Good Will Hunting

by Kyen

~ Moon Phase 1 ~ How Hunter’s Make Deals

            The sun shone down brightly upon the homely village as Kagome, Inuyasha, Miroku, Sango, Shippou and Karara stood atop a small hill, surveying it. They had been traveling for days, looking for the vanished Naraku and his children. They had been scattered to the four winds, but recent dreams and an encounter with another demon had led them to believe they were far from dead.

            “Come on, I’m hungry!” Inuyasha proclaimed and started towards the village.

            “Inuyasha, did you ever stop to think that maybe the villagers won’t take to a demon just strolling in?” Miroku asked the half-hanyou.

            He stopped, “Well then, Monk, you go in! They all seem to love you.”

            “Yes, well, I feel a darkness over the place anyway,” Miroku smiled and started down the path.

            “Have you noticed he always seems to feel an evil presence whenever we get to a village or an inn?” Shippou asked, ridding on Kagome’s left shoulder.

            “Yes, well, so long as it gets us room and board I don’t really care,” Inuyasha said, tucking his hands in his sleeves and followed Miroku.

            “Sir, we have no need of your services here,” said the man at the gate.

            “But, good man, I feel a dark presence within. Surely you want it purged from the house or soul who houses it,” Miroku argued. The man could do little against this, but remained firm. He suddenly looked up and noticed Inuyasha sprinting towards them. “Hunters, to arms! A demon is approaching!”

            Miroku suddenly realized why the man refused him. He swung back to Inuyasha and held his hands up, “Inuyasha, stop!”

            “Why?” Inuyasha called, halting.

            “These are Hunters! They will kill you if you come near!” Miroku called back.

            “Do you sympathize with this beast?” asked the guard.

            “He is a friend,” Miroku said.

            “Kill him too,” the guard snapped and Miroku blanched. By that time Sango, Kagome, and Shippou had appeared. “Look! The bring a kitsune with them! Kill them all!”

            “Hold!” a voice cried through the clamor of men reading their weapons on the wall. They parted and allowed a woman dressed in a short kimono to pass them. In her hand she held a glaive, her black hair dancing wildly in the wind. “They bring an exterminator with them. These demons are not evil.”

            “What if the exterminator is evil?” asked one of the guards.

            The woman swung at him, barely missing his head and sending him reeling backwards, “Never insult one of your noble cause!” The man nodded weakly and retreated, “Open the gates to them.”

            “I think she’s lost the will to fight,” whispered one guard.

            The woman growled and swung, slicing across the man’s ankles, opening shallow wounds that trickled some blood, “I am your leader! Never, ever, accuse me of loosing the will to fight!” She turned to the other guards, “Keep an eye on them though. I have a use for them.” The guards nodded and their leader descended the steps to greet the newcomers.

            “Please, forgive their rudeness,” she said. “I am Ieo, Leader of the Hunters.”

            “If you hate demons why do you have a demon name?” Shippou asked innocently.

            “We bare the names of our hated enemies to fuel our anger to them, to help us fight because we know we have defeated that demon, and so shall beat the one we fight today,” she said. “We are honored to welcome an Exterminator.”

            Sango nodded and Ieo motioned for them to follow her. She led them through the streets to a large inn. Maids immediately came and helped the two girls to a bathroom and then hot springs and then led the men to some hot springs in the back on the opposite side of the building. Ieo smiled and gave special instructions to one maid before leaving. The maid nodded and headed to fetch towels for the men, fingering a pouch now hidden in her pocket.

            “You don’t seem happy about staying here,” Kagome noted as Sango bathed in the hot springs. 

            “No, I don’t,” Sango admitted and went under.

            “Why? Ieo seems nice,” Kagome said.

            Sango shook her head, “She is playing us for fools, and I know it. These people are called Hunters. They are powerful warriors, like my people were, but they are not only exterminators of demons, they are complete sell-swords. They care not what they are hired for, so long as they are paid.” She dipped once more before coming up, “I heard in a rumor from about three towns back that they had called a Hunter called the Huntress, the Hunters best warrior, daughter of their leader, Ieo. She was sent for to make a demon flee the woods so they could hunt again, but she never returned for her payment, though the demon left. All she left was a note, saying the woods were safe.”

            “Oh awful!” Kagome cried. “I can’t imagine loosing my kid to a demon!”
            “They found blood, but not enough to make them think she was killed,” Sango continued. “They think she was either possessed by it or she ran it out and died somewhere else. They haven’t found her body, if she really is dead.”

            “But still, why do you think they would harm us?” Kagome asked.

            Sango frowned, “I don’t know, but I have a feeling, that’s all.”

            “You don’t like the Hunters, do you?” Kagome asked after a few minutes.

            “No, none of my people did. They went against your code. If a demon came to them asking them to kill someone else for the right price, they would do it. All they care for is how much gold their client can pay and how much blood sport they’ll get out of it,” Sango growled. Kagome did not press her, for she had to agree with Sango. She felt something was wrong, very wrong.

            “Inuyasha! Inuyasha wake up!” Miroku cried, shaking the half demon as he nearly sunk into the water, drowning. Miroku shook him and slapped him, but nothing worked.

            Finally, Miroku just hauled Inuyasha out and straddled him, pumping his chest, seeing if that worked. Shippou tried to help by bouncing on his chest, but nothing worked. He looked to Miroku in dismay, “Miroku, what’s wrong with him?”

            “Oh, he’s just sleeping,” said a voice and the two men swung around to face a fully dressed, fully armed Hunter. “And he’ll continue to do so till we give him the reversal powder.”

            “Reversal powder?” Miroku asked. “When did you have time to pour a powder on Inuyasha to make him sleep?”

            “Oh, I didn’t do anything. Miaka did it,” he said, naming a maid. “She poured it into the water. It’s specially designed to affect only demons, not humans.”

            “Then why am I not affected?” demanded Shippou.

            “Adult demons,” the man grinned, and Shippou fumed.

            “The menservants shall dress the demon and you two shall come with me, along with the girls who are being fetched,” the man said.

            “Why would I do something like that?” Miroku asked him with a feral growl.

            “Because if you don’t I execute your friend now,” the man said and twirled a small dagger on his fingers casually. Miroku could see he meant it and sighed. Grabbing his clothes he dressed and followed the man out, Shippou staying to watch Inuyasha.

            “You were right, Sango,” Kagome whispered. “They were up to no good.”

            Ieo sat in a large chair of a dais, Miroku, Sango, Kagome, Shippou and Karara before her. Inuyasha hung, asleep, displayed behind her, the guard tickling the half demon’s chin with his dagger.

            “Now, as you can see, we have an incentive to make you do as we ask,” Ieo said, nodding to Inuyasha. “So, here’s the deal. You agree to find my daughter, and we wake the demon and let him go with you to retrieve her.”

            “Why can’t you do it?” Kagome demanded.

            “The Demon Moon is coming in three nights,” Ieo explained. “It’s suicide to this village to so much as let one of your own go out and search for her. With the Huntress, my daughter and the best in our village, gone, we will have a hard time this year fighting off the hoards that shall try to attack.”

            Kagome could not argue with that, “Wake Inuyasha and show me he’s okay and then, and only then, will I agree to this.”

            Ieo produced a pouch and threw it to the guard, who took a small handful of the stuff and hurled into Inuyasha’s face. The half-hanyou sputtered and coughed and blinked drunkenly. “Where am I? Kagome, why am I tied up?”

            “Drowsy, but that’s about it,” Ieo said. “So, do we have a deal?”

            “How do you know we won’t just walk away and not keep your end?” Miroku demanded.

            “Simple,” Ieo smiled, “that awakening powder as a duel effect. I have a mirror that allows me to see my newest target and track them down. Through it I can track this half-hanyou and with a word, the poison will course through his veins and kill him in an hour.”

            “There’s poison in that powder?” Sango asked incredulously.

            “Yes, a small after effect we have been pleased with,” Ieo smiled. “So, do we have a deal?”

            “YES!” Inuyasha cried and Ieo grinned wider.

            “Good!” she rose. “You will be provisioned and then you will leave tonight. Remember, I’m keeping an eye on you.” She held the mirror up and swung it. With that, several guards came and undid Inuyasha led the group out of the hut.

            “She poisoned me!” Inuyasha screeched. “How could you let her do this?”

            Ieo suddenly appeared, “Oh, and, by the way, the demon who has my daughter, his name is Sesshomaru.” All of the gang’s eyes widened, Inuyasha collapsed, Shippou fainted and Kagome felt ready to scream.

            They had to fight Sesshomaru? Kagome’s eye twitched and half the villagers collapsed to the ground with their ears covered as her scream split the air.

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