile. Her body wouldn't respond to her plea. "I like your scent when you fear me." She contained a gasp.

Yes.

She was very afraid.

"When you fear my power over you."

She was so very… afraid.

With a jagged intake of air, almost mistaken constitution of a shortened gasp, she gathered a small bout of courage and forced her body to shift, pulling out of his twisting grip. Not waiting for a response from the youkai, she squeezed her eyes shut and threw her arms around his neck, burying her cheek into his chest. She felt him draw in a sharp breath, his muscles stiffening in shock within her gentle embrace, so starkly contrasted to his own. "Inuyasha!" she cried, her voice muffled by his front, as if crying out to attain the recollection obscured within a haze so uneasily penetrated by naught but her desperate voice, reaching out to touch the soul which had fallen from her grasp, to save the heart which had disappeared beneath a mask of crimson fault. "Please… come back…"

He seemed to hesitate, remaining unmoving. "Please!" Her voice seemed feeble and weak, overshadowed and smothered by his darkened and potent existence. "Don't leave, Inuyasha…" Her tone cracked, panic rising in her chest as he remained unresponsive to her calls, feeling her throat tighten and pinch her voice to a hysterical scream. "Come back to me!"

She waited, clutching to his neck and pressing her cheek against the soft flesh of his lower shoulder. His presence seemed to wrap around her, repressing her hopes and smothering them with shadow doubt, licking at her exposure almost tangibly, wrapping around her shoulders, seeping through her senses; suffocating her. "Please…" she said, quieter this time, her strength torn and shredded in her rasped whisper.

Two hands brushed against her shoulder; lightly, frighteningly. Kagome felt herself unconsciously flinch away from the contact, biting her lips and ducking her head deeper into the crook of his neck. The hands retracted, as shocked by contact. Timid. Unsure. Afraid. A soft gasp escaped her lips, her hands tightening on the haori to the pinnacle of her white, raw knuckles. Kagome slowly opened her stormy grey eyes, but did not look up.

"Ka… Kagome…?"

"Inuyasha…" she whispered in reply, raising her gaze to meet the familiar gaze of molten amber, harsh of youth and soft of concern, meeting the relieved pool of blue-grey in her own orbs, a small smile reaching her lips. His brows had drawn together, and he looked reproached and shamefaced, as if wanting to draw away in alarm. His eyes traveled from her dirt-smudged cheek to the light bruises on her neck, to the blood stains on her arms, and then to pause at the blood smeared across the front of her school uniform, his expression receding into a stronger remorse with every passing second. "Inu…" she began, but could not finish.

"What have I done?" he asked, his voice quiet and barely above a whisper.

She turned her gaze from his searching eyes, concealing her veiled response. How could she tell him?

"You hate me."

She gasped, her gaze snapping up to his unreadable expression. Before she could open her lips to reply, he stepped backwards, ripping her arms from around his neck and tearing off into the woods, leaving behind only a small pool of blood at Kagome's feet as trace of his trespass. She watched as he disappeared into the depth of night, clutching a bloodied hand to the front of her already crimson stained chemise, her eyes trained onto the darkened brush long after he disappeared into its abyss.

She dropped her gaze to the ground, remaining silent. Her eyes seemed to trail upwards, brushing over the smooth surface of the ancient well, its soft wood gazing at her with a tempting glow. She stared at the wooden structure. Just a few steps and she could escape it all… She continued to stare at it, silently, lost within her thoughts.

Her legs wobbled, as if the feeling in them had drained, pooling on the ground at her feet. Kagome's eyes fluttered, feeling her eyes roll back as her knees gave out completely, her knees slipping thickly in the small pool of hanyou blood in the soft, night hollow grass as her body fell heavily to the forest floor. Her eyes fell heavily on the wooden structure before her once more, as if her gaze was forced to the bleak partiality of cowardice positioned silently before her. A dull throb began to pulse from her abused knees. Kagome regarded it inattentively, her indifference focused on what loomed before her.

Her resolve evaporated as quickly as it had come, and a choked sob escaped her as she dropped her head into her hands, tearing her gaze away from the well. "I could never hate you."

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Kagome knelt by the stream, watching disgruntled swells ripple outwards as she disturbed the water with furious scrubbing. Pink tinted the liquid glass pooled around her bloodstained high school uniform, the crimson hue slowly rubbing off and diluting into the brook. She lifted the soaked top out of the water, grabbing a bottle of bleach and squeezing the blue gel onto the cloth, rubbing it into the crimson stains before dunking the shirt underwater again, repeating her insistent washing.

The stream reflected a dark shimmer, as the sky had faded into a young night, waning to evening with every slow, passing moment. The cool air of the twilight breeze tickled her bare arms, casting dark shadows on her skin, appearing pale and almost transparent in the moon's hollow glow.

She was kneeling before the water, stripped down to her bra and underwear as she washed her soiled clothes. She had returned to Kaede's hut, shakily, and discovered everyone else to be fast asleep, her and Inuyasha's ramen long since run cold. Kagome crept to her bag, reaching in a pulling out a spare pair of clothes by guide of the fading embers of the tiny fire. Sango only woke briefly, muttering a quiet good night before rolling over and falling back into slumber once more. Not wanting to change and leave out her uniform, now covered in blood, up for explanation the following morning, she decided to find a nearby stream and wash the substantiations away.

She had accomplished mission "seize pajamas", but was failing miserably in mission "destroy evidence".

She was humming a soft tune under her breath; it was a light a pretty, a graceful hymn from a song she picked up long ago from a small group of village children. Thinking of such and humming had always helped her moods, and she was in dire need of a better one than she possessed at the moment. Kagome thought of their smiling faces, a small smile tugging at her own lips. The smile, however, did not reach her eyes.

A sigh fluttered past her lips to tickle the air touching her cheeks. It wasn't much use to pretend to be cheerful when she wasn't…. yet she was so used to faking her smiles around others as not to pull down spirits for her own selfish reasons. She was the one who brought smiles to other's faces… not take them away. Now it was habit to be constantly optimistic and shallowly positive. Even though her emotions sometimes lacked the heart-felt meaning of her younger days, she had grown to realize that playing on them long enough would eventually strike the right note: eventually her forged smile would become a real one.

In this sense, she was hoping that singing a brightening tune may lift her mood; it had darkened very much so. Not darkened necessarily in anger of any sort, but more of a saddened, depressive darkness which had enveloped her since her most recent encounter with Inuyasha…

The young miko paused, her hands halting over the sodden material as she attempted to remember the lyrics to the song. It would do her no good to dwell on depressing thoughts; perhaps focusing on a cheery tune would help her to bury her demoralizations. "Ah!" she exclaimed lightly under her breath in remembrance.

She sat up, raising a dampened finger to her lips and tapping them lightly as she recalled the words. "As I look up into the dark sky," she hummed, returning to her work, "I ask the stars to lend an ear and hear my prayer…"

She bent her fingers and twisted the edge of her knuckles into the cloth, kneading it silently. "Do they hear my prayer?" she sang, her voice quite and subdued.

"Do they listen to my crying?"

Her voice began to waver, and she felt a prickling behind her eyes, but she shook her head, kneading the damp material with more force than before to hide her own distress from herself. "They do not hear my prayer, and do not hear my crying." Her voice cracked slightly, as if the tender notes of her long forgotten lullaby did not want to emerge into the reality from her dreaming distress. "I look up and see a shooting star…"

Her chafing slowed, and her impose began to fade from her fingers. "It falls from the sky."

Her let her hands fall limp in the cold surroundings of the nightly stream, staring at the unsettle water. She paused, as if daring herself to continue the illusionary tune, leaning over and blinking silently at the calming waters around her hands, stars glimmering on the dark surface of the glass. She drew in a small breath; not singing any longer, merely whispering. "The sky is crying."

Kagome reached out, as if allured by the blacked ripples of glass before her. She reached as if to touch it, to feel the smooth trickling between her fingers. She grazed the top of the water with her finger, watching the ripples flutter outwards from the water's disturbance. Knitting her brow, she pressed her palm to the water, allowing it to hover right at its rippling surface, the water tickling the bottom of her palm. A light pulse began to tug at her at her chest.

She licked her lips in concentration, reaching beneath her and pulling forth the pulse, feeling its warmth flow down her arm and seeping to her fingertips, until she could feel the heat all the way down her arm. Narrowing her eyes, she pushed the warmth from her arm to the bottom of her palm, forcing it into a physical form outside of her aura, watching as her entire hand was bathed in a powerful lilac hue. The vibrant purple pulse with her power and shot outwards through the water, waves of its passion soaking into the small lake with an affectionate glow.

A small smile reached her lips as she retracted her hand from the water to stretch out before her, as if to bath within the soft glow emitted by the purified pool. She felt the soft lilac color sink into her skin and tickle her aura with a soft heat which she had become accustomed to. Her eyes closed in a small bout of euphoria, basking within the sensation of purity which her powers emitted to her.

The soft flutter of a sigh breezed through her, another familiar action. Kagome opened her eyes, her gaze falling to her reflection in the glowing water, her vision soft as she stared into her eyes through the mirror below her. The soft purple hue was beginning to fade from the lake, but it seemed to linger nearest her image.

She watched her reflection blink back at her, stars twinkling around her mirrored image happily. Kagome sighed, plopping back down on her legs and glaring mildly at the still stained shirt. With a small huff, she lifted the sopping wet top out of the stream, wringing out the excess water and laying it down next to her high school skirt, also wet and soggy from washing. In neither case had she been successful in her purge of the bloodstains. She frowned, flicking off excess water from her fingers and pausing. Her meaningless pause stretched to a pregnant pause of meditation, yet what she was musing alluded her.

She mildly glanced around by means to divert her attention away from dangerous thoughts that may appear if she allowed her mind further roaming, ironically landing her gaze on the figure of her scantily clad self. Good thing the nearest signs of civilization were about a quarter of a mile away and sleeping. Otherwise they would have gotten a nice fashion show of Kagome's underwear. On that line of thought, she probably wouldn't care too much; be a bit miffed and embarrassed, but such feelings were shallow and would pass… but if it were Inuyasha… that was a different story. A half-hearted smile pulled at the corners of her lips, imagining such a comical scene as him walking in on herself half-naked. But the smile dropped as soon as it had come; her humor washed away instantaneously upon her redirection of thought.

Kagome took a slow, deep breath. Well, wherever he was, she hoped he wasn't drowning himself in guilt. His reproached expression flashed across her mind's eye, and she bit her lip. No matter how she tried to divert her thoughts, they always seemed to creep back towards her most recent experience with the hanyou. Her fingers traced silently up her arm to rest tenderly on the three wounds in her left shoulder, twin markings born on her other. It was an experience she would rather forget.

A shiver ran down her spine as she recalled the rough feeling of his tongue over the smooth flesh of her neck, and his claws digging mercilessly into her delicate skin.

But that wasn't the only reason she wanted to forget. She also wanted to forget that he had spoken to her. She wanted to bend the truth so that she could create an illusion of complete innocence on his trial.

There was something different about this youkai Inuyasha… nothing had provoked its release. He had been wearing his Tessaiga, so it should have been impossible; but it wasn't. Would this happen again? Her chest constricted painfully, and she swallowed. It was likely.

His words kept circling in her head.

"I wonder if you could still love such a corruption."

Still love. She bit her lip again, feeling a dull throb where her circulation could no longer reach.

He knew that she loved him…

That wild, tempestuous Inuyasha knew that she loved him.

No. He already knew that she loved him… in the sense that she cared for him. No. It was a different type of understanding that she found terrifying. He knew that she was in love with him.

More importantly, he knew that she would love him to the extreme of sacrificing anything for his in return. And he was right.

She would love a corruption.

And yet she trusted that he would not use this against her. But yet it wasn't her Inuyasha who was so aware of her weakness, but his insane, untamed side that clawed at his insides, remaining unsubdued and rebellious. It was this Inuyasha that realized her weakness. And she was sure that this Inuyasha would use it to his own advantage.

"I like your scent when you fear me."

She felt a nasty bile rise in her throat.

"When you fear my power over you."

Power. Kagome reached up to clasp the vile around her neck, feeling a warm, purified pulse beneath her fingertips. "Shikon no Tama…" she whispered, her warm breath charming her lips. It seemed now, ever since she had begun to develop her spiritual powers, that she had developed a stronger connection with the jewel's powers. The Shikon could either calm her or destroy her. According to legend and past, unfortunately, she was destined for the latter.

Well, she never believed in pre-determined fate, anyway.

The miko dropped her hand, turning to the rumpled pile of her pajamas, slipping silently into the downy confines of the silken cloth. She pulled her arms through the shirt, letting it slide over her head and over her chest to hang loosely over her stomach. Pulling on her pants, she let the waist dangle heavily around her hips, smoothing the front of her shirt over her chest. Sighing, she reached down and picked up her clothes, still soaked through and smelling strongly of bleach, folding them and slinging them over her arm.

She bent down and picked up her bow and arrows, slinging them over her shoulder and sighing in relief. Thank God, she actually remembered them for once. Taking a deep breath, she breathed in the filling scent of the forest before starting off down the path towards the village.

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It didn't take long for her to reach the small hut of the old miko. She hung her wet clothes on a nearby, low hanging branch, slapping the wet material with her palm for good measure before slipping into the precincts of the small house. Her eyes darted around the dimly lit room. Everyone seemed to be asleep…

Kagome crept around the sleeping forms of her companions, stepping nimbly over the futons to the corner in which her sleeping bag lay. She darted another glance around the room before gently nudging Shippou over to the side, whispering a quiet apology to the slumbering kitsune child as he whined from loss of warmth. She lifted up the fold of the sleeping bag to slide in-and was roughly jerked back from her bed.

A shrill squeak was effectively muffled by means of a hand over her mouth, another around her front to hold her arms down from lashing. A voice whispered into her ear, causing her back to go taut in alert, "Shh! Don't wake everyone up! I only want to talk with you!"

By their hushed tone, she couldn't determine who's voice it belonged to, but she nodded none-the-less, her body still rigid in anxiety. The figure, masked by the darkness of the hut, was also indistinguishable. They didn't waste any time, however, and jerked her arm in the direction of the small kitchen. Whoever it was knew their way around pretty well, but it didn't exactly help the alarm bell going off in the back of her head to get away from this person.

As soon as they had made it into the kitchen, the figure hastily pulled down the separating thatched curtain and tied it, then walked over to the window, pulling away the bamboo shade to reveal themselves, basked in the soft glow of the moonlight. "Kagome… there's something we need to talk about."

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Until next time! (Hopefully that's soon)

~Kaji-chan