Naruto Fan Fiction ❯ Eve of the Spiders ❯ Saori and the Spider ( Chapter 2 )

Chapter #1

Saori and the Spider

 

 

Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto and Co.

 

“Speech”

`Thought'

“Inner voices from memory”

Dreams

Other speech

 

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Aburame Shino had always been a loner, ever since before he could remember. He always preferred to train by himself.

 

When he was old enough to go to the academy he still preferred to be off on his own when he trained, did his class assignments, etc, etc. For the first few days were fine, everyone simply left him alone, at least until the girls started to think of her quiet - almost cold - exterior as `cool'. Since he never spoke or voluntarily showed any skill in front of his classmates they started to get curious, and soon they wouldn't leave him alone … at least until Shino released a wave of kikaichuu on his classmates…

 

No one bothered him after that.

 

Then he ended up in a three man cell with a noisy dog loving idiot and a shy stuttering Hyuga heiress, and in the beginning he still ended up avoiding contact with the others. It was a while before they all warmed up to each other, and even longer before Shino grew more tolerant to Kiba's outbursts and more understanding of Hinata's shyness.

 

It was a small accomplishment, but they were the only two people outside of his clan that truly accepted him, and the only people that ever seemed to grow on him. They were the only people he trained with when he didn't feel like training alone.

 

“Ano … S-Shino-kun, K-Kiba-k-kun, we s-should call it a d-day, it looks l-like a b-bad storm is c-c-coming…” Hinata mumbled.

 

Both Shino and Kiba knew she was right. The air had been humid all day, and for the past few hours they'd been training thick clouds had gathered and all but completely blotted out the sun. It would start coming down any minute.

 

“Hinata's right,” Shino responded quietly, “We should all get back before it gets too late anyway.”

 

And so the team departed, each going their separate ways.

 

A few of his kikaichuu that had been wondering around the training grounds while Shino was training returned to his body. Most of them had nothing special to report outside the fact that there were an unusually high number of spiders wondering around the trees.

 

To get back to the Aburame complex Shino had to cross the river that ran through Konoha, so to get home he had to cross the bridge. Had one of his stray kikaichuu not come back chattering to the others about something in the water he would never have noticed the body that washed up on the riverbed.

 

Shino's eyes narrowed to try and get a better look.

 

It was a girl, not much younger than Shino, lying half buried in the sand on the edge of the river. Her face was mostly covered in the wet mud and sand that plastered her hair to her face, and the glasses sitting on his nose were so covered with grime her eyes weren't even visible. Her mouth was filled with water and hung open slightly. As if that wasn't enough, she was covered it bumps, bruises and cuts all over her body, and there was one particularly nasty one just above her brow.

 

`She hit a lot of rapids on the way down here which means she washed down from way up river … possibly even past the waterfall…'

 

The nineteen-year-old Jounin jumped off the bridge and landed on the moist riverbank. His bugs were already inspecting the body, so he automatically knew she had no pulse. She'd already drown quite some time ago.

 

She was dead.

 

Shino carefully removed the girl's glasses so she could see her face better. Perhaps she was a girl from the village.

 

“COUGH! COUGH!”

 

Water began gurgling up past the girl's sandpapered lips and her body convulsed as soon as Shino touched her.

 

“Miss…?” Shino mumbled softly.

 

She didn't appear to hear him. She was concentrating too hard on breathing.

 

Shino picked up the girl just as the rain started to come down.

 

He couldn't have been sure - because of the rain - but Shino was almost positive he saw her crying…

 

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“Oi, four-eyes, you wake?”

 

“Hm?”

 

“You fell asleep, four-eyes-chan, and now it's time for you to wake up! Don't sleep the day away!”

 

“Ow….” The copper haired girl groaned as the throbbing of her temples brought her back to consciousness. She winced, and turned around to burry her face in a pillow that had way to much starch in it.

 

Everything hurt. Every single muscle in her body was stiff and sore, and her skull felt like it was being cracked open with a hammer. Her heart throbbed as well, but she wasn't sure if it was a physical because of the moisture running down from her eyes.

 

`Where am I anyway?' the young girl blinked at her blurry surroundings. Even with her eyes open she couldn't see a thing, just a jumble of blurry outlines and colours, `What is going on here?'

 

The copper haired teen felt around her surroundings blindly until she found the bedside table. There was something sitting on it, something cool, smooth and around. She picked it up and let her fingers run over them, they were glasses…

 

`I-I wear glasses don't I?' she realized. `How could I just forget something like that? Why can't I remember anything at all?'

 

The world came into focus when the glasses when she put the glasses on. She was in a white room, a hospital room, which was virtually bare with the exception of the bed, a small table, and an IV stand. The tiny window was covered by some off-white blinds so the white walls didn't completely blind the girl when she awoke. There was a clock right above the door that read 6:10 am in oversized black numbers - made for elderly patience with bad eyesight. Sitting on the table - next to where her glasses had been - was a shiny silver tray containing several IV tools, a few syringes and some other common hospital equipment.

 

Moving aside the tools, she picked the tray up to look at herself.

 

A pair of amber eyes - magnified by her large glasses - blinked at her from behind a veil of dark copper coloured bangs. Her bangs and side bangs were longer than the rest in the back, and it was all sticking out awkwardly from intense bed head. There were bandages almost everywhere, leaving little visible skin, even on her face.

 

“Is that … me?”

 

Thud.

 

She froze, something bumped into the leg of the bed, making it shake slightly. Something was scuttling around underneath the bed…

 

Grabbing one of the needles from the table the teen positioned herself by the edge of the bed, ready to strike if something popped out. She listened tensely to the tapping sounds of several tiny footsteps…

 

`It's a … it's a…'

 

A black blur shot up from under the bed, hitting the copper haired teen in the face and pinning her to the bed. She struggled against it before she realized that it wasn't hurting her, it was purring…

 

`…It's a … spider…?'

 

A large black spider - maybe the size of a large house cat - was making itself comfortable on her chest, like an affectionate kitten. Its long black legs curled under it and it stared her right in the eye with its large black eyes. The spider was almost completely black with the exception of the strange red mark on its back.

 

`…'

 

The spider lifted one of its legs, revealing a note that had been tied to its leg with the name `Saori' written on the front.

 

“Is that my name?” she asked the spider, not really expecting an answer. `It probably is, but for some reason I just can't remember… I guess this spider belongs to someone who knew me. Maybe it can tell me what is going on.'

 

Saori opened the note and began reading:

 

Dear Saori-chan,

I had to keep up my end of the deal didn't I? Take good care of Seakagokegumo (you can just call her Seaka), ok? She's still young after all!

Arigato, Yuuki

 

“Well then…” Saori paused before tossing the letter aside in frustration, “that doesn't help me one bit!”

 

The spider jumped at the sudden volume of Saori's voice and scuttled over to the pillow where it would be out of the way.

 

“Man, I'm going to go ask someone what is going on!” stated Saori stubbornly to no one in particular.

 

As Saori headed for the door she heard a familiar sound of several sets of tiny feet pattering on the ground behind her, so she paused and as she did the tiny footsteps also stopped. She turned around and the spider was standing right behind her just looking up at her.

 

“Uh … Seaka, right?”

 

The large black spider twitched, responding to the sound of its name.

 

`Whoever wrote that letter expects me to take care of a giant spider?' Saori made a small waving motion, “Shoo, shoo, don't follow me.”

 

Seaka took a small step back but jumped right back, making strange clicking noises. She lifted her two front legs and mimicked Saori by waving them back at her.

 

`It … she is like a … puppy.' Saori couldn't help but be amused. Apparently she wasn't afraid of spiders, she was just freaked out that it was so big, but there was no way she was going to take care of a giant spider just because someone she'd never met asked her to in a note. Not a chance.

 

“Listen, Seaka, you can't come with me,” she made sure to speak extra slow just to be sure the spider understood, “now I want you to go back to this `Yuuki' person, do you understand? So … go … got it?”

 

Neither of them moved for a long time. They just sort of stared at each other.

 

“Good,” Saori stated finally and turned back to the door.

 

She got a feeling of impending doom as soon as she opened the door. Before she was even able to turn Seaka had reared up and jumped right on Saori's back. She wasn't light at all, and the surprise attack sent them both tumbling to the floor.

 

“Goddamn it! GO AWAY!”

 

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Sorry its so short, but I wanted to get up an actual first chapter instead of just a prologue. I'll try and make later ones a little longer.

 

Reviews are loved

 

Lil_Pix