Fading away

Hahaha, I went to sleep at 2.45 AM when I finished chapter 13 and had written the first paragraph of chapter 14... then... strangely... I woke up at 7 AM, completely lucid and unable to go to sleep again... so I just finished chapter 14 and I'm on chapter 15 right now xDDDD

I'm trying to finish this story by next week since afterwards I'll finish school and there will be exams and stuff and unfortunately no room for Sesshomaru and Inuyasha besides math or anything else... X___x... oh well, might as well make the best out of my last holidays as a student xDDDD

this chapter is a bit longer... even though I hadn't planned it to get this long ^^''''' I just like having Sesshomaru and Inuyasha chat with each other...

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Sesshomaru was sitting at his desk and rubbed the bridge of his nose with a sigh as he furiously typed away on his keyboard with his other hand. One of his secretaries had done a serious blunder on registering a date for a meeting with another company a week later that the actual date – which was on the next day – and they still had to process all of the data they needed so Sesshomaru was working away those precious hours he usually kept for himself and for Inuyasha's books. At least he didn’t need those insane amounts of coffee he could smell even through the door to the secretaries’ office where pale, drowsy women blinked at their screens as if dreaming open-eyed. The youkai calmly took a sip of his almost cold tea while scanning through his achievement of the evening before he stood up to see if his two ladies were still alive. One had fallen asleep on the keyboard while the other barely could distinguish two words from each other but they still had managed to do most of the work he had given them to correct their blunder from what he could see when he shortly scrolled through their work before calling them a taxi, deciding that they had suffered enough. They left, staggering on their feet as they almost sleepwalked out of the office while their literally inhuman chef smirked to himself as he contemplated the advantage he had of being able to live little to no sleep. With a sigh Sesshomaru went back to his own desk, a slave to his own work that was right then stealing away his reading time until he noticed his phone hidden under a document.

 

He knew the number by heart as he typed it with one hand, his other independently occupied with his work. After a few rings a sleepy, mumbling voice answered:

 

“Hmmmm… Shirayuki.”

 

“Good morning, Inuyasha… did I wake you up?”

 

*fabric rustling*

 

“‘Good morning’? Are you kidding me, Sesshomaru? It’s 4 in the morning!”

 

“I know… were you sleeping?”

 

“*yawn* Not really… just dozing a bit…”

 

“Your voice sounds strange.”

 

“Really? How so?”

 

“Raspy… fragile… brittle… old… what’s going on?”

 

“*sigh* It’s my human night… or more like the rest of it, it’s only a bit more than an hour ‘till sunrise… happy now?”

 

“Sorry… if I had known, I wouldn’t have called…”

 

“Don’t sweat it, I didn’t tell you… I don’t really sleep anyway when I’m human…”

 

“Why?”

 

“Conditioned sleeping pattern… You wouldn’t want to sleep happily when you’re a little snack for any demon passing by, right?”

 

“Oh, right. You have a point there. But that time when I was around, you slept, didn’t you?”

 

“… Silly, think about why I slept.”

 

“… I don’t know.”

 

“*muttering*… You were around… I felt safe… and I was drop-dead tired…”

 

“Haha… I can see you blush right now.”

 

“Moron… And why is the mighty lord of the western lands and director of the Tsuki Company calling me, his bastard little half-brother in the middle of the night?”

 

“Don’t call yourself a bastard, Inuyasha… As if such things mattered now anyway… It’s nothing really… One of my secretaries made a big blunder in scheduling a meeting for next week when it’s due tomorrow and we still had to process information for it.”

 

“Oh… don’t tell me your secretaries are still at work now???”

 

“No… I just sent them home…”

 

“… inhuman chef.”

 

“That’s what I am.”

 

“…”

 

“I’ve given them the next day off and called another secretary to be my assistant for the meeting. Happy now?”

 

“That’s much better. I didn’t know you were such a … kind… chef.”

 

“I even called them a taxi.”

 

“Don’t choke on your friendliness, Sesshomaru.”

 

“Haha… well, my persona this time is a gentle boss. My last persona was colder and I had ‘bad reviews’”

 

“No wonder. Even I felt like I was freezing when under your command back then…”

 

“You know, back then, I hadn’t really realized that you were in my army. It was more or less a surprise to suddenly see you on the battlefield fighting on my side.”

 

“Oh? Really? Well, most of your staff knew and addressed me either as ‘bastard’ or as ‘Inuyasha-sama’. It was rather funny to watch them being indecisive on what to regard me as.”

 

“Well, if I had known earlier than just the last battle, I would have made you a general.”

 

“Really? Even though I am father’s misstep?”

 

“I based – and still do  – my staffs upon their abilities, back then it was fighting power, of course, and you would have barely made it through my criteria.”

 

“Barely? Whoa, you’re harsh. Why not completely?”

 

“Hmmm… back then, I’d have said that you are too much inclined towards the humans and relying too much on teamwork but now… I’d just say you’re too frail.”

 

“Is that so? We should have a sparring match once… just kidding; I’d lose like I have always lost against you.”

 

“Oh, you made it to a draw a few times and stayed alive through all of our battles.”

 

“Har har, remember that arm?”

 

“Oh, that one? It grew back, obviously.”

 

“Tche... How long did I take?”

 

“Oh, a year after you got rid of Naraku it was back.”

 

“Nice healing speed. Growing back a limb would take me a century… I think. Not that I tried it out.”

 

“Really? That’s slow… wait, it took you much less when I speared you up.”

 

“Obviously... Everything that doesn’t contain bones and is necessary to live heals much faster. Or else you’d be talking to an undead or to grave right now.”

 

“Is that so? Oh well… you can at least boast that you are the one who has given me the most life threatening wounds in my life.”

 

“Idiot, it’s not like I want to say such things now…”

 

“Hmm… speaking about wounds and life… why do you sound so weak when you’re human?”

 

“… because I AM weak right now, even to human standards.”

 

“But why?”

 

“… Sesshomaru… I wasn’t blessed with a body of a pure-blooded youkai and I’m getting old…”

 

“Shouldn’t the aging process only start during the last 50 years of your life?”

 

“That’s for my youkai side. My human side is another story.”

 

“Tell me about it.”

 

“… No.”

 

“Why?”

 

“… You… are important to me… and I want to be important to you as well… so I don’t want you to look at the weak me who isn’t really who I feel to be. I want you to see as the healthy me, the one who can walk around, who doesn’t need help for the slightest things and not the one I am right now.”

 

“Inuyasha… You already ARE the most important person in my life right now… I want to know everything about you… I realized that you deserved more than the way I treated you all those centuries along so I want to be a proper brother now. And what kind of elder brother doesn’t know everything about his younger brother?”

 

“Haha, thank you, Onii-chan.”

 

“…”

 

“Onii-sama?”

 

“…”

 

“Sesshomaru?”

 

“I prefer that one.”

 

“Some kind of brother you are. Joke aside… I feel honored and happy that you think about me like that but still…”

 

“Just tell me.”

 

“*sigh* … you’re so stubborn. Even Kagome wasn’t like that.”

 

“… perseverant you mean.”

 

“Whatever… Well then… how to explain? Maybe like that… Although my human and my youkai side are connected, they age differently. My youkai side halted the visible aging process of my human for a long time though but still… my human side feels the weight of those 6 centuries and is weak and old, tying me to bed for that one night… That’s pretty much it.”

 

“Is that really all?”

 

“… I can’t really lie to you… there IS or rather WAS something else… maybe I’ll tell you about that some other time…”

 

“Why not now?”

 

“… I just don’t want to.”

 

“Fine… but I still you want you to tell me one day!”

 

“When it has become just a distant bad memory, I will…”

 

“… you said ‘that one night’… is there a rhythm to your human night or do you just sense it ahead?”

 

“… don’t tell me didn’t notice until now?”

 

“I’m sorry.”

 

“You’re really having some obfuscating obliviousness anchored in your pretty head sometimes, you know? Try guessing.”

 

“Come on… I don’t really have a mind right now for guessing around!”

 

“*sigh* I am a so-called ‘lunar hanyou’ which means I change accordingly to the lunar phase. My human night is on new moon and lasts from the moment when the sun has gone down ‘till sunrise. And yes, I do feel it ahead as I feel weaker and more prone to human emotions on the day before.”

 

“Why is that?”

 

“Ask yourself, you’re the one walking around with a moon of your forehead.”

 

“Right… but you said that you are a ‘lunar hanyou’… are there other types?”

 

“I know of the types ‘daily hanyou’… and ‘annual hanyou’… the first ones change once a day, mostly on twilight and dawn while the other… changes once a year for a longer time…”

 

“Oh… and why are you human on a new moon’s night?”

 

“Because I was born on the first day of the lunar cycle, so I was told. Apparently it runs in the family that inu youkai hanyous are human on the lunar phase previous to their birth or just born on their first youkai-side night… if that makes any sense…”

 

“It does… I remember father dying on the first lunar crescent… I suppose you know he died protecting you and your mother on the day you were born.”

 

“On the night, you mean, but yes… Myouga-jii-chan told me about it…”

 

“It was also the first time I ever saw you…”

 

“Really? You were there?”

 

“Of course… I came to salvage the body of my father and to keep my promise to him.”

“Your promise?”

 

“… To bring you and your mother into safety if he didn’t manage it…”

 

“You did?”

 

“Hmmm… I brought you and your mother in the nick of time to her second castle… you were the tiniest new-born I’d ever seen, I could hold you in my palm.”

 

“Whoa… well, I was born a month previous to my due term.”

 

“Really?”

 

“Yes, the shock of being attacked had my mother go into labor prematurely… or so I was told… But you really held me in your palm?!?”

 

“Not really… but your mother lost consciousness in mid-flight and I had to hold the bundle you were packed in so you wouldn’t drop down…”

 

“Oh… thanks…”

 

“Never mind… it’s not like I did it back then out of care for you, I have to admit.”

 

“Haha… you knew I thought you were a god when you visited us, my mother and me, that time? The first time I ‘saw’ you?”

 

“Oh… a god, you say? I feel honored… although I didn’t actually come as a ‘friendly god’”

 

“I know… mother cried afterwards… because the inu youkai had refused to accept me… At least the clan had decided to let me live until I had reached maturity without labeling me as free meat…”

 

“I accept you now… completely… with all you are and aren’t…”

 

“Haha… thank you… but I have to disappoint you, I still don’t think of you as god again.”

 

“I didn’t expect that, silly little brother… can’t I see you once on a new moon’s night? I promise I won’t be repulsed or anything…”

 

“No, Sesshomaru… even brothers have secrets they don’t tell or show to each other…”

 

“I could take care of you during that night…”

 

“That’s what I’m scared of, Sesshomaru… I can imagine it, you know? As soon as I have transformed, you’ll be shocked, maybe even to the point that it’ll show on your impassible face but then you’ll catch yourself and take care of me… You’ll help me drink, let me sleep while giving me the security of someone holding watch for me and protect me from any harm but then? What will you do when the sun has risen again? You’ll never see me again as the one I am usually… you’ll always think of me as a weak person, someone who has to be taken care of like a baby or like a very old man… and you won’t desire me anymore out of concern for my health… … it feels nice to be desired, you know?”

 

“Oh… can’t you at least describe yourself right now? Or give me a picture?”

 

“NO. PICTURES. … I might sound like woman right now but I don’t want to show you my wrinkles and stuff… hahaha…”

 

“Wrinkles?”

 

“Lots of them… and grey hair…”

 

“Grey?”

 

“Alright… more like white… happy now?”

 

“Well… yes, I’m happy… you’ve told me such things… I feel like I know you a little bit better….”

 

“It’s unfair… you have no weak side you could tell me of…”

 

“Haha… but I’m showing you my weak side all the time…”

 

“… Idiot… that’s not a weak side…”

 

“Even if… I think it’s my favorite side right now…”

 

“…”

 

“Amazing, I can HEAR you blush…”

 

“Moron… don’t go saying stuff like that… Did you get a card for the premiere of the play as well?”

 

“Yeah… It’s in two days, right?”

 

“Hmmm… I look forward to it…”

 

“Me too… especially sitting in the honor loge with you… Like on a date.”

 

“Idiot.”

 

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