InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Purity 7: Avouchment ❯ Memories ( Chapter 62 )

~~Chapter 62~~

~Memories~

 

~xXxXxXxXxXx~

 

 

“How's his fever?”

 

Isabelle waited for the thermometer to beep and frowned at the digital readout as her face contorted in a grimace. “One hundred three point seven,” she replied with a shake of her head. “He vomited a little while ago,” she went on. “Then he fell asleep.”

 

Kichiro leaned over Gunnar, gently pushing his eyelid up and shining a penlight directly into them to check dilation. “That fever worries me,” he commented at length as Isabelle wrung a washcloth out in the porcelain bowl she'd brought in earlier. “We need to bring it down.”

 

As if in response to their softly uttered words, Gunnar moaned and kicked at the blankets that Isabelle had spread over him. “I looked the ratios over forward and backward, Papa,” she mumbled, carefully wiping Gunnar's face. “It was right on the paper.”

 

“Of course it was right on the paper,” Kichiro said as he plopped into the chair beside the bed. “It's always right on the paper. The problem is that there tends to be variables that you're not anticipating. It's part of being a researcher.”

 

“I . . . I know,” she murmured as she swished the washcloth around the bowl again.

 

“How did his blood work look?”

 

She took her time wringing out the cloth and folding it over to place on Gunnar's forehead. “It looked good . . . in fact, it looked exactly like it should though his antibody cell count is a little high, but not high enough to account for the fever.”

 

Kichiro pondered that for a few minutes, his expression one that Isabelle knew. He always got a certain look in his eyes whenever he was trying to think things through. “It makes sense,” he said at length as he rubbed his face as though he were exhausted. “You took that sample before he was purified. His levels might have looked good because his body was starting to change. When the spiritual power that balances out the youkai blood rose too high, his body's natural defense was to suppress his youki.”

 

She nodded slowly, seeing the logic in her father's words, and she sighed. “I'll do another blood workup in the morning,” she said.

 

“Sounds good,” Kichiro said, uttering a soft sound of agreement as he stared at her.

 

She didn't look to verify it. She could feel his gaze on her as she fussed with the coverlet and replaced the cloth with a fresh one. “So, Papa,” she finally ventured when he remained silent, “why do you smell odd?”

 

His answer was a long, drawn out sigh. “I thought I smelled pretty normal today,” he hedged.

 

Isabelle shrugged. “Yes, and no,” she agreed a little too neutrally. “I mean, you smell more like yourself than you have, but something's still off, and I know damn well that it isn't my nose.”

 

“I was testing the scent-tabs,” he finally admitted. “They might work a little too well.”

 

“Mama didn't like it?”

 

He shot her a dark look at that stated plainly that he believed his daughter was too perceptive by far. “Nope.”

 

“Did you tell her what you were doing?” she asked with a pointed lifting of the eyebrow.

 

“Of course I did,” he replied, rolling his eyes and shaking his head. “We simply failed to take into consideration exactly how keen our senses of smell are. Neither of us actually thought that the drastic change in scent would be that big an issue. Guess we should have.”

 

Isabelle grimaced and made a face. “Mama's pretty upset then,” she guessed.

 

Kichiro nodded. “Yes, she is . . . but she did know exactly what I was testing, and she knew what to do if something unforeseen had happened.”

 

“I know,” she muttered, her cheeks pinking as she smoothed Gunnar's hair—shockingly pale, a lovely shade of strawberry blonde, just like his mother's—off of his forehead. “Why didn't I end up like this?” she asked, more to herself than to her father. She'd taken the same ratio, hadn't she? What was the difference?

 

“Could be that the part of your blood that came from your grandmother assimilated the rest of it,” Kichiro mused.

 

Isabelle nodded slowly. “So since I was born this way, my body has a higher tolerance for grandma's blood.”

 

“That'd be my guess.”

 

She heard the front door open and close in the distance but didn't move. Griffin was late, but she couldn't say that she'd actually been worried since she'd been a bit too preoccupied when Gunnar had started showing signs of the transformation. Stuck in the human form that very few had ever seen, he'd be irritated enough that she'd seen him that way, in the first place, she figured.

 

With a low groan, Gunnar tossed fitfully before pushing himself up on his elbow. Isabelle reached for the small bucket she'd set beside the bed, barely positioning it before he heaved again. Grimacing and feeling completely helpless, she rubbed his back and pushed his hair out of the way and tried to remind herself that there wasn't a lot that they could do. The first round of vomiting started just after she'd gotten him to take a couple ibuprofen tablets when his temperature had started its initial climb. Whether it was because of the serum or because his body simply wasn't able to accommodate the drug, she wasn't sure, but she certainly wasn't going to give him another dose unless she absolutely had to.

 

His hand was trembling when he took the glass of tepid water that Kichiro offered to him, and he swished around a couple mouthfuls to rinse and spat the water out before flopping onto his back as a violent bout of shivers assailed him.

 

“Isabelle, I—” Cutting himself off abruptly as he stepped into the room and stopped short, Griffin's eyes widened just for a moment before his trademark scowl was securely back in place. Shaking his head in obvious confusion, he nodded curtly toward the bed. “Who's she?” he demanded.

 

Isabelle blinked, unsure whether he was being facetious or not, but the man looked entirely too perplexed for him to be feinting it. “He's Mamoruzen,” she replied dryly, tugging the blankets up over her cousin.

 

“Mamor—your cousin?” Griffin reiterated, his eyebrows disappearing under his shaggy bangs.

 

“Yes,” she replied as she dropped the washcloth into the basin and reached for the one that had been soaking.

 

“He's human,” Griffin pointed out dubiously, “and he's . . . well, he looks like a woman.”

 

Shaking the hair out of her face, Isabelle rolled her eyes but didn't argue with Griffin since even she had to admit that her cousin was definitely what she'd have called `pretty'. His bone structure tended to be very refined, anyway, and even with his usual black hair and golden eyes that he'd inherited from his father, Gunnar was definitely pushing `pretty' then, but as it was, with his mother's fair coloring, well . . . “He was purified,” she explained mildly.

 

Griffin didn't comment on that. “I'll, uh . . . I'll start dinner,” he finally muttered before ducking out of the room.

 

Kichiro checked his watch and winced. “I need to go pick up your mother and sister at the airport, but I suppose that you've got things under control.”

 

Isabelle nodded. “Okay,” she agreed wanly, pushing a lock of hair out of her eyes with the back of a limp hand.

 

“Call me if you need me,” he told her. She felt the brush of his lips on her temple and leaned toward him in a token hug just before he hurried out of the room.

 

Gunnar's face was pale, drawn, with ashy half-moons under his eyes, and though his breathing was light and shallow, he didn't really seem uncomfortable, all things considered. “Damn fool,” she muttered quietly as she wiped his forehead with a dampened cloth again.

 

It was unsettling, wasn't it, to see him that way? Lying in a bed and looking so helpless and worn . . . it wasn't a sight that Isabelle could quite reconcile in her head. Why was it that the men in her family always seemed to much larger than life? She'd thought as much at different times before, but that idea had never been quite as palpable as it was in this particular instance. Gunnar, who had always been stronger than the others, able to stand alone without anyone else's help and without caring what anyone else thought . . . She'd only seen him falter one time, and though it was years ago, she could remember feeling the same sense of desperation that she did now: the same sense of absolute helplessness, and just as she did back then, she'd wanted desperately to help him, but she hadn't been able to do a thing but watch from the shadows . . .

 

Running through the forest, she thought she'd caught his scent. Still outraged on his behalf, she'd gone for a walk in hopes that she could calm down before she'd done something that he'd hate her for, like tell her grandfather exactly what was happening at school.

 

He was catching ten kinds of hell, and all because he was hanyou set to one day become tai-youkai. It wasn't his fault, and it didn't make him any less worthy in her estimation. It didn't matter to anyone in their family, did it? So why should it matter to some bakas at school?

 

And she had known that he was far more upset than he'd let on when they'd parted at the usual place on their way home from school. Though he tried to hide it, she'd known, and it had only served to deepen her distress that he'd felt as though he'd had to hide it, in the first place.

 

Breaking through the forest, she'd closed in on his scent, biting her lip at the overwhelming sense of anger, of frustration in the rhythmic palpitations of his youki as she drew closer.

 

She skidded to a stop, though, about to call out to him where he sat, hunkered down beside the shallow creek that traversed InuYasha's Forest. With a gasp that she smothered with her hands, she watched in absolute horror as he reached up, as he dug his claws into the tiny black triangles that were his ears and yanked. The scent of his blood made her stomach churn, lurch in complete revulsion; the angry growl that slipped from him stayed her—the sound shifting from one of pure rage to one of a much deeper emotion—a sadness so encompassing that it shook her out of her shocked stupor, bringing tears to her eyes even as she struggled for any comprehension as to why he would have ever do such a thing to himself, and she'd understood on some level that the very last thing he'd want was for her to make her presence known . . .

 

So she'd ducked behind a tree, sinking to the ground as great sobs rose to choke her—tears that she shed because he couldn't, and even at seven years old, she'd known that Mamoruzen was suffering far more than he'd ever let on . . .

 

“W-water,” Gunnar gasped out, his papery voice cutting through the haze of memory.

 

Isabelle blinked and turned quickly, grabbing the glass of water and carefully helping him sit up to take a few small swallows. “Go back to sleep,” she told him softly as she set the glass aside and smoothed his hair off his face.

 

He didn't even try to fight her as she gently pushed him back once more. His eyes slipped closed, and she heaved a tired sigh as she pushed the questions she still had about that night out of her mind. No matter how desperately she wanted answers, unless he brought it up, she'd probably never ask him about it . . .

 

It was going to be a long night . . .

 

 

~xXxXxXxXxXx~

 

 

Griffin methodically tossed the salad as Butt-Ugly rubbed against his shins, mewling plaintively in a not-so-gentle reminder that she thought she was hungry.

 

It had been one of the most difficult things he'd ever done, to walk through the door of his own home. He'd wandered around for the bulk of the afternoon, loathe to face Isabelle when he knew damn well that he needed to tell her what happened, if, for no other reason, than to assuage his own conscience that was eating him up inside.

 

And it hadn't mattered how many times he'd gone over it in his head, there was no way to put a nice face on what he'd done. As much as he wanted to shirk the blame, he couldn't. He'd let himself get trapped in that situation, hadn't he? That was just as bad as instigating it, wasn't it . . .?

 

The trouble was that he didn't need to be brilliant to realize that her mind was fully focused on her cousin at the moment, not that he could rightfully blame her. He wasn't sure exactly what might have caused Mamoruzen to have that sort of reaction to the serum, but given that she had insisted before that he was the last person she'd ever test it on, he didn't doubt that she was feeling enough raw emotion as it was without him adding to her worries with the truth of what had happened.

 

No, he figured, he'd have to wait because as things stood, she'd only listen to a portion of what he needed to tell her, and then she'd probably do something stupid, like forgive him, and all because she hadn't really heard what he was saying in the first place . . . `Damn woman, anyway . . .'

 

He almost tripped over the cat when he turned to retrieve the jar of roasted pecans off the counter to add to the salad, and he snorted, shoving the animal with his toes. “Move it, you big, fat lump of stupid,” he grumbled indelicately. The idiot ball of fur ran back to rub against his ankles a little more, and Griffin heaved a sigh.

 

“She loves you,” Isabelle said softly from the doorway. Leaning against the frame with a thin smile, her eyes were sad, and her lips quivered just the tiniest bit when he finally dared to meet her gaze.

 

He snorted and shrugged. “I sincerely doubt that,” he muttered, dumping a couple of handfuls of nuts into the salad. “Thought you weren't going to test that stuff on your cousin.”

 

She sighed and pushed herself away from the doorway to pull a plate from the cupboard. “He talked it over with his father and grandfather, both of whom decided that he was the best candidate,” she admitted darkly as she scooped a lightly cooked fish filet off of the baking sheet. “I was overruled.”

 

“Told you,” he remarked though his tone lacked any actual hints of gloating. “Why's he human?”

 

She shot him a tired sort of look and shook her head, her self-disgust a palpable thing. “That's simple enough. The dosage was too high,” she replied, spooning a pile of steamed carrots onto the plate. “You know, it's the first time I've ever seen him as a human.”

 

“If I were that pretty when I was human, I'd hide, too,” Griffin commented darkly.

 

She laughed just a little, grabbing Griffin's arm and tugging him toward the doorway. “Come on,” she coaxed when he tried to pull away. “I'm sorry I didn't get your dinner made in time.” With a shake of her head and a wry grin meant to assure him that she was teasing, she shrugged. “Some mate I'd be, huh?”

 

Gritting his teeth at the genuine apology in her tone and the horrible joke she'd tried to make, Griffin shook his head and nodded at the plate. “You eat that,” he commanded, wondering vaguely exactly how she could manage to make him feel even more like an ogre than he already did when she was being nice. Guilt, he supposed as a deadly accurate memory of the kiss he hadn't wanted flashed through his head.

 

“I'm not hungry,” she replied with a sigh as she slipped the plate onto the table in the spot where he always sat. “I'll go get you a bowl of salad.”

 

He caught her arm and pulled her back before she could walk away. “You need to eat. You didn't eat much last week,” he stated, pulling the chair out with one hand and pushing her into it with the other. He sighed. He hadn't actually meant to remind her of the unpleasantness that had been prevalent in the house since her first experience with testing the serum. “You'd waste away, and then I'd be blamed for starving you,” he muttered. She opened her mouth to protest, but he shook his head, and with a little nod, she finally sat back. Griffin eyed her for a moment to make sure that she was going to stay put before lumbering back toward the kitchen to fill another plate.

 

“Yeah, I'm not eating that,” she said, pushing away the bowl of salad that he plunked onto the table next to her.

 

“Yes, you are,” he retorted evenly, slipping into the chair where she normally sat.

 

“We've talked about this before, Griffin,” she reminded him. “It's green. Dogs don't eat `green' anything.”

 

Rolling his eyes at her pouting remarks, he jabbed his fork into the salad and pointed it at her. “But you're in a bear's house, and bears like greens.”

 

Her face shifted into a little scowl as she tried to come up with something to counter that. It must not have worked because she offered a tiny, `hrmph' and poked at the fish with a fork.

 

They ate in silence for awhile. Isabelle seemed completely distracted, not that Griffin could fault her for that. She seemed to jump at every little sound, and she'd barely touched her food when she pushed her plate away and started to stand up.

 

“You need to eat more than that,” Griffin remarked, nodding at her plate.

 

“I'm just going to go look in on him,” she said with a falsely bright smile t o cover her blatant lie.

 

Griffin didn't say anything as he watched her hurry out of the dining room. Of course she was concerned. It was normal. Still, she wasn't going to do him or herself any good if she got herself sick in the process. With a heavy sigh, Griffin stood up and retrieved her plate and fork and followed her.

 

“Here,” he said, slipping her food onto the nightstand beside the door.

 

She glanced up from the basin where she was wringing water out of a washcloth and smiled in a tired sort of way, but it was genuine, and that was enough. “Thanks,” she murmured before she turned her attention to her cousin once more.

 

Griffin grunted in response then turned to go.

 

“Griffin?” she called after him though not loudly enough to disturb her cousin.

 

He looked over his shoulder but didn't turn around. “What?”

 

“I'm sorry,” she said, her voice taking on a husky drawl, as though the words were costing her dearly.

 

He shook his head, unable to meet her gaze as he fingered the doorknob and tamped down the urge to run away. “Just don't . . . don't do anything like that again,” he muttered.

 

“Okay,” she replied. “I didn't mean to worry you.”

 

He couldn't think of anything to say to that. The feeling that he was slime was growing way too fast, and he had to get out of there. “It's . . . fine,” he mumbled, hurrying out of the room as quickly as he could go.

 

 

~xXxXxXxXxXx~

 

 

The sound of sloshing water woke him, and Gunnar uttered a low groan. Every single cell in his body ached, and he felt oddly hot yet cold at the same time. Hissing sharply when a cold, clammy thing touched his forehead, he tried to turn his face away. But the cold was persistent, and he finally forced his eyes open to look at whoever was accosting him. “Izzy . . .” he whispered, his mouth too dry to speak louder. She was looking down at him at an odd angle, and he realized in a dazed sort of way that she had to have been cradling his head in her lap.

 

She managed a little smile and dabbed at his forehead again. “Think you can drink some water?” she asked.

 

He nodded, or at least the thought he did, wincing as he pushed himself up onto his elbow, wincing as he pulled his other arm out from under the warmth of the blankets to reach for the glass she held in front of him. “I'm not . . . a pup,” he managed.

 

“Of course you're not,” she replied simply though she didn't let go of the glass. “Are you feeling any better?”

 

That didn't dignify a response, as far as Gunnar was concerned, so he concentrated instead on sipping the water as she tilted it to his lips. “What time is it?” he asked, letting his hand drop away from the glass after he drank as much as he thought he dared. Stomach twisting uncomfortably, he was relieved when she set the glass aside again.

 

She sighed as he dropped back and clenched his jaw to keep his teeth from chattering. “It's almost three in the morning.”

 

He groaned.

 

“You had a nightmare,” she remarked in a conversational sort of tone as she idly smoothed his hair off his forehead. “You kept saying that they hurt.”

 

“They did hurt,” he replied as his body started to regain a semblance of warmth, as he allowed the rhythmic stroke of her hand to lull him.

 

“What hurt?” she asked.

 

“M' ears,” he murmured.

 

“Your ears?” she echoed, the muscles in her legs constricting as though she were about to move them. “Let me look at them.”

 

“Not now,” he said, his words almost slurred. “Then . . .”

 

Her hand stilled for a moment before she resumed the motions once more. “Why did your ears hurt?”

 

Gunnar turned his head slightly, making himself a little more comfortable. “'Cause,” he muttered, his voice muffled by the soft sweater she wore, “I ripped `em . . .”

 

She was silent for a moment, as though she were pondering what he'd said. He didn't open his eyes to verify that, though. “You . . . you mean when we were little? Why? I've never understood why you did that . . .”

 

He did open his eyes then, blinking slowly since he seemed to be having trouble focusing on her face. Her features wavered and came together only to waver again, but slowly she came into focus, and he sighed. “You were there,” he said though his tone lacked any real irritation. Unsure as to why he wasn't surprised, he didn't have the strength to think about it too much. Maybe a part of him had known it all along, just as a part of him had realized back then that InuYasha had remained there with him all night, too . . .

 

He hadn't really thought about that night in years. He had been ashamed of what he'd done for awhile, upset with himself that he would allow anyone to hold that much sway over his emotions, but in the end, he'd come to some understanding that he wouldn't have if he hadn't been faced with the ugliness of his peers.

 

She nodded slowly and uttered a soft sigh as she carefully but firmly inserted the digital thermometer into his ear. “You made me cry,” she replied in the same sort of simple tone. “I was so scared, and all I wanted was for someone to help you, even if it couldn't have been me . . . but I don't understand,” she admitted quietly. “I never have understood, I guess . . .”

 

“Re . . . minders . . .” he slurred, letting his eyes close once more. He wasn't sure exactly why he was answering her questions. Maybe he was just too exhausted to fend them off. Then again, maybe it was because, when it came right down to it, he knew damn well that Isabelle wouldn't judge him because she never, ever had . . . “Everyone saw . . . and knew . . . that I was weaker . . .”

 

She snorted—a harsh sound in the quiet room. “Weak? Please, Mamoruzen . . . you've never been weak; not ever.”

 

He shook his head slightly, forcing his eyes open again. “Not now,” he agreed, rubbing a hand over his face and grimacing at the heat radiating off his own skin. “Decided . . . they wouldn't be . . . a weakness . . . not again . . .”

 

She was quiet for a moment, carefully considering what he'd said, what he must have thought at the time. Somewhere in the back of his mind, he couldn't help but to see the humor in the situation. The Isabelle he knew tended to speak her mind and damn the consequences. “Is that what you thought? That being a hanyou was a weakness?” she asked gently. “Did you really believe that your hanyou ears were a sign of weakness? What are you? Sampson?”

 

He tried to snort at her reference to the man mentioned in the Bible whose strength was connected to the length of his hair. The sound was more pathetic than haughty. “Hardly,” he muttered. “'Sides, I won't let them be . . .”

 

“Is that what you decided?”

 

“Hai,” he replied, slipping into his native tongue.

 

She was quiet for a moment, and she sighed. “You know something?”

 

Struggling against the sluggish sense of sleepiness that didn't feel at all natural, he forced his eyes open again. “Mm?”

 

“You've never been weak, you know,” she murmured, her voice rasping, cloying. He had to strain to hear her. “Ears or no ears, it's never been who you are.”

 

“Maybe,” he agreed. “But they're a constant reminder of what I'm not.”

 

“And your mother?” she asked in a clipped sort of tone, as though she were trying not to be offended and failing. “Do you consider her to be a weakness?”

 

He stared at her for several moments as he considered her question—the same question that he'd asked himself all those years ago. The answer was as simple now as it had been back then—the same answer—the answer that would never change. “She's the reason why I refuse to acknowledge that being a hanyou is a weakness,” he finally answered. “She's my mama.”

 

Isabelle finally smiled. “Sometimes,” she allowed as she wiped his forehead once more, “you say the sweetest things.”

 

He groaned and shoved the cloth away. “You'd better never tell that to anyone else,” he warned.

 

She laughed and settled more comfortably against the headboard. “Don't worry, Mamoruzen. Your secret's safe with me.”

 

“Better be,” he muttered, letting his eyes drift closed at last. “I know where you live, you know.”

 

Her laughter was the last thing that he heard as he gave in to the lure of sleep.

 

 

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A/N:

 

For a better idea of exactly what they're discussing, please read the oneshot, The Lesson, which will be posted on Sunday, January 13. Why Sunday? Well, it's my birthday! Anyway,Enjoy!

 

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Final Thoughtfrom Isabelle:

His ears were a sign of … weakness …?

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Blanket disclaimer for this fanfic (will apply to this and all other chapters in Avouchment): I do not claim any rights to InuYasha or the characters associated with the anime/manga. Those rights belong to Rumiko Takahashi, et al. I do offer my thanks to her for creating such vivid characters for me to terrorize.

 

~Sue~