Foolish Games

You took your coat off and stood in the rain,
You were always crazy like that,
I watched from my window,
Always felt I was outside looking in on you…

........The freezing rain poured down from the heavens without mercy. The wind made the trees whip wildly back and forth as it howled through the forest. In a small clearing far from all civilization, a small lean to shuttered against the storm. Inside the meager shelter, a different kind of storm was brewing.
........ “InuYasha! I told you to LAY DOWN!!” Kagome screamed. She took a deep breath to calm herself as the half-demon stubbornly glared at her from across the tent. “Your wounds haven’t healed yet,” she said, her voice heavy with worry.
........ “Feh, merely scratches,” InuYasha replied while standing up, ignoring the sharp pain that ripped through his abdomen. Blood leaked steadily from the open gash in his side, progressively soaking through his kimono. It also poured from the cut on his forehead. The last demon the group had fought, ran InuYasha through the stomach with his claws after throwing him head first into the side of a cliff. InuYasha still won, of course, but that didn’t mean he did not need to rest.
........ Shippou came bounding over to InuYasha. “Does this hurt?” he asked, childishly poking InuYasha’s rib cage.
........ “Leave me ALONE, Kitsune!” InuYasha roared in response to cover up the wince of pain that escaped his mouth instantaneously. He bopped Shippou on the head a couple of times for good measure and then picked him up by the tail.
........ “It seems to me that you should listen t-” Miroku’s lecture was cut short when InuYasha threw Shippou, still dazed from his head being pounded, at his face. However, Miroku was saved by Sango, who effortlessly caught the flying fox-demon in one hand. “Ahh! Sango-san, you have saved me! Allow me to repay you with a kiss.” Miroku leaned forward only to have Sango’s fist (the one that wasn’t holding Shippou) connect solidly with him jaw. Needless to say, he was no longer in any shape to discuss Sango’s and his ‘relationship’ for a while.
........ Kagome, who had been silent through the whole ‘episode’ between Shippou and InuYasha, took the chance to get closer to InuYasha. When he looked her way, he found her right in his face. “Ack!! What do you want?!” he asked in a half-irritated-half-startled voice.
........ “I want you to LAY DOWN!!” Kagome all but screamed in his face, staggering him even further.
........ Sango and Miroku sat in silence (Sango because she had nothing to say and Miroku because he was still in too much pain to talk) as Kagome tried to convince the stubborn half-youkai to let her dress his still-bleeding wounds. They knew that if InuYasha had not been injured so severely, Kagome would have told him to ‘SIT!’ a dozen times by now. Sango was concerned with InuYasha’s health but was also growing weary of the two’s constant bickering. She yawned and Miroku glanced at her with a hopeful look on his face. When she didn’t lie down or even close her eyes, he looked somewhat disappointed.
........ “Sorry, Hoshi. I won’t go to sleep with lechers like you around to grope me,” she said nonchalantly, ignoring the fake offended look on his face.
........ “Sango-san, is that how you think of me?” Miroku inquired.
........ “Yes,” she sighed as Kagome continued to plead with a disturbingly composed InuYasha. It looked like he was going to win this fight, but Kagome would not admit defeat.
........ “Come on, InuYasha. It will only take a minute. At LEAST sit dow-” Kagome was cut off as InuYasha plummeted face first onto the ground. His face contorted in pain as his wounds opened further. Needless to say, Kagome noticed, “Oh my God! InuYasha, I did NOT mean to do that!! Are you alright?!” she said, hastening to his side.
........ “As I told you before, I’m fine,” he lied while pushing her away and attempting to stand.
........ Kagome felt her temper rise and before she could think, she screamed, “You are NOT fine, you worthless, pitiful excuse for a demon!!”
........ As soon as the words left her mouth, Kagome immediately regretted them. So many demons they had fought had called InuYasha pitiful and worthless that it was just the first thing that came to mind. Even as she said them, she didn’t believe that the words were true.
........ When he finally succeeded in standing, InuYasha stared at Kagome for a second with eyes filled with pain on a face like a blank page. Then he turned to the front flap of the tent.
........ “I’m sleeping outside,” was all that he said.
........ “No! InuYasha, I’m really sorry. I didn’t mean it! Please come back!” But Kagome’s apology was lost because he was already ducking out into the storm.
........ InuYasha was stunned. He never expected such malice from Kagome. Any other human or a demon: yes…but not Kagome. He had always thought of her as the one person who saw him for what he really was, not just some worthless half-breed who could never get anything right.
........ All of his life, he had blamed himself for the terrible things that happened whenever he got close to someone. Kikyo died because she fell in love with him. Naraku, the one who inflicted so much pain on the people InuYasha had grown to know, Sango and Miroku (not to mention himself), still roamed free because InuYasha wasn’t strong enough to stop him. SesshoMaru burned his mother to death in InuYasha’s own home just to spite him and then InuYasha failed to kill SesshoMaru in order to avenge her life because he was only half-blood.
........ When other demons or humans cursed and called him worthless, InuYasha just accepted it because, in his own mind, that is what he was. But Kagome…
........ I thought she understood that I really am trying my best to protect her even if I am worthless. I don’t want what happened to Kikyo to happen again.
........ “If only I weren’t so damn weak!” he said aloud though no one was there to hear him. InuYasha looked down to find himself shivering all over. He wasn’t sure if it was from grief, or because the freezing rain had turned to snow. He pulled his kimono top tighter around his body and started on his way; his bare feet made no sound in the fresh layer of snow.