Chapter 1: What’s a Guy To Do?
“Ms. Higurashi, I need you to cooperate. Now, I’ll ask you again. Where are they?” a lady with tanned skin asked Kagome.
Kagome looked at her, and noticed how tired the woman was; as though she hadn’t slept in weeks. Her eyelids drooped, her mouth sagged and the eyes that should have been a vibrant green were now dull and washed out. The color reminded Kagome of puke.
The lady in front Kagome sighed. Who was she again? But, the more Kagome thought about it, the more she realized it really didn’t matter. Kagome would never tell the woman where her former companions had gone. She peered up at the ceiling, and focused on the bright interrogation lamp, clearly unwilling to give the detective the information she wanted.
“Ms. Higurashi,” the exasperated woman tried to regain Kagome’s attention. “I asked you a question and I would appreciate it greatly if you answered me” The female leaned over the table and placed her hands in front of Kagome. “Where are the men who accompanied you these past several months?” As Kagome stared her down, the woman decided to give it a rest, and sat back down in her own chair.
Kagome glanced back at the person sitting across from her. She looked at the woman’s brown, limp hair, her scrunched blazer and fuchsia-colored button up. She looked exhausted. Kagome wondered “Should I answer her?” she looked at her hands folded in her lap. “It wouldn’t really matter either way.” She thought. Sesshoumaru and the others were long gone by now. And it wasn’t as though she had any idea of where they went. They never told her anything. He wouldn’t let them.
The woman sighed and threw a folder on the table. “Ms. Higurashi, do you know where the Demon Renegades are? If you have any idea, you need to tell me right now. They’re out there killing harmless humans.” again, no reply.
She slammed her palms on the table. “Do you have even the slightest idea of how deadly they are?!” she yelled.
That got Kagome’s attention, and she focused in on her interrogator. “When you wake up alone and cold, not knowing where you came from, or who to trust,” she paused and leveled the detective with a cool stare “Do you think it makes any damn difference whether they’re ‘killers’ or not?” Kagome snapped at woman, and jumped out of her seat, slamming her hands on the table. The woman stepped back, pulled a gun out and aimed at Kagome.
Kagome went on “You and your damn team left me there to die, so forgive me for forgetting my manners, but the way I see it, I don’t owe any form of explanation or cooperation to you and any persons associated with you,” she spat out. Kagome sat back down. The detective still had her gun pointed at her.
Kagome scoffed, and looked down “Shoot me. No one would notice, and no one would care. Well, besides you and everyone involved in your dumb investigation. He could care less about what happened to me. He never cared.” She drifted off back into her own thoughts.
The other female sighed again. There wasn’t any way she was going to get any information from her. Not now, at least. She exited the interrogation room.
“Sango, you need to rest. Go home, and get some sleep.” Her partner said as he approached her. But the moment he went to lay his hands on her shoulder, she wrenched herself away from him.
“How can I do that when two of the most dangerous demons are out there on the loose? How can I rest knowing they have the best computer hacker and programmer in all of Asia helping them?” she stopped. “He’s not even a youkai! Why the hell would he stay with them?!” Sango slumped to the floor, and began to sob. “He never even said goodbye,” she buried her face in her hands.
Hojo knelt by her, and placed his arms around her shoulders. “Sango, who knows why? Maybe they’re threatening him. You know Miroku doesn’t do anything unless he has a reason to.” Sango leaned into him, and continued to weep. They both knew it was a lie.
He hated seeing her this way. Why? Well, mostly because the Sango he knew didn’t act like this. Sango Taijiya was a strong, dependable, cool woman who he admired. She was also a person who never lost sight of her objective.
The woman who now sobbed in his arms was an entirely different person. She was someone who had lost the love of her life; someone who felt betrayed by the only man besides himself that she had truly, completely and wholly trusted.
He stared at the person who had caused this sudden outburst.
Kagome Higurashi. The woman they had left lying in the middle of the forest. When they had first approached her, he and Sango’s team had believed she wouldn’t make it. She had been bleeding profusely, and gasping for air. Kagome had been caught in the middle of an open-fired encounter. It had been between them, Tokyo’s top criminal profilers and detectives, and their opposition; the lethal-youkai resistance, the Demon Renegades. He had wondered briefly what a civilian like her had been doing there in the middle of the night. But, they were so close to catching their targets; he couldn’t spare her more than a thought or two.
They had been tracking the rebels when they had received an anonymous tip of their whereabouts, and as luck would have it, the tip had been correct. They had come face to face for the first time with the leader of the rebel group, Sesshoumaru Taisho. Hojo had seen and heard of the Taiyoukai’s legendary power and rumored skills, but he had never seen it in person. Not only had he seen it, but he’d been on the receiving end of it.
He was lucky that the extremely and insanely powerful demon hadn’t killed him. Hojo was no fool; he knew and understood that the demon bastard had meant for him to remain alive. Sesshoumaru had spared him that night. Why? He didn’t know. He and Sango had barely made it out of that place alive.
He’d never forget the desperation and relief written all over her face while they were approaching the Renegade’s stronghold. They had been chasing them, and followed them there after their first encounter in the open woodlands. Miroku had been there with Sesshoumaru and his younger half demon, half human brother, Inuyasha. They came to an empty warehouse. He remembered feeling so stupid. “This was their base?” he thought in astonishment. They had overlooked this place due to its cumbersome location, and since well, it had been the most obvious place to hide. Never would he again make the stupid mistake of overlooking a possibility no matter how unlikely it seemed.
As he thought further, he delved into the memory of that night. How had it gone wrong? How could it have? Then again, how could it not have? Everything was too perfect. It was almost as if everything but he and Sango’s team had been premeditated. But then, what about Kagome? How did she play into all this? He wasn’t sure.
As they approached the dank warehouse, Sesshoumaru and Inuyasha emerged from the building with Miroku at their heels. Acting before thinking, Hojo immediately shot at Sesshoumaru the moment he came into his shooting range. The Dai hadn’t been pleased at all. He unleashed an onslaught of pain on the hopelessly unprepared detective.
His partner, Sango was so consumed with finding her significant other that she hadn’t even noticed Hojo’s crippled state. As he reflected, he realized he couldn’t blame her. Sango, Miroku and he grew up together. He had seen the telltale signs impending relationship, and was overjoyed for the both when they had finally come together. Hojo knew just how much Sango loved Miroku, and vice versa. But that night, he tried to warn her. Hojo had begged Sango to consider that maybe, just maybe, Miroku wasn’t being held hostage. He told Sango “They’ve all known each other since their youth. There is no guarantee that Miroku isn’t with them of his own volition,” She didn’t believe him, but how could she?
In the moment they came face to face with their opposition though, Sango had been so convinced that Miroku was forced to go with Sesshoumaru and his gang, that she had been completely blindsided by his response to her when she had called his name. Miroku didn’t react the way she had expected at all. His reply blew her out of the park. He had looked her straight in the eye, and told to her that he was never coming back, and that she had followed them for nothing. He told her to go home, and stop bothering them. He told her she was nothing more than a thorn in his side; a burden.
After her initial shock, Sango had yelled at him, begging him to explain what was going on and why he was acting the way he was. The look in her eyes and the broken sound of her voice still haunted Hojo to this day.
Miroku didn’t answer her, and turned to follow after Inuyasha. Instinctively, Sango had rushed towards him. Sesshoumaru intervened and slammed her into a nearby wall. Hojo had watched from the ground injured and blurry-eyed, as Miroku turned to look at her, and then watched as he faced forward, and left without so much as a backwards glance. Sango had called his name with what little energy she had left, yet Miroku never looked back. After that, Hojo had blacked out. Sesshoumaru had expanded his youkai energy, and the force and oppression of it sent Hojo reeling into darkness.
He woke up in a hospital bed a few days later. Sango was sitting next to his bed. Her face was covered in bruises, and she had a bandage wrapped around her torso. She smiled softly, and said “Welcome back, partner.”
That was the last time he saw her smile. The last time Sango had been herself. That had been a year and a half ago. Now, here they were, back at the police department in Tokyo, Japan. A few days ago, Kagome had been found in the back of an abandoned white heist van. She was out cold. They had rushed her to the hospital. She had a minor concussion, and was bruised all along her right arm.
They didn’t know what had happened to her. He and Sango had both questioned her countless times, yet she never answered them. The answers she did give were useless. All she said was that after their team left her for dead, Sesshoumaru, Miroku and Inuyasha had found her, and picked her up. She had been with them the entire time. She knew their plans, she knew their routines. She knew them.
Yet, Hojo could never understand why the Renegades had left her. Kagome had to have something. Why else would Sesshoumaru keep her so close? They had to have known he and Sango would find her. Something major had to have happened for them to just leave her. But, Hojo would never find out; not unless someone told him. And the only person who was in any position to do so was Kagome herself, and she kept her mouth closed at all times possible. What was a guy to do in a situation like this? He wasn’t quite sure at this point.