Interference From Kouga
The next day everyone woke up to a beautiful, sun filled morning. They ate some leftovers from the night before to fill up their stomachs until they could reach Kaede-sama's village at noon. Haruko sat alone, still refused to talk to anyone.

"Let's go!" Inuyasha yells at the group, grasping his Tessaiga to show command. Everyone is helping Kagome pack her sleeping bags.

"We’re coming, Inuyasha." Kagome answers with her usual patience. "Chotto Matte."

"Hayaku, hayaku!"

"Hai, hai, we're done." Kagome shoots him a smile that causes Inuyasha to blush down to his neck, while Miroku lifts her pack up to the back of her bike. Shippo jumps into the bike basket, preparing for takeoff. Sango picks up her Hiraikotsu, while warning the Houshi with a stern stare. Haruko is still studying them with wonder. She no longer feels threatened by Inuyasha, because Kagome seems civil, and her subdue spell should be able to control the hanyou if he ever goes berserk. But a new sensation is surfacing, she can't quite put her hands on it, it's a strange feeling.

The group is starting to travel on. They're currently passing by a not so dense forest just east of the village. The birds are singing, the wind is blowing, although nobody is saying anything, their hearts are quite content.

Suddenly Inuyasha stops, his ears perking up, obviously picking up some kind of strange sound. His nose is sniffing the air, brows knitting together. He lets out an angry growl, eyes rolling. Inuyasha quickly extracts his claws. The sound is getting so loud that everyone is now able to pick it up.

"Shit, that bastard's here." Inuyasha curses under his breath.

A huge gust of wind, much like a mini-tornado appears in front of everyone. The tornado is moving toward Inuyasha's direction, not soothing down at all. Inuyasha's reflexes kick in, and he leaps out of the way. But the mini-tornado wouldn't stop; instead it's blowing toward Kagome's direction.

It doesn't take a genius to guess who's inside the tornado: a wolf youkai with two Shikon shards in his legs who's obsessing over Kagome and wants to kill Inuyasha for being his love rival and Naraku for being...well, Naraku.

The instant the tornado disappears, Kouga jumps out, looking cleaner that usual. He grabs Kagome's hand, perhaps by instinct, and looks passionately into her big brown eyes and says: "Kagome, so you've decided to come back to me."

Kagome stutters, not knowing what to say. Inuyasha leaps back and grabs Kagome away from Kouga’s grasp.

"Hands off." He demanded, "Hasn't your mother taught you not to touch things that don't belong to you? Or was she also a stupid wolf like you?"

Hearing how his mother got insulted, Kouga takes a swing at Inuyasha. Inuyasha is also just about to slice Kouga, when Kagome yelled out: "Osouwari!" five times in a row, sending Inuyasha into the deep depth of the earth.

After Inuyasha recovered from the shock, although still entrapped in the ground, he manages to curse back: "Kagome, what you do that for?"

"'Thing'", Kagome yells back, "You called me a thing? Besides, who are you to decide how I think? If I want to go with Kouga-kun, maybe I will, and I'll just leave you here...to...rot!!!" After she vents out her anger through words, she screams another ten "osouwari"s, making sure that the inu-baka stays here for a period of time.

Inuyasha is silent, Miroku looks into the pit Inuyasha made and says in surprise: "Wow, he actually passed out from those 'osouwari's."

"Well, he can stay that way, see if I care." Kagome turns her back to the pit. Sango and Shippo shake their heads, while Haruko looks at Kouga with intrigued curiosity.

Kouga looks at Kagome’s impression, knowing that his chance is finally here, he offers Kagome an invitation: "Say, Kagome-chan, I moved my headquarters to the center of this forest, would you like to see what I've done with the place? It's paradise."

Kagome looks at the wolf youkai in surprise, not sure what to do. She sweeps her eyes at the pit that Inuyasha is still in. Miroku and Sango are trying to pull the fainted hanyou out. That baka, he deserved it...is he really hurt?

"C'mon Kagome," seeing that Kagome's attention is diverting from him, Kouga takes his chance to grab her hand and quickly leads her away before the Inu-baka can wake up and catch them. And before Kagome can protest, she's being dragged away from her friends.

"Shouldn't we try to get Kagome-sama back from that wolf youkai?" Haruko asks, not really concerned with the event, but just curious why nobody else has made a move.

Inuyasha is still in the bottom of the pit; Miroku's strength obviously can't compete with the power of the subdue spell. Shippo's not helping much by jumping on top of the poor hanyou’s head every two seconds.

"Kagome-chan is fine with Kouga, he'll risk his life for her." Sango answers calmly.

Not sure whether she should ask about Kouga's origin, Haruko starts to fidget with the side of her sleeve. Sango and Miroku both detect Haruko's hesitation and smirks at all the memories of Kouga.

"Kouga is the leader of a wolf tribe, but his tribe was almost entirely wiped out by Naraku. He has two Shikon shards in both his legs, giving him hyper speed." Shippo goes through a quick analysis of Kouga's life, sounding more mature than everyone else. "He's said to be engaged to a female wolf name Ayame, but..."

"But that sonofabitch is obsessed with Kagome." Inuyasha suddenly wakes up. Everyone looks down into the pit with curiosity in their eyes, not really concerned about the hanyou’s health.

"Ah, Inuyasha, so you've woken up." Miroku taunts him, "Kouga dragged Kagome-sama to his new headquaters in the middle of this forest."

When Inuyasha didn't answer, Sango insisted, "Aren't you gonna go after her, Inuyasha?"

Inuyasha is still lying face down. His entire body is aching, especially his neck and back. But he's made no attempt to rub his injuries so far. His head is sideways, ears to the ground, his amber eyes are just staring into space, not really seeing anything. He looks like he’s…thinking.

No one made a sound for five minutes. Then Inuyasha suddenly jumps out of the pit and landed swiftly between Miroku and Shippo. He extracts his claws, also showing his fangs, and grows in the most terrible voice, "That wench!!!!!! I was trying to help her, and she sat me a million times???!!!???" Sango pulls Kirara and Shippo away from the burning hanyou. Inuyasha is currently going into a fit of rage. He starts to slice at every tree around them, shredding them to toothpicks. Finally, he draws out the Tessaiga and yells "kaze no kizu" while aiming at the direction of Kouga's scent.

The "kaze no kizu" didn't reach as far as the middle of the forest, but Inuyasha did manage to burn down about half a square mile of trees. Birds went flying while some of the animals shrieked in fear.

Miroku, Sango, and Shippo gulps at Inuyasha's reaction. Despite the fact that they've seen Inuyasha angry at Kagome before, they have never seen him vent out like this.

Haruko has never seen the power of Tessaiga before, it's kinda scary. Her green eyes are wide open, staring at the enraged hanyou. He has stopped moving, facing his destruction. Even though he's not tired, his chest goes up and down, drawing in large amounts of air. His teeth are clutching together, still growling. The wind blows on his beautiful white hair, while his dog ears move with the direction of the wind. He's still holding the Tessaiga, looking toward the direction of Kouga's nest. Haruko has seen the asshole Inuyasha, the innocent Inuyasha, and the stupid Inuyasha. But this is a totally different side of him. He looks dangerous. He looks angry. He looks pissed off. He looks...sad. He looks absolutely beautiful.

Haruko almost slapped herself at that thought. To prevent that thought from coming back into her head, she quickly snaps her head back, and stares at Shippo with great, yet fake interest. Shippo suddenly notices someone's eyes on him and looks toward Haruko's direction. Haruko feels stupid again, so she turns quickly to another direction, while trying to whistle to cover up her "innocence". Shippo sweat-drops on Sango's shoulder, not knowing what to do or say.

"Oi, Inuyasha, do you realize you just chopped off a family's five-year supply of fire wood?" Miroku asks with a tone of indifference. He feels like teasing the hanyou, not giving him a lecture.

At the sound of his friend's question, Inuyasha snaps back to his normal mode. "Keh! Like I care." He raises his head in an arrogant anger. "I was actually hoping to blast Kouga's nest away."

"And what? Kill Kagome-chan as well?" Sango raises an eyebrow at the hanyou. Her statement totally kills his pride in an instant.

"Well...actually..." Inuyasha stutters, "I didn't really think about that."

Everyone sweat-drops, even Kirara. Inuyasha withdrew his Tessaiga, and starts to scratch his right ear.

"So... genius, are you going after Kagome or what?" Shippo gives the hanyou a little push.

The hanyou stutters once again, now scratching his left ear.

"Um... I know I'm new and all, but is it really that safe to leave Kagome-san with a wolf youkai during their mating season?" Haruko cuts in.

Everyone turns to look at the miko-in-training in shock. Horrifying expressions fill up their faces.

"Oh no, how could I forget?!" Sango almost slapped herself, "Wolves' mating season started about a week ago." She gasps, "So that's why Kouga has a new nest!"

Miroku sighs at the information, he pinches the bridge of his nose, looking very tired.

"Wait... hold on... you guys don't think that Kouga is gonna..." Inuyasha's face is almost twisted, also looking very vulnerable.

Haruko is a little amused at the whole thing. "Wolf youkai take their mating very seriously. When they choose their mate, they also pick a new nest a month or so before mating season. Sometimes the female are not willing, so the wolves have to resort to tricking them, kidnapping them, or threatening them. Also, two male wolf youkai also..."

"THAT DOESN'T MATTER RIGHT NOW!!!" Inuyasha is going up in flames.

Shippo is almost crying. "But Kagome wouldn't mate with that wolf willingly!"

"Then..." Miroku cut in, "Kouga might resort to forceful mating."

"SHUT UP!!!" Inuyasha just can't take it anymore. "I'm going after them!" He draws out his Tessaiga once again. "That bastard..." He growls under his breath, "I'll kill him if he even thinks about touching Kagome." Then in a flash, Inuyasha leaps toward the center of the forest at an incredible speed, even for him.

Sango and Miroku sighs, "Let's go and make sure they don't kill each other."

Haruko stares after Inuyasha's body, a feeling that she can't describe surfaces.

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