Asking if she can't go to Nirvana, the priest approaches Kikyou again, and she turns her head just enough to view him from her periphery. She doesn't say anything to him, so he follows up with another question of her state of life, or rather, death. After a short pause, Kikyou asks the priest if he can't just let this go, looking sad.
Sayo leans around the tree she's clutching a bit more, worrying about Kikyou while also keeping her distance. The dragon clutching Kikyou is apparently a soul-binding spell, which the priest states that Kikyou can't escape from. One of the dragon's claws wrap around Kikyou's neck to further restrain her and she groans. The priest bids her to sit there and allow herself to be evaporated, assuring her that her soul will be saved by this. So she's supposed to sit still like a good little girl while she's destroyed, huh? Yeah, that's not patronizing at all...
And to Kikyou, that's not even the most patronizing part. She glares at him, indignant at how he thinks he can save HER soul. In her rage, she tears apart the soul-binding dragon with her spiritual power, sending chunks of it flying every which way. One of the clawed hands that was grasping at Kikyou before embeds into the priest's neck. Bleeding, he collapses to his knees, and his apprentice behind him recoils from the scene. This kid is freaking USELESS.
The priest falls on his face, eyes wide in agony while the dragon bauble that produced the creature rolls from his outstretched hand. The useless apprentice turns tail and runs, squealing all the while like the cowardly slime that he is. Kikyou walks up to the priest, telling his presumed corpse that if he had minded his own business, he wouldn't have had to die. I say presumed because that outstretched hand I mentioned earlier grabs hold of her ankle once she gets close enough and the priest lifts his head. You gotta hand it to the guy, he's pretty good at clinging to life.
He asks her what she intends to do, because time goes on for people who are alive, but has stopped for dead people like Kikyou. With his last breaths, the priest states that the dead and living should never be in the same time, in misery. His hand falls slack, but Kikyou remains standing there for a moment, contemplating the priest quietly.
Kikyou starts at a shuffling sound behind her and whips around to angrily ask who's there. She catches sight of Sayo, who's sitting in the grass splayed out like she just fell down. She's looking pretty terrified too. Kikyou asks if Sayo saw all that, walking toward her. Sayo leans away, appearing all the more frightened with Kikyou's shadow over her. Kikyou holds out a comforting hand and kneels down, but Sayo ain't having none of that.
Sayo only turns around once Kikyou shuffles away, then gets to her feet and walks a few steps in the direction she's retreating, meekly calling Kikyou's name with a pained expression. Kikyou twists around and regards Sayo with a similar face, saying goodbye and apologizing. Sayo stares, not following anymore.
During daylight hours, Kagome is urging her friends to get up and join her in trying to save those girls' souls that were taken away the night before. They're gathered on the bank of a river, with Inuyasha and Miroku sitting on a picnic blanket laid out over the shore, covered in various foodstuffs from Kagome's era. Inuyasha asks the hovering Kagome where they should go to do that, and Kagome all but scratches her head at the question. Reclining on top of Kagome's backpack and licking a lollipop, Shippou recalls how they BRILLIANTLY lost sight of the demons carrying away the souls last night.
Kagome kneels down next to Inuyasha, asking if he's gotten tired of looking already. Based on his spaced-out uncaring expression, I'd say that's a resounding yes, Kagome. He turns his head so he's looking opposite to where she's glaring at him, saying that there's nothing in this project for them, given that there's no Shikon shards involved. Kagome's annoyed by him repeating this excuse, lifting a figure as she explains that it helps people, but it's no use. Inuyasha don't wanna. Kagome sulks, mumbling that he's acting like a delinquent despite the fact that he's not. This makes Inuyasha finally face her with an indignant look, asking if she's making fun of him. Consternated, Kagome wonders out loud if she's not complimenting him.
Inuyasha scoffs, turning his head again and closing his eyes, beginning to explain that she won't be able to flatter or coax him. He opens his eyes to find that she's no longer sitting next to him and listening, irritating him. She's taken to looking out over the river under a raised hand, asking what it is she's seeing.
The two sit next to him, Miroku assuring Kagome that he's just unconscious, though she's capable of judging that for herself. Leaning forward, she says it looks like the apprentice is having quite the nightmare. She's still examining him when his eyes snap open and he sees her. He freaks right the fuck out, screaming and flailing away from her. It looks like she did the same, because next we see her, she's peeking out from behind Inuyasha, heart pounding and asking what this dude's deal is.
Apparently, the apprentice tells the strangers that Kagome looks like a youkai, but again, we're not shown. Miroku repeats this as a question, while Kagome complains with a raised fist that this is a SUPER rude thing to say. The apprentice explains that the youkai LOOKED human enough, but it was a terrible monster. He also mutters about a priestess, which Kagome catches, connecting the dots between a this youkai being a priestess and looking like her. It appears that Inuyasha has figured this out too, looking slyly at the apprentice out of his periphery. Though he doesn't say anything until the apprentice drops an unavoidable bombshell.
Oh yeah, Naraku would probably pull something just like this, wouldn't he? The paranoia is well-founded.
The apprentice stutters that he's not lying, and the priestess was calling in souls, which Kagome presumes are the souls of the girls they lost last night. She lifts a hand to her mouth, knowing that if that's true, than Kikyou is collecting those souls they were chasing, and the only question is why. Inuyasha is more concerned with the fact that Kikyou is STILL in this world, looking astonished and a little sick at the same time.
Kagome turns to him, haltingly saying they should make sure. But Inuyasha takes the "we" right out of that suggestion when he tells Kagome and the others to go back to town. Kagome, Miroku and Shippou stare at him questioningly.
So, what did I think of this chapter overall? The first half tugged at my heartstrings really hard. Damn near tore them right out. Kikyou may be quiet and reserved, but she's not mysterious or difficult to figure out. She's still working toward her goal of getting at Inuyasha, because her hatred and feelings of betrayal aren't going to just go away with time. As the priest told her, time has STOPPED for her, so it's not as though she can just pick up where she left off and get over it. She'll always be stuck in the moment that she died, with that agony and hurt lingering.
But she's TRYING. She's attempting to pick up the pieces of her former life and fit them back together. You can see it in the fact that she's "adopted" Sayo as her new Kaede, how she continues to perform the duties of a priestess, how she's installed herself in a community in a desperate move to pick back up that mantle of a productive member. True, some of that is probably due to the fact that she's also trying to make up for the souls she's stealing; trying to balance out her karma, so to speak. Still, it's obvious she really wants a sense of normalcy and comfort that she's always going to lack.
And I think that Kikyou's interactions with Sayo may have been a painful but necessary reminder that Kikyou will NEVER have back the belonging and community she once had. Sayo saw her kill in order to protect her life sustained by the stolen souls of others and was repulsed by it, no matter how much Kikyou was an object of her admiration before. Kikyou has realized that her new existence is bound to cause hurt and pain to those she attempts to integrate with, because she CAN'T exist without doing harm. Not when she needs souls to power her, and not when priests are trying to exorcise her.
So, yes, Kikyou is in misery, because her fundamental need to be close to others and help them, carried over from her life, must go unfulfilled. She has to walk alone, sadly.
As for the main gang, there's not a ton to say about them. I'm guessing they got held up quite a bit by Miroku prying the younger princess off him at the mansion, and that's why they lost the trail of the soul-stealers. Inuyasha's apathy appears to be a big ball-and-chain too; he denies being a goody-two-shoes and wants to be considered an uncaring monster, but was perfectly fine going along with the hunt the previous day. What changed?
Well, it could have been the embarrassing situation he faced that evening. He probably doesn't want a repeat of that nonsense, preferring to control the conversation with Kagome through playing up to her frustrations with him. It's much more comfortable to tease her in that way than for him to be "teased" in a more vulnerable way.
His want to go check out this claim of Kikyou's living status is something altogether more complicated. We don't have any hints about what he's thinking here, so Kagome's assumptions that she would be "in the way" are kind of leading. We'll just have to see what will go down later to do a proper analysis.
Also, do we know if he's healed completely yet? I guess having him out with the gang following leads might be an indication, but what happened to his fire for tracking down Naraku after he got back to full strength? Not getting Kagome into needless danger? Hesitation about getting seriously hurt so soon after getting better? *shrug*
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