![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
airian-reesu.livejournal.com posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
30shardsTitle: The Night It Rained
Rating: PG
Genre: drama/dry-morbid humor
Squicks: Death. Abrupt change in mood.
Couple: Sess + Swords (Tenseiga)
Theme: #29 - Anniversary (yes, believe it or not. Although the title does blatantly point to another theme…)
Word Count: 2070-ish
Summary: So that sword did have everything to do with Inu-Yasha after all. Figures.
Notes: includes Mama/KagomePapa
---
It was their wedding anniversary. It should have been a night of cuddling and kisses, of lips and sex, but it wasn't. They ended up at Grandma's house with the kids. She would have thought it bizarre, if it hadn't been her idea.
It was just that he worked so much and the kids were so young and sometimes she felt closer to them than him.
But she wouldn't tell him that.
He didn't really care too much, though. Apparently, as long as she didn't complain he didn't care what they did. He'd barely remembered the day, anyhow. And it had been a fun evening, even if the weather was terrible. Rain poured down in silken sheets, coating the windows in pale gray while every light was on within the house.
It was even worse when they all climbed into the car later on, rushing through the raindrops as Kagome waved and giggled to her grandmother. He climbed in the front seat as she struggled with the kids in the back, strapping her little girl and infant boy in their seats and closing the door. She was soaked through and he teased her before putting the car into gear.
There were on the road for less than fifteen minutes when it happened. It was a small mountain road, barely two lanes and lacking street lamps. He'd been laughing quietly at some offhand comment of hers, low and quiet so as to not wake the kids, when the car just…slipped.
The whole moment was slow, a frame-by-frame movie playback that was too horrifying to be film. Screeches and sharp gut wrenching turns before they were going down, down, down….
And then all she saw was black.
~
Sesshoumaru was accustomed to eccentricity by now. It was par for the course; he was an eccentricity. Or at least that's what this time would call him.
But nothing was as strange as that damn sword.
"You do know," he remarked idly as he turned onto the small side road. (He abhorred motorized vehicles -- they were so damn loud-- and the fact that it was raining didn't help his mood much.) "That if for some random reason I was pulled over, the fact that I have a sword in my front seat would be rather hard to explain."
Tenseiga made no verbal reply, naturally. Things made out of metal couldn't talk like living beings. At least it had been like that when the sword was created. Nowadays…well, that was something entirely different.
But that didn't mean Tenseiga couldn't communicate with him. In fact, it had done so on many occasions (much to his chagrin). And those occasions often lead him to do something uncharacteristically mercifully (damn thing). Granted, many of these tasks had turned out to be rather profitable, but he'd never admit that out loud. Tenseiga was demanding enough as it was--he didn't need it to think he would be easy to win over.
"I really don't know why I listen to you anymore. Definitely since you haven't 'spoken' to me in what, one-hundred years now?"
But, to be honest, it was that fact alone that had him out in this terrible weather (he had long since learned that there were advantages to remaining warm and dry, thank you very much. No more foolish wanderings in the rain for him). Tenseiga usually had some reason for this sort of nonsense. If he understood it or not didn't really matter to him anymore. He'd admit that he'd changed much over the years. If for the better, or for the worse, he could not say without some bias.
"I better not get muddy from all this," he warned the sword with a threatening glare, which of course it didn't react to. The fact that he was speaking out loud to an inanimate object was not lost on him. But when one lived for over five hundred years, one was entitled to a few odd quirks.
Sesshoumaru took the time to roll his window down just a crack (really, he couldn't stand being cooped up in this tiny space without some fresh air. Even if the wind noise was enough to drive him to distraction), and settled back for the ride. Apparently, if Tenseiga's not-so-subtle urging (called an abrupt daydream that made him drop his favorite coffee mug on his foot) was anything to go by, something was going to happen on this road. He didn't know what, since nothing that had really required his intervention had happened for a century or so. But, whatever it was, undoubted it had to do with "fate".
Sesshoumaru had never really liked fate much. It usually either bit him in the ass or bombarded him with stupid people. Either way, he was annoyed. He would have never believed in it, either, if it hadn't been for those said instances. For, certainly, such things would not happen on his own accord. So somewhere there was some idiot spinning a stupid wheel and laughing at him.
Well, they could laugh all they wanted. At least he'd accomplished something (imagine that) in his lifetime, which is more than he could say for others of his (or half his) species.
A familiar scent cut off his disgruntled musings and Sesshoumaru slowed his car to a stop at the side of the road. He knew that smell -- in fact, he'd been covered with it himself many many times in his life. It was death, strong enough to be sensed even under the pouring rain. Shutting off the engine, he grabbed Tenseiga off of the seat next to him and got out, not even bothering with the hood of the raincoat he wore, since it wouldn't be enough to hold all his hair in anyway.
Squinting through the rain, he saw the fallen guardrail, the puddle where tire skids would have been. He could even detect the scent of leaking gasoline and he swallowed the bad taste it left in his mouth. He hated oil products like that; he'd thought of them as toxic all throughout his life and it was hard to stop now.
Sesshoumaru gathered his youki around his feet, lifting himself a scant inch or so above the ground before walking over to the side of the road. Hovering over the muddy embankment, he peered down into the dark.
And sure enough, there was a car. The left side was smashed against a tree, the body collapsed in on itself like a weighted hammock.
Slicking back his already drenched black hair, Sesshoumaru sighed before descending. It wasn't everyday the sword called him out to see a car wreck. So, naturally, someone important had to be there. Someone he would have to save (just like always) and then they would all go on their merry little ways.
Chichiue, I'm really beginning to think you're the idiot at the wheel…
Once he was down in the small ravine he was able to take a clearer stock of the situation. So...four people in the car: two adults and two children. Out of them all…all were dead except for one. The eldest woman --probably the mother-- was still alive, although unconscious.
Then there was the others. The man was sandwiched between the seat and the side of the car. His head was most likely caved in, although Sesshoumaru couldn't tell for sure. And he supposed it was the impact that had killed the little girl and infant boy.
Heaving another sigh, Sesshoumaru took Tenseiga's sheath in his left hand and drew the blade free with a smooth, graceful gesture that he recalled so fondly and yet never had the chance to perform any more. Spinning it in his right hand; he brought it around front and peered into the dark.
And there they were, always the same. Greedy little things, with those horrendously stooped backs. They never looked any older, but then again so didn't he.
Sesshoumaru was just about to swing when he noticed something. He couldn't see any of those creatures around the man. He even took a moment to study him intently, in case there was something he had overlooked, but still there was nothing.
"Hn," he grunted, drawing back his arm. A simple swing, then another, and there was life again. It was actually rather easy, considering.
And then, because he was mildly interested, Sesshoumaru moved around the car to where the man's body was. The amount of blood could only prove that he was in rather rough shape. And, unlike everyone else in the care, he was still dead.
"Seems you're not needed, hmm?" Sesshoumaru mused out loud, sheathing Tenseiga. "Well then, at least this won't be a complete miracle. With such a fall as this, someone had to die."
Tenseiga showed its annoyance with a quick pulse at his side. Sesshoumaru scowled. "I'm not the one who forgot him, so don't go blaming this on me."
There a rustle in the car, followed by a cough. And then a scent came and hit him with enough force that he almost dropped his sword. The little girl was awake and…he knew that scent.
Closing his eyes, he took a deep breath, held it in as he searched his memory. Everything was filed so very neatly there, especially were scents were concerned, but there was just so many…
The first thing that came to mind was Inu-Yasha (who he had not thought of in hundreds of years). And that's when he knew.
So those stories were right, huh? That little human of yours was a time-traveler. Oh, the irony…
Bending down just slightly, he gazed through the broken window frame and, yes, that was she. That face could belong to no one else. Not even her incarnate.
"I'm surprised you were not reincarnated immediately, little miko," he wondered aloud, voice quiet in the rain.
Ah, so fate was laughing again. Or maybe it should be he who was laughing, since it appeared that he would be the master of fate now. At least for this little girl.
All this time, all this life, and now here he was, resurrecting Inu-Yasha's human girl. It seemed that the Tenseiga --like all of Chichiue's swords-- was made for Inu-Yasha, after all.
If Sesshoumaru had been young again, impetuous and arrogant again, he would have been angry. He would have cursed the world, his father, and most of all Inu-Yasha.
But now…
He sighed. That just figures.
Straightening up once more, he shoved back the heavy load of his hair (white now because of the extended use of his youki). He went to leave, but noticed something.
Someone was staring at him.
~
Her eyelids felt like lead. Something large and heavy was pounding on her head. And yet she still managed to open her eyes. Everything was blurry at first, distorted, but it didn't take her long to realize that she was trapped inside the car and staring at her husband's bloody face.
She couldn't scream. All she could do was turn her head and try to cry. But her chest felt so tight and heavy and she had trouble breathing…
That's when she saw him. A white, ghostly specter hovering at the edge of her sight. Her mouth opened in a wordless plea for help that died in her lungs.
The vision --what else could it be?-- didn't notice her at first. His hair, long and white, was soaked through and she realized that ghosts couldn't get wet.
Her brain was swimming so much that it took her a while to form the thought she wanted to. Is he here to help us?
It was as if he heard her thought, because he turned then and pinned dark eyes on her. No…not dark, gold, and she thought immediately of the afterlife. She was dead then.
But why would that sort of creature carry a sword…?
A long moment of silence passed, stretched, between them. The longer she stared the more he began to come into focus, the more she felt things, and she was just on the edge to believing he was real when he spoke. His voice was so soft, almost transparent and trampled by the falling rain.
"Never stop believing in fairytales, Higurashi-san. It'll be the best for you all."
And then he was gone.
-
Almost ten years later, on the anniversary of the day it rained, Higurashi Kagome fell through the well.
He knew this, because he watched.
------------
Augh…another vague relationship…oh well. It's more of a friendship than anything else, between those two. A friendship that makes big things happen. Sess may seem strange, but he is older.
Rating: PG
Genre: drama/dry-morbid humor
Squicks: Death. Abrupt change in mood.
Couple: Sess + Swords (Tenseiga)
Theme: #29 - Anniversary (yes, believe it or not. Although the title does blatantly point to another theme…)
Word Count: 2070-ish
Summary: So that sword did have everything to do with Inu-Yasha after all. Figures.
Notes: includes Mama/KagomePapa
---
It was their wedding anniversary. It should have been a night of cuddling and kisses, of lips and sex, but it wasn't. They ended up at Grandma's house with the kids. She would have thought it bizarre, if it hadn't been her idea.
It was just that he worked so much and the kids were so young and sometimes she felt closer to them than him.
But she wouldn't tell him that.
He didn't really care too much, though. Apparently, as long as she didn't complain he didn't care what they did. He'd barely remembered the day, anyhow. And it had been a fun evening, even if the weather was terrible. Rain poured down in silken sheets, coating the windows in pale gray while every light was on within the house.
It was even worse when they all climbed into the car later on, rushing through the raindrops as Kagome waved and giggled to her grandmother. He climbed in the front seat as she struggled with the kids in the back, strapping her little girl and infant boy in their seats and closing the door. She was soaked through and he teased her before putting the car into gear.
There were on the road for less than fifteen minutes when it happened. It was a small mountain road, barely two lanes and lacking street lamps. He'd been laughing quietly at some offhand comment of hers, low and quiet so as to not wake the kids, when the car just…slipped.
The whole moment was slow, a frame-by-frame movie playback that was too horrifying to be film. Screeches and sharp gut wrenching turns before they were going down, down, down….
And then all she saw was black.
~
Sesshoumaru was accustomed to eccentricity by now. It was par for the course; he was an eccentricity. Or at least that's what this time would call him.
But nothing was as strange as that damn sword.
"You do know," he remarked idly as he turned onto the small side road. (He abhorred motorized vehicles -- they were so damn loud-- and the fact that it was raining didn't help his mood much.) "That if for some random reason I was pulled over, the fact that I have a sword in my front seat would be rather hard to explain."
Tenseiga made no verbal reply, naturally. Things made out of metal couldn't talk like living beings. At least it had been like that when the sword was created. Nowadays…well, that was something entirely different.
But that didn't mean Tenseiga couldn't communicate with him. In fact, it had done so on many occasions (much to his chagrin). And those occasions often lead him to do something uncharacteristically mercifully (damn thing). Granted, many of these tasks had turned out to be rather profitable, but he'd never admit that out loud. Tenseiga was demanding enough as it was--he didn't need it to think he would be easy to win over.
"I really don't know why I listen to you anymore. Definitely since you haven't 'spoken' to me in what, one-hundred years now?"
But, to be honest, it was that fact alone that had him out in this terrible weather (he had long since learned that there were advantages to remaining warm and dry, thank you very much. No more foolish wanderings in the rain for him). Tenseiga usually had some reason for this sort of nonsense. If he understood it or not didn't really matter to him anymore. He'd admit that he'd changed much over the years. If for the better, or for the worse, he could not say without some bias.
"I better not get muddy from all this," he warned the sword with a threatening glare, which of course it didn't react to. The fact that he was speaking out loud to an inanimate object was not lost on him. But when one lived for over five hundred years, one was entitled to a few odd quirks.
Sesshoumaru took the time to roll his window down just a crack (really, he couldn't stand being cooped up in this tiny space without some fresh air. Even if the wind noise was enough to drive him to distraction), and settled back for the ride. Apparently, if Tenseiga's not-so-subtle urging (called an abrupt daydream that made him drop his favorite coffee mug on his foot) was anything to go by, something was going to happen on this road. He didn't know what, since nothing that had really required his intervention had happened for a century or so. But, whatever it was, undoubted it had to do with "fate".
Sesshoumaru had never really liked fate much. It usually either bit him in the ass or bombarded him with stupid people. Either way, he was annoyed. He would have never believed in it, either, if it hadn't been for those said instances. For, certainly, such things would not happen on his own accord. So somewhere there was some idiot spinning a stupid wheel and laughing at him.
Well, they could laugh all they wanted. At least he'd accomplished something (imagine that) in his lifetime, which is more than he could say for others of his (or half his) species.
A familiar scent cut off his disgruntled musings and Sesshoumaru slowed his car to a stop at the side of the road. He knew that smell -- in fact, he'd been covered with it himself many many times in his life. It was death, strong enough to be sensed even under the pouring rain. Shutting off the engine, he grabbed Tenseiga off of the seat next to him and got out, not even bothering with the hood of the raincoat he wore, since it wouldn't be enough to hold all his hair in anyway.
Squinting through the rain, he saw the fallen guardrail, the puddle where tire skids would have been. He could even detect the scent of leaking gasoline and he swallowed the bad taste it left in his mouth. He hated oil products like that; he'd thought of them as toxic all throughout his life and it was hard to stop now.
Sesshoumaru gathered his youki around his feet, lifting himself a scant inch or so above the ground before walking over to the side of the road. Hovering over the muddy embankment, he peered down into the dark.
And sure enough, there was a car. The left side was smashed against a tree, the body collapsed in on itself like a weighted hammock.
Slicking back his already drenched black hair, Sesshoumaru sighed before descending. It wasn't everyday the sword called him out to see a car wreck. So, naturally, someone important had to be there. Someone he would have to save (just like always) and then they would all go on their merry little ways.
Chichiue, I'm really beginning to think you're the idiot at the wheel…
Once he was down in the small ravine he was able to take a clearer stock of the situation. So...four people in the car: two adults and two children. Out of them all…all were dead except for one. The eldest woman --probably the mother-- was still alive, although unconscious.
Then there was the others. The man was sandwiched between the seat and the side of the car. His head was most likely caved in, although Sesshoumaru couldn't tell for sure. And he supposed it was the impact that had killed the little girl and infant boy.
Heaving another sigh, Sesshoumaru took Tenseiga's sheath in his left hand and drew the blade free with a smooth, graceful gesture that he recalled so fondly and yet never had the chance to perform any more. Spinning it in his right hand; he brought it around front and peered into the dark.
And there they were, always the same. Greedy little things, with those horrendously stooped backs. They never looked any older, but then again so didn't he.
Sesshoumaru was just about to swing when he noticed something. He couldn't see any of those creatures around the man. He even took a moment to study him intently, in case there was something he had overlooked, but still there was nothing.
"Hn," he grunted, drawing back his arm. A simple swing, then another, and there was life again. It was actually rather easy, considering.
And then, because he was mildly interested, Sesshoumaru moved around the car to where the man's body was. The amount of blood could only prove that he was in rather rough shape. And, unlike everyone else in the care, he was still dead.
"Seems you're not needed, hmm?" Sesshoumaru mused out loud, sheathing Tenseiga. "Well then, at least this won't be a complete miracle. With such a fall as this, someone had to die."
Tenseiga showed its annoyance with a quick pulse at his side. Sesshoumaru scowled. "I'm not the one who forgot him, so don't go blaming this on me."
There a rustle in the car, followed by a cough. And then a scent came and hit him with enough force that he almost dropped his sword. The little girl was awake and…he knew that scent.
Closing his eyes, he took a deep breath, held it in as he searched his memory. Everything was filed so very neatly there, especially were scents were concerned, but there was just so many…
The first thing that came to mind was Inu-Yasha (who he had not thought of in hundreds of years). And that's when he knew.
So those stories were right, huh? That little human of yours was a time-traveler. Oh, the irony…
Bending down just slightly, he gazed through the broken window frame and, yes, that was she. That face could belong to no one else. Not even her incarnate.
"I'm surprised you were not reincarnated immediately, little miko," he wondered aloud, voice quiet in the rain.
Ah, so fate was laughing again. Or maybe it should be he who was laughing, since it appeared that he would be the master of fate now. At least for this little girl.
All this time, all this life, and now here he was, resurrecting Inu-Yasha's human girl. It seemed that the Tenseiga --like all of Chichiue's swords-- was made for Inu-Yasha, after all.
If Sesshoumaru had been young again, impetuous and arrogant again, he would have been angry. He would have cursed the world, his father, and most of all Inu-Yasha.
But now…
He sighed. That just figures.
Straightening up once more, he shoved back the heavy load of his hair (white now because of the extended use of his youki). He went to leave, but noticed something.
Someone was staring at him.
~
Her eyelids felt like lead. Something large and heavy was pounding on her head. And yet she still managed to open her eyes. Everything was blurry at first, distorted, but it didn't take her long to realize that she was trapped inside the car and staring at her husband's bloody face.
She couldn't scream. All she could do was turn her head and try to cry. But her chest felt so tight and heavy and she had trouble breathing…
That's when she saw him. A white, ghostly specter hovering at the edge of her sight. Her mouth opened in a wordless plea for help that died in her lungs.
The vision --what else could it be?-- didn't notice her at first. His hair, long and white, was soaked through and she realized that ghosts couldn't get wet.
Her brain was swimming so much that it took her a while to form the thought she wanted to. Is he here to help us?
It was as if he heard her thought, because he turned then and pinned dark eyes on her. No…not dark, gold, and she thought immediately of the afterlife. She was dead then.
But why would that sort of creature carry a sword…?
A long moment of silence passed, stretched, between them. The longer she stared the more he began to come into focus, the more she felt things, and she was just on the edge to believing he was real when he spoke. His voice was so soft, almost transparent and trampled by the falling rain.
"Never stop believing in fairytales, Higurashi-san. It'll be the best for you all."
And then he was gone.
-
Almost ten years later, on the anniversary of the day it rained, Higurashi Kagome fell through the well.
He knew this, because he watched.
------------
Augh…another vague relationship…oh well. It's more of a friendship than anything else, between those two. A friendship that makes big things happen. Sess may seem strange, but he is older.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2005-04-26 10:48 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-04-27 12:08 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-04-27 02:15 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-04-27 08:15 pm (UTC)I happen to think of it as a good writing challenge. And I've always thought Tenseiga had so much potential and it is barely even mentioned in the series. I mean, c'mon, a life giving sword. That just screams "use me!"
Umm...end rant. Sorry... ^__^