Chapter 2: Ungrateful Grief

A Chapter by vponpo

They had stayed in the fog for too long. People in the village who'd leave into the fog would never come back.

By the time we had awoken, the first thing I had noticed was the fact that I could barely breathe, and the second was the small girl on top of me with fear in her eyes shaking me as hard as she could to get me to wake up.

“Big brother Riko!! Please wake up, Uncle Amehara is in trouble!” She yelled at me, tears streaming down her face.

That wiped the fog out of my mind instantly.

“Ame?! Where is he-” I was cut off by a cruel laughter in the distance, one I hadn’t recognized.

I instantly ran ahead, fog be damned. I'm not letting my best friend stay in potential trouble, not when I could help him.

I ran into a clearing, hearing small pants behind me, I shot a quick glance to see that Mukuro had been poorly trailing behind me. I removed my eyes from her form and finally took in what was happening. A tall man with shoulder length curly hair was holding up Ame by the neck and was getting ready to snap it. Ame was gasping slightly in the strange man's grasp and his tanned face was slowly draining of color.

I froze.

This man was clearly much bigger than I was, I don't even know what he is, much less if I’d be able to fight him. I’m running out of time but I couldn’t move a muscle in my body, Ame’s eyes were rolling back. The man finally said something.

I say finally as though it's been an hour, but in reality it's only been a few seconds.

“Oh? What do we have here?” His voice was like charcoal, dark and raspy. He quickly tossed aside Ame and the mute boy hit the ground with a sharp gasp.

“My toys from earlier came back to me? I thought I would only be able to get the short one over there, but I’m glad the other freak came back to their senses. It was too bad the girl had to die, but she was persistent.” Earlier? I don't remember anything… wait… girl?

That's when the memories came rushing back to me.

"Big brother Riko!"

The small orange haired girl sat up from where she was sitting on the ground. I noticed the flowers she was picking.

"Red spider lilies..?" I asked accidently, not stopping myself before I said it out loud.

"Yes! They're my favorite flower.. although many of the people within the village say that these are the flowers of death, I believe them to be the flowers that represent us and nature as wonderful things... I mean, what would be life if not for death? These beautiful flowers may seem like a bad omen to others... but.."

Her black eyes looked down towards the flowers as she picked up another one and handed it to me. The silk petals felt soft on my skin.

"All life breeds beauty, all death... brings a even greater beauty. People are just too afraid to see it."

He had killed her on the spot. She had bought me time to run away, which I took without a second thought, but I had passed out due to the fog before I could get too far away.

But if she was dead then how did she lead me back to-

My eyes widened as I whipped my head behind me, and there she was. Dead, with a single red spider lily in her tight grasp.

But when I turned back to face the man, his face was inches from mine, his toothy grin filling up half his face.

“You see I can’t exactly let you go kid. You freaks are worth a big price, especially since we don't get a lot of you. It was hard enough trying not to die in this stupid forest. Dead or not we’re taking all of you to sell to the highest bidder! I mean who wouldn’t want a exiotic pet…?”

He placed his hand on my head, feeling my tanuki ears. I had forgotten I had those, is this why we’re being hunted? I realised that the person before me had no scent of yokai on him.

I don't know what overcame me in that moment, but I sprinted as fast as I could and kicked him in the crotch as hard as I could, in the strange man's moment of weakness I quickly grabbed Ame and continued running, I could hear him running after me but in that moment I didn’t care. I ran and ran and ran until I was sure I had lost him, then I climbed up into a tree never letting go of Ame, holding him flush against my chest.

My mind was going so fast that I hadn’t realised that we were no longer surrounded by fog anymore, but rather a normal forest was reaching its end, and a small city was just ahead.

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