Taken by Sayah1112

Into the Night

I do not own Inuyasha, nor do I make any profit from this story.

A/N: A quick note before you begin...I wrote this story quite some time ago and am just now picking it back up. At the time, I had no idea where this was going (and it was completely going in a different direction until I read one of my readers comments on ff.net). SO, I will be updating here with spanking new chapters. Also, this was all written without a beta, so dont get too made at me if I make mistakes! If you like it (or hate it) review and let me know why :)

Happy reading!

Chapter One: Into The Night

"I don't know about this Yuri-Chan," Kagome whispered to her friend, her voice laced with worry and spiced with fear. "Mama says that the Grey district is no place for a girl during the day, let alone at night. I'm not sure we should be down here. What if someone actually sees us?"

Kagome tucked her sweater tighter around her body, pulling the hood down low. The icy cold of an October breeze snaked through the alleyway, rustling the scattered papers on the ground and sending a beer can tinkering across the way. In the distance she could make out the faint wail of sirens, the sound of shouts, and the whir and thump of the cars from the highway. She didn't know how she let her friend talk her into this or what it was that possessed her to think this was a good idea. It wasn't. It was a horrid, horrid idea. But Yuri would not turn back. Once her best friend's mind was set on something that was it. The girl could be as stubborn as an Ox sometimes, and as tenacious as a pit bull.

"Suck it up Kagome. I told you, Himo-Tailz is having their concert at Mead Hall. The quickest way there is through the Grey district. You need to stop worrying. Nothing is going to happen to us. The Grey district's got a bad rep but it's not all that bad. Me and my sister come here all of the time."

Kagome shoot Yuri a look from the corner of her eye. "My Sister and I. Secondly, you guys come here to hang out during the day and Serena always brings Raj along. Her boyfriend looks like a thug. That's why nothing ever happens to you."

Yuri shrugged her shoulders inelegantly, nonplussed by Kagome's apparent concern. Out of everyone in their group of friends Kagome was known to be the good girl. She was the worry wart of the group and although she liked to have fun she liked to do it responsibly. She tried to look out for her friends who were more wayward than not, and was used to taking flack for it. Yuri called it "Mothering. Like a mother hen. Always peck. Peck. Pecking." Kagome liked to call it common sense. Hell, she didn't even like Himo-Tailz, they were too loud and too screamy of a rock band to suit her musical tastes. The only reason she was here in this godforsaken place, nearly tripping over broken glass, bags of trash, and the prone forms of rambling drunks was because of Yuri. No one else could make it to the concert. Selena, Yuri's older sister, was off in China on vacation with her boyfriend Raj. Suki, another one of their friends, was home with the flu. And Aimee was grounded (apparently indefinitely) because she had taken her dad's car without his permission and then had proceeded to back it right up into a telephone pole. Which, of course, Kagome had warned her weeks ago against. But did any of her friends ever listen to her?

Nope.

Which was why she found herself weaving through the back alleys of the Grey district. A place known for it's violent crime and shady inhabitants. Drugs, booze, strippers and prostitutes were plentiful around here. Hell, you'd have a heck of a time trying to avoid any of them in these parts. The rumors circulating the Grey district were enough to raise the hairs on the back of her neck and have her diving under the covers huddled in a ball. But Yuri, always one to think first and ask questions later, had her heart set on seeing Himo-Tailz. And, it seemed, taking the most dangerous route to get there. At least twice a week there were stories in the newspapers of muggings, robbery and murders in the Grey district. As if that weren't enough to keep any sensible person away from the place, there were now reports of people gone missing. Specifically young women. Girls in high school, or just out of college were disappearing left and right around here. Most of them didn't even live in the area. They were, as Yuri and herself were right now, just passing through. Huddling inside of her hooded sweatshirt for warmth, Kagome tried to fight off the instinct telling her to turn back now. To drag Yuri by her hair if she had to and make a run for it. They could still go home. They could still get out of here. And no one, not a soul, would be the wiser. And, most of all, they would be safe. Sure, Yuri would be irritated that they had missed the concert... but wasn't that better then winding up dead? The heavy weight in Kagome's gut, and the distinct tickling at the nape of her neck, told her that that might be exactly where they were headed. Kagome always listened to her gut, and it always saved her in the end. She didn't want this to be the one time she ignored it.

"Look Yuri, I think-"

"Well, well, well... what do we have here?" Kagome's plea to go home was cut short but a rough, gravely voice. A man stepped out of the shadows, his form cloaked by the darkness of a polluted sky and broken streetlights.

"I don't know Han," Another voice, huskier and dark with intent, growled out from behind them. "But they smell young. And fresh."

Kagome closed her eyes, the dread that had been simmering in her stomach now boiled like acid up her throat. Great. Terrific. Wasn't this what she had warned Yuri could happen? By the shocked set of her friend's shoulders and the fear that was slowly beginning to twist itself across her face, Yuri was just beginning to realize her mistake. No one was invincible. And Kagome, in her insistent nagging, had been right all along. They should have never come through the Grey district. Not alone and especially not at night.

"Don't you guys have anything better to do?" Kagome put more bravado in her voice than there was in her entire body.

"Why don't you just step back and let us through? Trust me, if you don't, you'll live to regret it."

She placed a meaningful hand heavily on her pocket. A pocket that was completely empty, but they didn't know that. Yuri, wisely, kept silent. Turning to face her friend with shocked, sorrowful eyes.

"Looks like the little one is packing heat Han. You think you can handle her while I take care of her friend? You know how I love blonds."

Han laughed, and the sound grated across Kagome's nerves, sending a fierce frown to pull at the corners of her lips.

"I think I can handle the princess. And you know what Jim-bo? I don't think she's even really packing heat. Or anything for that matter."

Kagome could still remember the crunch of gravel beneath their boots, the smell of stale beer and rotten garbage. She could still see herself, as if at a distance, turn to face her attacker. She saw him make a grab for her- his hands heavy and callused with torn fingernails and streaked with soot and grime. She heard Yuri scream, her voice shrill and frightened. And she could still remember how, on that mid October night, something buried very deep inside of her had snapped. Something that, once awakened, would never lay dormant again.

Bright blue light, streaking across her senses, setting the air on fire with the intensity of it's glow. A raw, primal scream, one of outrage and contempt as that power was sent hurtling through the night air and across the alleyway.

Power, there was so much of it, and it had flown through her veins that night as surely as a hawk flew across a spring breeze. It snapped at her, pulled, lifted- leaving every nerve in her body raw as it lashed out at those who would try to put her into acute danger. At the ones who would try to harm who and what she was with their vile cruelty. She could still hear their shocked grunts, still see the whites of their soulless eyes rolling in their heads as she pinned them to the wall with a power she hadn't known she possessed.

"Run Yuri. Go home. Now." Kagome could barely get the words out of her throat. They had sounded harsh and strained even to her own ears. Yuri, for once, actually listened to her. If Kagome closed her eyes and tried really hard, she could even hear the sound of her friend's sobs and the slap of her cheap heels as she ran down the dirty alley way. Back towards home. And back to safety.

"I warned you." Kagome growled softly, her blue eyes as dark and stormy as the Atlantic ocean. She flexed her power, engulfing her enemies in the bright blue light of her essence. She heard them gasp, choke, tasted their fear.

And something within her rebelled. Her power was not for death. It was not meant to harm, only to help. How she knew this, was beyond her at the moment. But she did know that if she used this new weapon to kill it would change her irrevocably.

She pulled back. Called her blue light back into her slight and shaking form.

"Get out of here. Before I change my mind."

And, like puppies kicked one too many times, the two bulky, beastly men scrambled to their feet and bolted down the alley and around the corner- back into the Grey district and as far away from Kagome as they could get.

It wasn't until minutes later, when Kagome could no longer hear the frenzied slap of boots against the pavement, that she allowed herself to crumple to the ground. Her legs simply folded out from under her, her strength completely evaporated. She felt drained, fatigued, as if she had just run ten miles in under ten minutes. Her mind, ever practical and logical, was racing at the impossibility of what had just happened to her. Of what had taken place in this alley. She was scrambling for an answer. Something reasonable. Something that made sense... and she was grasping at straws. How could she explain what had happened? Why had a great blue light suddenly spring from her body and how could it be controlled by her mind? As Kagome sat weak and weary in the dark of her alleyway, searching for answers that she would never find on that night, she missed the soft yet confident pad of footsteps coming her way.

"Hello there my little friend."

Kagome looked up to see a wolfish grin and crystal blue eyes staring down at her.

"I haven't seen one of your kind around these parts in, well, centuries. You my dear are going to bring me your weight in gold, not to mention favors. But don't worry, you wont feel a thing."

And before Kagome could even begin to formulate a response, he was upon her. Her shaking, boneless

body no struggle for his sure and quick hands. The last thing Kagome remembered seeing that night was a pair of blue eyes and the asphalt, like a sea of bubbling black, getting smaller and smaller as she soared upward into the night sky.

It would be the last night that Kagome would ever call herself a normal girl. The night that her girlhood came to a distinct and abrupt end. A night... that would change her life forever.