Dystopian Story of Lovers by Murasaki K

Not Quite Bronte

(Answering the challenge from Bubbles on a single spark site) Sesshoumaru lost his mate Kameko five hundred years ago. Before she died, she made him promise that he must love another after her death, but he was reluctant to keep his vow until he met Kagome who looked similar to his deceased mate.

Dystopian Story of Lovers

Not Quite Bronte

Disclaimer: I don't own Inuyasha

~*~*~*~

"Sesshoumaru-sama, you can't go inside. There's nothing you can do now. Let her rest in peace." The monk gently ushered him away from the chamber.

"She wants me. She wants to be with me." Sesshoumaru half-pleaded with the monk.

"We had done everything we could. Every ritual ceremony was performed to call her soul back, but we had failed. Even if you see her now, she would not be able to respond to you. This would only add to your pain, milord."

"Her time belongs with me! And you will not hinder me from going into that room if you treasure your life, monk!" Sesshoumaru pushed him out of the way and barged into the chamber, ripping the shoji door apart.

He stopped before her. Suddenly his knees went weak, and he slid down to the floor, burying his face in her hand. "Kameko ..." with one last whisper he succumbed into the transitory blackness of exhaustion.

~*~

Sesshoumaru woke up to the cool touch upon his head. He caught the hand desperately and brought it to his lips. "Kameko! You've finally woken up! Don't scare me like that ever again!"

She smiled weakly at him. "So, you love me now, don't you?"

Sesshoumaru chuckled. "You always have a strange sense of humor."

"I'm so tired, Sesshoumaru. I won't be able to keep my eyes open for long," she murmured weakly.

"Ssshhh ... don't talk. Save up your strength. Just stay with me, Kameko, and everything will be alright." He stroked the side of his wife's cheek.

"No, before I go ..." She frowned as spasm of pain ran through her body. "There are so many things that I want to see for the last time. So many things I want to do."

"Don't talk nonsense! You're not going anywhere! The monks have prayed for you for thirty days, asking for your soul to return to your body, and drove away the evil spirit that possessed you. Now you are healed, my love, not entirely well, but you're back to life."

She smiled gently at him. "You don't understand, do you? It's not them who brought my soul back into my body. It was me. I was not ready, and when I heard you calling me, I knew why I was not ready. But now my time has come, Sesshoumaru. Don't deny this. You can't control what happens in life."

He opened his mouth and was about to object her when she put a finger to his lips to silence him.

"The sunset... I want to see it for the last time."

He carried her to the front door of the chamber that adjoined the room to the garden. He settled himself down on the floor, holding her in his arm.

"Sesshoumaru ..."

He kissed her brow to tell her that he was listening.

"I'm sorry I couldn't give you any heir." She sobbed. "I'm sorry that I was so weak, and I'm sorry that I have to leave you on your own." Her sob grew stronger until Sesshoumaru thought that his heart would break just from hearing the heart-wrenching sound.

"Then don't ... Don't leave me, Kameko ..." He croaked. With every second that passed he could feel the life that was slowly slipping away from the grasp of her little body.

"Will you eat well after I'm gone?" She asked him out of the blue.

Sesshoumaru smiled sadly. "To trust you asking me questions like that in a time like this. Kameko, if you leave me now, I will never laugh or even smile again for the rest of my life."

"No, Sesshoumaru." Tears began to flow strongly from her eyes now. "I was serious! Will you take good care of yourself after I'm gone? Will you eat well and regularly? Will you take enough rest at night? Answer me, please ..." she asked desperately.

He nodded silently.

"And after I'm gone, I want you to find someone. Someone strong and healthy, not like me. She must be beautiful, so that she would be able to compete with your good looks." The little woman smiled up teasingly at him. "She must be able to take a good care of you and to sense your mood. She must be able to make you smile, but she mustn't --" She paused. Her hand went up to caress the stripes on his cheek.

"She shouldn't be able to make you laugh because I'm the only one who can..."

"Kameko ..."

"You see; even though I'm willing to let you love another, I'm still a jealous woman. I wouldn't want to share this with anyone else because you laugh only for me."

"How could you ask me to promise you something like that? How could I love someone else but you?" He asked her with a strangled voice. Choking a sob, he questioned her weakly. "How could I love when you're going to take my heart with you?"

"Sesshoumaru ..." She buried her face in his chest. He could feel the hot wetness of her tears scorching his chest, burning him through and through.

"Forgive me, Sesshoumaru. I was selfish. But I just want you to be happy, happy in life without me. I love you so much that I'm willing to share your soul with someone else, and if you're not going to be happy when I'm gone, then ..."

"Then we might never meet again," she continued in a fearful voice, "It's a sin to waste your life. The gods might punish you by never allowing us to reunite with each other again." Even in the verge of her death she was still superstitious, but he knew why she still clung to that fallacy; because she was afraid, afraid to take the risk not to believe.

"We are the immortals, Kameko. We are the gods of our own fates. The higher power had long given up on us, too jealous of our beauty." He faked an arrogant expression on his face, and when she shrieked softly in fear, he chuckled and pulled her head softly to his chest.

"Don't, Sesshoumaru," her voice was muffled in his embrace, "It's blasphemy and it frightens me."

He whispered in an agonized tone, "Don't be, Kameko. There's nothing out there. There is no fear nor pain nor sorrow ..."

"No fear nor pain nor sorrow ..." she whispered in wonder.

"Say: 'I promise' Sesshoumaru," she ordered.

"I promise. I promise I will take good care of myself. I promise I won't scorn my life without you." He replied ceremoniously.

"And ..." She waited for him to finish his promise.

"I will live, Kameko. That should be enough." He answered her coldly.

"You will live and love." She nodded to herself as if he had already given her the sufficient promise.

The sun slowly went down, and the darkness that was approaching slowly and hesitantly began blanketing the sky with its dusk. Only dim ray of light reached them now, and at a distant space a star was dying away.

"I've loved you," she said, "I've loved you even before you were conceived. Ever since I laid my eyes on you, I bequeathed every belief of faith they had taught me. Gods help me, because I made you my god." And then she closed her eyes, breathing out the last gust of the borrowed existence.

And everything that was worldly was only her cold shell, but compared to the wintriness in his heart, it was merely a transitory breeze.

~*~

How was one to act that he was supposed to enjoy life? He ate regularly and decently despite the sense of dullness in his gut. He slept when the time indicated the beginning of the resting schedule. He did not feel hunger or the need for slumber within him. Because time passed, and if apathy was the sign of life then he would be very much alive in this case.

Time passed, and in every second of it Sesshoumaru was tempted to break his promise. He was tempted not to live.

Time passed, and the world moved on. Sometimes it altered or it stopped altogether, swinging backwards, or in the process of rotating, and life went on.

Time passed, but he just couldn't see why life went on. Why the world had not care when it had lost one of its children. And why could everyone else laugh when he could not? He thought that everyone else had forgotten her. But he was wrong. He had in reality forgotten anyone else but her. So he began to distrust the world and its inhabitants. He was furious against the world.

Time passed, and he resented the fact that he was immortal, watching jealously the mortals as they died, left the world, and, in his belief, were reborn. He was infuriated and jealous.

~*~

**500 years in the future**

Kagome didn't know why she always felt cold. Even though she wore thick clothes and ate a lot, she always felt cold.

She finished her breakfast hurriedly and gathered the dirty dishes on the table. She put the dishes in the little dishwasher she bought just a year ago and regulated the time for its washing schedule.

She went to her room and began to prepare herself for her first day of work. As she was putting on her make-up, she wondered what was to be expected today in her first day. Then she smiled a little. What right did she have to be expectant at all? People like her, who grew up alone in this world, belonged to the small community where they had to satisfy themselves with all the little things in the world, all they could get from life, which were mostly things that others didn't want.

Kagome was an orphan. When she was a week old, her birthmother left her behind in a hospital. All her life she was alone, living her life with no great expectance at all.

After she graduated from the business school, she was then fortunate enough to get a job as the executive secretary of the president director in a renowned company called Crestant Inc. The interview for the job application went surprisingly well despite the fact that she had no experience at all in this branch.

She opened her closet to examine her clothes. She had to admit that the content of her closet was meager. She hardly could find an outfit, having mostly only one-pieces of clothing. She pulled out a dark blue shirt dress that fit perfectly well to her body. The collar of the dress gave her a more formal impression, an appropriate impression for her job. She pulled her wavy, black hair into a low chignon at her neck, smoothed her pony to the side, and pinned it to place. She chose a lovely pair of tiny earrings with dark blue stone that accentuated the aquamarine color of her eyes to wear. Finally she put on her small, black leather-belted wristwatch, grabbed her dark grey tote bag, and made her way to the door. After slipping into her pumps and coat, she opened the door of her apartment and breathed in the fresh morning air.

~*~

When Kagome arrived at the Crestant tower, she was one hour too early before the work schedule, so she decided to wait at the lobby and read some magazines until she spotted some familiar faces to accompany her to the office.

The moment she buried her face in a magazine, a beautiful man in a dark suit entered the building. Walking straight to the hallway leading towards the elevators, he spared the vicinity none of his precious glances. His face held the expression of hostility and arrogance. He pushed the buttons of the lifts and was about to step inside the cabin when he suddenly caught a whiff of a scent that forever imprinted in his mind. It might not be the most fragrant scent or a unique one in the world, but it was the scent that he treasured the most.

He gripped the door of the lift hard to keep it from closing, and that was when he caught his image in the mirror in front of him. On his cheeks the stripes reappeared; his ears were now pointy; his eyelids red, and the color of his eyes turned into amber.

Sesshoumaru tried to control the youkai in him and chanted a quick incantation to hide his youkai traits. When the concealing spell was finally renewed, he stepped out of the lift-cabin and sought out the source of the scent.

He caught a glimpse of her face. The only thing that crossed through his mind was the fact that she looked cold.

*end of the chapter*

AN: this is a fiction answering the challenge in a single spark posted by Bubbles (2005-04-02). I hope I'm not disappointing her. Before you read any further I'm going to warn you that this fiction is going to be sad, and Kagome would have to go through the same identity crisis like the one she went through with Inuyasha, but there will be no undead corpse haunting Sesshoumaru down in this fiction. I hope you'll give it a try and be so kind to give me feedbacks. Thanks guys!