Tales of the Body Snatchers by tessahime

An Encounter Between a Pesky Miko and an Indifferent Taiyokai

Kagome had always considered herself the patient type. However, her fuse was a little short when it came to nonconstructive criticism from the High and Mighty Taiyokai of the West. Or the shorter title with which she often referred to him: The Asshole.

Okay, so she wasn't the best shot with a bow, and she didn't have the greatest control of her latent powers like InuYasha was always reminding her, but he should have been grateful she missed! Well, maybe not exactly.

You see, she was aiming for Naraku's ugly mug, but her arrow wound up flying off course as usual, streaking through a tentacle, and right into Sesshoumaru's... armor. Once again it shattered, and once again he looked at her impassively, though the tiny twitch of his mouth towards a frown, and the tightening of his eyes spoke of boundless anger.

He, needless to say, was NOT happy with her missing.

Despite the death glare he threw her way, she knocked another arrow and took aim again. Maybe if she aimed at Sesshoumaru, it would hit Naraku? She threw that thought out the window before it even finished itself.

Kagome once more pulled back as hard as she could, trying to keep aware in the middle of this fray where enemies and allies alike were, all the while pouring all the power she could access into the wooden shaft, iron head, and feathered tail of her arrow. "Please," she whispered to the gods above "please let this hit the mark!"

And she released it.

Kagome watched with baited breath as the arrow streaked away from her, brighter than usual, and across the battle field. She watched as it purified the low level youkai in it's wake, her eyebrows shooting up in shock. That was new. She watched as InuYasha jumped right in it's path, his back to it, and gasped aloud, preparing to shout her infamous 'sit', but it flew under his upraised arms and right into Naraku's heart. Or where his heart should have been. Instead, it pierced his chest and touched his portion of the jewel, instantly purifying it.

Now normally, Naraku would be pissed about being shot with an arrow, and even more so by a purifying one, but anger would be the extent of the damage done since the jewel imbued him with the ability to have resistance. The jewel would absorb the purity, and he in turn would feed it more of his darkness, and thus nullify the threat with only a slight expenditure of energy. But since Kagome overloaded the jewel with her own powers, and purified it, the jewel ate away at him from the inside out. It was a disgusting sight to say the least, but it was a welcomed one never the less.

In a last ditch effort for revenge, Naraku shot a rapidly dissolving tentacle right at Kagome. InuYasha, seeing the intent ran to hack it off, but got to it at the very second that it pierced Kagome's shoulder, the tainted maisma beginning to eat at her flesh...

"Kagome! No!" InuYasha screamed, horror etched on his face.

"It's okay InuYasha, I'm fine. He only scratched me! Finish him, quick!"

Without any futher prompting, the red-clad half demon ran at the weakened hanyou and unleashed his windscar... no sense in wasting extra energy using some other power of the Tetsusaiga on an opponent that was already defeated.

In his rush to claim the kill, he did not notice his much-hated-brother approach his most-valued-shard-hunter until he retrieved the hunk of the Shikon that Naraku had possessed and turned to walk to Kagome and give it to her to make whole. It was only then that he saw the way she was on her knees, wincing in agony, while his bother was sauntering toward her in a threatening manner. InuYasha froze, then ran.

Kagome had been watching the pissed youkai come closer to her, and when he was a scant five feet away, a red blur appeared between them that her pain-shocked mind turned into InuYasha.

"Stay away from her you bastard!" He shouted, hoping that his brother's sensitive eardrums would shatter. No such luck though.

"Move aside half-breed." He said in his tone that was somehow depicting numerous ideas of torture as well as utter boredom.

"Wow," Kagome found her mouth saying without her brain's permission, "that was a lot more than your usual bland vocabulary that consists of only 'die'..."

She didn't have to have InuYasha facing her to know what his face looked like at that moment. Eyebrows up, jaw down (dragging the ground probably) and eyes completely wide. When he turned around and stomped toward her, his face still held the predicted expresssion.

"Give me the jewel InuYasha" she sighed, not quite giving him enough time to recover from the unexpected shock of the 'weak puny human' once again standing up to his older brother. Dumbly, or rather numbly, he did as he was told without fighting, and he did not notice the movement of his brother to right behind him. Kagome caught Naraku's portion of the jewel as Sesshoumaru knocked out InuYasha from behind.

"That's kind of low for you isn't it Sesshoumaru?" she once again instigated. Only faintly noticing through the pain how his eyes flashed red for a moment.

"Wench, you would do well to watch your tongue lest this Sesshoumaru relieve you of it."

Kagome openly rolled her eyes at him, wincing as her shoulder throbbed. She brought the two pieces of the jewel together and watched at they melded, sighing at a task finally finished after two failed attempts. One whole Shikon, and one live priestess to protect it, for the moment. Too bad so many lives had been ruined in the time it took to resolve this. She glanced at Sango, clutching her brother's lifeless body. She looked over at Kouga's pack as they carried their now maimed leader who was bleeding from both shins.

"This damn bauble is not worth the trouble it causes," she grumbled.

Sesshoumaru was shocked. Not that anyone looking would have known. He was vaguely wondering if he would have to kill the little human if the tainted jewel were to persuade her toward its darkness. Not only could she purify it, but she ignored the persuasions that so many stronger beings had fallen prey to.

But that wouldn't stop him from giving her the verbal tongue-lashing that she deserved for ruining ANOTHER set of armor. Honestly, demon armor is NOT a cheap thing. Nor is it easy to come by. It requires a lot of threatening toward a well-known youkai sword smith that had a blatant ability to avoid him like the plague.

"Miko," he all but growled, not noticing the way she was swaying on her knees, nor the way she was losing a lot of blood, "You have once again accosted this Sesshoumaru. You will pay-"

His tirade was interrupted by her unimpressed snort. His eyes once again flashed red. This time it did not escape Kagome's notice though.

"Hey, don't you flash your eyes at me Mr. Too-High-and-Mighty-For-Anything-But-His-Own-Selfish-Good! You know it's not all that easy firing arrows in the middle of a moving battle field!"

Sesshoumaru found himself growling at the insolent child, and wondering where his control had fled to. "Miko," he bit out, his voice obviously warning her to watch her tongue, "you will show this Sesshoumaru respect-"

Once more she cut in. "No! She shouted. You will show me the respect I deserve for once. You're just like InuYasha, always wanting what you refuse to give!"

Refusing to be verbally assaulted anymore, he did his (and he would admit this only to himself) over-used trademark move of grasping her throat in order to choke the life from her.

"You, worthless human, are not deserving of this Sesshoumaru's respect," and with that he opened his hand and let her fall to the unforgiving ground and turned to walk away. Yes, he was wondering why he spared her life, and could only think that it was because she was not worth sullying his claws or his swords.

"Hey you jerk," He stopped, his shoulders visibly tensing, "that was rude! I only wish that you knew what it's like to have my problems! You wouldn't last a week!"

He turned to respond to her challenge, but froze in shock. There was a golden aura about the miko that pulsed in time with the heart beat that he could hear racing. It dawned on him that she still held the jewel within her grasp.