Thank you for coming to my TED Talk, and may your faces never fade. To avoid the questions.
As Sango makes her silent apologies to Kohaku, her tears fall onto a wide-eyed, listless Kohaku. I actually can't tell if he's totally unmoved or if I'm reading into the little upturn of his brows because I REALLY want him to come to his senses. Which, I suppose, is the entire point.
Before Sango can make good on her threat...
Sango's sword flips off and sticks in the ground some ways away, and while Sango's guard has lifted a bit, Kohaku also flips out from underneath her and sticks his landing too. Don't know how it happened with Sango still mostly hovering over him, but it was good visual harmony. Sango stutters Inuyasha's name, glaring into her periphery at him, but leaning on her hip instead of rising to go after Kohaku again. All the same, she barks at Inuyasha not to stop her, new tears spilling out of her eyes. Inuyasha calls her a dumb jerk, pointing out that murdering her own brother would only delight Naraku. I mean, fair, but could you maybe NOT call Sango names during a really shitty, emotionally-charged situation? I doubt that's particularly helpful in her current state of mind.
By this point, Kohaku has gotten on his feet and started running away. Inuyasha charges after him, fist raised, wanting to lecture HIM on his bullshit as well.
What? I said jokes weren't APPROPRIATE anymore. Not that they were IMPOSSIBLE. What do you expect from me, the perpetually inappropriate Writch?
Sango continues to sit on the ground and look questioningly at the scene, while Kagome, Shippou and a still severely sick Miroku roll up on Kirara. Kagome doesn't appear as confused, addressing Inuyasha softly. He's not likely to be hearing her, because he's still up in Kohaku's face, yelling at him to remember everything if he wants to live. An Arnold Schwarzenegger offer this is not. Kohaku just looks like he's about to fall asleep.
Kagome calls Inuyasha's name again, this time in question form, while Sango stares silently at the spectacle. Inuyasha recalls what Naraku had said before about why Kohaku had lost his memory in the first place; he himself was refusing to remember that his body and weapon slew his father and fellow exterminators. Presently, Inuyasha worries over Kohaku refusing to face his memories, allowing his mind to be captured by Naraku, and his fate of certain death if the Shikon fragment in his back is taken. As bleak as these thoughts are, Inuyasha still uses the optimistic term "if" to denote the timing of this event, as though it's not an inevitability. Oh Inuyasha, you sweet naive child.
A voice from above shouts at Inuyasha not to phrase it like that, before a crescent blade hurtles down at him, forcing him to leap out of the way. A powerful upward draft catches the alarmed Kagome and Sango's hairs as they look up at the culprit.
Kagura goes on to claim that letting Kohaku die without having the burden of those pesky memories would be a kindness to him. Can't he do that very thing by surviving to be extremely old and getting Alzheimer's instead? I mean, that's not exactly ideal either, but it's a hell of a lot better than what you're suggesting.
She recedes into the stratosphere with Kohaku on her feather while Inuyasha and Sango, who has finally stood up and made an ineffectual dash closer, stare up at them. Sango says Kohaku's name, then collapses to her knees again, punching the ground and cursing the fact that he's gone away. Again. Kagome approaches her, with another soft call of her name, because this is apparently all Kagome does in this one. In despair, Sango predicts that they'll go through all of this trouble again now.
Inuyasha scoffs at her, calling her and Kohaku tiring siblings. Just imagine what it's like to BE them. Fuck, it's a wonder they're not constantly asleep from the constant energy-draining drama. As he tosses the vial of Shikon fragments up in the air and catches them again, Inuyasha offers to tell Sango something NOW, so she won't act up again later. I think Inuyasha is the LAST person who should put himself in charge of policing peoples' behavior, but I guess we can hear him out.
He tells the shell-shocked girls that Naraku ordered Kohaku to kill Kagome and steal the Shikon shards off her. No surprises so far.
... How are you going to DO that?
No need to get into the specifics; just leave Inuyasha on that weird combination of snippy and hopeful as we cut to Kohaku's slouched form propped on his knees in front of Naraku, who sits at the roots of a tree weaving in and out of the rocks beneath him. He's shed his baboon disguise to the waist, which makes sense, because he's got on his full Kagewaki kimono on under that thing. He must be DYING in that getup.
Naraku asks Kohaku why he failed to kill Kagome, and of course Kohaku stays mute. Uhhh, dude, I think you forgot to turn off puppet-mode. He asks Kohaku if he wants back his human mind even now, which is less of a question and more of a threat, because he places his hand on top of Kohaku's head and tells him to go ahead, just TRY to remember everything. Through Naraku's touch comes a pulse of power straight through Kohaku, and it's not a pick-me-up.
Kohaku gives Naraku an obedient affirmation, but he does retain one shred of a memory - the image of a tearful woman whose face just doesn't fade from his mind like the rest. It's too bad that Kohaku's only memory of his sister has to be her poised to murder him. Just more misery heaped upon this poor mentally fucked baby child.
Elsewhere, Sango sits next to Miroku laid out on a mat in what looks like a barn of some sort. Yet another unoccupied building nearby in which Inuyasha and company can squat, I suppose. Sango is apologizing for the fact that Miroku chose to suck up the Saimyoushou's poison for the sake of her and her brother. Seems like the appropriate response to something like that is gratitude instead of an apology for a decision that was out of your hands, Sango, but hey, you do you, girl.
With what seems like great difficulty, Miroku haltingly says Sango's name. She asks what it is, and he tells her not to look so sad. How the fuck SHOULD she look, my dude? Some way that requires less consolation from you? To be fair, it really does seem like it takes him a lot of effort to give her the slightest smile and tell her that there is still hope for Kohaku, so she should smile instead. In order to make it easier for him to concentrate on recover rather than cheering her up, no doubt. Sango agrees and thanks Miroku, but the tears in her eyes don't subside, and she DOESN'T smile.
Turns out it's difficult to look happy on command. Go figure.
Miroku falls silent with a sigh and Sango addresses him out of sudden worry. When he doesn't respond, she leans over him, shaking his shoulder and stuttering for him to wait. She wants him to hang in there, but before she can get out the whole request for him to NOT fucking die on her, his hand moves right up onto her ass.
Outside, Kagome is telling Inuyasha that he seems to have grown up, making him ask what she means. As they sit around next to a river, Kagome says, somewhat defensively, that she's praising him, and then explains her observation comes from her saving Kohaku. Inuyasha scoffs, arms crossed in his sleeves and a lofty expression on his face, retorting that he just wanted to annoy Naraku by getting Kohaku back alive eventually. Are... are you arguing that you're a patty child just to be contrary, Inuyasha? To his credit, it IS a pretty accurate and self-aware assessment, JUST based on the fact that he would do that in the first place. He also says that their retrieval of Kohaku with his life intact would be like DEATH to Naraku, which I think is a severe exaggeration.
Kagome just smiles at him and his ridiculously ridiculous need to respond with verbal abuse whenever someone tries to compliment him. Maybe that's actually not something you should be amused by, Kagome? Maybe it's actually a pretty bad habit that is not healthy for ANYONE involved? Hm? Anyway, Inuyasha adds a bit more softly that Kohaku DID leave Kagome alive. This seems to surprise Kagome, prompting her to ask if he was really worried. He snaps back that of COURSE he was worried. Kagome rubs just under the injury on her arm from the incident, admitting that she was also pretty worried, since he was pretty late coming to help.
Inuyasha puts an arm around her, a hand on her shoulder, pulling her close to his side. He apologizes for how much it must have hurt.
Someone take notes for Miroku on how to properly comfort a woman in pain, please?
Inuyasha and Kagome sit quietly together for a while, Kagome's heart thumping as Inuyasha's baggy robe rustles in the wind. Oooooor, maybe that's Sango walking up behind them with Shippou on her shoulder, the two of them STARING at the couple like weirdos. Inuyasha and Kagome sure feel awkward, and in a moment jump apart out of embarrassment when Sango apologizes and said she thought she'd thank them. Inuyasha can only make a questioning noise as Kagome asks what the thanks if for in a panic.
So, what did I think of this chapter overall? An awful lot of things occurred to me throughout reading this one, as it was jam-packed with emotion at every turn. Small things like Inuyasha's fundamentally hopeful comment of "if" regarding the removal of Kohaku's life-sustaining Shikon shard. It wasn't a correction on the pessimism of "when", showing that he deep down he is holding out for a day when they can bring Kohaku home alive, even if they NEVER take out the shard. The implication of his value of the boy's life over the completion of the Shikon no Tama is enormous. Sango's low movement during Inuyasha's interference with her plan to kill Kohaku, not only because she obviously doesn't WANT to murder her brother, but also because she's already been sapped of energy due to all the emotional preamble. The lather she had to work herself into to get to the point of trying to kill Kohaku and then herself was quick to dissipate the moment Inuyasha batted her sword away, and she just looked EXHAUSTED after that. It was incredibly realistic and relatable.
The bigger theme of this chapter is a heavy one, and a tad oversimplified for my taste, but it does at least begin to address the issues of how we treat people with intense trauma. Kagura and Naraku's treatment of Kohaku is in the mindset of erasure - as long as he doesn't feel anything, he's better off. Naraku "medicates" away Kohaku's emotional response to the horrible things he's been made to do, and Kagura smugly tells Inuyasha's group that allowing him to die with this induced obliviousness is a kinder solution to the trauma than letting Kohaku feel it. They pretend benevolence, act like they're doing Kohaku a favor, even when they (or at least Naraku) openly admit that he's only useful to them when he and his emotional state are easier to control. Even then, he's worth more dead than alive, Naraku steering him into situations that should kill him. To Naraku and company, Kohaku is a grunt; a lifeless grenade you can throw into an enemy foxhole, much like any soldier on the battlefield, who must bury everything they are in order to function as a weapon of war for an uncaring evil cause.
While Sango was about to play into that very cause, in her genuine care thinking that the only way to take control back from Naraku was to take away his ability to USE Kohaku any longer, when Inuyasha stepped in with a rather radical idea. Naraku himself said that Kohaku was the one refusing to remember, and that of course implies that if Kohaku willingly took on that pain instead of suppressing it, he could break free from Naraku's control. Inuyasha wants Kohaku to take BACK his autonomy rather than handing it off to someone else in exchange for empty comfort. He wants Kohaku to take BACK his autonomy rather than dying to deprive someone else of the ability to control him.
And this intensely powerful sentiment is important, because it acknowledges how ignoring trauma DOESN'T HELP. In fact, it made Kohaku more vulnerable to further trauma, repetition of the same old issues that he could never deal with before. On the surface it does seem kinder and even more ethical to allow Kohaku to withdraw and disown the pain, but it's doing him and the people around him more harm in the long run. Inuyasha is absolutely right: if Kohaku wants to LIVE, truly live and not just perform prescribed actions in a daze until he's disposed of, he NEEDS to face that trauma and take back his life. Making peace with the horrible things that have happened can not only help to heal him, but also help him recognize when it's happening again, allowing him to fight back.
I very much doubt any of us reading this have trauma as large as Kohaku's, but we ALL have trauma of some sort, and I hope the analysis above can give us the strength to face our personal issues as well. I know I'm all the more aware of mine now, and there are a few people out there to whom, collectively, we should no longer be beholden. Spoiler alert, but Kohaku will eventually bust out of servitude, and I suggest we do the same, one painful step at a time.
Oh, and Miroku's shallow bullshit about not looking sad and smiling, then taking advantage of their vulnerability, doesn't help anymore than erasing peoples' memories altogether. Suggesting that Sango's feelings are somehow illegitimate should have gotten him punched LONG before he touched her butt. He's not cute, he's not funny, and I wish he would fuck right off until he learns to be a decent person.
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