Falls On Me by MomoDesu

The Rise Of The Fallen Miko

A/N: I normally don't like to do challenges, but I simply couldn't resist doing this one. I am going to try my hardest, since I've never been the best in the world at writing canon stories that are Sesshoumaru and Kagome centered. Remember, let me know what you think! If this is received well enough I will definitely continue!

Here's the challenge:

Posted By: Mlmonty

Date: 2007-03-24

Challenge: Sesshoumaru is an expert (archeologist dont care) in the subject of the feudal era, and has been called to a site where a 'dead' woman has been found remarkably preserved. When he gets there he realizes its Kagome. He never knew what happened to her or her friends. During the last battle she gets sealed somehow. She of course 'goes missing' sometime after Sesshoumaru shows up. He finds her (or was there when she woke up) and must help her adjust to society becuase it's AFTER her time.

So of course he helps her adjust wanting to know what happened to his brother and Naraku and the jewel. Okay so what you have to do is figure out.

What happened to her?

Help her adjust to a new era more sophisticated than hers.

Have her and Sess fall in love SLOWLY. Dependency can do that you know.

My recommendation for what happened to the jewel is it was completed and reabsorbed into her causeing her to be sealed for whatever reason you think of. It becomes one with her making her virtually immortal once she's awake. Maybe that's why she was sealed to give her body time to adjust or something. Dont know think of something okay.

Just a side note to Mlmonty; I hope I don't mess this up. I have been tossing it around for quite some time now in an effort to make it the best that I can.

MD

-----

Normally, a Shinto shrine was the epitome of peace. At least in his opinion. Unfortunately this shrine was the total opposite, with people ranging from regular visitors and staff to first timers and students here to see the miraculous find in a smaller hidden shrine on the main shrine grounds.

The smaller shrine within the larger shrine was stiflingly hot. Sesshoumaru rolled up his sleeves as he examined the contents of the shrine. He received the call from an excited colleague three days ago, telling him he had to get down to this shrine.

"Sesshoumaru, you were alive during the feudal era weren't you?"

"Yes I was. It was quite the exiting time."

"Then you have to get to this site now. Since you lived through it, you have to see this. We estimate some of the artifacts to be dated as early as 1500."

"Where are you?"

"The Sunset Shrine."

"I'll be there in an hour."

So far there were a few things that he recognized. Namely his brother's sword. The Tessaiga; the sword that he battled so hard for that he lost his arm. It was a shame that the sword returned to him in this manner. Upon that discovery he dismissed the rest of the crew and vowed to take care of the rest of the job himself.

"What happened to you, Inuyasha?"

-----

Devastation. That was the only word that covered it. Utter devastation.

The bodies of lesser demons, as well as human, littered the battlefield, filling the soil with blood and the stench of death. All that stood were five warriors, demon and human alike, all with the same goal of bringing down the dark hanyou.

"It should have never been allowed to go this long, Naraku," a young miko in strange clothes yelled as she notched an arrow back, charging it with holy power the moment before she let it fly.

The hanyou just laughed at her attempt and watched the arrow slice off one of many tentacles. "You are correct. I should have ended this long ago. You will all die by my hands today."

-----

Sesshoumaru picked up yet another dusty artifact. He was surprised that most of this stuff had survived roughly a thousand years, but it just went to show what real craftsmanship went into the making of these weapons and necessities that were used in everyday life.

A quiver, full of arrows. He knew he had seen this before, but where? Lots of people in his time carried quivers if they were trained in archery, but this one was different. There was a power that radiated from it; a power that was very familiar yet a stranger all at once. He took the quiver to his work table and turned the light onto it. It still looked like your everyday piece, but his eyes immediately zoomed in to what made it different. A piece of fire rat fur cloth tied to the strap. Just like that of his brother's haori.

-----

She looked up as the half demon plopped down next to her and leaned on the well. "I don't know how well I will be able to protect you during the battle, so take this."

"What?"

He ripped a piece of fabric off of the bottom of his haori. "Keep this with you, to remind you that I will always come for you."

She took the strip of fabric and tied it to her quiver. "You always come for me." She lay her head on his shoulder. "As long as we are together, we will not be defeated."

-----

He went back to the corner where he found the quiver in hopes of finding the bow, but instead got something he didn't entirely bargain for. A pulse of power knocked him off of his feet and onto his back. "What the...."

On his hands and knees he crawled back over to the area that he felt the power come from. He felt the pulse again, from beneath the floorboards. "I've been alive too long, I'm losing my mind." He felt like he knew the signature of that power, he just couldn't place it. He sniffed the air, to see if there was a scent with this power, but was disappointed when the only thing he smelled was stale air and musty fabric from the wall hangings, along with the metallic smell of his own blood from where he scraped his hands when he fell.

He lifted himself to his feet and went back to his work table, pulling the first aid kit from underneath it to get a roll of gauze to wrap his hands. Even with demon healing on his side, he still wasn't immune to a lot of the bacteria in this era. After getting a nasty infection from a site a few years back he finally gave in and admitted that he wasn't as all powerful as he thought himself back in the era of his birth.

His hands wrapped and taped he picked up a pair of heavy duty work gloves and slipped them onto his rough calloused hands. Looking over to his bag, he hoped that he had packed his crowbar. The power underneath the floorboards was quite disturbing to him, he had to find out what was under there.

Squatting in front of the large duffel, he fished through the different items before grabbing the crowbar, a shovel in case he had to dig to reach his goal, and a couple of paint brushes to clean off dirt and dust.

Back at the area he was intending to rip out, one thought hit him. "The family." He lay the tools on the floor, took off his gloves, and stood up. He walked out of the door, closing it and securing the lock behind him so no one wandered in, and set off in search of the Higurashi family or an employee that could direct him their way. Finding someone didn't take too long though. Not too far from the old shrine there was a tree, with a young boy hiding behind it.

"Boy," Sesshoumaru called.

The boy peeked around the corner of the tree. "Demon," he called back.

"Does your family care for this shrine?"

"Yeah. What about it?"

"Go get your mother or father. I need to speak with them."

Without another word the kid scampered off in the direction of the main shrine house, coming back moments later with a middle aged woman and man running after him.

"What did you find??" the man panted, out of breath from running to meet him.

"Nothing yet," Sesshoumaru replied cooly. "Though I suspect that there is something under the floorboards and ask for your permission to rip them up to find the source of the energy waves I keep feeling."

"Energy waves?" the woman asked.

Sesshoumaru nodded. "Yes, energy waves. Do you not feel them?"

Both the man and woman shook their heads. "The last person in our family line that had that ability to sense power disappeared over 500 years ago. Unfortunately the ability was passed through the females in our family and she was the last that carried the trait. We just care for the shrine."

Sesshoumaru nodded. "Do I have your permission? I have a feeling that what is under there will be quite the miraculous find."

"If it will reveal more of the history of the shrine, you have our permission," the woman said.

"Thank you." He nodded to the caretakers once more in thanks before turning and walking back to the locked door of he mini shrine. He tried to stay cool, calm, and collected even when he wanted to do nothing more than rip off the doors of the shrine and then the floorboards to find what had such a power to knock him down like he was a toddler instead of a grown demon.

Once back inside Sesshoumaru put the gloves back onto his hands to avoid any more cuts and scrapes and picked up the crowbar. Board by board he popped up the floor, the power and energies swirling around him becoming stronger and stronger as he moved along. With a three foot wide patch opened he grabbed the hanging light and shined it over his discovery. A burial shroud. "How can a dead body produce this much energy, unless..." He grabbed his camera and snapped shots of the hole and the body under the floor before he carefully reached down and started to remove the shroud the best he could.

Underneath the shroud was the perfectly preserved body of a woman.

It was her. He didn't know how, but it was her. "Kagome." In a moment of weakness he ran his hand down the side of her face, which was miraculously unsoiled even after being under the floorboards for a thousand years. "What happened to you?"

There was another pulse of energy, though it was no where near the strength of the first. Sighing, he picked up his camera and began to snap pictures once again before he removed her body from the floor. She looked dead; she was pale and cold. He wondered if it was the jewel's powers that kept her preserved so well. The least he could do now is made sure she had a proper burial. He may not have gotten along with his brother, but it was his own way of showing brotherly love. This woman was his brother's wench, he would see to it that she was given the funeral of a member of the house of the western lands as he did for his brother so many years ago when he perished during the final battle with the evil hanyou Naraku.

When he was satisfied with the pictures he grabbed his notebook and began to take notes on how he found her, the energy pulses, her state after being buried underneath the floor of the mini shrine for a thousand years. It was a mystery to him. After the battle took place the atmosphere of the entire country seemed to change a bit. There weren't as many demon attacks as there were when the jewel was in pieces. Humans started to overpower demons with their numbers until the only demons that didn't cease to exist where the most powerful and dominant. There were some that did breed and keep the blood lines going, but there were only roughly four of the most powerful lords left from his day. He rarely kept contact with any of them, save for the wolf prince. Kouga was the one funding all of the research in a desperate attempt to figure out what exactly happened to Naraku and those who battled him. All of the truth had slowly trickled down into legend as the years passed until all that was left was a tale of a half dog demon and the shikon miko who defeated the greatest evil that Japan had ever seen that wasn't man made.

There was another pulse. Sesshoumaru was feeling a sensation that he hadn't felt since he took Rin as his charge; he was baffled. He didn't have the answer for once and it disturbed him. He lay the notebook down and went back over to the girl. Again, in a moment of weakness, he brushed the hair out of her face with the back of his hand. Sighing, he picked up his tools and stood, going back to the table and depositing them into his bag.

He sat upon the stool and placed the shroud before him on the table. Flicking the record button on the tape recorder before him, he began to take his notes. "The shroud found over the body of the miko is in supreme condition; white linen with very few stains. No signs of blood or -" he was cut off by a blood curdling scream. He darted from the stool and to the source of the scream. The miko.

-----

Kagome sat up in the hole where she had lay for centuries, looking around. The last thing that she had remembered was the completed jewel, making the wish that the fighting spirits inside would find peace. Now she was in this strange little building that looked like a shrine, yet there were tools laying around, as well as a pile of boards that looked like they came from....where she lay.

She did the only thing that seemed logical at the time. She screamed. A scream didn't even begin to cover it. It was more of a shriek, a blood curdling scream so loud that she was left breathless afterwards. Inhaling madly, she immediately choked. The smells that assaulted her senses were too much, making her eyes water.

Footsteps were heard to her left, her head shot over to the source of the sound. A man. A rather large man. With white hair and stripes over his...."Sesshoumaru," she croaked. Her throat felt like it had been stuffed with cotton, her mouth dry.

"Yes, little miko. Now please calm down." He stood again, returned to his table, and grabbed the large bottle of water and a cup. Pouring a small amount into the cup he returned to her, handing it to her. "Drink slowly. I gather it's been roughly a thousand years since you've consumed any liquids."

Graciously she took the cup from his hands, nearly inhaling the contents. Of course, after so long of nothing passing through her lips, she choked. Sesshoumaru knelt down next to her and lightly patted her back. "I warned you, didn't I?"

Kagome nodded. "Why aren't you trying to kill me?"

"You lay in a death like state hidden in this shrine for nearly a thousand years, and you are more concerned with why I am not killing you? I do not think that me not taking your life is ranked exceptionally high on the agenda right now. I am more curious as to why you are still alive, and what you were doing buried in this shrine." He sighed as her eyes widened and began to water. After raising Rin and playing 'grandpa' for generations of her family he knew exactly what was about to happen.

As the tears began to flow down her face he gently picked her up and moved her out of the hole in the floor. Weakly she fought him, slapping him in the chest and flailing her legs, until she finally gave in and sank as deeply as she could into his larger body and cried into his shirt.

He decided to utilize another one of the skills he learned while dealing with RIn and other crying women from her line; he kept his mouth shut. Instead he sat down on the dusty floor with her, settling her down comfortably in his lap, and just held her as she let out over one thousand years worth of grief and anguish. His questions would have to wait; right now the important thing was finding out why she was there and what exactly happened during that final battle.

-----

After what seemed like forever Kagome finally calmed. She pulled her face away from his shirt and peeked up at him through her lashes. "Why haven't you tried to kill me?"

"I thought we have already gone over that."

"What happened to me?"

"You don't know?"

"If I knew would I be asking you?"

"I suppose not."

She scrambled out of his lap. "What is wrong with me? What is wrong with you? You hate me, remember! You want to kill me! You want to dismember me and scatter my limbs all over Japan and probably eat my soul!"

He looked at her with little amusement in his eyes. "I don't eat souls. Do not confuse me with that clay pot that my brother used to mope over."

At the mention of the hanyou and the miko Kagome's face fell and the tears returned. Sesshoumaru mentally slapped himself and decided he hated the taste of his toes. Over the years he had mellowed quite a bit, even grew to enjoy a good joke now and again, but also developed a thing his former partner called 'foot in mouth disease'. The girl weeping in front of him was too fragile to even consider talking about anything of importance right now.

He looked down at his watch. "It's almost midnight. Please allow me to take you to my home so you may clean up and eat. We will discuss matters in the morning."

"You promise you won't kill me?"

"If I wanted you dead you would have been before you could have drawn your first breath."

Kagome stood and wiped her face. "Even though this goes against my better judgement, you are my only chance at survival right now."

"I'm glad you are coming to your senses."

-----

Kagome sat quietly and watched the city that she knew as Tokyo fly by. She had always envisioned the modern Sesshoumaru being some sort of swank businessman and having a driver, not a retired college professor that focused his area of study on the feudal era that drove a small economy car. Not saying that the vehicle wasn't nice. Just much different. It had all of the normal features of the cars in her time; a radio, air conditioning, power windows and locks, even a temperature controlled cup holder. The most striking feature was the lack of a steering column. In it's place was a joystick that was in between the driver and passenger seats so one could steer from either side of the car. It was a technology that Kagome knew the car manufacturers were testing in her time, but apparently in this strange new future this sort of car was quite common. In fact, as Sesshoumaru explained to her, this car was actually low end compared to some of the other models on the market.

The Tokyo she was seeing now was nothing close to what she imagined the future to be like. It was actually a lot cleaner than she thought it would be. Her Tokyo wasn't horrible by any means, but even the air smelled cleaner. Sesshoumaru again picked up the slack when he saw the confusion on her face. Apparently not very long after she had fallen through the well for the final time the world's global warming and energy crisis had reached it's peak and the governments of many countries finally decided to work together and make use of cleaner energy sources. Using cleaner sources meant less pollution and the earth began a slow healing process. Everyone knew it wouldn't be the same, but at least the source of all of the damage had been slowed down.

"Even though I have lived many lifetimes, I will never understand humans," he said with a sigh, after his mini explanation on the modern world.

It wasn't long before they pulled up to an apartment building. Kagome noted that it wasn't any different from the buildings in her own time. There was even a private parking garage. Once in the garage Sesshoumaru pulled into his designated parking spot and shut off the engine. "Home sweet home," he joked. He got out of the car yet noticed Kagome had failed to get out as well. Circling the car, he noticed her fumbling for the handle which was neatly tucked away. If you hadn't been in the car before, it could be confusing. He opened the car door for her and held it while she got out. "Cars haven't changed that much in five hundred years." When she was safely out of the car he closed the door and set the alarm with the remote that hung on his key ring.

Silently she followed him to the elevator and watched him fish a key card out of his back pocket. Once they stepped in he waved they key card in front of a little panel below the numbers and then hit the '10' button. As the elevator lurched up to his floor Kagome wrestled with her mind to find something to say. What could she say? She had already made her feelings quite apparent when they were back at the shrine. Her childhood home that was no longer her home.

Soon the doors opened to a private entryway and they stepped out. She watched him fiddle with his keys again and open the door. Once inside she looked around with great curiosity. When she was in the feudal era she sometimes wondered what sort of place the cold taiyoukai would live in. Of course at that point she never imagined him living in a modern apartment in Tokyo.

The living space wasn't exceptionally neat like she thought it would be. There were books scattered over almost every surface, paperwork all over the small table in the kitchen with a small space where she could tell that he either worked or ate. Probably both.

"Come," he beckoned to her from down the small hallway. As if on autopilot she followed him, ending up in the only neat place in the entire apartment; the bathroom. "I will find some clothes for you to wear. I thought that you would like to bathe, giving your obsession with it when you traveled with my brother."

She just nodded and waited for him to leave the room before removing her clothing that had grown rather grimy over the last thousand years. Quickly realizing that plumbing hadn't advanced much in the past five hundred years since she bathed in her time, she stood under the spray in the small shower stall. She had missed this more than anyone would ever know.

Kagome grabbed the bottle of shampoo off of the shelf built into the wall. "So this is how his hair still looks so good..." Pouring a small amount into her hand she put the bottle back and worked the shampoo into her hair. Go figure it would be unscented. She thought so much, considering he was a dog demon. Inuyasha's nose was sensitive enough, she could only imagine how Sesshoumaru handled the modern world with his sensitive sniffer.

After she rinsed her hair she washed all of the grime and grit off of her body. Surprisingly his body was was scented, and in a way it comforted her to be surrounded by the masculine scent, even though it was the scent of a male demon that had tried to kill her more times than she could count.

She still couldn't figure out why she was still alive. He should have killed her on the spot. And apparently the icicle that she had always accused him of having jammed up his butt had melted. The words Sesshoumaru, smile, and laugh were things she never thought she would use together. Other than him not being the cause of her demise, why was she still alive one thousand years from the time of the final battle? She remembered a few things; the massacre and watching almost all of her friends die one right after other, her first love being dismembered, and her anger being channeled into the final blow that killed the evil hanyou and allowed her to complete and purify the jewel that was now safely imbedded in her side once more. There were no physical signs that it was there. The power that it once held was barely even apparent, like it had a volume button and someone had suddenly turned the sound down to nearly mute.

Still standing under the shower spray she heard the door creak open. "There are some clothes on the vanity for when you are done showering." The door closed once again and that was the end of that.

After what seemed like an eternity yet no where near enough time under the spray the hot water began to slowly run cold. Just like in her era that was her cue to make her exit. For once in her life she didn't feel bad about taking all of the hot water; he was a big bad demon, he could take an icy shower.

Using the simple white towels that were located on a little shelf next to the shower stall she dried herself off. The clothes that he had brought in sat on the vanity as promised; a simple pair of silk pajamas that she assumed belonged to him. They were so large they hung off of her like a she were a skeleton. For all she knew she did look like a skeleton. The last two months in the past were spent steadily fighting to finish their quest and she rarely had time to care herself. She used the brush on the vanity to brush out her hair that was in desperate need of a cut.

Feeling truly clean for the first time in what felt like an eternity she took a moment to look at herself in the mirror in front of her. Her hair had grown out, but it wasn't like there was an opportunity for her to go to a stylist in the feudal era. Even after her thousand year sleep she still had dark circles under her eyes. Her body looked the same; the same scars, the same subtle curves that had started forming soon after her sixteenth birthday, the same killer arms from years of using a bow. There was something missing. She couldn't quite place her finger on it.

Sesshoumaru was waiting for her on the other side of the door. She could feel his energy signatures coming in waves with emotions ranging from confusion to anger, even a touch of sadness. As nice as this bathroom was it didn't seem like the right place to spend the rest of her evening. Time to face the music.

When she opened the door Sesshoumaru was sitting across the hallway leaning on the wall. "Are you alright?" His eyes were bloodshot and his voice rough like he had been crying.

Kagome laughed as much as she could. "No. Not in the slightest."

He stood up to his full height. "Come. I will show you to my bedroom. You may sleep there until we can make other arrangements."

Like a zombie she followed him into his bedroom. The sheets were still rumpled and there were a couple of pairs of pants strewn over a chair. When he stopped she made her way to the bed and sat on it. It felt so good to be in a real bed. Once comfortably bundled in the down comforter and snuggled into the pillows she closed her eyes. "I don't know if I want to sleep," she whispered. After particularly harsh battles she always had some sort of nightmare, usually involving losing one of her friends. She had no recollection of what had happened though she feared if she slept she may see it all again in technicolor. "Thank you, Sesshoumaru."

The look of sadness on his face made her chest ache. He had lived through the aftermath; he knew what happened. "You're welcome, miko." Without another word he turned and left the room, leaving the door cracked in case she called for him.